"The largest dam removal project in U.S. history came one step closer to fruition this week, as California issued permits for breaching the four dams on the Klamath River.
The State Water Resources Control Board issued a Clean Water Act certification and environmental assessment for the proposal to remove three dams in Northern California and one in southern Oregon.
"Decades in the making, this historic and comprehensive project will help restore native fish populations, and improve water quality in the Klamath Basin," board Chairman E. Joaquin Esquivel said in a statement.
At issue are four dams on the Klamath River, which snakes from southern Oregon through a rugged and remote part of Northern California to the Pacific Ocean.
The river is the second largest in California, and it is home to multiple tribes that have relied on its salmon runs for millennia. Those runs have dwindled significantly due to a variety of factors including climate change and the river's four downstream dams."
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