Auburn Dam - Legacy

Legacy

Since its inception, hundreds of millions of dollars have been poured into the Auburn Dam project, but no further work has been done since the 1980s. However, the Bureau of Reclamation continues to list the Auburn as a considered alternative for the future of its Auburn-Folsom South Unit project. As of now, massive evidence of the dam's construction still remain in the North Fork American River canyon, specifically the excavations for the abutments and spillway, with the consequences of increased erosion.

In recent decades, California has been struck with a severe series of droughts. In order to facilitate continued deliveries of water to the thirsty southern half of the state, the Central Valley and State Water Projects have been forced to cut water supplies for agriculture in much of the San Joaquin Valley. Annual deficits of water in the state are projected to rise from 1,600,000 acre feet (2,000,000 dam³) in 1998 to an estimated 2,900,000 acre feet (3,600,000 dam³) by 2025. The state has proposed three or four solutions to the shortfall. One, the Peripheral Canal, would facilitate water flow from the water-rich north to the dry south, but has never been built due to environmental concerns. The raising of Shasta Dam on the Sacramento or New Melones Dam on the Stanislaus, or the building of Sites Reservoir, has also been proposed. Lastly, the Auburn Dam has also been revived in light of this. According to supporters, it would cause the least environmental destruction of the multitude of choices, and would give the most reliable water yield, regardless of its skyrocketing costs.

In part as an alternative to Auburn Dam project, flood control for the lower American River is being improved through the $1 billion Joint Federal Project (a collaboration of the US Bureau of Reclamation and the US Army Corps of Engineers) at Folsom Dam which adds a new lower spillway and strengthens the eight dikes that serve as part of the dam. Additional work proposed includes a possible raise of Folsom Dam several feet to improve its flood control and storage capacity. Key levees downstream have also been improved for flood control in the Sacramento area by the US Army Corps of Engineers and the Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency. Sugar Pine Reservoir, an auxiliary component of the Auburn-Folsom South Project upstream in the watershed, was transferred in title by the Bureau of Reclamation to Foresthill Public Utility District in 2003. As a result of a court decision in 1990 (Hodge Decision), the uses of Reclamation's Folsom South Canal changed further when the Freeport Project came online in 2011 to redivert water supplies for East Bay Municipal Utility District and Sacramento County Water Agency from the Sacramento River instead of from the canal via the lower American River, thereby reducing the need for additional supplies from Auburn Dam to the American River. Anticipated diversions from the Folsom South Canal had previously been reduced when the Sacramento Municipal Utility District decommissioned its Rancho Seco nuclear facility in 1989 and no longer required large quantities of cooling water from the canal.

A pumping station to supply water to the Placer County Water Agency was built in 2006 on the Middle Fork American River, supplying 100 cubic feet per second (2.8 m3/s) to a northwest-running pipeline, eliminating the need for Auburn Dam for this supply. The capacity of the station is eventually expected to be upgraded to 225 cubic feet per second (6.4 m3/s). By 2006, the Bureau of Reclamation itself began to restore the dam site, which then had been untouched for more than a decade. The river diversion tunnel was sealed but not filled in, and the remnants of the construction site in the riverbed as well as the remains of the cofferdam excavated out of the canyon. After the riverbed was leveled and graded, an artificial riverbed with manmade Class III rapids was constructed to channel the river through the site. The restoration project also included the construction of other recreational amenities in the Auburn site. This act was seen as the final step of decommissioning the Auburn project and shelving it forever.