The proposal put forward by Scottish
and Southern Energy in 2006 was to re-establish a low flow down the 20 km or so from Loch Garry to Struan.
This would be achieved by allowing some escapement
of water from streams which enter Loch Garry from
the north and by modifying the lower
Garry intake to allow flow to continue down from there.
The proposed flow from Loch Garry would amount
to a maximum of 414 litres per second
(though less than half of this might be achieved in a dry summer) and up to 499 l/s from the lower Garry intake.
To put this into perspective this is similar
to a low summer flow in the little River Braan at Dunkeld.
In addition to adding flow to the Garry, small
flows would be restored to two other totally
abstracted streams, the Cuaich (29 l/s) and the Sluie (19 l/s), which flow into the Truim,
a Spey tributary near Dalwhinnie.
To balance up the water which SSE would have
to “lose”, it was further proposed
that the compensation flow which is released
down the Tromie ,
another Spey tributary, would be reduced by around
40%. This water, released from Loch an t-Seilich, was
apparently considered to be a generous compensation flow, greater
than the flow naturally occurring during very dry weather.
However, this flow was originally agreed
in order to offset the very considerable abstraction of water from Spey Dam by the British
Aluminium Company at Fort William!
SSE did not propose to reduce any electricity generation in order to restore flow.
It was also proposed that research should be conducted into finding the best way of returning gravel to rivers that has been excavated out at hydro intakes over the years.
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In 2006 SSE proposed to restore a modest flow (499 litres per second) to the Garry and, in exchange, to reduce the flow into the River Spey.
SSE also proposed to add a flow of 29 litres per second to the Cuaich, a tributary of the Spey crossing the A9 at Dalwhinnie, a tiny amount of water in a stream of this size. Probably about doubling the residual trickle you see here.
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