REMOVE THE DAMS TO PREVENT THE SOUTHERN RESIDENT ORCAS EXTINCTION

  • recipient: Congressman Simpson
To Congressman Simpson,

This petition is an emergency request to remove the Four federal dams on the Snake River.

Per your statement, Senator Simpson, the Four federal dams on the Snake River need to be removed immediately to reverse the decline of Steelhead trout and Chinook Salmon.

WHY THE DAMS NEED TO BE REMOVED AND ALTERNATIVES:
Excellent examples of INDISPUTABLE DAM REMOVAL SUCCESS and river restoration projects: the Elwha and Glines Canyon dams on the Elwha River of Washington state, Condit Dam on the White Salmon of Washington state, four dams on the Penobscot River in Maine and Marmot Dam on the Sandy River in Oregon. The removals of these large dams have reduced taxpayer waste.

WIND ENERGY has exploded in Washington and Oregon, tapping private investment and now producing more electricity by far than the four lower Snake River dams.

The dams are aged, resulting in escalating costs of necessary maintenance; paid for with hard working people's tax dollars and already-tight federal agency budgets. Barging has declined drastically as railways have become more efficient.

The dams create warm water that salmon are poorly equipped to survive. The Southern Resident Orcas eat Chinook Salmon and are dying from starvation because the dams won't allow the Chinook Salmon to swim through. The Chinook Salmon is their main food source and within one year, the 74 Southern Resident Orcas will be extinct from starvation.

Removing the dams will help the Chinook Salmon and Steelhead Trout to recover. Fish will return to thousands of miles of habitat. The Chinook Salmon will provide much-needed prey to feed the starving and dying Southern Resident Orcas.

Breaching the lower Snake River dams would be fast action. It would provide the best and quickest opportunity to increase the salmon in time to give the Orcas the Chinook Salmon they need to survive.

SOUTHERN RESIDENT ORCAS, CHINOOK SALMON, AND STEELHEAD TROUT: Southern Resident Orca families are dying at an alarming rate. No new calves have survived for several years. Even more important is the fact that reproducing females (the mothers) have been dying over the last decade. Without mothers, the population cannot survive. The result: EXTINCTION.

The most controversial dams are four on the lower Snake River in Washington State followed by Oregon, Idaho, and Montana.

THE BONNEVILLE POWER ADMINISTRATION:
The Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) was created by the federal government in 1937, FORTY YEARS AGO, to transmit the electricity generated by the 31 dams on the Columbia River and its tributaries, as well as the Hanford nuclear power plant in Washington. It is also responsible for funding efforts to prevent the extinction of migratory salmon and steelhead that inhabit the Columbia and Snake Rivers. YET, returns of salmon and steelhead to their spawning grounds in Washington, Idaho, and Oregon have DECLINED PRECIPITOUSLY as each new dam was constructed. In recent years as the hydro system has aged, maintenance costs have RISEN to cause BPA to raise its ELECTRICITY RATES.

FARMERS: Irrigation pumps could be replaced and pipes extended to the Snake River for farmland irrigated behind Ice Harbor Dam. Or, the land could be converted to non-irrigated farmland or pasture. Either option would cost far less than maintaining the salmon-killing dams.
Sign Petition
Sign Petition
You have JavaScript disabled. Without it, our site might not function properly.

Privacy Policy

By signing, you accept Care2's Terms of Service.
You can unsub at any time here.

Having problems signing this? Let us know.