With today’s ever-increasing stresses on people and nature, Washington state needs to demonstrate that it can do its best at preserving biodiversity and preventing the extinction of our most iconic wildlife. That is reason enough for us to retire the four lower Snake River dams.
I offer another reason why the Snake River dams should be retired. That reason is energy security, and by that, I mean clean energy security.
Population growth and the stresses caused by climate-warming are driving an increasing need for carbon-free electricity. That clean electricity must also be generated with the least harm to the environment.
Although the four lower Snake River dams deliver a comparatively small amount of Pacific Northwest Power (about 3 percent), they are doing so at a great environmental cost.
Future power will be costly. Aging turbines need replaced at a significant cost.
There is a continued lowering of generating capacity as reservoirs fill with silt. In addition, power is available often times when it is not needed. Although it can offset burning fossil fuels, it makes no sense to compete with wind and solar renewable energy coming online with further use of devastating and ailing hydro.
So, as operating costs rise due to aging infrastructure and climate stress, and dam performance deteriorates, the lower four dams are not contributing to our energy security.
It is time to reinvest the ever-increasing monies allocated to these dying dams into building a carbon-free and environmentally safe power infrastructure for our future.
Let’s retire the dams and “Build Back Better” as President Biden would say.
Malcolm Cumming
Clinton
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