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CSPA and Allies File Recommendations to FERC on Merced River Studies
by Chris Shutes, CSPA FERC Projects Director
December 15, 2009 -- CSPA and its partners in the relicensing of the Merced River Hydroelectric Project filed comments and recommendations to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission today following FERC’s fourth-ever study dispute resolution process held in November.
Merced Irrigation District has attempted over the last year and a half to keep consideration of salmon and steelhead out of the process of relicensing its hydropower project at New Exchequer and McSwain dams on the Merced River. CSPA and allied conservation groups have been resolute in not letting Merced ID get away with this effort to avoid responsibility for grave declines in Merced River fisheries.
Merced ID had an apparent victory in September when FERC disallowed studies of anadromous fish. The National Marine Fisheries Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and State Water Resources Control Board disputed FERC’s decision. This triggered a process in which arguments and evidence about Merced ID’s effects on Merced River fisheries were expansively discussed. A Study Panel appointed to consider the arguments found that FERC’s approach was geographically too narrow, but still proposed a regimen of studies that didn’t get to the nitty-gritty of fish on the edge of local extinction.
The filing today by CSPA and its partners points FERC back to the fundamental issues: the need to improve conditions for salmon and steelhead downstream of Merced ID’s huge storage reservoir, and the need to get salmon and steelhead upstream of Merced ID’s facilities to dozens of miles of Wild and Scenic river habitat.
Today’s filing also addresses on many levels the way the FERC does business. Entities like Merced Irrigation District are able to avoid responsibility for their damage to fisheries only because regulators like FERC allow them to do it. Part of the process of saving fish involves showing regulatory agencies like FERC how they can do a better job of protecting the public interest if they can find the political will to get it done.
Today’s filing was made by the usual suspects in the Merced River relicensing process: CSPA, Trout Unlimited, American Rivers, Friends of the River, Merced River Conservation Committee, Northern California Council of the Federation of Fly Fishers, and Golden West Women Flyfishers. CSPA’s Chris Shutes was the principal author.
“Merced Irrigation District is a bad player in the world of hydro relicensing,” said Shutes. “We are willing to work with entities that respect our values and make a sincere effort to meet our interests, even though they seek to protect their own interests and even though we may disagree with them on this or that issue or even on many issues. That’s not the case here. These folks have strategically tried to use the regulatory process to avoid responsibility for the dire condition of salmon and steelhead in the Merced River. That’s just not acceptable. And it’s also not acceptable if FERC enables their manipulation of a process that was designed to enhance public participation and to protect the public interest. ”