FERC revoked the operating license for a troubled hydroelectric dam in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, citing a perpetual failure to address safety issues that could cost lives and the owner’s loss of land in bankruptcy proceedings.
The commission said owner UP Hydro “has discontinued good faith operation” of the Au Train Dam and decided that a license termination by implied surrender is in the public interest (P-10856).
With FERC’s Dec. 29 order, oversight of the dam shifts to the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE).
EGLE warned FERC in mid-December that the Au Train Dam was going the same route as the Edenville Dam, another Michigan dam, which collapsed in 2020 and caused $250 million in property damage. (See Michigan Dam with Prolonged Safety Issues Fails and FERC Terminates More Boyce Hydro Licenses.)
The 0.9-MW facility was built in the early 1900s to power a paper mill.
The revocation caps a tumultuous year for the dam and its old and new owners.
Since acquiring the Au Train Dam in 2010, UP Hydro has failed to remedy inadequate spillway capacity to lessen flooding risk, a condition of FERC’s transfer of the license. The company in 2020 told FERC it couldn’t finance spillway upgrades and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in early 2023. At that point, FERC’s director of the Division of Dam Safety and Inspections told UP Hydro to at least lower the dam’s south levee to reduce flows through the spillway during floods. UP Hydro to date has not provided proof that it has begun that process.
Though UP Hydro sent a request to FERC in 2020 to surrender the dam, it rescinded the request in February 2025.
FERC’s regional Chicago office conducted a mid-2025 inspection and found additional neglect, including seepage through a newly discovered hole in the bottom of the vault, poor vegetation management, rodent infestations and shrubs and small trees growing in the channel downstream from the spillway.
The Au Train Dam is classified as having high hazard potential, meaning a dam failure would pose a threat to human life and cause significant property damage. The dam’s 40-year license, originally issued to the Upper Peninsula Power Co. in 1997, had about 11 more years to go.
“As a high hazard dam, the Au Train project poses a threat to public safety and UP Hydro has been unwilling and unable since 2010 to undertake required remediation,” FERC wrote.
Following UP Hydro’s bankruptcy, mortgage holder Stephenson National Bank and Trust in 2025 foreclosed 18 of the 22 parcels that the dam occupies and sold them to Green Bay, Wis.-based D. Charles Trust Investments.
The 18 parcels include those containing the powerhouse, transmission line, most of the impoundment and the surrounding project buffer. The investment company ordered UP Hydro to vacate the premises and decommission the powerhouse and said it would block access to the powerhouse Dec. 31, 2025.
“Loss of access to the powerhouse will immediately affect the licensee’s ability to comply with the terms and conditions of the license, including Article 401, which requires continuous minimum powerhouse discharge for the protection and enhancement of fish and wildlife resources in the Au Train River, or to ensure the safety of the facility,” FERC said.
FERC pointed to other failings by UP Hydro, including numerous past due dam safety submittals and audits, neglected coordination with downstream communities since 2021 and repeated failure to work with Michigan state agencies to permit and improve the dam.
