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BPA Claims Removing Dams Could Cost $550M a Year by Staff Puget Sound Business Journal, March 2, 2007

The Bonneville Power Administration says that removing four Snake River dams would cost Pacific Northwest ratepayers as much as $550 million a year.

The Portland-based federal agency, which markets 40 percent of the electricity in the Pacific Northwest, released its analysis Friday in response to a report released late last year from environmental and fishing groups, which said the dams could be removed and ratepayers would be better off over a 10-year period.

But BPA officials said they didn't provide input for the environmental and fishing groups' report and that the four dams "produce enough electricity to supply a city about the size of Seattle at a very low cost," said Steve Wright, BPA administrator, in a statement.

"Their output cannot be replaced easily or inexpensively," he continued.

The environmental/fishing group report "understates the replacement energy costs and does not address costs associated with replacing the capacity capabilities of the dams," according to a BPA statement.

The BPA operates 31 federal dams in the Northwest.

Related Pages:
Pulling the Plug by Kevin Taylor, The Inlander, February 28, 2007
Dam Removals Could Cost Millions by Rocky Barker, Idaho Statesman, March 6, 2007
Assumptions Fuel Dam Cost Differences by Rocky Barker, Idaho Statesman, 3/9/7

Related Sites:
Independent Economics Advisory Board report
BPA fact sheet on the cost of breaching the dams
Salmon advocates Revenue Stream report