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NMFS Takes Idaho Projects Out of Hydro BIOP by Mike O'Bryant Columbia Basin Bulletin - December 8, 2001

One of the major changes the region will see when the National Marine Fisheries Service releases its final 2000 biological opinion governing operations of the Columbia River federal hydro system is the exclusion from the BiOp of Bureau of Reclamation dams in the upper Snake River basin due to ongoing water adjudication.

Much of the 427,000 acre feet of flow augmentation for salmon and steelhead recovery originates at Bureau facilities.

The BiOp will also identify three critical watersheds the region must begin to work on beginning in 2001, and three additional watersheds each year for the next five years. NMFS is prioritizing these watersheds for the region, even before watershed management plans are completed, because of their potential to contribute significantly to salmon recovery.

National Marine Fisheries Service staff revealed Thursday some changes it has made since July to its in-progress BiOp. A final BiOp, along with a U.S. Fish & Wildlife BiOp for upriver bull trout and white sturgeon and the All-H paper, will be released later this month.

NMFS said it had made significant changes to its draft released July 27 for review by federal and state agencies and tribes. At a meeting before the Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Authority's members management group, NMFS said it was there to respond to some of the larger issues fish and wildlife agencies and tribes had commented on in the draft, but not to argue details, negotiate or seek any further agreements. Jim Ruff, of NMFS, said the BiOp was in the final stages of preparation and that Thursday's conversation would not affect its final outcome.

One of the major changes to the BiOp is a change in scope. All of the upper Snake River hydro projects, from Hells Canyon Dam upstream, have been removed, at least for now, Ruff said. That excludes from the BiOp at this point much of the water the region uses to augment flows in spring and summer for lower Snake River salmon and steelhead migration.

"Because of ongoing Snake River basin water rights adjudication, we could not complete the BiOp for those projects," Ruff said. "The Bureau projects have been broken out and we'll address those next spring."

While the BiOp originally included 30 BOR projects, it now includes just 19, most of which are in the Columbia River.

The BiOp will also list the Methow River in Washington, the Lemhi River in Idaho and the upper John Day River in Oregon as priority subbasins.

"We've included a list of priority subbasins where we have the best prospect of getting results if we can solve the water supply problems," said John Volkman, of NMFS. He said the list, which will be found in the All-H paper, contains an additional three subbasins each year, so that by the end of five years 15 sub-basins will be in progress.

The subbasins were identified for their high density of water diversions, presence of federal lands, healthy habitat and because they are generally fertile areas to grow stocks, according to Volkman.

The draft BiOp and All-H paper had received 60,000 to 70,000 comments, according to Rick Ilgenfritz, of NMFS. Some 9,000 of those originated from public meetings federal agencies held in January and February on the All-H draft. Others came from a technical review with states and tribes of the draft BiOp in September and October. All comments will get a response, appearing in either the body of the final documents or in a separate public involvement appendix.

"And, once the papers are released, we'll be able to correspond individually with some commenters," Ilgenfritz said of the remaining response process.

Other highlights or changes from draft language to the final BiOp for hydro operations include:

• No changes were made to spill recommendations at dams. One of the reasons, according to Ruff, is transmission constraints from north to south in the Hanford area and west of Idaho near Spokane prevents the region from spilling more water at lower Snake River dams until 2004-05 when Bonneville reinforces its transmission capability in the area.
• No change for drafting Grand Coulee Dam, which already called for additional drafting of 2 feet, something that yields an additional 150,000 acre feet of water for summer flow objectives.
• NMFS received support from nearly all parties to look into modifying flood control actions, so is calling on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to complete a feasibility study by March, 2001.
• Oregon and Washington suggested water quality measures at dams, including actions that help dams meet total dissolved gas and temperature standards. Ruff said NMFS has identified some actions "to move us toward that goal," including studies and monitoring.
• Operations below Bonneville Dam for the fall run of Columbia River chum ranged from 125,000 cubic feet per second to 160 kcfs. Paul Wagner, of NMFS, said the sliding scale reflects the level of risk and the actual flow will be determined in-season by the Technical Management Team.
• NMFS calls on Bonneville to continue negotiations with Canada to provide more water, but Ruff warned that more water when the region needs it will result in not getting water at another time.
• Pre-season management responsibilities will continue through the Implementation Team and in-season management with TMT.

NMFS had received many comments on process and involvement, such as how will tribes and fish and wildlife agencies provide input on the action agencies' (the Bonneville Power Administration, BOR and the Corps) 1- and 5-year plans.

"Frankly, the draft was silent on that," said John Palensky, of NMFS. "Now there is language that encourages these agencies to consider state and tribal plans and to take input from state and tribal fisheries agencies."

Dan Daley, of BPA, said the rough thinking on how to allow public input is to release draft 1- and 5-year implementation plans in March that will inform tribes and the Northwest Power Planning Council of the planning process, and then issue a final plan in September. However, he doesn't envision annual consultations.

"The initial implementation plan would at least include all the measures contained within the BiOp, what we need to meet our federal obligation," Daley said. "But I have a nagging pain in the back of my neck that this will take a couple of years to get right."

Palensky said the tribes were concerned that without an IT executive committee, it would not have a way to influence decisions at IT, since tribes have withdrawn from that organization. Previous BiOps had included such a committee from IT's inception. That committee was to be made up of state governors or high-level state officials, but had never met. It was excluded from this new BiOp.

Performance standards for salmon recovery are still going through changes, even at this late point, said Tom Cooney, of NMFS. He said comments on the standards said they were confusing, so many of the changes NMFS has made is to make them less confusing.

"The most general standard is population levels, which is measured over time and relies heavily on Lambda to determine population levels," Cooney said. He said measurements are based on population levels since 1980 and that NMFS is developing a way to measure more recent improvements.

Bill Hevlin, of NMFS, said new language in the BiOp restates how NMFS characterizes adult survival increases. He said the draft proposed a too high (according to comments) 25 percent adult passage survival increase through such corrective measures as decreasing fallback and reducing water temperatures. The restatement, which also represents some reduction, according to Hevlin, is to call for an increase in survival of 3 percent through eight dams (with the exception of sockeye).

Chris Toole, of NMFS, said the agency received the most comments on its jeopardy analysis. Commenters were concerned about NMFS being overly-optimistic because it "set the bar too low" and overestimated the benefits of some actions. Comments also came in saying the draft BiOp was too pessimistic about the benefits of breaching. The BiOp should include the benefits of improved water quality downstream after breaching.

Because there is not enough years and time at the 5- and 8-year check-in to determine the impact of most off-sight mitigation work, action agencies will be required to provide hard evidence that their proposed actions are working.

What happens if there isn't hard evidence to support an action and when would that trigger breaching? asked Bob Heinith, of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.

"We're not sure now, but we're trying to be clearer about what would constitute a failure," Cooney said.

Ruff said NMFS will work with the action agencies to define advance actions that would need to be taken. That would include looking at the 5- and 8-year check-ins for Snake River drawdown. NMFS would call on the Corps to do an advance plan, update its lower Snake River drawdown environmental impact statement and begin economic planning.

"All this so that when 2005 rolls around and we have a failure report, action agencies are prepared to move into breaching construction and to go back to Congress to seek authorization and appropriation," Ruff said.

Many commenters worried about the number of capital construction projects in the BiOp and how those would get funded. Construction projects include structural changes at dams.

"There are discussions in D.C. about how this works," Ruff said. "For this BiOp to work, we need the commitment to fund it or we won't be better off in five year than we are now."

"That's also one of the reasons for 5-year planning," Daley said. "So we can see what needs to be appropriated five years out."

Palensky said NMFS considered all the comments very seriously and made a lot of changes. However, what most of those are will have to wait until the BiOp is released next Friday.

"The science will go on," he said. "But for this BiOp, it's pencils down."

Link information:
Northwest Region National Marine Fisheries Service: www.nwr.noaa.gov