5. Distribution of costs and benefits

6. Consistency with planning criteria and norms

7. Basin-wide linkages

8. Assessment of development effectiveness and lessons learned

5. Distribution of Costs and Benefits

Question No. 4 posed by the World Commission on Dams: Distribution of costs and benefits-who gained and who lost?

Details regarding which groups gained and which groups lost with regards to specific project purposes and impacts are addressed primarily within Section 4 of the case study report. In Section 5 of the final report, the distribution of benefits and costs will be summarised in a table, which will serve as the basis for synthesising results about who gained and who lost. Each column in the table will represent a category of project purpose or impact (e.g., irrigation, and hydropower). Each row will represent parties potentially affected by some aspect of the project (e.g., farmers, Native Americans). Within each table cell will be a symbol-plus (+), minus (-) or zero (0) - that indicates whether a specific group was positively affected, negatively affected, or not affected by the project with respect to a particular purpose or impact.

6. Consistency with Planning Criteria and Norms

Question No. 5 posed by the Commission: Did the project comply with the criteria and guidelines of the day?

The Bureau of Reclamation and the Army Corps of Engineers-the two federal agencies most responsible for construction and operations at the Grand Coulee-are widely considered pacesetter agencies in water resources development. In many cases, these agencies were the authors of applicable project development and operations guidelines and criteria. Reclamation's techniques and methods of land reclamation and irrigation techniques have been used as models for irrigation projects in many other countries. Similarly, the Corps of Engineers' procedures for flood control project planning is highly regarded. For the most part, Reclamation and the Corps played a very influential role in establishing the norms for U.S. water resources planning. However, two areas where the agencies and organisations responsible for decision making in the Columbia River basin may have fallen short concern Native American rights and salmon protection (see also Sections 4.4 and 4.5).

Another area of interest in the context of planning criteria and guidelines concerns whether basin-wide planning norms that existed in the 1930s informed the planning of the Grand Coulee Dam. Often times, theories of basin-wide planning assume the existence of a single development authority that can plan and implement a basin-wide scheme. That clearly was not the case for the Bureau of Reclamation or any of the other entities (e.g., public utility districts) that built dams in the Columbia River Basin.

Consistency with Planning Criteria and Norms

1. Assess the extent to which key water resources project planning criteria and guidelines of the day were followed in the planning of the Grand Coulee Dam and the CBP.
2. Describe ways in which the existence of multiple jurisdictions and multiple water resource development agencies confounded the possibilities for developing a unified river basin development plan at the time the Grand Coulee Dam project was planned.
3. Comment on the extent to which cumulative environmental impacts were addressed during the pre-project planning of the Grand Coulee Dam
4. Assess the extent of which new criteria have been internalised in operation since the project was constructed.

7. Basin-Wide Linkages

The main objective of the case study is to examine the development effectiveness and decision-making processes with respect to the Grand Coulee Dam and the CBP. The case study is not intended to be a comprehensive study of the entire Columbia River Basin. Rather, its aim is to provide a focused study of the Grand Coulee Dam and CBP in the context of the Columbia River Basin. While the case study cannot examine the basin as a whole, it can discuss key linkages between the Grand Coulee Dam and projects upstream and downstream of the dam. For example, some people argue that the construction and operation of the Grand Coulee Dam significantly influenced planning and design of dams upstream in Canada, and that those dams, in turn had dramatic effects on Canadian natural and cultural resources. The study will focus on the Grand Coulee Dam, but it will also comment on basin-wide implications that are directly linked to the construction and operation of the Grand Coulee Dam. For example, an important basin-wide planning issue is whether projects like the Grand Coulee Dam were planned one at a time, or whether project planners accounted for the cumulative impacts of a sequence of projects planned for the foreseeable future. This aspect is tied to basin-wide planning issues because the absence of effective basin-wide planning is often what leads to inadequate consideration of (and response to) cumulative environmental impacts.

Basin-wide Issues to be Addressed

1. Explore the Grand Coulee Dam's influence on the construction and operation of dams immediately upstream and downstream.
2. Sketch, in general terms, the ways in which the Grand Coulee Dam and the CBP have influenced natural and cultural resources in Canada.

8. Assessment of Development Effectiveness and Lessons Learned

The qualitative and quantitative information presented in sections three through seven provide a basis for understanding the predicted and unexpected development impact of the Grand Coulee Dam and CBP. In the final case study report, this data will be synthesised and analysed to develop a set of lessons learned.