4 dams, the future of Kennebec fish runs and salmon’s survival at stake in federal licensing battle

MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • January 3, 2021

While Maine and the world have been focused on the pandemic, a fight over the future of Maine’s second largest river system is raging inside the electronic docket of an obscure federal relicensing proceeding. At stake in the drawn-out proceedings before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission relating to whether and under what terms to relicense a 106-year-old dam that stretches across the river between Benton and Fairfield are the fate of river-run fish in the Kennebec River watershed and quite possibly that of Atlantic salmon in the United States.