Portland, OR. — The Public Power Council (PPC), representing nearly 100 consumer-owned electric utilities across the Pacific Northwest, has filed an opposition in federal court warning that proposed changes to Columbia River System dam operations would significantly undermine grid reliability, raise electricity costs for consumers, and increase carbon emissions — without a quantified showing of added benefits for salmon and steelhead.
The filing responds to motions for a preliminary injunction in long-running federal litigation over operations at eight lower Columbia and lower Snake River dams. PPC has been involved in the case since it was first filed nearly 25 years ago.
According to PPC, the relief sought by plaintiffs — expanded spill requirements and tighter minimum operating pool limits — would sharply reduce the region’s most flexible source of carbon-free electricity while forcing utilities to rely more heavily on fossil fuel generation.
“Public power utilities and the communities we serve are fully committed to salmon recovery — and we have been steadily paying for it, year after year,” said PPC CEO and Executive Director Scott Simms. “But this motion asks the Court to mandate sweeping operational changes with immediate reliability and affordability consequences, without a quantified demonstration that the requested spill and reservoir operations will actually improve fish survival beyond what is already in place.”
PPC’s opposition is supported by sworn expert declarations, including an independent analysis by Energy GPS principal Joshua Rasmussen. His modeling applied the plaintiffs’ proposed operational constraints to historical hydropower data and assessed the resulting system impacts.
Rasmussen concluded that the requested injunction would eliminate roughly 2 million megawatt-hours of carbon-free hydropower annually and reduce available summer hydropower capacity by approximately 1,200 to 1,400 megawatts, with losses reaching as high as 1,700 megawatts during peak demand hours. Based on forward market prices, replacement energy and capacity costs in 2026 alone are estimated at $152 million to $169 million.
The analysis also found that replacing lost hydropower primarily with natural gas generation would increase regional carbon emissions by an estimated 815,000 to 881,000 tons of carbon dioxide in 2026.
“These losses come at exactly the wrong time,” Simms said. “The Pacific Northwest is already facing tightening resource adequacy margins and rapid load growth. Reducing flexible hydropower during summer heat events materially increases the risk of emergency conditions and higher costs for consumers.”
A separate declaration from fisheries expert Andrew M. Deines, Ph.D., a managing scientist at Exponent and a certified fisheries professional, challenges the biological basis of the plaintiffs’ claims. Deines states that the requested operational targets are not translated into numerical spill rates, making it impossible to conduct a standard scientific comparison between current operations and the proposed changes.
Deines further notes that at today’s already high spill levels, empirical evidence shows diminishing marginal returns, meaning additional spill may provide little or no incremental benefit to fish survival. He also cautions that several of the proposed reservoir operations would push the system into largely untested conditions, effectively turning the river system into a large-scale experiment.
“We in public power support science-based salmon recovery,” Simms said. “But if plaintiffs want the Court to impose sweeping mandates, they must quantify what they’re asking for and demonstrate the incremental benefit. That showing has not been made.”
PPC’s filing emphasizes that public power utilities are not-for-profit and cost-based, meaning increased wholesale electricity costs would flow directly to households and businesses. It also argues that the plaintiffs have failed to meet the high legal standard required for a mandatory preliminary injunction, particularly given the scale of the economic and reliability impacts identified.
The opposition notes that current dam operations are governed by a 2020 Biological Opinion developed through extensive scientific review under the Endangered Species Act, and that public power utilities already fund one of the largest fish and wildlife restoration programs in the world through Bonneville Power Administration rates.
Rather than additional court-ordered mandates, PPC urged a collaborative approach.
“After more than two decades of litigation, it should be clear that court-ordered operational mandates are not a durable solution,” Simms said. “The region needs a negotiated approach that supports salmon recovery, respects Tribal treaty rights, protects grid reliability, and keeps power affordable for the people of the Northwest.”
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Isn’t this their diabolical plan? It is maddening!🤬