The wonders of California’s Yosemite valley are familiar to visitors from all over the world: the towering granite face of El Capitan, soaring more than 1 000 metres above the valley floor, the fractured-looking Half Dome, the plummeting waters of Bridalveil Falls. But few of the 3.3 million visitors to Yosemite every year have heard of the national park’s other wonders, the imposing granite rock face of Kolana, or the twin waterfalls of Wapama and Tueeulala in neighbouring Hetch Hetchy valley.
The reason is simple: Hetch Hetchy valley lies beneath 90m of water, kept in place by the concrete wall of the O’Shaughnessy dam. But a movement to remove the dam and return the valley to its natural splendour is gaining momentum. Spurred on by a review initiated by the California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, activists are optimistic that one of the most controversial building projects undertaken in the western US may soon be reversed.
In 1913, two decades after Yosemite was dedicated as a national park, Congress agreed to build a dam to provide water and power for San Francisco, about 270km away. That decision, which pitted the interests of industry and economic growth against the environment and quality of life, remains as controversial today as it was almost 100 years ago.
The Hetch Hetchy valley is a serene spot. Granite rock formations tower over the reservoir, the burnt orange bark and pale green leaves of manzanita trees mingle with firs, bracken and even grapevines at the water’s edge. One end of the 14-and-a-half kilometre long reservoir is dominated by the concrete hulk of the dam and the sound of water rushing into the Tuolumne river. Signs inform visitors that dogs, bikes, swimming and boating are forbidden, and the gates are locked at sunset.
Spreck Rosekrans, co-author of Paradise Regained, a report published last year by the pressure group Environmental Defence that puts the case for the removal of the dam and the restoration of Hetch Hetchy, said: ”This valley here was really one of the first great conservation struggles in the world. It was one of the first times that people said wait, maybe we don’t want progress like this.”
The battle in 1913 involved an Irishman, Michael ”The Chief” O’Shaughnessy, the civil engineer who gives the dam its official name, and a Scot, John Muir, credited as the father of the US national park system.
Muir, who described himself as ”a poetico-trampo-geologist-botanist-and-ornithologist-naturalist etc etc”, is credited with bringing the glories of Hetch Hetchy and Yosemite to the attention of California and the world. The Hetch Hetchy valley, he declared, ”is a grand landscape garden, one of nature’s rarest and most precious mountain temples”.
But his efforts to prevent it being flooded were in vain. ”Woe is he and thee and me and all the world’s beauty lovers that such dollar-dotted tangles should approach our sacred Sierra temple,” wrote Muir. He died the year after construction of the dam was approved.
The first serious proposal to remove the dam came in 1987 from an unexpected quarter: Donald Hodel, President Ronald Reagan’s secretary of the interior. With no viable alternative source for water or power, Hodel’s suggestion was dismissed. But in the intervening years analysis, including computer models, has suggested that removal of the dam would have little impact on water or energy provision.
Environmental Defence says that by diverting water from other dams, 95% of the water and 73% of the power provided by Hetch Hetchy would be retained. It puts the cost of the scheme at a maximum of $1,65-billion.
Critics counter that the true cost is closer to $10-billion, and that the notion that the power shortfall could be made up by conservation and the development of gas and solar power is naive. One of few visitors to the dam on a weekday last week, Ed Andersen, from the San Francisco area, had little time for the arguments of environmentalists. ”My theory is that if people want to look at the valley they should put them on a nice cruise boat, take them up the valley and they can take all the photos they want.”
The dam’s owner, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, dismisses proposals to remove one of its assets. ”You have to balance nostalgia against the practical reality of present-day California,” said Tony Winnicker of the commission. ”We are in a state where water is the most precious resource.”
The commission is negotiating a $4,3-billion programme to improve its ageing water system. Proponents of the dam’s removal say that this presents a unique opportunity to do away with it. But, said Winnicker, ”It comes down to priorities. Is that the one place you would spend $10-billion in the next 20 years?”
However, Ron Good, executive director of the pressure group Restore Hetch Hetchy, believes the campaigners will win. ”There’s one thing Americans can agree on, whether libertarians, Republicans or whatever,” he said. ”They want what’s best for our national parks. Just knowing that it is there is very important to many Americans, even if they never go there.” – Guardian Unlimited Â