When Tacoma Power combined power generation with transportation, it benefited people and fish – and netted a national award.
Today, the utility won its third straight Outstanding Stewards of America’s Waters Award from the National Hydropower Association. The award, honoring the North Fork Skokomish Powerhouse, is for Operational Excellence.
Working in partnership with the Skokomish Indian Tribe and natural resource agencies, Tacoma Power designed the unique system to use water discharged from turbines to attract migrating adult fish into a collector. The new fish collection and transportation facility re-opens fish passage on the North Fork Skokomish in Mason County, which has been blocked since the two Cushman dams were built in the late 1920s.
The North Fork Skokomish Powerhouse and Fish Facility:
- Provides clean, renewable energy for 1,700 Northwest homes
- Supports upstream and downstream fish passage for coho, spring chinook, steelhead and sockeye salmon
“Tacoma Power remains at the forefront of innovation,” said National Hydropower Association Executive Director Linda Church Ciocci. “Their efforts to re-establish the endangered salmon and steelhead populations upstream of their projects while increasing clean, reliable hydropower generation are the definition of good water stewardship.”