America's Most Endangered Rivers® of 2023 - Eel River
The Eel River once teemed with abundant native fish and other wildlife, supporting the Wiyot, Sinkyone, Lassik, Nongatl, Yuki and Wailaki peoples, who have lived along the river since time immemorial. Today the river’s Chinook salmon, steelhead, and Pacific lamprey are all headed toward extinction in large part because of two obsolete dams that make up Pacific Gas and Electric’s Potter Valley Hydroelectric Project. Together the dams completely block salmon migration and harm river habitat. The license for the dams recently expired and PG&E no longer wants to operate the facilities. It’s up to federal regulators to require PG&E to remove the dams as part of the decommissioning plan, expected during the fall of 2023.
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As the Supervising Game Warden for that area from 1977 thru 1998 and growing up on the South Fork of the Eel at Leggett I came to hate those Dams. It always pained me to see so much habitat lost for so little gain. Lake Pillsbury was mostly about summer cabins and campgrounds. Few live there year round and are there for vacation. The river could return to a prime fishing location and produce an abundance of Salmon and Steelhead. The waters above produce nothing presently! About time!
Pls, keep your water clean & free...💚
This has very interesting implications for the Russian River as well. For all the harm it caused, the Potter Valley Project kept water going to Lake Mendocino through the E. Fork Russian, which in turn fed the main stem and provided needed water for Salmon and Steelhead even in drier years. Dam removal is definitely good for our fish but it must be done intentionally and in a manner that doesn't cause unnecessary harm to the Russian River
Please use miniature hydrogen, miniature hydro, miniature methane ,and miniature free energy generators . Of course solar and wind may work better depending on the location.
Those with intervenor status who want removal should push FERC hard to do its job and order removal of the dam, rather than give PG&E all the time in the world to do nothing while it plays for time in the hope someone will take the problem off its hands. Its plan for decommissioning is an empty shell in which is found another empty shell. The Russian River diversion is a classic California water theft that can no longer be tolerated or accommodated. Without the dam in question it could not have been possible and without the dam it can not for all practical purposes continue. Northern California is drying out. The Eel River desperately needs all its water as do those in its drainage basin who depend on it.