New Plan Afoot to Divert Water From the Eel River into the Russian River After Dams Removed During High Flows
Scott Dam which is part of the Potter Valley Project. [Photo cropped from one by PG&E]
The Eel Russian Project Authority consists of representatives from Sonoma Water, the county of Sonoma, Mendocino County Inland Water & Power Commission (or IWPC, which is itself a consortium of local governments and water agencies), and the Round Valley Indian Tribes. It is negotiating with PG&E during the process of decommissioning Scott Dam, which impounds Lake Pillsbury, and Cape Horn Dam, near the tunnel that diverts water from the Eel into the Russian River. It will also have the legal authority to own, build and operate the new diversion facility where Cape Horn Dam is now.
In August, Russian River water users and the Round Valley Indian Tribes asked PG&E, which owns and operates the Potter Valley Project, to include one of two possible alternatives in its license surrender application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC. PG&E said it wanted to negotiate with a governmental body, so the new Authority was formed. PG&E is not bound to accept the Authority’s request to include its preference in its submission to FERC, and FERC can accept it, reject it, or ask for modifications. As James Russ, representing the Round Valley Indian Tribes, noted, “PG&E seems to change their mind quite often, and sometimes it can be very quickly. They can do a 180 degree turn. So I just wanted to make sure we’re on the same page at this point in time.”
In a March 13 letter to the editor in the Press Democrat, Dave Canny, PG&E Vice President for the North Coast Region, wrote that the company “still supports the concept of a diversion with fish passage;” but that it was not interested in seeking a nonpower license from FERC on behalf of the proponents, “which would cause delays and expenses for our customers.”
Though PG&E is often referred to as “a black box,” the IWPC hired engineering consultant Tom Johnson to design two possible diversion facilities up to 30%, to get enough information about each to decide which one was worth pursuing.
The two alternatives are a pump station, a series of seven pumps that would divert the water during the wet season, and a roughened channel, or an 800-foot-long section of the river that would be engineered with a 3% slope and filled with carefully placed boulders to simulate a somewhat natural flow and transfer the water using gravity.
Though the roughened channel would not use electricity, environmental groups opposed it from the outset because they feared that if anything went wrong, it would be more likely to harm fish passage than a pump malfunction, which would have a more direct effect on water users in the Russian River watershed. Johnson extolled the benefits of the pump station in his report to the Eel Russian Project Authority directors at their March 19 meeting. “It was just superior because of the lower gradient, less energy that needed to be dissipated by the channel itself, (and it) didn’t necessarily have big twelve and fourteen foot boulders with water crashing about,” he reflected. “All in, the pump station was always going to be a better fish passage alternative.”
Johnson said the channel also had the potential to cause more sediment buildup than the pump station. At the 30% design level, the two options looked like they would cost about the same to build, though the margin of error was too high to be sure. Running the pump station will cost water users an estimated $5 to $10 an acre foot, but the lower cost of water using the roughened channel scenario was the only criteria where the channel won out over the pumps, in the opinion of the members of the technical advisory group that studied the matter.
And, while there are examples of roughened channels being used in waterways, they are rarely used in the mainstem of a river as powerful as the Eel in winter. Johnson noted that pumps are a little more tried and true. “The pump station, while it is a complicated object,” he acknowledged; “It’s a pump station. Y’all are water agencies. Y’all know how pump stations work.”
The station would use about one megawatt of power per year to operate, and it would be equipped with a backup generator in case it fails during a winter storm, which is likely in rural Potter Valley.
James Russ, representing the Round Valley Indian Tribes, noted that the Potter Valley Project dams aren’t the only ones coming down in the larger region. “Probably everybody in this room knows that the dams up on the Klamath are being removed,” he said. “Are there lessons to be learned from what’s going on up there?”
David Manning, Environmental Resources Manager for Sonoma Water, replied that there will be lessons to be learned about restoration from the Klamath, including, “how fish will deal with the ongoing impacts post dam removal, and how quickly they recover from the restoration of the lakebed. Those are all great examples that can be taken from the Klamath dam removals and brought to the Eel for this project.”
Sonoma Water has received a $2 million Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation for planning to bring the design of the pump station up to 60%. Manning expects to hire an expert this year, and for the work to take another two and a half years. The cost share is 65% federal and 35% local.
The actual dam removal could take place over the course of one year, which would release a huge amount of sediment all at once, or over the course of a few years, which would spread out the impact. Johnson said a lot of modeling needs to be done to plan for various scenarios, but, “Whether that is something PG&E is going to do at some point in time is unclear. It needs to be done, and I’m certain it will be done before the final designs for a new diversion facility are in place. It’s just unclear who and when, and who’s going to take the lead on making that happen.
And a team of attorneys is working on the water supply agreements, “Because that is a burning question,” Johnson noted. “Everyone needs to know, how much water?”
Earlier:
- An Expired License, a Mysterious Applicant, and a Threat to Sue: What Else Can We Expect as the Fight to Control the Waters of the Eel River Continues?
- ‘Everyone knew it was coming’: Eel River Waters Continue to Be Diverted as PG&E Granted Annual License for the Potter Valley Project
- Fish Fight: Two New Developments in the Ongoing Damming of the Eel Via the Potter Valley Hydropower Project
- Two New Decisions on the Potter Valley Diversion from the Eel River
- PG&E Signals That It Will Speed Up Removing Dam Which Helps Divert Water From the Eel River to the Russian River
- PG&E Plans to Remove Both Potter Valley Project Dams—Mendo, Humboldt, Lake and Sonoma Fight
- PG&E Proposes Reducing Russian River Flow and Transferring Potter Valley Project to Subsidiary
- New Proposal Over Eel River Water Diversion Plan Leaves Some Stakeholders Out
- Water Talks: Waiting on PG&E to Figure Out Life After the Potter Valley Project
Join the discussion! For rules visit: https://kymkemp.com/commenting-rules
Comments system how-to: https://wpdiscuz.com/community/postid/10599/
Stop stealing water from one basin and filling another. Everyone thinks they have the right to control nature and then complain when nature says f you. Fact is the eel was formed for a reason just as other basins were , just because some zip codes have cheap land to develop or more wealthy people living in it doesnt give them the right
But stealing water from the fish was ok as long it was used to fuel the underground cannabis economy, right?
Excess water use was and is one of the most consistently and unanimously raised complaints about cannabis in our area.
Bad practices in some locations have occurred. Legal growers face extreme and exceptional regulations not endured by fellow agronomists on adjacent parcels with other crops. Cannabis is easier to grow and consumes equal or less water than tomatoes or corn.
It’s only stealing if it’s cannabis. If it’s alfalfa, almonds or grapes then God Bless America! Right?
Except for a couple egregious examples in the news, these Mad River water consumers would have no idea what happens off 101.
This point was emphasized at the Baywood Country Club meeting. If you’re growing cannabis, your water use is monitored. If you raise cattle, nobody cares.
Everyone knows the water stolen from the Eel River is used to Water Wine Grape Fields for the wealth u landowners who make anywhere from $3,000 to 20,000 per acre every year from those grapes. I say show me the water and force those grape growers to dig their own wells
buy their own pumps and build their own agricultural ponds to store the abundant winter ground water. If we’re gonna pump any water than it should be from the ground. There is no such thing as a two basin solution. In the end the Eel River still has water stolen from its basin to water rich weather wine grape owners crops. Its water theft no matter how they try to paint the picture with slogans like “2 basin solution”. Nothing but political mumble jumble.
CA keeps allowing more and more houses to be built in Sonoma Co., without any regard for where the water will be coming from. Time to stop the madness I say–as a resident of said county.
Oh so stealing 80 percent of a water shed for decades to supply the rich with wine grapes weed from other counties summer cottages on the river leaving a mere 20 percent for the people who live along it as well as the fish the nature and everything else should be over looked because a couple hundred grew weed for 10 years …. right i see your point . Someone stole a grape so that justifies stealing the entire crop in all fairness by that logic right ?
A couple hundred people grew weed for 10 years? What planet are you from?
The diversion amounts to 1 or 2% of the Eel’s total flow. The dams impact about 8% of the Eel’s total watershed.
The real issue is the cold water habitat above Scott Dam which could be important in rebuilding the Eel River fisheries.
But let’s not pretend that removing dams that have been in place for over 100 years will cure all the ills of the Eel that have happened in the last century.
Questionable. There are 3,684 sq miles in the Eel. That’s 2,357,760 acres x 8ft of rain = 18,862,080 acre/ft of water falling in the watershed. All CA ag uses approximately twice that annually: 30 million acre ft. So you’re proposing Eel river weed alone uses .5-1% of all CA ag water? Over 6 billion gallons? (1%of 614,622,763,008g?) Doubt it.
I made no comment quantifying the amount of water used by cannabis. I pointed out that water diverted to the Russian was approx 1 or 2% of high water flows at the mouth.
It may not cure all the Eel River ills, but I don’t understand how restoring rivers to something closer to their original status will be anything but good for the fish and other riparian species. The rivers produced millions of fish annually for scores of thousands, if not millions, of years before Euro-American colonization, without dams and commercial exploitation. ‘Splain’ that one to me, Lucy.
Release a ton of sediment capable of killing entire runs of fish by suffocation. Meanwhile also continue taking high winter time flows that would naturally move that sediment down the river system to the ocean. What could go wrong? I see possibilities.
You’re confusing the diversion of a small fraction of high winter flows with diversion of high winter flows. The diverted water would contribute nothing to moving sediment through the system.
It never was okay, but in our system, money talks. The fish unfortunately have no voice.
Yeah, they do. The Tribes and other motivated citizens are speaking up and dams are coming down. An uphill battle for sure, but when there is no salmon for the Salmon Festival and no fish for commercial fishers or sport fishers it sorta kinda becomes obvious unless one just refuses to accept reality.
Wrong. Water diversion has been a long-term practice and point of contention since way before the underground or legal cannabis economy existed.
If the political pimps and their whore attorneys from the Yuppy Wine Grape Wineries can’t steal the water from Mendocino and Humboldt Counties one way, they will try another way!
Stand up in solidarity and tell the Yuppy WI eries not one more drop 💧 from the Eel River to water your wine crops!
Why would Mendocino even think to give Sonoma County our most precious resource for free?
We should give them nada one drop.
And every drop they do get we should be charging them the most we can. We have the water! Tax em tax em tax em, charge every single water user! Put a electronic meter on every single wine grape field! Charge the wineries triple! You know why those wineries can build those huge castles and gobble up all that land, cause they steal the water from Mendocino County and pay hardly anything meanwhile households pay 1000x the price. Let’s find a better way! $$$$$$ TAX THEM
I’ve always said this. They will get water no matter how big of a fight Humboldt or mendo makes. But we should get perks. Make them pay for all of it. Humboldt could have really nice infrastructure paid for by water sales to the south if we got paid.
check out how Humboldt is cut out completely from this planning phase because we have no reason to support future diversions.
It’s ridiculous that one can float down the Russian River with water from the eel. Meanwhile the main stem eel is not given enough water for the same kind of recreation to be possible.
The answer to the final question (how much water?) should be not even one drop.
this will be the new approach(like sites reservoir), to divert water at high flow through pumping to reservoirs preferably away from the natural river channel.
it’s a little imperfect, but it sure beats damming up rivers mid stem.
in this example, I presume they could top off lake mendo and dry creek down in Sonoma during the winter merely through pumping a portion of what is ultimately spent at sea.
I’m not sure how the tribes get on board though.
Problem with that is that the eel has been being choked off by deposits for decades and it needs a good flush to truly bring back the salmon , it is the winter run off that clears the deposits not just in the river its self but also in the bay creating a deeper channel and river which keeps the water temps down longer as well lower water temps equals more fish less blue green algae all around better habitat for fish and everything else living
I agree with that.
Personally I believe that we need to keep water in its own watershed, and I believe waterways to be sacred.
The chorus of ignorance chimes in. BTW, since you believe waterways are sacred I assume you were outspoken in your efforts to protect the South Fork and numerous tributaries throughout the Eel River watershed from pot driven dewatering and pollution, right?
Any recent examples of pot driven dewatering? You know that growing is out in the open under satellites now, and water storage from winter is mandated. Turns out pot growers don’t want to run out of water mid summer, nor do they universally behave as a dewatering monolithic organization.
Arcata? You guys have flush toilets up there?
Wintertime diversion of 150-200 cfs will have no impact on water temp or flushing of sediment deposits. None. The real issue with the dams has been cutting off upstream habitat, and more recently concerns about dam safety with Scott Dam.
Who told you how much they planned to take at once? Taking too much winter time flow will effect sediment being moving down stream.
The Eel doesn’t flow into any bay
Yes it does. It has a large tidewater bay.Ive hunted and fished in it for decades.
An estuary is not a bay
Thats semantic. So that would make Humboldt Bay an estuary also since streams enter it too, as well as San Francisco bay. The point is it has a substantial tidal area.
Humboldt bay has several estuaries attached to attached to it. But they are geologically and hydrologically distinct features.
The terms are interchangeable. I have hunted and fished in humboldt bay for decades also, no doubt before you even knew it existed. Again, the point is that the Eel River has a large tidewater bay like area with several large sloughs attached. In fact, ocean going vessels used to use it. The tidal influence goes to just above Fernbridge.
Yes….port Kenyon, 7 mile slough, salt river and beyond. It was a shipping hub at one time long ago.
What bay?
High winter flows also restore spawning gravels and riffle and pool configurations.
It may take a few good rainy years to flush the river out but it’s got to be better than no flushing at all. I don’t understand the recurrent suggestions that if the river does not return to an absolute 100% pristine state it’s all for naught.
Removing the dams will do nothing to “flush the river out” – very much the opposite in the short term as stored sediment is released by removal of the dams. The very small amount of water diverted at high winter flows will do no more to “flush the river” than if you spit in the ocean. But enjoy your fantasies.
However, removal of the Klamath dams is a great opportunity to better understand the dynamics of sediment movement and design the least damaging means of moving it through the system. Especially because there’s the potential for a huge negative impact to low gradient stretches of the river.
Why did it flows to the sea is not at all wasted water.
then all they need to do is engineer a power generator that works with the water flo, to power the pumps. sounds like another dam’s on the way
Water has been diverted from the Eel River for years. Most of the water goes to ALL of the wine vineyards around Napa Valley. I had read reports of 30% of the Eel River is diverted. And you know they will not give up a drop of that water. A person needs to wonder if PG&E doesn’t get a kick back from the winery corporations.
Please quote a source for your delusional comment that 30% of the Eel is diverted. Also try looking at a map before claiming the diverted water is going to Napa Valley vineyards.
Either way the Eel River water is being stolen so wealthy yuppy wineries can make a fortune and give absolutely nothing back for the water they take from Mendocino and Humboldt Counties. Mendocino needs to tax the hell out of every gallon that is siphoned away. In fact we need to say “not one more drop for Sonoma”
I don’t have the time but I sure wish somebody would compile a list of the wineries using grapes grown from the stolen Eel River water. So we can all shame and boycott them…I’m no fan of boycotts but that seems to be the proper direction to go with this scandal…Oh-and of course the weed grows that also use this water! Name them and Shame them and Run them out of business…
this is some other BS the legislators have come up with. So we can not trust the prog leadership.
Finance expert John Williams has recently analyzed California’s new tax policies, which include the introduction of a wealth tax targeting affluent residents and an exit tax for those relocating out of the state.
These measures aim to address California’s significant budget deficit, which has reached $68 billion. The state’s approach to increasing revenue involves direct taxation on the assets of the wealthy, with additional scrutiny on asset reporting.
Quoting publications without stating the source or even including quotation marks is plagiarism. You obviously didn’t write this yourself.
Wait the state thinks it can tax someone for leaving ? Lol thats funny shit right there . Jurisdiction anyone ? Only california is so conceded that government In california thinks they can do f all in another state , i bet if they move to fl good ole ron will protect their assets from these entitled government pricks
Assuming that it’s even true. Stating “facts” without sources is automatically suspect.
And on everyone else too
Follow the money.
That activity is profoundly exhausting.
Ridiculous
Let’s focus on getting the Fall run of Chinook salmon back to one million adults before we start the “diverting water” conversation.
What happens to our water should not be PG&Es decision.
Notice how the southerners are still not offering to pay us one penny for our water.
Not one more drop!
What was Warm Springs dam built for? The Russian river does not deserve and should not receive a drop of Eel River water.
Sonoma needs to develop their own water. Why is Sonoma even allowed to use our County Supervisors Chambers? Sonoma should go back to its yuppy wine grape growers and develop their own water system using water found in their own basin!
Perhaps Sonoma County should stop depending on Mendocino and Humboldt County to water Sonoma County wine grape crops and should instead develope their own reservoirs and pumping stations. They are not out friends they are only up here to steal our water, just like poor neighbors they are here to borrow and steal something they could never pay back. Mendocino and Humboldt gets absolutely nothing in return.
Get the hell out of our basin SONOMA COUNTY. DEVELOPE YOUR OWN WATER PUMPING STATIONS AND RESERVOIRS IN SONOMA COUNTY AND LEAVE OUR WATER AND RIVER ALONE!
Undam the Eel River, Free the Eel River
Jared Huffman and his democrat cronies will steal as much Eel River water as possible for their Sonoma and Marin friends.
I don’t think Huffman is fighting dam removal. Do you have any references or is this just an extra-special belief you need, like the Modern Republican Party is a patriotic organization?
He fully supports continued diversion in connection with dam removal.
Yes he does and so would any politician from down there and since their larger voting population controls our district we effectively have no voice. So much for the wonderful “democratic” process. Another pos situation that we cannot vote our way out of….direct action, education through boycotts, attention generated of this scandal leading to education and hopes that the larger population will even give a crap seem to be the only directions available….Do Not expect ANY help from the corporate media- and that is ALL media anymore…
If you are ok with stealing the Eel River’s waters and diverting them into the Russian River don’t complain about shoplifters and rampant shrink at retail, you’re part of the no moral compass problem too.
Over the last decade I’ve watch the hills of Mendo and Sonoma Counties planted with thousands of acres of grapes. I wondered where water to support these grapes would be found. Now we know. The government will steal more water from the Eel River to fill the Russian River.
It’s been more like the last 30 years I thought?
wine plantations have taken over some of the most beautiful landscapes in Napa, northern Sonoma, southern Mendo and Lake counties.
All to feed the global market.
The debate down there when it started was, “well would you rather have subdivisions or wineries?” Those were the choices for local people back then.
Wine growers are much worse than weed growers when it comes to converting wild land into commodity plantations, and they are very good at doing it all legally.
One of the many things American culture lacks is a limiting impulse. We have a bit of one with the conservation ethic, but then environmentalism steps in and its too unmoored from practical reality.
The Indians win on this one, as they have a conservation ethic imbued into their cultural identity that is essentially religious.
Other Americans are much to quick to alter landscapes and change everything.
It all steams from the law. Land owners have a right and in some cases a requirement to use their property to make as much money as they can from it . However water from another basin is not theirs . Plant as much as you want or build as many homes as you want , but if you land doesnt have the water to support either then you are wasting your money. You do not have a right to other peoples assets and the tax payer does not have a requirement to supply you with water at any point failure to ensure proper resources are on the property to support your plans or desires is not something the general public needs to solve for you if the resources are not there then it is the wrong property for that plan or the wrong plan for that property end of story
Thanks. I missed the s after decade as it has been decades.
Ignorance abounds. The diversion has been significantly reduced over the last couple of decades, not increased.
Please support your post with facts as opposed to your ignorant opinion.
The reduction in the diversion is a statement of facts, not opinion. You could look it up.
It’s your post so you’re required to support it. Otherwise, it’s merely your opinion.
Facts are facts. It’s not my job to pick up slack for the stupid and lazy.
I have read the Eel was one of the greatest steelhead fisheries in the world before the legendarily all powerful Ag interests in California wanted that water for grapes. Read the King of California if you want to understand the power of the California Ag lobby.
The dams were built over a hundred years ago for power generation. Water for grapes had nothing to do with it.
Water for everything, had everything to do with it…
Still does…
“during high water flows” my ass! It’s known that any diversion is a permanent thing to fuel grapes, growth, and greed. Who’ll monitor this illegal diversion? No, tear down the dam and be done with it!
Mendocino South can deal with their water woes without stealing it from Humboldt.
Yes, during high water flows.
As stated in the article:
“But after months of committee meetings and analyses across a wide spectrum of interest groups, a new joint powers authority decided unanimously on March 19 to pursue a pump station that would divert water from the Eel River into the Russian River during high flows.”
You fall right in line with the large number of commenters who either don’t read or comprehend what they’re commenting on.
It’s ludicrous to say Humboldt County would support further diversion of our precious water. Where do you get these opinions as opposed to facts?
I never said or implied Humboldt County would support the continuing diversion. I merely pointed out any new diversion would occur during high winter flows.
Apparently we can add lack of reading comprehension to your skill set.
Who’ll decide when it’s a high water flow? Hopefully not you.
Grape money and sprawl is the driving factor for the diversion.