Klamath water deal reached

But critics, including Hunter, suggested that the deal could prompt PacifiCorp to lay its money on winning renewal from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The commission is expected to follow the lead of U.S. wildlife agencies, which have required the company to build fish ladders over the dams. Those ladders could cost up to $300 million and might not work. Several studies suggest it would be cheaper for the company to demolish the dams and find alternative power.

The Klamath River Basin has been an epicenter of the fight over dwindling water in the West for a decade.

In the drought year of 2001, worries about endangered fish prompted the federal government to cut back water to farmers, igniting a heated summerlong protest.

The next year farmers won more water, but environmentalists blamed a cutback in river flows for the death of 70,000 salmon.

By 2006, the river's chinook salmon population had declined so much that federal officials sharply cut back the commercial fishing season, spreading dismay to coastal communities.

At the same time, those representing the Klamath region's competing interests began trying to settle their differences behind closed doors. Meeting roughly once a month, they quarreled in secret but slowly reached the consensus that yielded the final draft released Tuesday.

Farmers won the three prime concessions they had sought. The agreement establishes water deliveries they can live with: more in wet years, less in dry. It provides $40 million toward subsidized power to run irrigation pumps and develop renewable energy to replace the electricity they now get from PacifiCorp's hydropower dams. And it assuages their concerns that the reappearance of endangered salmon won't end up shutting down farms in the upper basin "if and when the fish get up here," said Greg Addington of the Klamath Water Users Assn.

Steve Rothert of American Rivers, one of several environmental groups that endorsed the deal, said he was confident that even with guaranteed water for farming, the agreement guarantees adequate flows in the river to help salmon rebound.

"We are on the cusp of ending decades-long disputes and charting a better future for farmers, tribes, fishermen and all the communities that depend on a healthy Klamath River," he said.

The dissenting environmental groups disagree, saying the agreement cements promises to farmers that in dry years could rob the river of water needed to sustain the salmon and other fish.

"What began as an effort to help salmon and remove dams has turned into a plan to farm American taxpayers," said Steve Pedery of Oregon Wild, the other dissenting group.

He said the plan also institutionalizes "large-scale commercial agriculture" on 22,000 acres in Klamath wildlife refuges, which his group has fought to see reserved just for birds.

The plan goes far beyond fixing the river. It calls, for instance, for the purchase of a 90,000-acre tract for the Klamath Tribes of Oregon for use as a reservation.

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eric.bailey@latimes.com