TRANSCRIPT:
Jared Huffman: "For about the last hundred years, water has been diverted from the Eel River into the Russian River because of a hydroelectric project that PGE has owned. It's called the Potter Valley Project. Now, it's interesting because the water right to divert that and to transfer it to another basin was just for hydropower. It wasn't an inner basin transfer for any consumptive use. But over the last hundred years, people in Mendocino and Sonoma and Marin County, even, have come to depend on these water diversions and the water supply. Part of that project has actually evolved into the most significant part of it. The hydropower became, you know, pretty, pretty fungible, pretty marginal because it's a small hydro project, but the water supply function that it served has become hugely important because entire communities have built up around it, including the wine grape industry in the Anderson Valley.
"So fast forward to the last couple of years, PGE has made a business decision that this project doesn't work for them anymore. They lose $9 million a year on it, by the way. So it was a non-performing hydro project in their portfolio. And then they discovered a seismic problem in the largest of the hydro dams there. Scott Dam. So it's a dangerous facility.
"There would be an opportunity for anyone who wanted to buy the project, but nobody is dumb enough to want to buy it because it's all liability and you know,the hundreds of millions you would spend to buy it would just get you the right to lose $9 million a year if you became the owner.
"So I think it's important for people to just look clearly at that reality of what's going on. Now, there's good news here because that that can all seem very scary for the folks who have come to depend on that water supply diversion. If it all goes away that would be hugely disruptive and scary. "The good news is we can meet the needs of the Russian River Basin without that hydro project. And that's what I've been working on for the past, gosh, four or five years now. I saw some of this coming. I convened an ad hoc group of stakeholders in both the Eel River and the Russian River Basin to just take a clear-eyed look at this. There are still people today that want to believe that Lake County or other people will somehow come to the rescue and buy these assets and keep things just the way they've been for the last hundred years. I don't peddle false hope. I try to look realistically at this and find solutions. The good news is we've got a partnership now with key players in both basins dedicated to what I have called the Two Basin Solution, taking out the dams and the infrastructure that PGE is abandoning. But doing it in a way that preserves a run of the river diversion into the Russian River and can fully meet water supply needs in Mendocino and the North Bay. So that's the essence of what this is.
"I actually think it's it's going to be really good. I think there's a way to even have greater water supply reliability than we have right now, because water diversions have come way down with the seismic problem and with other problems. I think we can make it even more reliable. But the key is everybody working together with that clear-eyed vision of the Two Basin solution. And that's been that's been my project."
Elise Cox: "So what are the milestones that we need to look for? Because I'm getting news about the variants and I'm getting news about the Potter Valley Decommissioning. And I'd like to know what the milestones are for the Two Basin Solution so that we can report on it to our listeners and so our listeners can understand whether or not this is moving forward."
Jared Huffman: "Yeah, we're talking about, you know, within the next year or two a decommissioning plan being presented to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission by PG&E. All the stakeholders will have a chance to weigh in on that and tell the federal agency whether they like it or not, or if they have concerns. And then FERC will look at that and probably put some conditions on it. And, you know, they're not going to just rubberstamp it. And all of this will play out over it over several years. "The reason I'm pretty optimistic about it is that PGE has finally agreed to partner with the water interests in the Russian River Basin to integrate the new infrastructure that they will need to maintain a run of the river diversion as PGE takes out its dams.
"So there's a lot of misinformation. You know, this is this is politics. In the year 2024. So there's just tons of disinformation and conspiracy theories. And some people would have you believe that if Scott Dam, which is in Lake County, if it comes out, that somehow the Mendocino in the North Bay lose their water, that's totally untrue. Completely untrue. And we are moving forward simultaneously with new infrastructure to maintain that run of the river diversion as this other infrastructure comes out.