The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission recently sought comments on its draft environmental impact statement for the four lower dams on the Kennebec River at a series of meetings in Augusta and Waterville. Public comments were overwhelmingly in favor of stronger measures to ensure fish passage, including stronger dam removal than the environmental impact statement describes.
Albert Einstein is quoted as having said: “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” This statement applies to the situation with the lower Kennebec dams.
Biologist John Waldman, reporting on accounts from colonial times in his book “Running Silver,” wrote that one could once “walk drishod on the backs’ of schools of salmon, shad and other fishes moving up Atlantic coast rivers.”
The world that our forebears created is much different, with anadromous fish runs generally destroyed on the U.S. East Coast and Maine having the largest that remain. Much of the improvement is due to the removal of Edwards Dam on the Kennebec more than 20 years ago, allowing reconnection of the Sebasticook River and, more recently, China Lake.
Sadly, the larger picture in Maine is much less encouraging; native anadromous species are only able to effectively access less than 10% of their former range.
On the Penobscot, Maine’s largest watershed and the source of the presidential salmon tradition, the first two dams were removed over 10 years ago, yet salmon passage remains inadequate with fish unable to transit Milford Dam, the first dam remaining in the system, within 48 hours. This leaves them weakened and their ability to spawn successfully compromised. Maine’s best Atlantic salmon river only has a remnant population sustained by artificial stocking.
On the Androscoggin, Maine’s third-largest watershed, there has been dysfunctional fish passage at head of tide in Brunswick for the entire term of the current FERC license.
The Saco River is Maine’s fourth-largest watershed and its greatest restoration disaster. Despite fish passage settlement agreements that go back over 30 years, effective fish passage has yet to be demonstrated at the Cataract Project at head of tide. Skelton Dam, the next major dam upstream, is the only one in the system providing further fish passage. The Saco Anadromous Fish Passage Report of March 2024 reported only one Atlantic salmon ascending the East Channel Fishway in 2023. Although it is well established that the Saco was a historical Atlantic salmon river, the restoration history of the Saco is one of unending delay, missed milestones and schedule movement to the right. There have been no consequences to the hydropower operators as this sad saga continues. With seven dams within its first 40 miles, the restoration picture is grim for the Saco.
FERC’s record of supporting restoration of sea-run fisheries is abysmal, and the new impact statement proposes the same approaches for a critical part of the Gulf of Maine’s Distinct Population Segment of Atlantic salmon, the last Atlantic salmon population in the country.
The Kennebec River Watershed is Maine’s second largest and is over 600 feet wide throughout the reach defined by the lower four dams, making it extremely difficult for fish to locate relatively narrow fishways. Unless stronger measures than those specified in the FERC environmental impact statement are adopted for the lower Kennebec dams, all we can realistically expect is a series of missed milestones, delays and rescheduling similar to the Saco, resulting in little improvement to the status quo and continued denial of free-swim access by Atlantic salmon and their native co-evolved species to the motherlode of spawning habitat in the Sandy River Watershed.
With few hard dates set, the proposed restoration will not be implemented within a reasonable timeframe. Climate change will exacerbate the situation. Delays will result in an effort spanning decades rather than years. As climate change continues, data used to drive project decisions under the draft environmental impact statement will become increasingly out of date.
Going back the Einstein quote, this process is a result of current thinking. FERC must change its thinking.
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