Site C dam approved by B.C. government

British Columbia did not get the memo that the era of giant dam building is over.

B.C. has approved the $8.8 billion Site C dam — a massive hydroelectric project that would flood a large area of the Peace River Valley in northeastern B.C.

LINK (via: CBC)

Opponents see the project as a way to enable the development of multiple BC LNG projects.

“Last month, three LNG projects were approved by the BC Government in our watershed and now Site C Dam in the Peace. All this to support an industry that would frack the hell out of the Northeast, dam some of the greatest farmland in the province, ram pipelines through northwest BC and put terminals on our coast that will destroy wild salmon populations. What’s in it for British Columbians?  A foreign workforce?" said Shannon McPhail, with the Skeena Watershed Conservation Coalition on Tuesday.

Walker takes ax to Alaska capital budget

On of the items stricken from Parnell’s proposal, according to OMB, is $20 million for the Susitna-Watana dam.

Boom!

LINK (via: Alaska Dispatch News)

How Alaska bucked the trend of salmon loss — but that’s in jeopardy

At a time of wild salmon recovery, Alaskans should heed history as they contemplate the prospect of a Susitna River dam, writes guest columnist David R. Montgomery in the Seattle Times.

LINK

Groton Dam Removal Project

Inspired by DamNation, along with some help via a 6K Patagonia World Trout grant.

Fresh concerns from water testing in Lake Quesnel

More than two months after the environmental disaster, concerns are still being raised about the contents of the tailings pond at the Mt. Polley mine.

“They were taking in human waste, medical waste and solid waste from the Greater Vancouver area and they were bringing it onto the Mt. Polley site and dumping it.”

LINK (via:CKNW)

Chinoho ho ho

An update from a friend up north regarding an agency cat fight around some seriously flawed Susitna Dam science. This would be downright comical if it were not for the fact that the agency behind the flawed science wants to build a massive 735-foot, 600-megawatt-capacity dam on the Susitna.

Over the past few weeks there's been some sparing between Alaska Energy Authority (AEA), those who want to build Susitna Dam, and federal agencies. All this lead up to meetings designed to review AEA's first year of research on the Susitna. The fish stuides in particular caused quite a stir. Perhaps  the issues are too many to count. NMFS and USFWS called out AEA for for misidentifying a high percentage fish, failing to properly study salmon spawning locations, and erroneously measuring fish abundance.  In general, NMFS states that AEA did not coordinate between its own various studies or meet its own sampling goals or overall study objectives.

To make a long story short, after spending nearly $200 million of state funds AEA and consultants (many of whom also worked on Pebble) can't tell the difference between a chinook and a coho. They were so confused in their studies that they went so far as to call them "Chinoho."

This matter came up in this week's meetings, with AEA arguing how hard it is to tell the difference between Chinook and coho juveniles. Sue Walker from NMFS replied by saying, "While it is true that it can be difficult at times to distinguish between Chinook and coho juveniles, we all agree that what you are calling a "chinoho" is really a coho. That is pretty clear."

The AEA fired off an outraged response to the federal contention that the project’s salmon science is flawed.