The Columbia River Team is charged with leading the Sierra Club’s work on the Columbia River Treaty and the reintroduction of salmon to the Upper Columbia River Basin. Our primary goals are to:
(1) Add the health of the river (“Ecosystem Function”) to the Columbia River Treaty as a third primary purpose co-equal with hydropower generation and flood risk management.
(2) Reform treaty governance and implementation structures to support this new mandate.
(3) Support tribes in their work to reintroduce salmon into the Upper Columbia watershed past Chief Joseph, Grand Coulee, and other dams.
(4) Work towards establishing an International River Basin Organization (IRBO) for watershed governance that will facilitate multijurisdictional, transboundary dialog and action on water- related issues not covered by the Columbia River Treaty.
We are a member of the U.S. NGO Columbia River Treaty Caucus alongside a half dozen other organizations that share our goals (see shared campaign website at www.ColumbiaRiverTreaty.org). We also coordinate the international Columbia River Roundtable forum, which exists to build and connect a community of the Columbia by working together respectfully and networking across the international boundary. We have also made presentations to other Grassroots Network groups. Our team members connect our work with the four Northwest State Chapters: Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana (in addition to liaising with allies in British Columbia, Canada).
In 2013, thousands of Sierra Club members joined with 15 tribes and other NGOs in asking our federal government to add Ecosystem Management (health of the river) as a third primary treaty purpose co-equal with hydropower and flood-risk management. As a result, federal agencies (BPA and the Army Corps of Engineers) adopted this in their Regional Recommendations to the U.S. State Department. In our work, Sierra Club is working as part of Save Our Wild Salmon (SOS), a coalition of NGOs.
In 2018, Canada and the U.S. began negotiations. Canada included First Nations in its negotiating team; the U.S. State Department did not include tribes as part of American negotiating team.
Here’s a brief review of recent developments:
After 19 rounds and six years of formal negotiation, teams from Canada and the United States reached an Agreement-In-Principle (AIP) last July. If finalized – now a big if - the new Columbia River Treaty will guide shared management of the Columbia River through 2044. The treaty primarily concerns the operation of three large storage dams in the Canadian Columbia Basin – but has major impacts on Basin-wide fish, river health, hydropower, flood protection, agriculture, navigation, fishing, and recreation, through its control of downstream flows.
We judged the AIP inadequate. It fails to elevate Ecosystem Function, the health of the river, as a new primary treaty purpose, and did not meaningfully elevate voices for the river (such as tribes and/or federal agencies with river health mandates and expertise) in treaty governance. The AIP does include some modest steps forward for river health and justice, which are now frozen.
The countries’ negotiating teams were unable to move from the AIP to a final agreement and get it ratified by the Senate before President Trump took office. Amidst unprecedented tensions in the U.S.-Canada relationship, it has been reported that President Trump’s discussions with Canada have included (among many other items) a demand for treaty changes, presumably diverging from the AIP. This raises the prospect the Administration may take a unilateral approach, upending the Agreement in Principle. Over the years, the U.S. Negotiating Team has consulted with key Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle, especially Senators Risch (R-ID) and Cantwell (D-WA). Senator Risch is now chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which would oversee treaty ratification.
We understand that treaty negotiations are presently frozen. In the meantime, treaty operations of the river are guided by a set of Interim Agreements that were implemented last fall. The Interim Agreements advance a narrow subset of provisions from the AIP that give some near-term certainty to power and flood control. All other provisions, including the modest river health benefits, are frozen, and now depend on future negotiations.
Treaty flood control operations shifted in September 2024 from a pre-planned “assured” system to an ad hoc “called upon” system that will shift more flood protection responsibility to storage reservoirs in the U.S., with negative impacts, such as deeper reservoir drawdowns and reduced or mis-timed flows for salmon, in certain water years. This shift has been partially cushioned through 2027 under the Interim Agreements, which guarantee some Canadian flood control storage (60% less than before) for three years.
The Columbia Basin is an international watershed. Its management requires international collaboration. We are concerned that the Administration does not understand this, and is abandoning what progress has been made in recent years, while damaging necessary Columbia River relationships with Canada, British Columbia, and First Nations. Canadian leaders have clearly stated that their first choice is still to finalize a modernized Columbia River Treaty with the U.S. based on the AIP. However, if the U.S. fails to return to treaty negotiations in good faith, it is possible that Canada will eventually issue a notice of Treaty termination and/or otherwise move towards management of the Columbia that is not coordinated with the U.S. or informed by shared goals.
Select recent media coverage:
- March 29 story in The Columbian: “Pause in Columbia River Treaty talks stokes worry…”
- March 27 op-ed in Spokesman-Review: “Protecting our relationship with Canada protects us all”
- April 3 Canadian op-ed in Vancouver Sun: “Trump's talk of a Canadian "faucet" has Columbia River Basin residents on edge”
- For those of you wanting a deeper dive, the Province of B.C. hosted a recorded hour-long webinar with its First Nations partners on March 25th.
Our near-term priorities are to:
● Monitor upcoming dam operations, including the first year of flood risk management under the Interim Agreements instead of the pre-2024 treaty.
● Monitor U.S.-Canada relations and watch for a restart of treaty negotiations, or not.
● Keep allies, and Northwest Congressional and governors’ offices, informed, and maintain regular contact with Canadian conservation and community voices, and with provincial and First Nation governments.
● Explore public education and grassroots power building opportunities.
Here is the status of action on the treaty from the Canadian Columbia River Treaty Delegation
A new video explaining the AIP is now available. It features members of the Canadian Columbia River Treaty negotiation delegation describing the different elements in the AIP under the themes of flood risk management, Canadian flexibility, hydropower and transmission, compensation, and ecosystem health and Indigenous values. We encourage you to watch and share with others.
A link to the video and details about the virtual information session are also on the B.C. Columbia River Treaty AIP webpage, along with a Backgrounder on the AIP and answers to frequently asked questions.