AP | Idaho Utility To Dismiss Lawsuit Against EPA Over Dams. According to E&E News, “An Idaho utility will dismiss its lawsuit against EPA because the agency has now approved allowing warmer water temperatures in an area where federally protected fall chinook salmon reproduce. Idaho Power in documents filed last week in U.S. District Court says EPA has approved allowing the warmer temperatures in the Snake River below the Hells Canyon Complex on the Idaho-Oregon line. NOAA Fisheries says the change is not likely to jeopardize salmon or their critical habitat. ‘We are happy with EPA’s decision to approve the site-specific criteria,’ Idaho Power spokesman Brad Bowlin said in an email. Idaho Power says allowing warmer water below the dams could reduce the cost of electricity and save customers up to $100 million over 50 years. Hells Canyon is a mile-deep canyon carved by the Snake River, much of it popular for recreation but inaccessible by road. The three-dam Hells Canyon Complex built from the late 1950s through the ‘60s partially tamed the river. Snake River fall chinook were listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in the 1990s. A recovery plan released in 2017 identified the Snake River below the dams as the best spot for the cold-water species to boost its numbers of naturally reproducing spawning fish.” [E&E News, 12/2/19 (=)]

 

Editorial: Innocent Animals Cannot Do Anything About Climate Change. Only People Can. According to USA Today, “As the world grows warmer, heart-breaking accounts of animal suffering have multiplied from what scientists suspect, or have established, are the direct result of man-made climate change. For humans, the consequences of global warming are difficult to internalize because any changes seem, for the moment, to be slow or aberrational. But the impact on the world’s delicate ecosystems can be catastrophic:  … Vanishing songbirds. Scientists released a study this year calculating that the wild bird populations of the United States and Canada have diminished by almost 30% since 1970. Nearly 3 billion birds are gone, including a quarter of blue jays, nearly half of Baltimore orioles, and hundreds of millions of sparrows and warblers.  … Massive antelope die-off. In three weeks, 200,000 saiga antelopes fell dead across the steppes of Central Asia in 2015, two-thirds of the world’s population. Scientists recently solved the mystery when they discovered that warming temperatures might have unleashed a dormant bacterium in the animals, causing massive internal bleeding.  … Disappearing state and national symbols. Encroaching heat is driving away state birds, including Alabama’s yellowhammer, the California quail, Georgia’s brown thrasher, Iowa’s and New Jersey’s goldfinch, Minnesota’s common loon, New Hampshire’s purple finch, Pennsylvania’s ruffed grouse and Vermont’s hermit thrush. A national symbol of Australia — koalas — already threatened by human development, have died by the hundreds in the nation’s recent drought-fueled fires.” [USA Today, 12/2/19 (+)]

 

 

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