at Topsy and the John C. Boyle Dam, Klamath River, Oregon, May 19, 2024
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- Опубліковано 21 сер 2024
- The John C. Boyle Dam was completed in 1958. Originally named the Big Bend Plant, the Pacific Power & Light Company renamed it as the John C. Boyle Hydroelectric Project on June 21, 1961 to honor Boyle’s 52 years of distinguished contribution to the electric utility industry. [Boyle 58]
John C. Boyle was the engineer who harnessed the Klamath River for electric power generation. Not just with the building of dams at Big Bend (1956-1958) and Iron Gate (1960-1962), but beginning with Copco 1 (1911-1918) and Copco 2 (1911-1925) of Wards Canyon and upriver to Oregon at the Link River Dam (1920-21). [Boyle]
The Link River Dam sits between Upper Klamath Lake and the Klamath River and regulates water for both industrial and ecological needs. It’s a tricky job, as water resources are frequently over-allocated, often putting farmers and fish at odds with each other’s survival needs.
Once the planned dam removal is complete, the Klamath River will still be regulated by dams at Link River and Keno but from there the river is free to flow to the Pacific Ocean.
Regardless of one’s position on the right to farm, fish, to build dams or to remove them, managing the Klamath for hydroelectric power and regional irrigation likely prevented proposed plans by the Army Corps of Engineers to divert Klamath water into the Sacramento Valley. [Boyle 48]
It’s difficult to imagine the consequences for the Klamath watershed had that kind of diversion happened. The value in the power generated by the Klamath dams and an eye on future capacity quite possibly saved the Klamath Basin from an impoverished fate similar to that of the Owens Valley at the hands of the Los Angeles City Water Company.
Part of that eye on the future may also have helped save the Klamath from diversion into the Central Valley of California. With the exception of the John C. Boyle and Iron Gate Dams, that “future capacity” remained undeveloped but included plans for a dam at the confluence of the Klamath and Salmon Rivers - Ishi Pishi.
For those familiar with Ishi Pishi, the idea of a dam is nearly unfathomable yet remarkably similar to the Copco dams in Wards Canyon. How does one justify such a thing? For an engineer, to design a damming system is a fun and challenging project where it might become a bit easy to disregard the impact on others by thinking the greater good needs their service.
Engineers may excel at applied mechanics and Newtonian physics but are not so in tune with those who endure the negative consequences. Their’s is an essential service that often aims for the greater good. But it often requires teamwork, political leadership, and government policy that helps guide opposing needs toward collaborative solutions.
Despite hydroelectric’s reputation as low carbon and eco-groovy, the lower Klamath dams and their reservoirs asserted their dominion only to illustrate how “harnessing” a river requires more than an engineer’s clever reworking of water flow. Rather than build more dams as planned, a century of experience has lead the way toward removing them in order to renew a natural system that all life depends upon.
Author's Note:
The source for references of fact come from John C. Boyle's memoir, 50 Years On The Klamath, self published in 1976 and 1982. Additionally, the sources of opinion and sentiment are influenced by Marc Reisner's, Cadillac Desert, The American West and its Disappearing Water as well as the book Dreamt Land by Mark Ajax.
Updated June 7, 2024 to correct a misstatement regarding Keno Dam.
![АЛАУДИНОВ у Скабеевой: эти их ВСУ нас НЕ ДОГОНЯТ 😁 [Пародия]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/an0anqU4WGQ/mqdefault.jpg)
This dam removal project makes me so happy. Thank you for the wonderful views!
The river as it should be. Natural
Great background info and we now witness little damage from our use over the years; looks good and a miracle so much has been removed from Dam Site - Looks like Fish City!!!! Thanks for your updates.
Looking great! That water clarity is better than the Williamson. I'm sure that quite a few little native trout from Spencer Creek have shot out into that section. Exciting stuff!
I'm anxious to see how it looks after a big storm this coming winter.
this area doesn't seem to have been planted/seeded like Copco 1 and Irongate. I wonder what the plan is?
It's been reseeded. The higher elevation and cooler weather has it behind Iron gate by a few weeks.
I've not had a chance to research a difference in precipitation but that also could account for it.
There are plans to reseed in the fall and fencing around the perimeter may be complete by now.
The fencing is terrible but is needed to keep people and their OHVs from turning it into a dust bowl.
It has been. I was there a few weeks ago and there are lots of green shoots, but they are still very small and don't yet affect the overall color very much.
I know its super early and the water is murky but have any fish been spotted moving up/down the "new" river.
I don't know but it's unlikely fish are able to survive passing through the current release tunnels at Copco and Iron Gate (going up or down). Its a known killer due to change in water pressure.
There are fish in the system above all the dams and the water isn't too murky for them. Water out of Klamath Lake looks this way and the turbid conditions may be approaching normal.
Having seen this with my own eyes, the removal could’ve been done better with significant more input from locals.not just the Nations. It’s now going to take decades for that river to self clean and be fully habitable again. Videos like this are deceiving to what’s really going on. Wait for the rain to come and all that reservoir soot starts flowing into the river right as salmon migration gets underway. Did anyone think about that?
The thing about fall runoff and reintroduction of silt concern is that the silt is mostly the same sticky sort of soil that's above the former waterline now covered in sheet grass and star thistle. It will take awhile to revegetate for sure and the race is on to avoid the nasties but that soil may hold better than first thought and not wash away so quick as to kill.
There will be additional seeding before autumn rain.
Anyway, we all make our best bets from experience and my bet suggests it will get muddy with low DO but the fish will find the clear water side streams and will spawn for the first time in my lifetime within my lifetime. I don't worry about this fall but this summer? Yes, I do.
And yes, this video is misleading if it's expected to be anything more than what that day was like. That's why I revisit these locales over and over and over and why each release has the date in the title.
We all see small bits of the bigger picture anyway. That's why Its important we all add what we can and work for success. Thanks for sharing.
Tell us that you don't know what you're talking about, without telling us you don't know what you're talking about.
Asinine to get rid of the dam with what’s ahead.
Also slowest drone on the planet literally.
Okay, so I'm slow. I drive slow too. I like to see and think about what I see. It's not for you - that's fine too.
I do agree that removal is a loss for many whose lives were attached to reservoir lifestyles. For them the transition is difficult.
However, jumping on the whining wagon doesn't help solve problems either.
To have continued the life killing legacy of the Boyle dams despite a hundred years of learning would truly have been asinine.
@@meridianphoto we will need water.
@Blake4625kHz that's for certain. However, managing the river for hydro power provided very little actual storage for either drought or flood conditions. If managed for storage and fish the "lake" would likely look a lot like the Trinity. Obviously not enough water for that.
Important to note, the regulating dams at Link and Keno continue to divert water from the Klamath River for upper basin agricultural interests - as per longstanding agreements.
My understanding is that removal of the four dams below Keno did not take water rights away from irrigation interests.
At some point the National Marine Fisheries may adjust their biological opinion that regulates Keno and Link but that's getting in way too deep for me.
Asinine would be keeping the dam in place
@@gregorymilla9213
Asinine to have your as s as a dam, it would with hold the Atlantic ocean