SCL Causing Major Bank Erosion on Skagit

Salmo G Ya need to talk with the powers that be!!

SCL is cranking out some serious water on the upper Skagit here every day causing some serious bank erosion between Lucas and Barnaby!! Every single day now, since over a week ago, these makor flow releases are causing huge chunks of bank to give way... DAILY!!

http://waterdata.usgs.gov/wa/nwis/uv/?site_no=12178000&PARAmeter_cd=00060,00065

Just drive over the Rockport bridge around 2PM and look at how muddy the water gets and all the tree debris coming down the river. Guide Jim Stahl witnessed a rather large cedar just miss a boat last Sat. as it fell into the river.

I understand SCL needs to let water out, but why, "All at once!" ? Can't they just keep a more constant flow rather than a bank cutting surge of water? I've heard from smaller sleds and drift boats that they can actually feel the huge surge of water as it hits them.

This is somthing that needs to be brought up to county officials, DOT, and the USFS... before too long the way the river is cutting the water wont be flowing under the HWY 530 Rockport bridge much longer.

Ditto evreything John says it's a freakin mess. Sunday We had trees, stumps, Root wads and just plain Mud coming down the river. It was simple for me what to do I just put it back on the trailer and went home then on the drive home i started to think about the guys in the Drift boats, Ackerlund with a boat load of Eagle viewers hoping that nobody got struck from behind while rowing.

Now it goes to 4000 cfs mood swings ? Perfect. Hope this goes through spring, should be great for upper Skagit spaw... It's an African Tiger Fish.

Do african tiger fish bite? or are they like the Austrailian shitonna fish?

Johnny,

First, let me describe the rationale for the operations, and then we'll talk about erosion.

SCL used the same low or base flow over the past month as now. They kept the daily high flow lower during the chum salmon spawning period (late Nov - early Jan) so that redds wouldn't be spawned too high on the bank to keep them wet all the way through fry emergence. It's the same concept as was discussed previously about the March through May steelhead spawners.

Now that most chum spawning is complete, SCL is allowed a higher daily maximum flow, so the daily amplitude is greater. (Amplitude = difference between daily peak and low flows.)

There is nothing unusual regarding the range of flows presently coming from the Skagit project. SCL has been operating this way for decades. What is unusual is hearing that normal hydro flow fluctuations of up to 4 kcfs are causing major bank erosion. I won't say that the flow fluctuations aren't the cause, but it seems odd. I say odd because I don't normally unusual effects from normal operations. Bank erosion typically results from much larger than normal flow events. Typically it takes flows on the order of a 1.5 - 2 year flood to cause significant bank cutting and erosion. I'm describing this so you will understand why I'm puzzled about the alleged cause and effect of hydro project flow fluctuation and the erosion you're seeing.

It's a holiday weekend, so I won't be able to reach anyone at SCL until Tuesday. I'll call and ask them and maybe SRSC to check it out. Let me know if it continues. Even if there's nothing that can be done about it, someone up there may want to monitor it and see where the bank is cutting toward.

As for smoothing out the daily surge, it's a matter of how people use electricity. They get up in the morning and turn on lights, heat, etc. about 6 AM thru about 10 PM, and powerhouse operations reflect that. It takes about 6 hours for that surge to reach Marblemount, and then a few hours more to reach Rockport, etc. That's how society behaves and doesn't want to change. SCL has only a limited capacity to re-regulate flows (and energy production) at Gorge Dam, the lower-most of the three. The best we were able to accomplish at relicensing is to get them to downramp slow enough so as to not have the major juvenile salmon strandings that occurred in the past.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

Salmo-
In defense of John, this is not a normal swing in cfs. In the past it has always been a swing of 1,000-1,500 cfs and occasionally 2,000 but never a 4K change. The other concern is that they will do like they did last year and keep the flows up through April and then about May 1 drop them back down there by leaving many steelhead beds high and dry.

If I didn't know better I would say that they are trying to F#$# with us

Tim

Maybe the surge of people moving to the NW, for our cheap electricity and higher paying jobs. Contributes to the need for more electricity needing to be generated, not that its right but the needs of people are always going to outweigh the needs of the fish. We are sure at a crossroads with a lot of issues right now.....

Come on Steve, not to be disrespectful but we've been hearing the "Seattle's daytime demand of power" crap as the reason behind the daily fluctuation pattern for way too many "Fred Flinstone" years. Next thing we'll be hearing is that they run sustained flows in the summer months at a level 2000 cfs because not much generation is required, seeing as hardly anyone is in town to run air conditioning because we're all on vacation...

I understand "how things work" in the real world, not like we ever store power to sell to other states for profit or anything. What pre-historic year was it that began use of substations and transformers ?

I could really give a pi$$ whether or not it's safe for boats, anglers, eagle watchers or highways as long as we could have a non-fish killing flow regime adhered to... Please.

Joe-
Well said.

Tim

I have to agree with Salmo g. - it would be unusaul for the current flow management to be the major cause of the erosion problems being seen. For as long as I have fished the Skagit seem daily "tidal" flucations of 12 to 18 inches has been pretty common.

That is not to say that those flow flucations are a good thing for the fish - they are not. However it is also clear that Seasttle City light does mananage the power generation for the best economical value to its rate payers. Of course the non-fishers think that we anglers should have lower impacts on the listed fish so that their power bills stay as low as possible. Pretty clear that we as a society have placed a higher value on having cheap power rather than viable fisheries. But what really puzzles me is why some anglers also think best use of the fish reource's productivity is for such non-fishing uses.

Tight lines
Curt

I fished those flows all last winter, that really isn't that much flow for that river.

Not below HMSP it's not...it's ripping right along from Marblemount down, though...if it were open above there last year, it would have almost been too high to fish at all...

Fish on...

Todd

Todd
It's only popping up to 8500 cfs at Marblemount, what am I missing?

That is usually when stuff starts to kick loose a little but not too much to not fish.

Last year we were lucky to get any flow lower then 8500 on a weekend.

Just because we were lucky to get it any lower than 8500 on a weekend last season don't make it okay.
In conjunction with 2 - 3 almost 100 year flood events since 2003, any fluctuation more than 4000 cfs in a 12 hour period is definitely moving bank and vegetation more than normal. (While certain unstable portions of the river channel haven't yet regained a firm hold, mini blow through re-routes are a no brainer when those bumps in velocity come through.)
The snakey zone that houses Thomas, S. T., Barnaby and the Corn Patch are taking the good brunt of it, seeing as that whole area is now largely comprised of unstable silt. Bummer for future steelhead production as a fair number of return fish used to "hang out" in this reach...

Don't exactly understand the meaning of your last sentence Smalma ?

Dave,

We fished it, and far too much for my liking, since the Sauk was blown so much last year...and I caught plenty of fish, too, for that matter...but it's a lot more comfortable to fish, and the fish are a bit easier to find, when the river is running more at 4000-6000, rather than at 8500 or 9000...

Fish on...

Todd

Every weekend we fished it last year it was ritualistically running at either 10k or 10.5k, not 8 or 9. Not too much of a difference, but more water none the less. I recall seeing active bank erosion on those days too.

Todd
True, what I was trying to say or ask is what happened recently to cause the erosion or has it always done this and I didn't notice.

I just don't recall seeing that much erosion under these flows.

Sky Guy seems to remember, I must have drank too much last year

Thanks Salmo g !! I do hope SCL will run a boat up there and begin to monitor the situation... it is a pretty serious one that is concerning many locals up here.

It's not so much the hydro project flow fluctuation thats so much the concern its that fact that the flow fluctuation is all coming at once with a huge surge of water... and yes, it is doing some major cutting and bank erosion. (Especially the south side section of bank just up-river and around the corner from Lucas... As of Friday that large cedar that just missed that boat last weekend was still lying in the tail-out )

TFF,

A 4K change isn't the most common, but please don't say "never" unless you'd like to send me your address so I can ask SCL to mail you a printout of the record of 4K daily flow fluctuations. It will be a good sized parcel.

Did you read the previous thread about the allegation that steelhead redds were dewatered, but never documented? And the drop was 0.5'. How many mainstem steelhead do you see spawning in 6" of water?

I don't mind folks bashing power companies. I do it for a living, and one key to success is to have your [censored] together and being able to back up the allegations.

Rvrfshr,

I guess it's fortunate that I don't post here for respect. My objective is to post the most accurate and credible information that can be had. Sometimes that doesn't comport with visceral perceptions.

I'm not sure what your point is regarding flow fluctuations and load following. There is no practical way to store massive amounts of energy. Hydropower enjoys an efficiency advantage over thermal generation in that "fuel" in the form of water and hydraulic head can be stored and used as needed in response to demand. So that's what utilities do. The Skagit Project has little reregulation capacity at Gorge or Diablo, unlike Mayfield on the Cowlitz or Merwin on the NF Lewis, so the changes in daily generation show up in the hydrograph. Summer flows are more stable partly in response to changed energy consumption and generation patterns from SCL's resources and partly due to fisheries constraints. SCL wheels energy as does every utility that owns resources. One advantage of that capability is that SCL can provide more fish protection by wheeling and buying and selling energy than it would otherwise be willing to do with only its own resources.

As Smalma points out, society has already made choices, and people choose cheap energy over fish. SCL's flow management isn't a perfect choice for fish by any means, but an analysis of the managed flows shows a higher % of redd protection than is achieved by natural unregulated flows for chinook, chum, pink salmon, and steelhead. If you'll attend a presentation of SCL operations and how it both affects and protects fish, I'll try to set it up.

Todd,

Just to be clear, flow management considerations were considered for their fish benefits and liabilities. No consideration was given to angler flow preferences. The system is built around managing a water budget. All the water that comes in must go out. SCL is left with managing it to meet their energy interests as best they can and satisfying the various fish constraints, which use up most of the weeks available on the calendar.

Johnny,

I can't reach anyone today. I'll try tomorrow.

I'm still puzzled that 4kcfs is causing bank cutting because 4kcfs isn't much on the Skagit when we're talking flood flows. 25-30kcfs is pretty common on the Marblemount gage. I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that the high flows in early December may have left the bank between Lucas and Barnaby in an unstable condition. Perhaps the onset of the 4kcfs increase last week was just enough to set that bank cutting in motion. If that's the case, it would just be a matter of time until unmanaged flows increased enough to cause the effect you and others are seeing. Anyway, that's just guessing for now.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

I think SG is probably onto it with the last part of his post above.

We are experiencing the nearly same situation on the Chehalis this year (we don't have a dam though). Did the Skagit flood pre-christmas this year, like happened in SW WA? That flood dislodged a ton of debris and mud and deposited it throughout the river. Much more than normally is found around the river (which is a lot). So, ever since the floods we have HUGE amounts of debris coming down the river every time it rises a foot or more. Drivng a sled up the river is just a constant weaving and juke-ing, and we still hit lots of small stuff.

I don't know, but that could be a partial cause of the issue.

Then again I was boondoggin' on the Satsop on Sunday morning, and I noticed on some stretches, just running by in the boat would cause enough bank erosion to muddy up the side of the river. And our boat is a jon-boat.

Edit:

Salmo G-
Excuse my using the word "never." In replace of it let me say "very uncommon" except during high water events.

Tim