News
Email
Print
Public Resource, Company Profits: Homeowners at High Rock raising questions about lake management
ADVERTISEMENT
Published: September 3, 2007
HIGH ROCK LAKE - HIGH ROCK LAKE - There wasn't much along High Rock Lake when Randy Thomason's parents bought a home in 1973.
"All you had were weekend cabins," he said. Many were hardly more than shacks, with no heat or bathrooms. People just wanted a place to rest while enjoying the water.
Thirty-three years later, development has exploded. About 125 subdivisions have gone up over the years, and upscale homes sit beside those weekend cabins.
Thomason now makes his living selling lakeside homes. On a clear day last month, he piloted his pontoon boat in and out of the lake's coves, pointing out palatial homes along the shore. These days, the average value of a home on High Rock Lake on the Davidson County side is $350,000, more than double the average value of a home in the entire county. Some homes sell for as much as $1 million.
But the lakeside views come with a hitch - at times those million-dollar homes look out over a mud flat.
The water levels are controlled by Alcoa Power Generating Inc., which draws water from High Rock Lake and three other reservoirs along the Yadkin River for hydroelectric power under a license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
That license will expire next year, and as Alcoa seeks a renewal of its 50-year license, the explosion in real estate has raised the stakes. In addition, Alcoa's initial purpose for the dams no longer exists. The smelting plant that ran off the hydro power is closed, and the company now sells the power on the open market.
More than 20 parties - including local governments, neighborhood groups and other agencies - signed a relicensing settlement agreement this year. It was a negotiated compromise on issues ranging from ensuring stable water levels to what Alcoa will do during a drought. But many with an interest in the lake's future have not signed on to that plan, and the federal government will have the final say.
Property owners and environmental groups have long complained that High Rock Lake's fluctuating water levels result in beached boats, dead fish and poor water quality.
The complaints reached a fevered pitch during the drought of 2002. Water levels dropped more than 24 feet below normal, drying up the lakebed and killing fish and vegetation.
"Basically, it was a giant stinking mudhole," said Robert "Pete" Petree, the chairman of SaveHighRockLake
.org. The organization refused to sign the relicensing settlement agreement because members felt that Alcoa was still drawing down too much water during the winter months.
Water levels are again an issue as much of North Carolina is in a drought. Late last month, Alcoa asked FERC for permission to reduce downstream flows into the Yadkin-Pee Dee watershed, and it reduced the amount of power it draws from the reservoirs in May in anticipation of the drought.
The issues are many and varied, but they all boil to this: Why should a company control a natural resource for the next 50 years?
"Alcoa is using a natural resource that basically should belong to everyone in the state, and their use of that resource and how efficiently they use it is directly tied to their profits," said Robert Browne, the director of environmental programs at Wake Forest University.
"Their profits go to their shareholders instead of to the public good."
100-year history
Today, Alcoa is a $30 billion company with 123,000 employees worldwide, but its roots go back to the early 20th century.
In 1915, the Aluminum Company of America bought an unfinished smelting plant in the town of Badin from a French firm that was going out of business. The smelting plant, Badin Works, opened in 1917, and the Narrows reservoir provided the electricity for it to run.
Over the next few years, Alcoa built High Rock Lake and Falls reservoirs. In 1962, it built Tuckertown reservoir.
High Rock Lake was largely undeveloped when Alcoa got its first license in 1958. That soon changed as Alcoa began selling land for farms and lakeside homes, according to the High Rock Lake Association.
Those who invested money to buy nice homes on the lake, however, weren't told that they would have to deal with fluctuating water levels, said Larry Jones, the president of High Rock Lake Association, in a history on the association's Web site.
Water levels have been a sticking point between Alcoa and property-owners since then. Alcoa draws down more water during the winter months to prepare for the spring rains. It draws down less water during the summer months when more people are out on the water. But the company also draws down water even during droughts based on the operating guidelines of its current license.
In 1968, Alcoa amended its operating guidelines to limit the amount of power it generates during the summer in an effort to keep water levels more stable. The company tries to keep water levels from dropping more than five feet below normal during the summer months. But the guidelines on water levels are not binding, and water levels have continued to be an issue on High Rock Lake. During the 2002 drought, when water levels dropped more than 24 feet below normal, property-owners had had it.
Fluctuating water levels also affect the environment, said Browne of Wake Forest University, endangering vegetation and fish populations. Browne said that a new dam hasn't been built in the United States in the past 25 years. The trend is to tear them down.
"The renewals of dam permits … they're increasingly on the radar screen of homeowners and environmental groups because we're starting to realize dams have a lot of negative impacts on the river and on different species, especially when you have fluctuating water levels," he said.
Fluctuations necessary
Alcoa officials say they have worked hard to find the right balance between competing interests.
Gene Ellis, the licensing and property manager for Alcoa, said that the company began reaching out to various stakeholders five years ago.
He said that Alcoa understands the concerns and has tried to work with property owners and local governments. But he said that there are a number of factors that make fluctuations in water levels unavoidable.
One is that Alcoa has to release a certain amount of water downstream each week to provide drinking water to South Carolina residents.
And High Rock is especially susceptible to fluctuating water levels because it is at the top of the chain of the four reservoirs. Alcoa stores water in High Rock and releases it to other reservoirs downstream.
As part of the proposed license, the company has agreed to extend its recreation period by about eight weeks. Currently, the recreation period runs from May 15 to Sept. 15. The new period would begin April 1 and end Oct. 31.
During that period, the company agrees to keep the lake level within four feet of full. A reservoir is considered full just before water begins to spill over the dam. During the winter months, the maximum draw down would be up to 10 feet below full. The proposal for a new license also includes plans for how the reservoirs operate during a drought, Alcoa officials say. The license includes a drought-management plan in which Alcoa agrees to send less water downstream and generate less power during times of drought. Alcoa also would have more large storage areas along the Yadkin River to ease the impact on High Rock Lake and avoid what happened during the drought of 2002.
Alcoa is spending more than $7.5 million to improve recreation areas along the four reservoirs. Ellis said that the company is also spending about $140 million in improvements at the four reservoirs. In the relicensing settlement agreement, the company is either selling or donating 6,300 acres of property around the lakes, more than 40 percent of its land holdings, to be used for recreation or conservation.
Jones, who has criticized Alcoa in the past, said that the company has improved its operations of the reservoirs. The High Rock Lake Association signed the relicensing settlement agreement earlier this year because of improvements Alcoa has promised in water levels and shore management.
"Many years ago, the interest in maintaining high water levels was kind of sloughed off by Alcoa and FERC as being an issue of local property owners wanting to have water for their enjoyment," Jones said. "We're seeing better management of the lake."
But critics such as Petree say they still don't trust Alcoa to manage the reservoirs in the public interest. And now that Alcoa is selling the power instead of using it locally, its critics are even more skeptical.
In 2002, the company started shutting down its smelting plant in the town of Badin. Since then, Alcoa has sold power generated from the reservoirs. The company gets about $44 million a year in revenue. The profit, about $8.4 million, is used to offset the costs of buying power near other smelting plants Alcoa owns in the United States.
Alcoa also has had a tough time in the market. Alcoa failed in acquiring rival company Alcan and is now vulnerable to being acquired itself. But Ellis said that even if the company is bought out, the license won't change.
On a recent summer day, Petree sits outside in the back of his house overlooking the pier. The lake is quiet, except for the occasional roar of a boat. The ground is wet from a recent shower.
Petree said he just wants future generations to be able to enjoy the lake. He wants assurances that this natural resource will be protected for the next 50 years.
"You get to the point of a common sense of right and wrong," he said.
■ Michael Hewlett can be reached at 727-7326 or at mhewlett@wsjournal.com.
Email
Print
