- Editor’s note: Reporting for this story is supported by a grant from the Upper Kern River Fisheries Enhancement Fund.
More than two dozen people gathered recently in a Forest Service conference room in Kernville and online to sift through the details of reams of studies about how Southern California Edison’s Kern River No. 3 power plant affects everything from frogs to fishing.
The studies are part of Edison’s application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to relicense the 40 megawatt plant. Its current license, issued in 1996, expires in 2026.
No detail from the mound of studies was too minute to escape the attention of the assembled anglers, boaters, river advocates and Native American tribe representatives.
Before the parties got into hashing through the studies, however, David Laughing Horse Robinson, representing the Kawaiisu tribe, insisted the entire process was illegal and needed to be stopped.
He said he and his tribe were never notified, nor consulted, about the relicensing application, something that needs to be first on the to-do list.
“No consultation’s taken place so this can’t take place,” Robinson said at the meeting held Oct. 23. “You should stall everything until we are caught up.”
Edison and FERC representatives at the meeting pledged to meet with Robinson separately to bring the Kawaiisu tribe up to speed and make sure their concerns are included in the record.
“If you’d heard that as many times as I have, you’d know it’s not true,” Robinson responded.
He had numerous questions about Edison’s studies on how plant operations affect cultural resources, trail access, recreation, cold water fish populations, vegetation and much more.
Martin Ostendorf, Edison’s manager of hydro relicensing, promised to meet with Robinson and assured the group at large there would be more than enough time for everyone to comment on individual studies and the relicensing in general, which will likely take another year or more.
It’s a long process with a number of steps still to go, he said.
Right now, the public has the opportunity to ask for more studies, or that existing studies be modified to include more information. Public comments are being accepted through Dec. 10.
The studies can be found on Edison’s website at https://www.sce.com/regulatory/hydro-licensing/kr3 under “Relicensing Documents.”
Comments of 6,000 words or fewer may be made at: https://ferconline.ferc.gov/QuickComment.aspx using Docket Number P-2290-122. Longer comments with attachments may be made here: https://ferconline.ferc.gov/eRegistration.aspx
The Kern River Boaters have followed the process avidly with particular concern to minimum flows alloted to the river. Under the current license minimum flows are 40 cubic feet per second in winter months, then 100 to 130 cfs May through August.
That’s not enough, boaters say.
They provided their own minimum flow study using the California Environmental Flows Framework that recommends minimum flows of 195 cfs in winter, 335 cfs in spring and 230 cfs in late summer and fall.
During the study meeting in Kernville Brett Duxbury, with Kern River Boaters, grilled researchers on river temperatures and dissolved oxygen above and below Edison’s diversion point at Fairview Dam, among other points.
Other participants, including representatives for the Forest Service, California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Kern River Fly Fishers, weighed in as well.
After the public comment period closes Dec. 10, FERC will make a determination on which studies need updating.
The next big step in the process is that Edison will file its Final License Application Nov. 30. There is no public comment period for that document. At some point in the future, FERC will say whether the final application is adequate and then some time after that, will start the NEPA process.