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REVIEW the. Act was passed.::':~ hatIcally: ,,' ted). , U.S. Fish and Wildlife Water and Power Re- 'doski & Hamill, supra Consultations on West- 86, 41, 41 (1986). It is ns .for new BR projects, :n m 1980. The author ng projects involved in Flaming Gorge reoper- lY93J OF RAZORBACKS ANV ;;<;RVOIRS 57 rdy opinions was the reoperation of .Flaming Gorge Dam for :he benefit of endangered fish. In addition, in 1992 FWS is- sued jeopardy opinions for the Narrows Project and the Price- San Rafael Salinity Control Project which also rely on Flam- ing Gorge as an RPA.112 Ironically, the dam which was the site of the 1962 Green River poisoning is now being proposed as the means to protect the river fish.113 H:' Although the decision to use Flaming Gorge reoperation ]{:;8.S an RP A for the CUP structures was made in the early . Jft:!980s, FWS did not issue the Final Flaming Gorge Biological l~:rOpinion until late November 25, 1992. During the interven- ,.J,,~<'iiig years, FWS studied the effects of Flaming Gorge's opera- If''' tion evaluating "normal operation" from 1979-1984, and ~\ -,-." -, ) l'~ "constrained flows" from 1985-1991. The Strawberry .... Aqueduct and the Jensen Unit, for which Flaming Gorge's re- i~iI: operation is an RPA, began operation several years ago while i'~i':'the Flaming Gorge studies were still in progress. It bears re- y;:. .peating that FWS found over ten years ago that all of these :H~~;projects placed or, when complete, would place the river A'f. ;,.. fishes' survival in jeopardy. The other two CUP projects for ',:~f1which Flaming Gorge reoperation is an RP A, the Uinta and ;~i':':.Upalco units, have yet to begin construction. The Biological Opinion for Flaming Gorge is a jeopardy opinion with a five-part RP A. The first of the RP A's two sub- stantive components is reoperating the damso that flow and temperature conditions in the Green River will more closeiy resemble the river's natural hydrograph. The RPA's second substantive requirement calls for legal protection of Green River Flows from the dam downstream to Lake Powell, not- ing that "development of a legal mechanism to ensure that the releases from Flaming Gorge Dam are delivered to and available for use by the endangered fish in occupied habitat . . . is necessary" if the Jensen, Uinta, Upalco, Narrows, and Price-San Rafael Projects are to comply with the ESA and the river fish are to recover.114 To this end, the RPA assumes 112. [d. 113. [d. at 9. 114. Flaming Gorge Opinion, supra note 6, at 32.