Oregon utility set to remove dams

PORTLAND, Ore. — A major Oregon utility says it's too expensive to keep two hydroelectric dams on the Sandy River, which comes roaring off Mount Hood and empties into the Columbia River. So on Tuesday, Portland General Electric will begin tearing them down.

When the dams are fully removed, one this summer and the other next summer, the Sandy River will be a free-flowing river for the first time in nearly a century — and no longer a hindrance to steelhead and salmon returning to spawn.

"It's incredibly significant for the entire Sandy River Basin; it's going to breath new life into the basin and it's going to provide new recreational and fishing opportunities," said Amy Kober, a spokeswoman for American Rivers, a conservation group. "This was a region that was built by dams, but we are realizing the benefits of healthy rivers. We are getting back into balance."

The dams to be removed are the 47-foot-tall Marmot, which is on the Sandy River, and the 16-foot high Little Sandy dam, which is on a tributary of the Sandy.

When the Marmot is fully dismantled later this summer, it will have been the tallest dam to be removed in the Northwest in 40 years — and the largest ever removed in Oregon.

The dam removal kicks off a wave of river restoration projects and dam removals in the Northwest. Kober said many dams have reached the end of their life span and with stricter environmental legislation utilities are finding it more difficult to keep them economically viable.

The Savage Rapids Dam along the Rogue River; the Condit Dam on the White River in Washington; two dams along the Elwha River in Washington — including what will be the nation's tallest dam to be decommissioned at 210-feet — are all scheduled to be taken down over the next several years.

"Nationally, dam removal is an accepted mainstream thing these days," Kober said. "We are moving more and more outdated dams and communities are embracing this to get their rivers back."

PGE officials said the 22 megawatt capacity dam system, built in 1913, was too costly to maintain, particularly considering new environmental protections for endangered salmon and steelhead. The utility is building a 126 megawatt wind farm in southern Oregon that is expected to go online by December.

"When we made this decision in 1999 we did an analysis of how much it would take to keep the dams in and upgrade them to modern fish protection," said Mark Fryburg, a PGE spokesman. "The maintenance costs are rather high."