Ken Salazar

The utility company that owns four dams on the Klamath River in Oregon has reached a deal with federal and state officials, as well as an alliance of non-governmental parties, to remove the dams as part of a larger plan to restore the river and its salmon runs as well as help farmers in the area.

Matthew Preusch of the Oregonian writes that after months of closed-door discussions, the groups have agreed on a dam-removal plan for the Upper Klamath basin. Disputes over diminishing water levels and mass fish die-offs have pressured PacifiCorp to abolish the dams that fragment the river, which runs from southern Oregon to the California coast.

While environmental groups such as Oregon Wild have long called for removal of the Klamath River dams, they're not exactly keen on the entire basin plan. Perhaps that is because part of the deal exempts PacifiCorp from any liability, should unexpected environmental clean up costs occur.

American Rivers issued a press release saying the pact "sets in motion (the) world's largest river restoration."

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has already sang his praises to the plan, but Congress has until 2012 to decide whether the dam deal can be done. This includes allocating $500 million for the removals -- $250 million of which must come from the California legislature, whose budget has seen better days.

-- Natasha Walker

Sportsmen, businesses and conservationists in Alaska banded together this week to send a letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar requesting he block a plan that would open nearly 1 million acres to potential oil and gas leasing and mining, reports Elizabeth Bluemink of the Anchorage Daily News. The plan to open federal land in the Bristol Bay region would harm rivers and streams that support already-troubled populations of salmon, the groups say.

The Bureau of Land Management is behind the plan to open the land, although studies it issued last year indicate the nearly 1 million acres "didn't appear to contain valuable resources." This has many questioning the validity of the studies, since the land is downriver from the highly-valuable proposed Pebble Mine. Critics ask: If the land doesn't have viable mineral deposits, why open it to mining?

The BLM says reasons to keep the land closed are outdated. The 1971 Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act created native corporations in Alaska and allowed them to select parcels of holdings before anyone else could stake claims. Now that most of the parcels have been divvied up, the BLM doesn't see the point in waiting longer before leasing remaining lands. Those in favor of opening the land counter that the sportfishermen wouldn't have hooks if it wasn't for mining.

It all comes down to resource value. Competing interests for mines, dams, recreation and wildlife habitat have been exacerbated by recent concerns over salmon population declines throughout the Pacific Northwest. This has led to some surprising partnerships, like the one between loggers and environmentalists as InvestigateWest reported earlier.