As California faces local weather change and a future with greater storms and longer droughts, the challenges earlier than us result in an often-asked query: Ought to we make a few of our present dams greater?
That’s exactly what is going on now on the American River above Sacramento. Folsom Dam and its 340-foot-tall wall of concrete has been defending the capital from flood since 1956. It’s midway by way of a development undertaking to extend its elevation by about 3.5 ft.
In the meantime, upstream on the Sacramento River, a potential undertaking with very related engineering is at Shasta Dam. A proposal to lift the 602-foot dam by one other 18.5 ft has some contemporary political help, with latest laws within the Home of Representatives. However many years of steadfast opposition has made elevating Shasta by any quantity one of the controversial water concepts in California.
Why does elevating Folsom by 1% increase no hackles whereas the thought of elevating Shasta 3% deeply divides the water group?
The advantages and the impacts of every potential dam are very completely different. And so are the politics.
Elevating Folsom is a life-or-death matter to assist be certain that the dam by no means fails. Elevating Shasta is extra of a balancing act of public values that pits some water advantages in opposition to environmental preservation and affected lands which are sacred to native native tribe.
The thought of elevating Folsom Dam started to floor greater than 20 years in the past as a earlier flood safety various — a massive new dam within the northern American River canyon close to the group of Auburn — light into historical past.
Floodplain pursuits in Sacramento concluded that it was politically unimaginable for Congress to approve a dam after a number of makes an attempt. In 1999, the Sacramento Space Flood Management Company, the Military Corps of Engineers and the federal Bureau of Reclamation all turned their consideration to learning further storage at Folsom and levee enhancements downstream.
A single individual opposed these concepts solely as a result of they had been alternate options to the Auburn Dam. And it seems this individual was one of the highly effective members of Congress on the time, Republican John Doolittle of Rocklin, who remained in Congress till 2009 however couldn’t cease progress at Folsom.
There’s a actual public security purpose to make this dam barely taller. In the mean time, Folsom is just not tall sufficient to comprise the most important conceivable storm the dam is designed to guard in opposition to, an apocalyptic occasion identified in water vernacular because the Possible Most Flood. Below this theoretical catastrophe of disasters, the height of flood waters would circulate excessive of Folsom Dam, endangering its very survival. With this slight increase, floodwaters are predicted to remain within the spillway system, defending the infrastructure.
Work is now underway on a collection of enlargements of wing dams, an auxiliary dam and the primary dam itself. Completion of the $373 million undertaking is scheduled for 2025.
In the meantime, at Shasta Dam, the thought of enlarging this construction has been round for many years longer than enlarging Folsom.
A taller dam has its advantages.
“Extra water storage, extra yield, plus you will improve the chilly water (behind Shasta) for fisheries,” says proponent Jerry Meral, one in every of California’s true water veterans who served underneath each administrations of former Gov. Jerry Brown. “It’s such a winner.”
Elevating Shasta additionally has its impacts. Whereas state regulation permits a taller Folsom Dam to barely encroach upstream on the American River forks, it prohibits the identical upstream of Shasta on the McCloud River. The California Legislature since 1989 has prohibited any state company or division from taking part “within the planning or development of any dam.”
To a neighborhood Indian tribe that isn’t formally acknowledged by the federal authorities, the Winnenum Wintu, the McCloud is essentially the most sacred of landscapes. The tribe has staunchly fought the dam.
Undeterred, Central Valley Republicans within the U.S. Home of Representatives are making one other run at elevating Shasta. HR 215 by David Valadao, R-Hanford, seeks to interrupt the political logjam by Congress pre-empting the state prohibition on a bigger dam.
Uncommon is the California water undertaking that has no opposition, significantly the elevating of an onstream dam. With Folsom as a shining instance, such rarity could also be what it takes for a dam increase to really occur.
Tom Philp is a Sacramento Bee columnist. ©2023 The Sacramento Bee. Distributed by Tribune Content material Company.
