There’s good news for whitewater kayakers in Vermont, as whitewater releases are set to begin from Vermont’s Green River Dam for the first time in 15 years.
The whitewater advocacy group American Whitewater announced today that—along with the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), Trout Unlimited, and Vermont Natural Resources Council—they’ve reached an agreement with Morrisville Water and Light, the owner of a hydropower dam on the Green River, to implement state water quality requirements, including whitewater releases from the Green River Dam in Morrisville.
American Whitewater officials said that the agreement with the dam owner comes after more than 15 years of advocacy for whitewater releases led by American Whitewater and the Vermont Paddlers Club. The agreement to implement Vermont’s Clean Water Act conditions on Morrisville’s federal hydropower license include requirements for minimum flows, reservoir stabilization, and whitewater releases.
American Whitewater has worked to secure whitewater releases on the Green River since it helped conduct a controlled-flow whitewater boating study in 2011 that documented the importance of the remote and challenging whitewater run between the Green River Reservoir and the Lamoille River.
The group successfully appealed to the Vermont Supreme Court a decision by DEC opposing whitewater releases, and in a first of its kind decision, the Supreme Court required scheduled (timed) releases on the Green.
American Whitewater officials said years of delays followed as Morrisville unsuccessfully challenged Vermont’s Clean Water Act requirements in federal court. They said Morrisville even threatened to decommission and remove the Green River Dam and drain the reservoir adjacent to Vermont’s Green River Reservoir State Park.
But, after 15 years of court battles, Morrisville has agreed to implement Vermont’s hydropower license conditions while the state of Vermont has agreed to conduct a post-license analysis of its Green RIver Reservoir stabilization requirement. The exact timing of the whitewater releases is still being worked out.
