Hearings to examine S.1034

Okay, the subcommittee will come to order. Today we're holding our first hearing of the subcommittee on Water and Power. I want to thank the ranking member, Senator Wyden, for joining me and for the members that are here now and will be joining us. I want to begin by saying that Senator Wyden and I have worked together on a number of things related to energy. So and he might even comment on that. I had him out in North Dakota, but I'll let him mention that. Today obviously we're talking about water and power. Water access is fundamental to quality of life. For families, it means safe drinking water when they turn on the tap. For farmers and ranchers, it means the ability to grow crops and raise livestock. For communities, it means the opportunity to attract businesses and grow. Western states face unique challenges in reliable access and delivery of water. I'm going to be intrigued here to see if my staff put in what we all know, and that is that whiskey's for drinking and water is for fighting. But we'll see if they got it in there. Just in case I wanted to reference it. But it does, it's an old saying, but it does have real meaning and that is, you know, water is so important to everyone across the country. So incredibly important issue and a challenging issue. And these challenges include all regions of the country and rural population center, areas that are very wet, areas that have drought. It affects all of us. In North Dakota, we understand these challenges very well. Our state has long worked to manage both floods and drought, sometimes in the same year, which requires a close relationship with our federal partners, including the Bureau of Reclamation on critical water supply projects in our state. Today we'll be hearing testimony from the Bureau of Reclamation and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on a number of bills, including a priority for my home state to reauthorize the Dakota Water Resources Act, which I want to thank Senator Padilla for joining me on. Appreciate very much. This bill provides much needed authorizations to provide more reliable drought resilient water supplies for North Dakota and the five tribal nations located in our state. Also, it will support completion of two key regional water supply projects, the Northwest Area Water Supply Project serving Minot and surrounding communities, and the Eastern North Dakota Alternate Water Supply Project helping to serve communities in the Red River Valley of the North. North Dakota has yet to fully realize the promise of over a million acres of irrigation as compensation for the loss of approximately 550,000 acres of prime farmland permanently flooded by federal water projects under the Pick-Sloan Flood Control Act of 1944. Access to clean, reliable, and affordable water supplies is a quality of life issue and our legislation is consistent with historical federal promise to the state and tribes upon construction of the Garrison Dam and Lake Oahe. Senator Wyden did get to the Williston Basin, but he did not get to Lake Sakakawea, which is a 100 mile long man-made lake which competes with some of the other reservoirs to hold the most water of any reservoir in the United States. And of course is incredibly important not just to our state, but to states downstream all the way down to the end of the Missouri River, which of course joins the Mississippi in St. Louis or just south of there. So with that, I look forward to hearing from our witnesses this morning and I would like to turn the microphone over to Senator Wyden for his opening comments.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and it is good to be back working with you. We have worked together on a host of things, transportation issues and energy issues, and I recall being invited to North Dakota. I was glad to be able to come when I was chairman of this committee. It's a wonderful committee and I believe I was introduced to the Walleye Caucus or something close to that because I was told that as I navigated all these great lakes and whatnot, I would have some terrific walleye and that was in fact correct. So if I can wangle an invitation to come back, I will do it. It was a good trip. What the chairman is doing is particularly important to the West right now. And if I were to sum it up, Western states are facing a devastating one-two punch: historic drought and record low snowpack. And I have town hall meetings in every one of my counties, have more than 1,100 of them, and I'm heading out to the rural part of the state here shortly and I know that the dominant question will be those two topics and what the chairman has smartly agreed to look into, which is the question of how are we going to get strong federal leadership and smart policy when it comes to water management. Western drought and the federal government seems to have taken a back seat on these issues and communities in the West are suffering. For example, one of the areas that we feel very strongly about is the Klamath River Basin in Southern Oregon. It's an example of why strong leadership and good policy are so critical. The federal government has a responsibility to safeguard water infrastructure, meet tribal obligations, and protect water access. In the Klamath, decades of conflict have shown what happens when that leadership falls short. The communities, the tribes, and ranchers have paid a big price. The Colorado River is another example of why strong federal leadership is so critical. Sustainable solutions require strong federal engagement and consistent funding. I was proud that last Congress, this committee passed a law that I wrote that's already delivering real results to communities along the Klamath. It's important that we step up and do more. For Western communities, the combination of farmers and ranchers and tribes and families means that you have to provide certainty to a whole host of important community concerns. Those are individuals who need the reassurance of knowing that the people representing them are doing everything they can to protect this critical water resource. They simply can't go from year to year lurching about trying to figure out where reservoir levels are going to be and are they going to collapse or are agreements going to unravel. So I just want to briefly mention two pieces of legislation, Mr. Chairman. First, I have a bill that brings the private sector to measuring watershed results. It's called the Watershed Results Act and it takes the current outdated approach to this question of really getting value for scarce dollars on its head. It's a pilot approach that pays for performance projects are going to benefit from. If you're making real results on water supply reliability and watershed health, you in effect go to the head of the program. Taxpayers deserve to know that money is producing real on the ground results. Under the current system, huge sums of money head out the door without enough safeguards to ensure that it's being put to good enough use. I don't want the record to show that David is nodding his head in agreement, but I do want to tell seriously that I do appreciate the fact that we've got two very dedicated civil servants and we look forward to working with them on these issues. The concept for the legislation is simple. If you want to improve your local waterways, great, but demonstrate to us you have the best way of doing it before the taxpayer dollars go out. The other piece of legislation is a bill that I have with Senator Murkowski. When I was chair of the committee, she was the ranking Republican. Pleasure to work with and we have teamed up on DOE's Water Power Technologies Office. I'm going to put into the record a longer description of it, but this really measures what we did with the clean energy tax credits that were really thought up in this committee and passed by the Senate Finance Committee. They basically bring a technology neutral approach to the energy field and we sure need that in terms of water power technologies. Let's reward the private sector again building on the other piece of legislation because it's technologies that we ought to be looking at and I want to give a special thanks to the Oregon State University PacWave project, which allows researchers to test technologies that generate electricity from ocean waves. I'll close with this. Just as we did with the clean energy tax credits, Mr. Chairman, we said nobody really knows what the best producers are going to be 30 years from now. So why not create an opportunity for technological innovation? The Murkowski-Wyden bill allows that. I look forward to working with my colleague and pursuing the bills that you're talking about and I know Senator Padilla is interested in because that's the way we work hands-on all the time, using my basketball analogy, coming to play every single day and I look forward to it.

So is it the Ducks or the Beavers that have the green and yellow that I wore in honor of your state today?

Well, I've already been thinking about my response because the chairman is wearing green and yellow. What we do in our area is we wear green and yellow one day and black and orange the other day. So we cover our bases, but I'm pleased to see the chairman is connecting St. Patrick's Day with the Ducks who have where I went to school and I look forward seriously to working with them.

The Ducks are awesome. This is actually for North Dakota State Bison, but the Ducks are awesome. Senator Padilla, did you have some opening comments? Okay, then we'll go to our witnesses and first we'll hear from David Palumbo, who's the Deputy Commissioner of Operations for the Bureau of Reclamation within the Department of Interior. Mr. Palumbo, thanks for being here and the floor is yours.

Thank you, Chair Hoeven, Ranking Member Wyden, and members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today on behalf of the Department of the Interior. I am David Palumbo, Deputy Commissioner for Operations for the Bureau of Reclamation. Reclamation appreciates your work and we stand ready to work with the subcommittee on these important bills. One of Reclamation's focus bills before the subcommittee of the Reclamation focus bills before the subcommittee today, a number focus on expanding existing or creating new grant programs. Senator Wyden's Watershed Results Act and Senator Hickenlooper's WaterSMART Water Project Navigators Act seeks to improve Reclamation's WaterSMART program, which provides funding and technical assistance to states, tribes, and local entities for water conservation, drought planning, and infrastructure improvements. The bills seek to expand Reclamation's authorities in the form of a new pilot program and new federally funded positions to help entities access federal funding. Senator Padilla's GROW SMART Act amends existing Reclamation authority to fund demonstration projects that promote agricultural water efficiency projects. Reclamation would suggest that each of these new programs could be amended into existing programs to better meet the goals of the legislation. We would like to work with the bill sponsors to that end. Senator Hickenlooper's Snow Water Supply Forecasting Program Reauthorization Act extends and expands Reclamation's work developing multiple snow monitoring technologies to improve forecasts for the benefit of water management. Senator Cortez Masto's Large-Scale Water Recycling Reauthorization Act and Senator Daines' Fort Peck Water System Reauthorization Act extend authorities without the need for additional funding. Senator Padilla's MORE Water Act reauthorizes the large-scale water recycling program as well as other recycling and environmental restoration programs. The MORE Water Act also creates a broad new conveyance program for federal and non-federal projects that expand Reclamation's authorities beyond what are presently funded by Congress. We share the goals of the legislation to increase water supply and conveyance and would like to work further with the bill sponsor. Another bill that establishes a new program is Senator Gallego's Water Security and Drought Resilience Act. The bill reauthorizes and expands the small storage program for five years and creates a new program for natural water retention and release projects. In addition, the bill authorizes the Verde Reservoir sediment mitigation project in Arizona. Reclamation recognizes the importance of this project to promote water supply and resilience in the Colorado River Basin and would like to work with the bill sponsor to promote such opportunities. Senator Daines' Lower Yellowstone River Native Fish Conservation Act and Senator Risch's Urban Canal Modernization Act would both transfer the financial responsibility of addressing infrastructure challenges from local water users to the federal government. In the case of the Lower Yellowstone bypass legislation, the administration wants to work with Senator Daines to address financial concerns from irrigation districts while also ensuring local control by project beneficiaries. On urban canals, the bill seeks to make 35 percent of funding non-reimbursable. Reclamation recognizes the high costs faced by operating partners and would like to work with the bill sponsor to address concerns with increasing federal costs on state and local projects. Senator Hoeven's Dakota Water Resources Act authorizes over a billion dollars for rural and tribal water projects across North Dakota. Senator Thune and Senator Rounds have introduced three bills to conduct feasibility studies on water projects in South Dakota. These bills provide Reclamation with the authority to conduct detailed analysis on the economic, environmental, technical, and legal viability of these projects that impact South Dakota and surrounding states so that Congress can determine how best to move forward in the coming years. Finally, Chairman Lee's bill is related to a feasibility study on various temperature control options at Glen Canyon Dam that will optimize hydropower and prevent entrainment of fish species. We appreciate the chairman's commitment to critical water delivery and hydropower generation at Glen Canyon Dam and Reclamation's facilities across the West. As we approach the 70th anniversary of the Colorado River Storage Project Act, which authorized dams such as Glen Canyon and Flaming Gorge, Reclamation remains committed to the Colorado River Basin and the system of dams and reservoirs that support millions of people. In closing, the Bureau of Reclamation remains committed to managing water in a responsible manner for the American people. Thank you for supporting Reclamation's important work. I would be pleased to answer your questions.

Thank you, Mr. Palumbo. Again, appreciate you being here and your comments and, of course, your responsiveness to the questions from the panel. Next, I'd like to call on Mr. Terry Turpin, Director of the Office of Energy Projects for Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, FERC, within the Department of Energy. Mr. Turpin, thank you for being here.

Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Hoeven, Ranking Member Wyden, and members of the subcommittee. My name is Terry Turpin. I am Director of the Office of Energy Projects at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The office is responsible for taking a lead role in the commission's siting of infrastructure projects, including non-federal hydropower projects, interstate natural gas pipelines and storage facilities, and liquefied natural gas terminals. Thanks for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss current legislative efforts regarding hydropower permitting and the commission's role in oversight of this infrastructure. As a member of the commission's staff, the views I express in this testimony are my own and not necessarily those of the commission or of any individual commissioner. Under the Federal Power Act, or the FPA, non-federal hydropower projects must be licensed by the commission if they are located on a navigable waterway, occupy federal land, use surplus water from a federal dam, or are located on certain waters subject to the commerce clause. In accordance with the FPA, the commission currently regulates over 1,600 non-federal hydropower projects, including over 2,500 dams, representing about 57,000 megawatts of authorized capacity, which is more than half of all the developed hydropower in the United States. The commission serves as the lead agency in all FPA proceedings and prepares the documentation required for each project under the National Environmental Policy Act. Currently, the commission is processing about 187 pending applications, of which approximately 90 percent are for relicenses of existing hydropower projects and about 10 percent are for original licenses or new power generation. Based on the license terms of existing projects, the number of projects that will begin the relicensing process will continue to be high well into the 2030s. Over the next 10 years, more than 410 projects, representing about 41 percent of the commission's licensed projects and about 15 percent of the licensed power production capacity, will begin the pre-filing consultation stages of the relicensing process. Once the commission has issued a license, its role is to provide regulatory oversight of projects during their license term. This post-licensing workload involves ensuring compliance with license requirements, processing requests for extensions of time to comply with those requirements, and processing applications to amend licenses by modifying project facilities or their operations. The commission's post-licensing workload also entails processing requests for license transfers between parties, as well as applications to surrender a project license. During fiscal year 2025, the commission processed 172 extension of time requests, 73 amendments to project facilities and operation, 612 complaints or allegations of non-compliance, and 27 license transfers or applications for the surrender of a project license. Under the FPA, the commission is responsible for ensuring that the water-retaining features of hydropower projects are designed, constructed, operated, and maintained using current engineering standards and that they continue to meet federal guidelines for dam safety. Through regularly scheduled inspections during construction and operation, commission engineers verify that dams meet the stipulated design criteria and identify any necessary remedial modifications or required maintenance. In fiscal year 2025, commission staff to this end conducted 2,085 inspections related to incident response, construction, and operation of dams and completed review of more than 11,000 dam safety-related filings. As the lead agency for FPA hydropower proceedings, the commission has developed processes that take into account and take into consideration the views, recommendations, and conditions provided by federal and state agencies and other stakeholders while also meeting our own statutory obligations to license projects that are best adapted for improving or developing a waterway. Commission staff remains committed to working with all agencies, stakeholders, and Congress to ensure the most effective processing of energy infrastructure matters and would be happy to provide any technical assistance you need as you move forward. Thanks again for inviting me today, and I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you, Mr. Turpin. I see that Senator Daines has joined us and I would ask Senator Daines if you had an opening statement that you would like to make before we go to Q and A.

And I would also note just very briefly that it's very fitting that Senator Daines gets to make an opening statement because I notice that he's retiring and I've enjoyed serving with him greatly. Speech on you.

Well, you're both very kind. Thank you.

Look, Ranking Member, look how young he looks. Doesn't he look young? He looks so young to me. Whatever he's done it was right. So young. Anyway, go ahead if you'd like to make opening statement.

All right. Thank you. You're both very, very kind, Chairman Hoeven and Ranking Member Wyden. It's been an amazing 14 years here on Capitol Hill and I'm energized, encouraged, and grateful for for being a partner in so many important issues here in Washington. But today's agenda, there's four of my bills. The Lower Yellowstone River Native Fish Conservation Act, the Fort Peck Water System Reauthorization Act, the Cooperative Watershed Management Program Reauthorization Act, as well as the Hydropower Licensing Transparency Act with my colleague Senator Cortez Masto. All of these bills have critical impacts on clean water and energy availability in Montana. The Fort Peck Water System Reauthorization Act extends authority to December of 2028 for the Bureau of Reclamation to finalize construction of essential water infrastructure. This project is designed to provide municipal, rural, and industrial water from two interconnected water systems within the Fort Peck Reservation and within Roosevelt, Sheridan, Daniels, and Valley counties. I think it's helpful to remember the semi-arid climate that we have in Montana. DC and Seattle receive about the same amount of rain, about 41 inches a year. In Montana, we get anywhere from 13 to 16 inches of measurable precipitation in a year. And so it's a semi-arid climate and that's why these water projects are so important in really an arid part of the country. The infrastructure is so important. I'm pleased that this bill will help ensure timely completion of the project. My other bill, Senate Bill 3409, the Lower Yellowstone River Native Fish Conservation Act, reaffirms that BOR retains exclusive ownership, operational control, and financial responsibility for the Lower Yellowstone fish bypass channel. This is what we can be very responsible as it relates to stewardship of our fish populations with these important bypasses at the same time being good stewards of our water to allow our farmers and ranchers to continue to support the most significant economic driver in my state, which is agriculture. The Lower Yellowstone irrigation project, located about 70 miles upstream from the Yellowstone Missouri River confluence in eastern Montana, includes an intake diversion dam, a screened headworks structure, 71 miles of main canal, and 225 miles of lateral canals. The project was authorized by the Department of Interior in 1904 to provide irrigation water to approximately 58,000 acres in eastern Montana and western North Dakota. This is where Senator Hoeven's ears perk up because I mentioned North Dakota. It's used to irrigate crops such as sugar beets, alfalfa, wheat, barley, and rye and enables aquifer recharge for well replenishment. In 2007, construction of a 2.1-mile-long bypass channel for fish was authorized to allow the endangered the pallid sturgeon access to upstream spawning grounds. However, irrigators in the region are being expected to take on operation and maintenance responsibility of this extraordinarily expensive bypass channel. I've received dozens of letters from irrigation districts, county commissions, and rural electric co-ops, as well as individual ag producers and the Governor of Montana, Greg Gianforte. I'd like to ask unanimous consent that these be added to the hearing record.

Without objection.

Federal agencies, not the irrigators, should be responsible for ensuring the long-term success of the bypass channel in order to protect the pallid sturgeon, and this bill will do just that. By the way, if I could brag for a moment on what we do in Montana managing fish populations. Once upon a time when I was a little kid growing up, we used to stock our rivers in Montana. We would grow the fish in the hatchery and dump them in the rivers. Fish biologists started to challenge that idea and said would native fish actually be more resistant to disease and would we actually see higher fish populations if we stopped stocking the rivers? It seems counterintuitive. They studied that in the Madison River, which is not far from where I grew up. I was fly fishing the Madison River before Brad Pitt discovered fly fishing with Robert Redford. And they they took a section of the river and they stopped stocking it. And they studied it and they found out the fish populations went up, not down. And they found out that the native fish were more resistant to disease and they weren't as aggressive in feeding on the eggs and so forth during spawning periods. And so Montana no longer stocks its rivers. And our fish populations on a per mile basis are at the highest levels. We're in really good shape. Our fishery is very robust. So this is why I share that because we're very thoughtful and intentional as we think about managing our fish species and like the pallid sturgeon here. And we want to have the bypass channel there, but we've got to make sure our irrigators aren't bearing the burden of the cost of doing that and that we share that to make sure our farmers and ranchers and our fish populations can all thrive. Um, before I close, I want to also recognize Senator Cortez Masto. We have a bill on the agenda, Senate Bill 3500, which would increase transparency in the licensing process for hydropower projects. I have a few letters of support for our bill. I ask unanimous consent to add that to the record as well. Mr. Chairman, I need without objection from you.

Without objection.

Thank you. The companion bill H.R. 3657. See, we didn't beat North Dakota State this year, but somebody else did and he's he's much more compliant now, Chairman, ever since that. That's a good looking tie though you have there. Um, the companion bill H.R.

It's the duck colors.

It's the duck colors. Well, this is bipartisanship breaking out here on the Hill. H.R. 3657 has already passed the House floor by voice vote. I encourage the committee and the Senate to likewise pass the bill by unanimous consent and get it to the President's desk. Mr. Chairman, I've I'm well past my time. Thanks for the extra minute.

That's absolutely fine. Uh, I see that Senator Murkowski, another person who would be an expert I'm sure on fish stocking or not. Um, I mean or not stocking. And we are talking about S-T-O-C-K-I-N-G, not S-T-A-L-K-I-N-G.

True, true, true.

Which Daines does with animals on a regular basis and his wife Cindy does too, I've seen. Pretty effective.

Pretty effective.

Very effective, yes. Um, but if you'd like to make an opening statement, Senator Murkowski.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I I will and I appreciate what you have shared with the committee, Senator Daines, because um as you know, in Alaska, we're pretty proud of our wild wild species that roam our rivers and and we see the same thing. It is the it is the native species that are are heartier, are more resistant. Um, management is is kind of an important thing. We recognize that, but um interesting to hear your comparison. Mr. Chairman, I love the fact that we are before the Water and Power uh subcommittee here this morning. Senator Daines has reminded us that in his home state, it's often relatively arid and as you mentioned your 16 inches. Um, I just harken back to my birthplace, Ketchikan, Alaska, where I checked the average rainfall um for 2025 and it was 160 inches. So just add a zero to your 16, sir.

Senator Murkowski, now you're bragging on me, right?

I don't know. You know, sometimes we we say what's the problem with with these states that don't have ample water because we can't really relate to that. But thus the reason um for the for the two measures that I have before the subcommittee here this morning. And I appreciate both you and the ranking member including um S. 3518, which is the Fair Licensing for Operators of Water Structures Act, as well as S. 3684, the Water Power Research and Development Reauthorization. Senator Wyden is very familiar with that one. But as I mentioned, we we got a lot of water in Alaska. We've got great water resources with the lakes, the rivers. We have some of the strongest tides in the world along the um along the thousands of miles of coastline. Our our tides in Cook Inlet um are right up there with the Bay of Fundy. So we got a lot of strength in our tides. Um, and yet so many of our our coastal communities, um our river communities still rely on diesel. Uh, if you're watching the news right now, diesel is through the roof. Um, but it was already through the roof. You've got communities that are paying over $10 a gallon for their diesel. And so it uh it makes a difference in terms of the impact to our families and our communities. Um, so the FLOWS Act, S. 3518, makes some common sense improvements by hydropower permitting. Right now in the state where you have a small operator, the operator is required to file formal license amendments with FERC for routine maintenance or simple equipment replacements. So keep in mind, these are projects that are are the plans are already approved, the work is relatively minor, the safety uh oversight is is fully intact. But you have operators that are still waiting months and months for approvals and that translates into costs for our small utilities and our communities. So what we do in the FLOWS Act is clarify that routine maintenance, in-kind replacements, and temporary operational adjustments that do not substantially change a project do not require a full licensing amendment. So FERC still retains full authority over dam safety. They can require when changes are needed, but we eliminate some of the red tape that slows the projects down. And I'll I'll tell you, I had an opportunity to go out to a uh a dam project um on the island of of near the community of Sitka and to understand that what they were trying to do was provide for a a a painting, if you will, um uh not for anything other than to just reinforce the dam structure that was already there. That was that was required to go through this this lengthy process just just to repaint. So we look at things like that and say, look, there's got to be a better way. We also address a gap affecting um marine energy technologies. So we establish a modernized licensing pathway for micro hydrokinetic projects. These are the small systems that can harness energy from tides, from waves, and river currents that don't have any dams. Um, if you want to go fishing somewhere, there's a great little uh amazing community in southwestern called Igiugig. Um, it's it's up on the Kvichak River. It's a small population, 68 people. Um, but they have been uh in partnership with Ocean Renewable Power Company and they have been um testing an in-river turbine that generates electricity directly from the current. And every year that that device operates, the community is saving nearly 23,000 gallons of diesel fuel because this is how they get their power if they don't have their in-river. They got a couple solar solar uh panels there. But the turbines have allowed the village to shut off its diesel generators for roughly 275 days a year. That's a huge savings for a small community. And and again, I mentioned this is in an area where there is prolific fishery. Uh, what we have been able to demonstrate through the years of monitoring is more than 100 million sockeye salmon smolts and 10 million adult salmon passing the turbine without observed injury or mortality. I've been out there on site. I've seen this turbine when it's been sitting up waiting to go into the river. I've seen it in the river. This is this is an area where if there is no fish, there is no purpose for the people to be there. So they would be the first one to object if this interfered. And uh it's it's an astonishing project. Others are looking to its potential. But despite this, the project is regulated under the same framework that's designed for a large conventional dam. So think about this. This is this is a small um uh turbine that that sits not on the bottom of the river, but just a little bit above so that you've got flow underneath and flow above um and it's in the river and yet it's being regulated as a larger conventional dam, which doesn't make any sense. So the FLOWS Act creates a licensing process better suited for these small innovative technologies. It establishes clear timelines so developers and communities know um when to expect decisions. The other bill is the one that I'm working with uh ranking member Wyden. I appreciate your good work on this. This this builds on what we have done before in our water power research and development um uh authorization. So we reauthorize DOE's Water Power Technologies Office. This has been instrumental in advancing hydropower and marine energy research, uh including several projects in Alaska. We update the program to reflect where the industry's going. It supports integration with microgrids. It promotes workforce development and domestic manufacturing as well as encouraging research into Arctic operating conditions, ensuring that technologies are designed to work in cold water and ice-prone environments. We also promote collaboration with tribal entities and local stakeholders. Um, really important in in my area where many of our energy projects are developed in partnership with our Alaska Native communities. So two good bills. I think we take a practical approach. We modernize outdated regulations. We support innovation and we make sure that the federal programs reflect the realities that are facing our communities. So this helps us in Alaska, but I think this kind of pioneering, this kind of technology, we can prove it out in Alaska. We can make it we can make it work in Oregon, in North Dakota, in California, in uh Colorado. So I appreciate the subcommittee's good work on these important issues and look forward to uh to partnering with you on them. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Murkowski. Interesting stuff. Uh, now we'll turn to uh the questions uh for the our panel members here. Mr. Palumbo, thank you again for appearing today. We appreciate uh the Interior Department and Bureau of Rec's support for the Dakota Water Resources Amendment of 2026. As you know, we've worked carefully to craft legislation that aligns support with Reclamation, the state of North Dakota, and the five tribal nations in our state. Uh, the bill received bipartisan approval out of this committee in the last Congress. Again, I want to thank Senator Padilla for co-sponsoring the legislation and appreciate his willingness for us uh to work together on bipartisan water priorities for both uh California and North Dakota. Uh, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, our legislation is key to completing critical water supply projects for our state, including the Eastern North Dakota Alternate Water Supply, ENDAWS. ENDAWS is a win-win partnership for both the federal government and North Dakota. It ensures that half of North Dakota has access to a reliable, drought-resilient water supply. This project also enable or yes, this project also enables Reclamation to generate revenue from underutilized Garrison Diversion facilities like the McClusky Canal. Communities in eastern North Dakota and potentially western Minnesota would benefit from lower uh construction and uh operations costs as a result. So my question is will you continue to work with me, our state, and the tribes to help pass this legislation so we can work on the funding side and bring these projects to completion?

Uh, thank you, Senator Hoeven. Yes, absolutely. Both the ENDAWS and the NAWS projects are instrumental for the state of North Dakota, of course for tribes and non-tribal members. Uh, you have our commitment to work with you on those projects. You mentioned drought resiliency. They're both incredibly important drought resilience projects and our commitment remains solid to work with you on that legislation.

Thank you, Mr. Palumbo, and the Bureau has been a good partner and and we truly appreciate it. Again, thanks for being here today. Mr. Turpin, uh you noted in your testimony the complexities in the licensing process for hydropower projects, relates a little bit to what Senator Murkowski was talking about. But uh including compliance with other statutes requiring coordination with numerous federal and state agencies, often on different timelines and deadlines. So my question is will you expand on FERC's efforts to streamline the licensing process to better leverage hydropower resources?

Uh, absolutely, Chairman. I mean the commissioners uh are very invested in that in that uh singular issue and have uh been expressing a lot of interest in a lot of different ways to uh tackle the uh the plethora of all the permitting decisions that have to get lined up just to get one project approved.

Do you have any specific recommendations as to how Congress can help you in that process?

Um, I think the the biggest uh recommendation I'd have is simply just a recognition that all the statutes that are out there that that govern these facilities, they all aren't lining up in the same in the same fashion. I mean they all have uh slightly different intents as to what the outcome is supposed to be. And what that does is present a lot of agencies with um slightly different missions. And so at the commission, our focus is on that best adapted plan for the entire waterway, which includes power production and all the water usages that you've mentioned, but that may not be true for other agencies with that are looking at a much smaller uh much smaller slice. So I think the thing that's needed is really that congressional direction about what is in the national interest, what is the thing that Congress wants focused on for these licensing processes so that we can all kind of get into the same vein and process these as efficiently as we can.

Well, then I think it's important that you provide those recommendations as part of our efforts on permitting reform, which you know is something that the committee's working on. So very important. Again, thanks to both you for being here and I'll turn to the ranking member.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My colleagues have been very gracious. We're going to go with Senator Padilla next and then I'll follow him and Senator Hickenlooper's been very helpful too. Senator Padilla.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Senator Wyden, for the accommodation. Uh, appreciate it. Deputy Commissioner Palumbo, uh first of all, I want to thank you for your decades and decades of honorable civil service and leadership uh in the West. It's notable and very, very much appreciated. On the subject at hand, we know that there's many barriers to meeting our water infrastructure needs in the West, and one of the key barriers has actually been time. Even when we know what projects we need, from water recycling facilities to conveyance improvements, uh safe drinking water upgrades, etcetera, the process to authorize and fund these projects can take years, sometimes a decade or more. The MORE Water Act, which I've uh put forward, would streamline that process by reauthorizing and expanding programmatic approvals for the Bureau of Reclamation's water supply projects instead of requiring project-by-project authorization by Congress. Projects would be able to directly seek funding once they're found to be feasible. I'd like to think that faster development of water recycling projects, faster development of conveyance projects in the West would be welcome news. So, Deputy Commissioner, do you agree that the programmatic authorizations in my MORE Water Act, similar to the programmatic authorizations in legislation by Senator Cortez Masto, Senator Gallego, Senator Curtis, uh would help us address our water infrastructure needs?

Thank you, Senator Padilla. Absolutely. Programmatic authorities help the Bureau of Reclamation be more nimble to react more swiftly to address drought in the West in particular. We do benefit from project-specific authorizations as well, but having a programmatic ability to implement efforts on the ground is also often expedited by having such that such authority. We have an aging infrastructure authority where we can deploy resources, again, very nimbly without having individual project authorizations as long as those those underlying projects have been authorized in some fashion. So programmatic...

Exactly. I think it's all about balance, right? We can't do all project-by-project. We can't do all programmatic. We have to have the right balance. I don't think we've struck that right balance in recent years. Now, on a second topic, I know our time is going by fast. Recent research suggests that agricultural water use efficiency measures are dramatically less expensive, or can be dramatically less expensive, than the construction of new water supplies and its required infrastructure. They often cost hundreds of dollars per acre-foot of water in savings, which is could be as much as 90 percent less than the thousands of dollars per acre-foot that new water supplies could cost. Now, we have huge water needs in the Colorado River Basin and elsewhere in the West, so yes, cost is a focus and a concern. This speaks to the other measure that I've introduced that's before us today, the GROW SMART Act, which would authorize federal funding to support demonstration projects of innovative agricultural water efficiency projects that benefit farmers. These are not mandates. These are voluntary. They're demonstrations. They're farmer-led. They're locally driven efforts to test new irrigation strategies. Again, is this a tool, would you agree that voluntary demonstrations of innovative agricultural water use efficiency projects can be a valuable tool in addressing the supply and cost challenges that we have to meet the needs of our growing population and our growing economy?

Yes, Senator Padilla. We have...

Great answer. Feel free to expand.

We have an acute supply and demand imbalance problem in the West, as you're very well aware of, and we've gotten very good at doing more with the same amount of water. And what I see your bill doing is trying to do the same with a less amount of water, and that's where we really need to pivot to manage water in the West. We know the supplies are reducing, so if we can figure out smart ways to do the same with less water, the Bureau of Reclamation absolutely supports initiatives such as that.

Thank you. We're trying to lean in, think innovatively. California alone is the fourth largest economy in the world. If you bundle the all Western region of the United States, it's obviously much bigger than that. California alone is the largest agricultural producing state of any state in the nation. You combine agriculture of all the Western states, it's even larger. So the needs are acute in the West. We're leaning into it, and we appreciate your partnership. Thank you.

Ranking Member Wyden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Mr. Palumbo, Mr. Turpin, both of you have been for decades on the front lines thinking about this. And I will just tell you, I feel a little bit like I'm having an out-of-body experience because I'm a Senate Democrat and I'm advocating using the private sector more, and the administration made up of Republicans has been using mostly a program kind of standard. And my sense is there's an opportunity here to do something that's overdue, which is to be bipartisan. And tell me your thoughts about how we might figure out how to start gradually using results and the private sector to play a bigger role. And we're certainly not advocating throwing everything out altogether, but it just seems to me that results and the private sector have an opportunity now to make a huge difference in terms of water when we need it, and there's a chance to kind of at least look at it in terms of a pilot sort of way as we're doing in our legislation. Your thoughts.

No, thank you, Senator Wyden. The Reclamation really prides itself on professional excellence, and one way in which to achieve professional excellence is to measure our results and using the private sector or the public sector for that matter, holding ourselves accountable, measuring ourselves with the best available technology, with gold standard science, verifying what we're paying for is actually achieved is very important to Reclamation. Our programs and our WaterSMART program, for example, establish a application review committee where we review applications that come in to ensure that they're using the best available science, that they're using demonstrated projects, and then ultimately we verify that what we anticipated to be installed was installed. However, what your bill is proposing is ratcheting up that a bit to verify those results with the private sector. We would like to work with your office to figure out how our existing WaterSMART program could incorporate some of the ideas that you put forward in your bill to smartly assess whether the American taxpayer is in fact getting what he or she has paid for.

I probably ought to quit while I'm ahead because I appreciate the fact that you'll work with us. Can we do that and so over the next couple of weeks we can nail down something that really uses the private sector because I think we're now headed towards the home stretch of this session and there's lots of interest in this area because as I talked about, you know, earlier, I'm I'm heading out to town hall meetings where this is the issue, the question of droughts and water and snowpack. We have just been hit by a wrecking ball in terms of, you know, the opportunity to deal with these issues. Can we try to nail this down in terms of using the private sector over the next couple of weeks?

Yes, absolutely. We'll sit down with your staff with our WaterSMART program and and look at all the objectives and see how they can be incorporated into what we're we're doing today.

Great. That's very much in line with what I understand your career had always been about, which was not particularly looking at water as a blue issue and a red issue and everybody saying this is my approach because it's partisan and all the rest, but just trying to get at the best and smartest ideas, and I think we've got a chance to do some good work. Thank you. Mr. Turpin, let me just ask a question of you. I mentioned, you know, Oregon State, you know, really testing technologies. One of the things that I was struck by in the debate that we had over the last few years is that neither side really looks adequately at technology. And so what I did is I came up with something that we call technological neutrality. And the chairman remembers, for example, Senator Manchin, you know, who always said he's for all of the above. And I said, so technological neutrality can go even further because you basically can test just about anything as science gives you the opportunities. Isn't that what we're trying to really do as look at the technologies? That's what Senator Murkowski was talking about. I think that's what you've talked about in the past, and it's something that could bring all sides together. I know that I've filed my bill in the past that became law because I want whoever is in charge around here in the years ahead is going to say technological neutrality encourages good science and innovation and the private sector. I'd be interested in your thoughts.

Well, I completely agree. The commission has a long standard of of if you look at it not just from technical neutrality, but from sort of energy production neutrality. It's all energy provision is on the table and it's really about the best way to get that to the American people's use. So couldn't couldn't agree more. And in terms of technology on on waterways, as you mentioned PacWave, I mean, there's there's a number of efforts that have been underway to, you know, to incubate test beds to try to get different ways to test things so that companies have a chance. It's an enormous risk to take on undertaking a full project and a full license on a new technology. And so things like PacWave present really good approaches to allow that.

Thank you. Thank you very much for your thoughts, and and we're going to be interested in the other point that you talked about, which is the incentives. In the bill that was enacted, you know, we basically tied it to reducing carbon. I think there are a variety of other opportunities in addition to that. In other words, I filed that old bill so we can continue to create incentives for reducing carbon, and that I say to the chairman really came from this committee when Senator Risch and others were saying, hey look, you know, we're just interested in the bottom line. We want to have something that really is going to be responsive to reducing carbon. If you all, Mr. Turpin, have some ideas on that, it'd be useful here and it would be useful in the Finance Committee, so you'd get a twofer. Big thanks to both of you and for your dedication over so many years. Mr. Chairman, a good hearing. Look forward to working closely with you.

Thank you, Ranking Member, and we'll turn to Senator Hickenlooper.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank both of you for being here. This is obviously a very timely meeting. Let me start, Mr. Palumbo, and I thought you probably don't know that much about my background, but I have the, some would say regrettable history of having been an English major as an undergraduate and trying to figure out a way to have a career in writing, but at the same time fell in love with geology. And so I noticed, I couldn't help but notice you were an English major as an undergraduate and then got into the engineering side of things really more in graduate school. Anyway, I hope it serves you as well as it has served me. Obviously, the Colorado River Basin, and you having been given the lower basin responsibility, we've missed key deadlines on figuring out how we're going to negotiate this incredibly intense drought that we're all dealing with. And Reclamation's draft EIS makes it clear that none of the alternatives, if examined fairly, will adequately protect the system without additional agreements or some form of subsidies. Without clarity on what Reclamation will rely on and what actions it will take, let's say in the absence of a consensus, which we're still working on, just to be plain, it is hard to, maybe impossible for states and tribes and water users to plan ahead or hash out these negotiated solutions because, again, we don't have clarity on what authorities Reclamation is going to rely on. So if the basin can't reach an agreement, what actions is Reclamation preparing to take to protect the Colorado River system and manage after 2026? And what activities are you looking at right now in terms of, you know, getting us closer to a deal?

Thank you, Senator, and thank you for acknowledging our similar paths. A couple things. Let me first say, as you indicated, we are working to achieve consensus. That is our preferred outcome of the seven basin states' discussion is consensus. But as you said, it is incumbent upon the Bureau of Reclamation to operate the system responsibly within our existing authorities should we not achieve consensus. And so what would we do in that particular case? I'll start at the top of the system and work down. We have authorities under the 1956 Colorado River Basin Project Act to operate the upper initial units. We would do so meeting the multiple benefits purposes that are identified in that act and operate those upper initial units. Moving down to Lake Powell, not only do we have the 1956 act, but we also have the 1968 Colorado River Basin Project Act as well as the subsequent what we call the long-range operating criteria that were went through a rulemaking process in 1970 that establishes releases from Lake Powell to Lake Mead. We would rely on that authority. Moving down to the lower basin, we know there's a supply and demand imbalance. There's a deficit of supply, and we know that there'll need to be reductions in the lower basin. And we would implement those reductions, you know, pursuant to the 1928 Boulder Canyon Project Act, the act that authorized Hoover Dam and the All-American Canal, as well as set forth the apportionments to the lower basin states. We also have a Supreme Court decree, Arizona v. California, 1964, ultimately consolidated in 2006, and we would have reductions in the lower basin relying on that authority. I'll maybe also say the Secretary of the Interior as the water master, as but beyond just the water master, has authorities under Reclamation's founding act, the 1902 act and the 1930 act. We would rely on those. Again, we're hoping for consensus, but we'll be prepared to operate the system.

Great. And that's, I mean, that's going to be the necessity if we can't get to a negotiated settlement. I still am optimistic and hopeful that we can do that. I think the, you know, the Congress provided the $4 billion in the Inflation Reduction Act specifically for drought mitigation of the Colorado River. I was part of that putting that in there and making sure that it stayed in there. Idea was to promote conservation and enhance environmental resilience, basically to reduce risks to the entire system. Obviously, the good news is Colorado and the upper basin states had several bucket two projects that were approved that would basically play a, achieve all those goals. The bad news is the funding, the actual allocation of those appropriated dollars has been held up for over a year. Do you have any idea when that funding is going to be released and, if not soon, what's causing the delay?

Thank you, Senator. You raise an important point. Of the $4 billion we received for drought, we've obligated almost $3 billion. So we have a billion left to go. We have those bucket two projects that you mentioned. We have some other projects in the lower basin. We're going through a process right now to ensure that we obligate that money before the end of fiscal year 2026, putting it to the best use both in the upper basin and in the lower basin. We need conservation. We need contributions. We need pools to help offset impacts to tribes and non-tribal communities. And our intention is to get that money out the door, put it to work, and have it obligated before the end of this fiscal year.

I'm out of time, but I want to thank you for all your work on this. I think if it was left to the senators of those seven states, I think we'd have this deal done. And I think there's always a little bit of space between governors and senators, and in this case they're just at loggerheads. But I think there's a strong will that the seven states, there's no reason why they shouldn't be able to figure out a compromise and take into, you know, hear the other side of each negotiation, each point of contention, and then find out what is a fair resolution of this so that we don't put you in that position of having to make decisions that are difficult and are just going to get you into more and more hot water. So anyway, thank you for all your work, and I will commit on Colorado's side, but I think I can speak for all seven Republican and Democratic senators who believe that we really need to find a solution where all seven states have a consensus. Thank you for all your work. I yield back to the Chair.

Thank you, Senator Hickenlooper. And I knew you were a man of science, now I understand you're a man of letters as well, so that's good. And I don't envy you or you, Mr. Palumbo. That is a massive challenge in terms of the Colorado River and figuring out how you handle the issue fairly between upstream and downstream. So just a massive challenge, but really important to a lot of people. Again, the old adage, you know, that whiskey's for drinking and water's for fighting because it's, these are real challenges, but I know you're hard at work on them, appreciate it. I want to thank both of our witnesses for being here today as well as the members of the Energy and Water Committee for being here. Questions for the record and statements for the official record are due by 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, March 24th, and with that we are adjourned.