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Dams on the Snake River are Killing Salmon and, Ultimately, Orcas. Don't Stop Removal by Michael Shurgot The News Tribune, March 9, 2025

U.S. Rep. Dan Newhouse, says he was never asked to provide information
for the reports, even though the dams are in his congressional district.

Sen. Jim Risch of Idaho and Rep. Dan Newhouse of Washington have recently introduced in Congress the Northwest Energy Security Act. This bill is a reaction to recent discussions about breaching the four dams on the lower Snake River. Should this bill become law, it would block any future efforts to remove those dams.

It would also doom to extinction several salmon runs in the Columbia/Snake River system and the southern resident orcas of the Salish Sea.

Risch and Newhouse extol the supposed economic and power benefits of the dams while ignoring completely their enormous ecological damage.

The stagnant ponds behind the dams kill salmon, while the orcas are starving and unable to reproduce consistently.

Witness Telequah's carrying her second dead calf around the Sound. Risch and Newhouse also ignore sensible, scientifically-based alternatives to the current irrigation and transportation systems, and that the only functioning hydropower dam produces at most 4% of the Northwest's energy needs. Four percent!

Are we really willing to exterminate two icons of the Pacific Northwest when reasonable alternatives to such willful destruction are readily available?

If you care about rivers, salmon and orcas, please urge your representatives to oppose this immensely dangerous legislation.