Back in 1878 the channel was deepened to 20 feet, and in the 60’s it was dredged even deeper to 40ft. But as ships became larger in order to carry more cargo in the late 1980s, trade with the rest of the world forced officials to take action. In 1989, Portland and five other ports including Vancouver, St Helens, Woodland, Kalama and Longview, asked the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to conduct a feasibility study. In 2003, the USACE estimated that the costs for the Columbia River Channel Improvement project would be USD134 million for two years of construction starting in 2005, which would provide a return of USD1.71 in economic benefits for every taxpayer dollar spent. It asked Congress for funding and the States of Washington and Oregon, which used state lottery bonds, each contributed USD27.7 million. But by 2005, when construction started, the price for the project rose to USD151 million and the economic cost-benefit fell to USD1.66. As the project is drawing to a close by the end of this year, the environmental and economic promises of the [now] USD184.7 million-project has been costly, especially in a global economy that has resulted in a huge decline in international trade. This decline has also seen fewer ships using the River and those larger ships that Oregon and Washington leaders were counting on may not arrive, putting the economic benefits of deepening the channel even further in doubt.
Environmental concerns
Before the project started there was concern about the impact the works would have on the environment, ranging from harming fish to boosting salt-water intrusion to increasing contaminants in the river’s estuary. And although monitoring will continue for another three years, until now, contamination has been low and fish damage minimal. Other environmental aspects of the dredging works were also a concern. Initially, the USACE agreed to 736 acres of mitigation work to compensate for dumping dredged sand and rock onto farmlands, forests and wetlands. In the end, only 352 acres were completed. The Columbia River is home to 13 endangered or threatened salmon. Therefore, USACE agreed to around 4,000 acres of restoration work, in addition to some projects to address damage marshes and other fish habitat from past dredging. To date, only 700 of those 4,000 acres have been restored or are in process. Another 600 acres were dropped, while the remaining 2,700 acres are pending. It’s not clear if they will be completed. The reason for this was simple, after regulators approved the plans it encountered a lot of opposition from fishermen, landowners and state and federal agencies. Sport anglers opposed converting a bay on to a tidal marsh, while gill netters and others opposed work on fishing grounds, saying it would harm fishing. Farmers and landowners opposed projects to convert farmland to wildlife habitat. In addition, only one in five proposals to retrofit tide-gates to allow fish into 38 miles of Columbia River has gone through. In response to the opposition, the USACE and the port authorities concentrated their efforts on mitigation work, restoring wetlands and forests for endangered Columbia white-tailed deer on port-owned Cottonwood Island near Rainier instead. But for those in opposition and concerned about the environment the actions of USACE are clear – the mitigation projects address specific damage and were legally required, while the restoration projects weren’t.
Trade
When the works are completed the Columbia River would be 43 feet deep, which is still too shallow and cannot compete with the neighbouring deep-water ports of Seattle, Tacoma or Vancouver BC, which play host to today’s larger vessels and more efficiently send Northwest wheat and steel to markets around the globe. But the global economic downturn might have given the ports on the Columbia River an advantage as shipping lines save money by minimising not only port calls but also using smaller ships. For example Columbia Grain and other bulk exporters will be able to load their holds more fully once the project is done. New investments along the River show that a deeper channel will lure new business. Asian demand for American soybeans was non-existent back in the 1980s. Now, the soybean trade is driving projects like a new USD200 million grain terminal in Longview, a joint venture backed by Japanese and Korean investors, the country’s first in 25 years!
There might be one small concern left. With the expansion of the Panama Canal in 2014 and with economies picking up again shipping lines might to larger ships again and the Columbia River can’t get deeper anytime soon…