An Idaho-based energy company filed an application for a license to build a hydroelectric project on the Arthur P. Bowman Dam at the Prineville Reservoir, but final approval could still be years away.

Symbiotics LLC, which has offices in Idaho and Utah, wants to build an $8.8 million hydroelectric plant that would use water currently flowing through the dam to produce up to 6.8 megawatts of energy, according to the license application. One megawatt is enough energy to power 600 to 1,000 homes at any given time.

Symbiotics is also applying for a water-rights permit.

The project includes two turbines and would be built onto the existing 245-foot earthen dam, which controls water flowing from the reservoir into the Crooked River. Water from the dam is regularly released for fish and to provide irrigation water for the Ochoco Irrigation District.

Because it would be a run-of-the-river project, the hydroelectric project should not affect existing water flows.

Hart Evans, a spokesman for Symbiotics, said it could take several years to get the license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which oversees licensing for the dams.

The agency has to approve the application and requires an environmental assessment as part of the process.

In the meantime, Evans said the company is conducting studies to determine how many fish could get pulled into the turbines or would be able to pass through to the Crooked River.

An eight-mile portion of the river directly below the dam is protected as wild and scenic and contains one of the region’s healthiest populations of redband trout, a subspecies of rainbow trout.

Various agencies, including the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, want to ensure the protection of the redband trout population by keeping reservoir fish such as bass and black crappie out of the river, Evans said.