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September 2000

COLUMBIA/WILLAMETTE CHANNEL DEEPENING UNRAVELING

Federal Fisheries Agency Yanks Project Approval

AT ISSUE: NWEA's lawsuit challenging the National Marine Fisheries Service approval of the Columbia River channel deepening project helps to erode support for the project.

The proposal to deepen the shipping channels of the Columbia and Willamette Rivers is floundering in the wake of a late-August decision by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to withdraw its approval of the project. Pointing to new information in three areas, NMFS said it needed to begin its analysis again. In particular, despite over a decade of data gathering and planning by the Corps, NMFS found that the continuing lack of information on how the project would affect salmon in the Columbia River Estuary precluded its continuing support. NMFS and the Corps have spent the last eight months fruitlessly attempting to agree on what studies were needed to fill information gaps. Significant disagreements stemmed from the Corps' unwillingness to sponsor studies that could highlight flaws in its Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

The approval from NMFS had come in the form of a Biological Opinion (BiOp), required as the result of a interagency consultation process triggered by the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The Channel Deepening BiOp had concluded that the project was not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of these species, despite the fact that channel deepening could cause significant adverse effects to an already highly degraded estuary habitat. The estuary is a nursery area for 13 stocks of ESA-listed salmon and steelhead. NMFS had also concluded that the deepening project was not likely to appreciably diminish the value of their critical habitat because it counted on proposed future studies, as yet unplanned monitoring, and yet-to-be-determined or assured mitigation measures.

NWEA Challenges Fisheries Approval

It was these tenuous reasons NMFS used to support the deepening project that formed the basis for the lawsuit NWEA filed this February. The court challenge, in which four other groups joined, recently withstood efforts by the government to dismiss the case and transfer it from Seattle to Portland. The lawsuit seeks a court order forcing NMFS to withdraw the Biological Opinion and to ensure that the Corps does not rely upon it to move forward with the dredging project. NMFS' own Northwest Fisheries Science Center had concluded that the channel deepening project "is an incremental insult to a degraded system that is important in the salmonid life cycle."

In its letter withdrawing the BiOp, NMFS told the Corps that its Science Center was about to issue new information on the effects of altering the estuary on the shallow water habitats of the estuary upon which salmon rely. NMFS also pointed to new information which "suggests that salmon may be susceptible to a wider range of sub-lethal impacts from certain contaminants, and at lower ranges of exposure, than was previously believed to be true." Toxic contaminants are known to cause a range of sublethal effects including problems with feeding, predator avoidance, reproduction, growth, and susceptibility to disease, among others.

Last, NMFS noted that it lacks confidence that restoration of habitat in the estuary will take place. Although not required by the BiOp, and thus not officially termed "mitigation," NMFS had hoped that restoration would restore the original food chain to salmon. That food chain, based on the product of estuarine wetlands, has been supplanted by a century of Columbia River dams, dredging, and widespread removal of wetlands. Despite its original optimism that wetland restoration would effectively offset the harm from channel deepening, NMFS never explained why it was acceptable to further degrade the estuary. Even so, had NMFS required the restoration as mitigation, it could have tipped the cost-benefit analysis against the deepening project.

NWEA Opposes State Permits

In addition to the approvals required by the Endangered Species Act, the deepening project is facing decisions by federal, state, and local agencies. The Corps itself has yet to issue a Record of Decision (ROD) signifying the final decision resulting from its EIS. The ROD was originally expected in February, 2000. One potential difficulty faced by the Corps was the announcement that the Portland Harbor portion of the Willamette River, a significant part of which was slated for channel deepening, was to be designated as a federal Superfund site. In response, the Corps decided to delay the Willamette portion of the project, asking federal and state agencies to restrict their reviews to the Columbia. NWEA opposes separating the analysis of the two rivers because dredging toxic contaminants in the Willamette will affect the Columbia and its fish and wildlife downstream.

Oregon and Washington are in the process of issuing Clean Water Act approvals of the project. NWEA has spearheaded opposition to these approvals because channel deepening will further degrade existing water quality problems in the Columbia River Estuary, where birds and mammals have demonstrated reproductive disorders caused by toxic chemicals. With NMFS, the preeminent agency in charge of salmon protection and recovery, unable to approve the project as acceptable, it is difficult to see how the states could do so. Finally, both states are considering making findings the project is consistent with the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA), while the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) gears up to permit the Corps to establish an ocean dumping site of unprecedented size.

NWEA Attacks Congressional Authorization

The December 16, 1999 BiOp was rushed to completion to accommodate the Corps' schedule of reporting to Congress that the dredging project was "environmentally and socially acceptable." The Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 1999 had authorized the project in advance provided that the Corps report by the end of 1999 on its economic, environmental, and social benefits. Following withdrawal of the BiOp by NMFS, NWEA sent a letter asking the Corps to similarly withdraw its Chief Engineers Report to Congress. The letter pointed out that because "a major pillar for the conclusions drawn in the Chief's report to Congress is absent, Congress now has before it a report containing substantially incorrect information." Despite the Corps' report to Congress, no federal or state agency including the Corps itself has fully reviewed the impacts of deepening the Willamette River.

For copies of NMFS letter withdrawing its Biological Opinion, the NMFS Biological Opinion, the NMFS Science Center report, NWEA comments on water quality certification, or litigation documents, please contact Susan Crisfield at 503/295-0490 or scrisfield@advocates-nwea.org.

Northwest Environmental Advocates' mission is to work through advocacy and education to protect and restore water and air quality, wetlands, and wildlife habitat and to stimulate the development of renewable energy sources to replace nuclear and fossil fuels in the Pacific Northwest.

Nina Bell - Executive Director
Susan Crisfield - Channel Deepening
Flori Hall - Development Assistant
Allison LaPlante - Legal Intern
Eugene Rosolie - Green Power Project Director

Northwest Environmental Advocates 133 SW Second Ave., Suite 302, Portland, OR 97204-3526, PHONE: 503/295-0490, FAX: 503/295-6634, e-mail: nwea@advocates-nwea.org.

133 SW 2^nd Ave., Portland, OR 97204-3526 (503) 295-0490 FAX 295-6634