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		Draft Seventh Annual Report to the Northwest Governors On Expenditures of the Bonneville Power Administration to Implement the Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, 1978-2007 May 2008  |  document 2008-3 read full report > (6mb PDF)

Comment on this document

The Council is seeking public comments on this seventh annual report to the Northwest governors on Bonneville Power Administration expenditures to implement the Council’s program to protect and rebuild fish and wildlife in the Columbia River Basin. The seventh annual report details Bonneville’s spending from 1978 through 2007.

The report details Bonneville expenditures to implement the Council’s Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program. The program, prepared by the Council under authority of the Northwest Power Act of 1980, a federal law, is designed to protect, mitigate, and enhance fish and wildlife, and related spawning grounds and habitat, of the Columbia River Basin that have been affected by hydropower dams.

Comments will be accepted through the close of business on Friday, June 6, 2008. Comments should be directed to Mark Walker, Director of Public Affairs, Northwest Power and Conservation Council, 851 S.W. Sixth Avenue, Suite 1100, Portland, OR, 97204, or submitted by e-mail to .

Sincerely,

Stephen L. Crow
Executive Director
 

Executive Summary

In Fiscal Year 2007, the Bonneville Power Administration spent a total of $716 million to mitigate the impacts of hydropower dams on fish and wildlife of the Columbia River Basin. Of this amount, $139.5 million was for direct spending to implement the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program. The remainder was money Bonneville reimburses the Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation for fish-related dam operations ($60.3 million); interest, amortization, and depreciation (these are called “fixed expenses”) on capital investments in facilities such as hatcheries and fish passage at dams ($112.9 million); forgone hydropower revenues that result from dam operations that benefit fish but reduce hydropower generation ($282.6 million); and power purchases to replace the forgone hydropower ($120.7 million). Tables 2-4 of this report detail Bonneville’s direct spending on the Council’s program in Fiscal Year 2007

The 2007 expenditures bring the grand total of Bonneville’s fish and wildlife spending, from 1978 when the expenses began, through 2007, to $9,378,800,000. Here, in descending order, is a breakdown of the expenditures, 1978-2007, which are detailed in Table 1 of this report:

• $3.02 billion for power purchases to meet load requirements in response to required river operations that reduce hydropower generation.
• $2.06 billion in forgone revenue, the calculated value of hydropower that could not be generated because of required river operations to assist fish passage and improve fish survival, such as water spills at the dams when salmon and steelhead are migrating to or from the ocean.
• $1.84 billion for the Council’s direct program. As noted above, the direct-program expenditures do not include annual expenditures from the separate capital-investment budget. With capital expenditures added, the total for 1978-2007 is $3.97 billion.
• $1.49 billion in fixed expenses for bonds issued by Bonneville to pay for capital investments in fish-passage facilities at the dams.
• $922.5 million to reimburse the U.S. Treasury for the power-generation share of other federal agency expenditures to mitigate the impact of hydropower on fish and wildlife. Primarily these reimbursements are paid to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Reclamation, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for efforts to improve fish and wildlife survival apart from the Council’s program, such as operation and maintenance of fish passage facilities and federal fish hatcheries.

The Council thanks the Bonneville Power Administration for providing information about the agency’s fish and wildlife expenditures for this report.