In 1991 the Edwards Manufacturing Company, owner of the Edwards Dam on the Kennebec River in Augusta, ME, applied to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for a renewal of their license to operate a privately owned hydroelectric dam. Their application was denied; Edwards Manufacturing Company was required to come up with a plan for the enacting and financing of decommissioning the dam, as well as the restoration of the river. This was the first time in history that the federal government ordered a privately owned hydroelectric dam destroyed against the wishes of the owner. Numerous factors were involved which eventually led to this decision, namely the environmental and economical benefits the removal of the dam would bestow upon the immediate and surrounding regions. Because this case was the first of its kind there was substantial controversy regarding the legal steps taken which resulted in the decommissioning, as well as the question of how FERC obtained the authority to issue an order of this type. In the not too distant past the Kennebec was the primary highway through Maine; providing the easiest method of transportation across the land and a constant supply of resources for the numerous people who settled near it. The first settlement on the river was established in 1607, thirteen years before the colonization of the Pilgrims. As far back as 1785 there was speculation on the subject of building a dam near the city of Augusta, as it was such an exemplary location. No actions were taken until 1834, when a group of citizens of Augusta joined together, forming the Kennebec Dam Company, and decided to build the Augusta Dam. The structure was contrived of huge timbers covered and topped with concrete rising twenty-four ft. above the water level and spanning the nine-hundred seventeen ft. width of the river; it was completed in 1837 (Daily Record,1997). The Kennebec Dam Company had inadvertently chosen quite an opp...
