State eyeing local water for future growth

200,000 acre-feet of Blue Mesa at stake

It’s been nine months since local officials learned of the state’s interest in securing a contract from the Bureau of Reclamation for 200,000 acre-feet of water from Blue Mesa Reservoir. For the first time two officials from the state Department of Natural Resources visited the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District (UGRWCD) board of directors to discuss the proposal. The conversation ranged from concerns about climate change and water supply to population growth and agricultural losses. To the state, Blue Mesa may or may not be a solution to the dilemmas.

Colorado Division of Natural Resources executive director Harris Sherman sent a letter to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation dated August 28, 2008, making a formal request “to enter into a contract… for 200,000 acre-feet of water from Blue Mesa Reservoir for the benefit of Colorado.”
When he and the division’s assistant director for water Alexandra Davis visited the UGRWCD on June 1, 2009, Sherman explained why the state was interested in Blue Mesa. He said the reservoir could be needed to meet water supply demands due to population growth in Colorado.
Sherman said state demographers were projecting the population to increase by five million people over the next 40 years.
Of those, four million will live on the Front Range and the rest will head to headwaters regions like the Gunnison Valley. “It is incumbent for us to be looking 20, 30, 40 years out if we are to competently deal with how Colorado addresses its water resources,” Sherman said.
He said climate change was also one of the state’s concerns. Colorado State University is projecting a four-degree increase in temperature over the next 40 years, along with a 2 percent to 20 percent reduction in the flow of the Upper Colorado River. “Those are some of the big-picture issues we’re struggling with,” Sherman said.
He said the question that needed to be answered was, “What future could Blue Mesa Reservoir play for the benefit of this area and for Colorado?”
The UGRWCD was asking the division the same question.
The board sent a letter to Davis prior to the meeting with seven questions, such as how the state was paying for the water, how the contract was being used to benefit the entire state, and how the release of contract water would be controlled.
Davis said the state didn’t have an answer to any of the questions. “Unfortunately, most of the questions are as yet unanswerable. We haven’t gotten that far down the road. We probably wouldn’t get that far without consulting with the water users who are impacted or who benefit,” she said.
Davis said the letter was written last fall to allow the bureau to consider the potential contract during the formation of the Aspinall Unit re-operations environmental impact statement (EIS), which was finalized earlier this spring. The EIS describes a new water management plan for the Wayne Aspinall series of dams, including Crystal, Morrow Point, and Blue Mesa. “It was important to start that dialogue with the bureau before the EIS was finalized… It may be that a state contract with the bureau doesn’t do anything to help us,” Davis said.
Sherman added, “We saw this as a potential opportunity for the state. I think we recognize there are many important questions that need to be asked. We really need your input and the input of others to determine if this idea has merit.”
UGRWCD board member Dennis Steckel asked if part of the plan was to rent or set aside water so it is available for the state in the future.
Davis said that was a question that needed answering. “Does it make sense to tag 200,000 acre-feet as Colorado’s water?” she asked.
Sherman said, “What I would like to do is flip this over. Dennis, what do you think we should do with this water?”
“Safely augment our users up here, I suppose. The bureau will always have that reservoir, in case things get really dry,” Steckel said, adding that people also had concerns about the recreational impact of withdrawing that much water. The UGRWCD’s letter to Davis states that the active capacity of Blue Mesa during the 2002 drought was 262,000 acre-feet and “releasing an additional 200,000 acre-feet would have virtually emptied the reservoir.”
One of the concerns that several board members brought up was in regard to growth on the Front Range. Steckel said, “I see Front Range communities making all kinds of approvals for developments without really explaining where the water comes from.”
District board member Bill Nesbitt said he thought one of the things missing from the state’s contract proposal was a related land use planning component. He asked if the four million new residents on the Front Range was “a given” and whether the state considered that “smart growth.”
Sherman agreed that land use planning was an important part of the conversation. He said the average person in Denver uses 160 gallons of water a day, half of it on their lawn. People with more land used more water, and people in apartments used the least.
Sherman said he saw a lot of good efforts among water providers to promote conservation. But, “It’s one thing for the water provider to understand that, and it’s another for the land use decision makers, city councils and planners to understand it… Sometimes when you are making land use decisions on the Front Range you’re not aware of the implications elsewhere in Colorado.”
The group also discussed oil shale. Sherman said the state was anticipating a jump in the production of petroleum fuel from oil shale.
Nesbitt said there was still a question about whether developing oil shale was an efficient use of water. He said traditionally it takes three gallons of water to extract a gallon of oil shale, not including the energy for refinement.
Sherman agreed that efficient oil shale development was still in a research phase and questions remained about whether enough water would be available for an increase in production. But, he said, there were estimates that a gallon of unrefined oil shale could be extracted with less than a gallon of water.
UGRWCD board member Gary Hausler questioned whether 200,000 acre-feet of water was even available. He cited the prediction of up to a 20 percent reduction in flow in the Upper Colorado River. The Gunnison River joins the Colorado at Grand Junction. “Is there real wet water? I would maintain there probably isn’t water there to take. There may be lots of water on paper, but it’s not really there in a creek. We all remember 2002 big-time,” Hausler said.
Sherman said the CWCB was midway in progress on a study of the availability of Colorado River water. The study was factoring in climate change, and Sherman said hopefully it would provide some answers. The completed study is nine to 12 months away.
Board member Ken Spann said the state was looking to the basin’s water users for input, but it was hard for the board to provide useful input without more information about the contract proposal. “Who will decide how the 200,000 acre-foot contract will be used? How will it be operated? How will it be paid for?… It may be something we can absolutely support, it may be something we absolutely oppose, but without meat on the horse, I can’t tell whether to feed it hay, or grain.”
Spann said the division’s request letter was sent last August, and it was currently June. He said he would have liked the division to contact the local basin sooner. “I understand the timing. I wish you had done it a little differently,” Spann said.
Davis said the letter was sent to all the parties in the Aspinall EIS negotiations. “This wasn’t a letter that came out of nowhere. This letter says quite clearly that nothing is going to be decided without input from stakeholders.”
Spann replied, “We have, in writing, asked you some very basic questions, and the answer we got was ‘We don’t know.’”
Davis suggested then going through the letter and answering the questions. To answer the first question, “How will the contract be paid for?,” she said the bureau had informed the division of a potential standby contract to set aside water for a dollar an acre-foot. An acre-foot would cover a football field to a depth of six inches.
Spann said you couldn’t buy water for less than $7 an acre-foot.
Davis said there had been no formal discussions with the bureau, so a final cost was unknown.
UGRWCD attorney John McClow asked if it would be a fatal flaw if the price to actually use the water were higher.
Davis said it could be, particularly given the current economic situation.
Spann brought up the issue that Blue Mesa has a 1957 priority date on its water right, and there were many other senior rights in the state. In the event of a prolonged drought, he said it would provide the state only one emergency release at best. Spann said the division would literally have to change Colorado’s priority system of water rights to get their intended benefit from Blue Mesa.
“My advice is to look for fatal flaws in this, internally, before you continue any discussions with the bureau,” said board member Steve Glazer. “There are a plethora of poison pills here.”
Sherman asked Glazer to identify four poison pills.
Glazer said they had just identified one—the priority order.
Hausler said the availability of water in the Colorado River was another potential poison pill.
McClow said there might be limitations on the bureau’s contract, such as a common clause that prevents water withdrawals during times of drought.
Sherman said the letter and conversations last fall were considered a placeholder. “This is a preliminary concept that needs to be vetted. We are now starting this process of vetting these issues with you and others,” he said, to nods of agreement from the board.
Sherman said there had been very little work done since the presidential election, and the new administration might have a different take on how to proceed. “At the end of the day if there are few if any benefits we are going to abandon this idea,” he said.
Nesbitt said there was a lot of worry and concern simply because of a lack of communication and knowledge. The UGRWCD thanked Sherman and Davis for coming. Both groups agreed that the meeting was productive, and they should have more discussions in the future.
For one last talking point, board member Steve Schechter asked the division to protect agriculture lands and water. He said the rising cost of oil would drive up the cost of food, which could lead to a lot of hungry people if the population predictions are true. “To get food from central California to here is very expensive. At some point we’re going to need all of our ‘ag’ lands in this state to grow food… Please take that into consideration,” said Schechter.
Sherman said agriculture had a proud history in Colorado, and Davis asked how the state should protect it, since most farmers and ranchers aren’t prohibited from selling their land.
Spann said anything the state did that affected the profitability of an agriculture operation, such as increasing license fees for vehicles and farm equipment, could lead to selling the land, and thus the water rights on it. “Most of these people are out there because they chose to be. It’s a culture,” Spann said. “Some of us, me, a couple others in this room, and others you may know, if we had made a different choice back in the early ’90s, the water would already be in Arapahoe County… But anything you do that increases the cost of the operation, there is a point where it tips over, and the choice that gets made is sell the ground.”