The Smiths own a home on two acres beside the Skykomish River. If the Sunset Falls hydropower project is approved there could be a road and parking lot put in on their property.
credit:
Ashley Ahearn
The Smith's house in Index, Wash.
credit:
Ashley Ahearn
Kim Moore leads the Sunset Falls project for the Snohomish Public Utility District. The Utility says small hydropower should be considered "green" even though Washington does not list it in the Renewable Energy Portfolio.
credit:
Ashley Ahearn
Tom O'Keefe, head of American Whitewater, stands in front of Sunset Falls. Just below the falls about 10,000 river users launch their kayaks and rafts each year.
credit:
Ashley Ahearn
Canyon Falls is smaller waterfall upriver from Sunset Falls that would also have lower flows if the hydropower project is approved.
credit:
Ashley Ahearn
INDEX, Wash. — The Skykomish is one of the only major rivers in Washington that has not been dammed for hydropower. It’s also listed on the State Scenic Rivers System.
The river runs from the Cascade Mountains and empties into Northern Puget Sound. It’s a hot spot for wildlife and outdoor recreation.
It could also be a hotspot for hydropower.
View Sunset Falls in a larger map
Jeff Smith lives on a quiet bend of the Skykomish River with his wife and three dogs. As we step out onto his back deck it feels like we’ve stepped into a postcard of the scenic West.
“It’s one of the most spectacular spots in the whole country,” Smith says, looking out over the river. “You’ve got Lake Serene at the bottom of the cliffs of Mount Index. You’ve got Bridal Veil Falls spilling out of there. This is the South Fork of the Skykomish river, flows out of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.”
Snowy peaks frame evergreen-lined ridges -– and just below us the river sparkles in the midday sun. Wild geese bob around lazily in the eddies.
Smith has lived on the Skykomish for 20 years. It’s not hard to see why he’s devoted to this place -– and why he’s worried about its future.
“So the dam site would go across the river,” he says, pointing upriver from where we’re standing. “Right in here somewhere right below the cliffs of Mount Index.”
Snohomish Public Utility District wants to divert some of the water out of the river above Smith’s house. Then it would pipe the water downhill past two waterfalls and through a series of turbines to generate power.
The water would then be released back into the river. Because of this diversion there will be less water flowing by Smith’s house. It’s also going to decrease the flows over the two waterfalls. That has Smith upset.
“So we see out here this amazingly beautiful free-flowing river would become a streamlet of some sort. It’s hard to say exactly what it would look like but it’s likely you could probably walk across the river.”
If the utility gets approval to go ahead with the hydropower project’s construction, Smith says it would build a road right through his property and a parking lot where his garden is now. But he says this isn’t just about him. It’s bigger.
“We should all be saying no to this type of thing. It’s destroying something that’s eternal for something that’s temporary. That’s really what it comes down to.”
“We should all be saying no to this type of thing. It’s destroying something that’s eternal for something that’s temporary. That’s really what it comes down to.”
At the Snohomish Public Utility District headquarters Kim Moore, the lead on the Sunset Falls project, nods when I ask him about Jeff Smith.
“Mr. Smith is right, we’d probably have to have a road that goes through his property.”
Moore countered that the utility surveyed over 140 potential sites for new hydropower before settling on Sunset Falls.
“Sunset falls is one of the most –- in fact the most — attractive in the four county area that we’ve reviewed so I think it behooves the district to look at that right in our backyard.”
“Sunset falls is one of the most – in fact the most attractive in the four county area that we’ve reviewed so I think it behooves the district to look at that right in our backyard.”
Demand for power in Snohomish County is growing. Right now the utility buys 90% of the power it delivers to its customers from outside of the county. Moore says the utility would prefer to be generating its own power.
The Sunset Falls project would provide enough power for about 3 percent of SnoPUD’s customers.
Moore says the utility is also looking at other energy sources like wind and geothermal.
“Currently there isn’t any one big solution that handles all your energy needs so I guess you add up enough 3 percents you have a real number.”
Salmon will not be affected by the hydropower project because they end their migration below the falls. But endangered bull trout do live in the section of river that would lose some of its water to the pipes and turbines.
There are about 10,000 people who raft the Skykomish each year. But they put their rafts in below where the power project would be so the it wouldn’t affect them.
Tom O’Keefe is the head of American Whitewater, a nonprofit that represents whitewater rafters and kayakers around the country. He says even though recreational use won’t be impacted, this project is still a bad idea.
“The Skykomish River is one of just a very small handful of rivers in the state that do not have any dams or hydropower development on them. And we just feel that there are some places that should not be developed for hydropower and this is one of them.”
Snohomish Public Utility District has filed an application to further research the site. They should find out if they’re approved within the next month.
Then they will have three years to research the site before applying for a federal license to move ahead with the necessary environmental permits before construction.
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