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View Full Version : Auburn Dam Controversy?



Bduck
12-31-2009, 10:46 AM
As some of you know, I come from Sacramento. I left there in Nov 97' due to military installation(McClellan AFB) closures. Over the yrs that I lived there, there was a proposed issue of building a dam in the foothills near Auburn east of Sacramento. This issue had died long before I moved on. I have seen some of the prep work that was done in preperation of this project going through back as far as the early 80's. There was a bridge built across one of the canyons that was going to be part of the new lake. The bridge also connected two towns, Forest Hill & Auburn. The proposed dam that was to be built died after it was discovered that it would be built near an earth quake fault line. Northern Cal. supplies an abundant of water to southern Cal by way of a aqua duct system that the state poored million$ into. Now they have been needing more water up north. If this dam were built, northern Cal would have once again a abundant water supply, an excellent fishery, possible a good blue ribbon Kokanee reservoir with seeing how deep this lake was going to be. Its amazing how I read posts on this forum of how one state(Colorado) needs water and that would be tapping the Flaming Gorge, in 2 other states, for it, and another state(Calif.) can't build dams because of earth quakes. We are witnessing alot of bridge repair work all across our great land for earth quake proofing. Some buildings as well. But with knowledge that our engineers hold and the "modern marvels" that we possess here, politicians are always going to stand in the way. I guess its true Calif is a big disaster waiting to happen and the rest of us will have beach front property. I know Calif is broke right now but it will eventually recover. Is there a possibility in the future of the Auburn Dam being revived? BTW, that bridge is still there.

SuperD
12-31-2009, 12:11 PM
When I was in college, my geology class studied the proposed Auburn dam project. I don't know if it was just the professor skewing the results but our findings were that the dam would silt up in a very short period of time. I think it was less than a 100 years. I'm also not a biologist but hear people always crying about tearing down dams to restore habitat. My uneducated opinion would be that we can't have too many dams and water storage should be our ultimate goal here in CA. With the largest population of our state living in a desert and wanting water from northern CA, I can't see how we can let run off get away.

FishwithGary
01-02-2010, 12:50 PM
I'm with you on this one. And it will never happen.

Gary

Bduck
01-03-2010, 09:46 AM
Unfortunately the Auburn Dam is something that is not going to happen. Silting up is an age old problem that we face with alot of reservoirs. I remember reading an article on the Flaming Gorge about a silting problem. What about dredging? As our populations grow throughout this country, the demand for fresh water keeps climbing higher. Of all the water(2/3 water) that covers this planet, only a small fraction of that is fresh, only 3% fresh. Now, that makes it even less in Calif. Other states have a little more & some have less as well. Runoff is too precious to let get away. The future holds for us desalination plants all along our coast lines. Some third world countries have them. crymeariver