Two dams are coming down on California’s Eel River. Will it threaten water supplies?
… Over the next several years, Pacific Gas and Electric Co., the current owner of the Potter Valley Project, is planning to retire the hydroelectric plant and remove two dams on the Eel River that provide water for the facility. With power production shut down, tunneling water into the Russian River won’t be necessary. … The Potter Valley Project provides a portion of the water supply for large swaths of Mendocino and Sonoma counties. … Scores of vineyards here are tethered to water rights that are subject to restriction when river levels drop. During the recent drought, hundreds of water-rights holders were forced to stop pumping — a scenario many believe was a preview of a future where the Eel River doesn’t continue to supplement the Russian.