It’s Time To Breach The Snake River Dams

The Snake River dams were controversial even before they were built.  While they were still in the planning stage, Northwest Tribes, salmon advocates, and even state agencies spoke out against the damage that would be caused to salmon.  Tribes who lived along the Snake River had already seen the devastation that major dams caused to their way of life – changing wild and free-flowing rivers into slow, heavily managed “systems.”

But the dams were built anyway, and the fight to remove them has continued for more than 50 years.  Tribes, fishermen, salmon biologists, conservation groups, and the State of Oregon have battled federal agencies responsible for the dams and salmon in court for decades.  And when it became clear just how important Snake River salmon were as a food source for the Southern Resident orca community, orca advocates joined the call to breach the dams. 

 The fight has dragged on for decades, but in the last few years there have been signs of light at the end of the tunnel.  Some changes were positive: renewed leadership from Northwest Tribes and a new Administration changing their approach to negotiations.  Some were not so hopeful: the continued decline of salmon and Southern Resident orcas, along with the worsening impacts of climate change and increasing cost to maintain the aging dams.  But these changes caused some leaders to take another look at breaching the dams, concluding that the only way to save Snake River salmon as well as secure a future for Pacific Northwest communities was for the dams to come down. 

Even the federal agencies that oversee these dams agreed that breaching gives salmon their best chance at survival. However, breaching has not moved forward due to the services provided by the dams, like power production, irrigation, and river transport.  Multiple times, those federal agencies opted for management plans that were inadequate for salmon recovery and failed to make any real changes to the system, sticking to the failing status quo. upheld a failing “business as usual” approach. 

Finally, in 2021, elected leaders from Washington State committed to reviewing those services and what is needed to replace them – a major step toward dam breaching and a solid plan to support communities through river restoration.