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Ask the Experts: How Likely is Dam Breaching? by Matthew Weaver Capital Press, December 7, 2023

"If you really look at the economics,
they probably shouldn't have ever been authorized,"

"I think it totally depends on who the next president is," attorney Karen Budd-Falen said. "If someone decides to breach the dams or to not breach, it's going to get litigated."

The president appoints people within the Department of Justice who would determine how hard or easy to make the litigation, she said.

An agency must act within statutory confines, but Budd-Falen pointed to "huge differences" in regulation interpretation between the Trump and Biden administrations.

"I suspect the next four years are going to inform this, just like they're going to inform a lot of other things," she said.

Michael Blumm, a professor at Lewis & Clark Law School, believes the vulnerability of the dams boils down to economics.

"If you really look at the economics, they probably shouldn't have ever been authorized," he said. "They're not as valuable as most big, federal dams. ... They're not that valuable to the hydrosystem, especially with all the new renewables coming online."

A 2022 study by Northwest RiverPartners estimated that electricity rates could increase by more than 25% if the dams are lost.

Blumm pointed to rail along the river and trucks as viable alternatives to the river, a point agricultural stakeholders have argued against.

He said ag could barge their grain to the Tri-Cities and ship their crops from there, and cited older state studies that "the cost of transportation would increase pennies."

A report from the Pacific Northwest Waterways Association released in August estimated that moving commodities from barge to truck or rail would increase the cost of wheat per bushel by at least 8%.

"The barging industry is not a very significant industry, it doesn't employ a lot of people," Blumm said.

Blumm pointed to Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson's $33.5 billion estimate for the cost of mitigating for water and transportation users. He believes the actual cost is "a lot less than that."

The PNWA report found that increasing wholesale prices for commodities to cover the added cost of transportation "is not an option and has a high probability of bankrupting over 7,600 farms unless U.S. farm subsidies to the tri-state region increased by $55 million a year or $1.65 billion over 30 years."