Geographic Programs – Columbia River Basin Restoration (CRBR) Program

FY2025 Examples of CRBRP accomplishments include: Seven new projects were funded and are completing their first year of work focused on strengthening toxics monitoring all around the Basin by making improvements to spatiotemporal trend analysis, pathway identification, or developing novel methods and approaches to sampling and risk analysis. A non-profit, working with hundreds of growers and farmers in the mid- and upper portions of the Basin to phase out high-hazard pesticides, implement water quality protections and improve market profitability, has transitioned 49 farms (45,000 acres) to best practices to benefit salmon.
A state agency in Montana hosted multiple pesticide waste collection events and pesticide container recycling events, resulting in the collection of more than 15,000 pounds of waste pesticides and 5,000 pounds of plastic.
A non-profit is working with farmers and local industry and partners in Idaho to implement irrigation upgrades on agricultural fields to reduce phosphorous runoff which fuels the production of methyl mercury, a highly toxic pollutant to aquatic organisms. Using geographic information system mapping, they were able to assess reduction potential across 36,000 fields and identified that the target reduction of 445,000 pounds of phosphorous could be met by upgrading less than 6% of the fields if they target the highest efficiency projects.
A tribe and a state agency in Oregon, learning from other partners’ successes in the Basin, hosted an inaugural household hazardous waste collection event, resulting in the collection of 5,338 pounds of commercial/agricultural pesticide waste and 8,810 pounds of household hazardous waste.
A non-profit in Oregon, working with thirteen schools in the lower portion of the Basin, began active construction, treating 29,552 sq ft of impervious surface for stormwater and removing 4,985 sq ft of impervious surface, and leveraging almost $3 million in partner contributions to improve green stormwater infrastructure.
A tribe in the upper Basin is cleaning up an estimated 40 tons of lead and soil contamination from two shooting ranges and another is implementing a lead tackle exchange program.
A few entities are implementing a variety of bank stabilization projects in central and eastern Washington to reduce the amount of soils containing pesticides, mercury and other metals from eroding into adjacent waterways.