Fish Habitat Proposal – Spawn in Two Weeks, or Wait Until Next Year

In their October 2009 environmental screening report, the proponent offered these proposals to compensate for the fish habitat which would be lost due to the construction and operation of the proposed hydro-electric power station at the Bala falls.

One significant issue is that the proposed power station would virtually eliminate the flow of water over the north dam and this flow is needed for walleye (also known as pickerel) spawning (the spawning areas are shown here and a description is here).

As described at the end of Section 6.2.5.2 of Section 6 of their environmental screening report, the proponent originally offered that since they would take most all of the available water through their proposed power station and not leave at least the 9.5 m³/s of flow over the north dam required for walleye spawning between April 15 and June 1, they would instead provide an additional 200 m² spawning habitat enhancement area adjacent to the exit of the south channel as compensation.

Somehow, the walleye were expected to figure out that if there wasn’t enough flow at the base of the north falls to do their thing, they were to mosey over to a pile of rocks at the south falls to spawn.

Anyways, the proponent subsequently modified the above according to this proposal, dated November 30, 2010. Here they offer that instead of the offered 200 m² compensation area, the proponent would ensure that at least 9.5 m³/s of water would go over the north dam, and they would reduce the amount of water going through the proposed power station if necessary.

Two likely issues are:

1. They would only ensure this 9.5 m³/s of flow over the north dam for a two-week period. If the little fishies don’t spawn during the two-week period, well, they’ll just have to wait until the next year. Talk about pressure to perform.
2. You can be sure there would be disagreement about whether the 9.5 m³/s is in fact adequate for spawning, and whether the proponent was in fact providing 9.5 m³/s of flow. After all, this would just be someone’s estimation of flow by looking at it. And when the people paying your salary and deciding whether you get to keep your job want to make more money by putting more water through the power station, the fish would lose that unfair battle.

And on the topic of unfair, in justifying the lost fish habitat due to the 45′-deep and 36′-wide water intake for the proposed power station which would be where Purk’s Place is currently, the proponent considers this same water intake to be a fish habitat, even though they confirm there would be “entrainment mortality” – this is the technical term for what happens to fish that get sucked into the power station.

Fish and turbines do not a good combination make and (warning, this part is for mature audiences only, may contain coarse language), the fish may encounter:

• “rupture of the swim bladder” due to the rapid pressure change,
• “grinding (when a fish is drawn into an area with small clearance between turbine parts),” and
• “sudden acceleration or deceleration resulting in turbulence and shear forces that could literally tear fish to pieces“ (this text is all directly from the proponent’s environmental screening report).

That is, the proponent is suggesting that fish should raise their young’uns at the intake to their proposed 4,300,000-watt bass-o-matic.