Bruce Howard
Avista

Paul Kusnierz
Avista 

DESCRIPTION

Water quality regulation and compliance grows ever more complex for hydro operators.  Whether seeking a Clean Water Act Section 401 Certification, implementing 401/License Conditions, or carrying out hydro construction projects, hydro operators have to navigate a wide range of water quality protection requirements for success.

This session will help hydro owners, contractors and consultants understand the key regulatory contexts for water quality compliance and provide examples of how these issues are playing out across our region.

This Panel is within the Regulatory and Policy Track at the conference. 
 
This session is a 201-level discussion for those looking to take a deeper dive into this subject matter. 

Moderator:
Bruce Howard, Advisor, Avista

Panelists:

• Pradeep Mugunthan, Senior Principal, Four Peaks Environmental Consulting
• Ed Zapel, Principal Hydraulic Engineer, Northwest Hydraulic Consultants
• Paul Kusnierz, Senior Fisheries Biologist, Avista

Panelists Bios:

• Paul Kusnierz has been a fisheries biologist for Avista for almost 9 years. He is responsible for the implementation of multiple fisheries and water quality protection, mitigation, and enhancement measures associated with Noxon Rapids and Cabinet Gorge hydroelectric facilities on the Clark Fork River in Montana and Idaho. Prior to working for Avista, Paul worked in water quality monitoring and TMDL development for the Department of Environmental Quality in Montana and Chinook Salmon research and harvest for the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes in Idaho.
• Dr. Pradeep Mugunthan is a Senior Principal at Four Peaks Environmental. He brings over 20 years of experience in environmental modeling and compliance. He has worked on FERC relicensing and Clean Water Act Section 401 Certification compliance at various hydropower projects in the Pacific Northwest.
• Ed Zapel is a civil/hydraulic engineer with 39 years of experience in hydraulic, hydrologic, hydropower, and fisheries engineering developed in a variety of engineering assignments throughout the western United States, Alaska, and Canada. Ed has worked within the hydropower discipline since 1984 and has been directly involved in numerous hydropower design projects throughout his career, many of which have focused on mitigating water quality issues, particularly Total Dissolved Gas (TDG) and water temperature. His projects have often incorporated laboratory scale modeling evaluations of proposed mitigative actions or alternatives to confirm viability and verify effectiveness prior to implementation and construction. Ed's experience includes more than twenty-four years in private consulting practice and thirteen years as a hydraulic engineer and Water Management Section Chief with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Seattle District.