On March 28, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission released a long-awaited draft environmental impact statement regarding the relicensing process for Shawmut Dam on the Kennebec River in Maine, as well as for license amendments for three other dams on the river. 

This process provides an opportunity to significantly improve upstream passage for federally endangered Atlantic salmon, as well as a host of co-evolved species, including Atlantic sturgeon, shad, alewives and river herring. While fish passage proposals by the dam-owning power company — and OK'd by FERC in the draft EIS — are an improvement over the current situation, the proposals fall short of what is needed to ensure restoration of the river's salmon population. The plan calls for construction of fishway bypasses at two dams, and use of mechanical fish lifts at the other two dams. Bypasses are effective but mechanical fish lifts have proven to be inadequate in meeting fish passage goals elsewhere.

Trout Unlimited and other advocates for improving conditions for migrating fish on the Kennebec also call for decreasing the size of screens to protect out-migrating fish from the current 2 inches to half of an inch.