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power rates, or BPA should charge an exit fee if and when the companies 

 close their World War II era plants and thereby fail to provide the jobs and 

 incomes for which the Northwest has paid this considerable subsidy. 



In its BPA at a Crossroads report last year, the BPA Task Force of the House 

 Natural Resources Committee identified $150 million in annual savings for 

 the agency. I would respectfully refer this committee to the BPA Task Force 

 report, and to the testimony of my colleagues, K. C. Golden of the Northwest 

 Conservation Act Coalition and RaJph Cavanagh of the Natural Resources 

 Defense Council, for detail on what really drives the current BPA financial 

 crisis and how to turn the agency's fortunes around. 



3.) There are other lost revenues to BPA. 



For full fairness, those who would criticize the cost of fish flows must also 

 acknowledge other lost revenues to BPA. According to one estimate, each 

 acre-foot of water withdrawn in southern Idaho for irrigation deprives 

 Bonneville of some 2000 kilowatt-hours of hydroelectric generation at a lost 

 revenue in excess of $50. Running water through the navigation locks 

 instead of the turbines at the four federal dams on the Lower Snake River 

 waterway alone costs Bonneville some $25 million annually. I am not 

 suggesting that BPA or the Congress shut down southern Idaho irrigation or 

 the Columbia-Snake federal waterway -- or fish flows! -- in order to maximize 

 hydroelectric production. 



Quite the opposite, I conclude that it is unfair and unproductive to fixate 

 exclusively on lost revenues for BPA to provide fish flows. Several Northwest 

 industries -- not just fishing -- cause Bonneville to lose hydropower 

 generation and revenues. At the minimum, those who live in glass houses 

 should pay their fair freight before casting stones. A new allocation under 

 section 4.(h)(10)(C) of the Northwest Power Planning Act would only go part 

 way in charging that fair freight. 



4.) The cost of sahnon extinctions would run much, much higher. 



Mr. Chairman, whatever the expense of salmon recovery, it pales in 

 comparison to the staggering cost that the Pacific Northwest faces in the 

 extinctions of wild salmon stocks. The debate in this hearing and before the 

 public generally has focused on the costs of sabnon recover\' plans under the 

 Endangered Species Act and the Northwest Power Planning Act. Our region 

 conducts such a narrow debate at great peril; the stakes are much higher. 



• Losses in the Northwest and Alaska fishing industry. First of all, artificial 

 production in hatcheries can not and will not maintain our Northwest legacy 

 of salmon for future generations. Unless hatchery operators infuse wild 

 genes into each brood cycle (at a minimum rate of 2-3 percent), artificial 

 production of salmon quickly collapses due to in-breeding and other ills. So 

 no wild salmon, no hatchery salmon, no salmon at all. 



That means inevitably the loss of a Northwest-based fishing industry, 

 historically one of the pillars of our regional economy. According to one 

 study, salmon fishing -- sport, commercial, and Tribal -- generated $1 

 billion annually and maintained 60.000 jobs directly in the Northwest 

 economy. The fishing industry pumped these dollars-and-cents benefits 

 into coastal communities and the tniire region until regulators last year shut 

 down Chinook and coho harvest oM ihe Washington and northern Oregon 

 coasts. 



As salmon disappear in Oregon, Idaho, and Washington, Northwest boats and 

 sport anglers have reluctantly journeyed north to Alaska for opportunities to 

 harvest and stay in business. The Magnuson Act keeps the oceans off of US. 



