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| The storage capacity of major Columbia Basin dams. A significant proportion of storage is in Canada. |
This article was first published in Castanet July 9, 2024
People might be defined by international borders but rivers don’t care about these paper boundaries.
The Columbia River basin is an enormous area made up of all the land where water drains into the Columbia River—which crosses the Canada-U.S. border. The basin covers a huge region, including much of B.C., Washington, Oregon and Idaho and parts of Nevada, Utah, Montana and Wyoming.
Since 1964, the basin has had its own treaty—the U.S.-Canada Columbia River Treaty. Now, 60 years later, that treaty is being re-negotiated.
There were two issues that drove the original treaty, flooding and electricity. The U.S. wanted upstream dams the would be able to hold back flood waters, following a devastating 1948 flood in Oregon. The flood was caused by heavy snowfall over the winter, a late spring (which preserved the snowpack), followed by spring rains. It is estimated as many as 102 people died and Oregon’s second largest city, Vanport, was destroyed. U.S. negotiators wanted B.C. to build dams that could control the release of water upstream in the province, preventing flooding in the lower lying U.S. states.
The second goal of the treaty was to create holding areas for hydroelectric dams. The geography of the Columbia River basin lent itself to hydroelectric dams both in B.C. and the U.S. but reservoirs in the U.S. couldn’t store enough water for year-round hydroelectric power. In the treaty, B.C. agreed to build dams to provide 15.5 million acre-feet of water storage that could be released on schedule to power hydroelectric dams in the U.S.
With the agreement, B.C. obtained two things. First, the U.S. paid B.C. $69.6 million CAD for flood control for 60 years. Second, B.C. Hydro was entitled to half the power generated by dams in the U.S. (called “the Canadian Entitlement”) which currently is approximately 5,000 gigawatt hours of energy per year. B.C. can use the electricity itself or sell it . The electricity is worth about $120 million annually. When the original treaty was made, Indigenous peoples were not consulted on either side of the border. In 2023, the B.C .government signed an interim four-year agreement to share 15% of the Canadian Entitlement benefits with three aboriginal groups affected by the Columbia basin dams—the Ktunaxa, the Secwépemc and the Syilx Okanagan Nations. The original Columbia River Treaty also neglected to consider ecosystem issues, in particular fish access for salmon and steelhead.
In 1965, few scientists understood the impact of global warming, which will change the way the Columbia basin works in two ways. First, with warming temperatures, the area will experience more winter and spring flooding, making flood control more critical. Second, reduced meltwater from snowpack and glaciers will reduce water availability during the summer, which will affect hydroelectric reliability.
The treaty is being renegotiated to “modernize” the agreement, taking into account today’s complex environment. It doesn’t expire but there are adjustments that come into effect in September 2024. Either party can terminate the agreement with 10 years notice and in September 2024, flood control policy changes from “assured annual flood control” (for which B.C. was paid a lump sum in the 1964 treaty) to “called upon,” where the U.S. can request help but must cover Canadian costs incurred during flood control.
The process of renegotiating the treaty is slow. The process started in 2018 and in October 2023 the negotiators were in Portland, Oregon for their 19th round of negotiations. This time around, there are also public sessions where the negotiators will present information and ask for input. You can be a part of that process by subscribing to a Columbia River Treaty newsletter at https://engage.gov.bc.ca/columbiarivertreaty/sign-up/. One priority for the new treaty is to keep the levels of the reservoirs on the Canadian side more stable, preventing large drops in water level like the ones during the fall of 2023 at Arrow Lakes Reservoir behind the Keenleyside Dam, which resulted in large fish kills.
The stakes couldn’t be higher. The result of the negotiation of the Columbia River Treaty will be important for flooding, clean electricity, ecology (especially migrating fish) and basin residents, especially aboriginal nations affected by the dam creation.
The negotiators have a lot on their plate.
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