Rio Grande Basin Roundtable: ‘We are the basin that has received the most funding to date’ — Mike Gibson

From the Valley Courier (Ruth Heide):

Rio Grande Interbasin Roundtable Chairman Mike Gibson said in the years since the state has funded water projects through basin-specific roundtables and a statewide account, this basin has garnered more than $8 million from the statewide Water Supply Reserve Account. “We are the basin that has received the most funding to date,” he said…

During its December meeting the roundtable unanimously approved a $23,500 request from Judy Lopez to implement “The Value of Water,” an educational campaign to continue the informational work begun this year during the “Water 2012” initiative. “We have had a great year,” Lopez said.

Water 2012 included a variety of activities including weekly articles in the Valley Courier, radio spots, tours, contests and other water informational events. Lopez said the Rio Grande Basin is a model for others and has been termed the “kumbaya” basin because of how well folks got along and worked together to promote water education.

“The Value of Water” is the next step, Lopez explained. One of the goals of this next campaign will be “getting people to understand we have a gap between what we have and the amount of water we need.”[...]

The Valley Courier will continue to publish water educational articles, with about 24 scheduled for 2013, and radio interviews will continue, as well as classes and tours on different topics such as wetlands. Lopez requested $23,500 for salaries and supplies that will be matched for a total of $66,450 for “The Value of Water” campaign. The funding request will go on to the state for consideration for funding from the statewide account.

Roundtable member Travis Smith said he supported this funding application, and he commended Lopez and Water 2012 Coordinator Leah Opitz for getting the water conversation out past the “same 10 guys and gals” to the general public. He said the educational components are often overlooked in water circles and hard to measure, but they are important. One of the measures of success from these initiatives will be raising up new water leaders for the future, he added.

More IBCC — basin roundtables coverage here.

Colorado Water 2012: ‘There was and continues to be tension between the Western and Eastern Slopes’ — Mike Gibson

Here’s the latest installment of the Valley Courier’s Water 2012 series. Mike Gibson describes the workings and role of the Rio Grande Basin Roundtable with respect to the IBCC and other basin roundtables. Here’s an excerpt:

There was and continues to be tension between the Western and Eastern Slopes as some feel water should be moved to the Front Range, and many on the Western Slope do not share these ideas. Similarly, these diverse opinions were held in other river basins…

Members of the [Rio Grande Roundtable] RGRT have participated in discussions to address the issues facing other basins and the state. It has been concluded that meeting the shortfall in municipal water (600,00 acre-feet by 2050) will be achieved by conservation, implementation of projects under construction or design, new projects in the future, such as new reservoirs, potential new sources of water, and transfers from the agricultural sector. While the latter may be the easiest way to meet the shortfall, there is general consensus that such transfers should be minimized to preserve the agricultural lifestyle and economy of the State. These deliberations also considered the necessary water for recreational use and maintenance of the natural environment…

The Water Supply Reserve Account has been funded to $41.8 million of which $4.8 million has come to the Rio Grande Basin. The process to obtain these funds is for the proponents to discuss their project with members of the roundtable and its chairman. If it is determined the applicant and their project will meet the necessary criteria for funding, a formal application is completed and presented to the roundtable for their endorsement. The request is subsequently reviewed by CWCB staff and finally presented to the CWCB for approval.

The WSRA funds that have come to the Rio Grande Basin have covered a variety of “water projects” across the Basin, including reservoir studies and rehabilitation; on-site improvements to diversion structures and head gates; repairs of water conveyance structures; river restoration; the conservation of agricultural land and its associated water; and outreach and education. Recipients have included irrigation and reservoir companies and non -profits involved with conservation and restoration. The projects have been geographically widespread, from Creede, to Fort Garland, to San Luis and have been completed on the Rio Grande, Alamosa, and Conejos rivers and their tributaries. Since WSRA funds have been available, the Valley has addressed many outstanding issues that were known but did not have a mechanism to be implemented.

More Colorado Water 2012 coverage here.

U.S. water infrastructure needs: ‘The cost is massive and the cost of not doing it is massive’ — David LaFrance

From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):

Water infrastructure in the United States is aging and by 2035 could cost $1 trillion to update or replace. Water users should expect to pay higher rates, said David LaFrance, executive director of the America Water Works Association at the closing luncheon of the Colorado Water Congress on Friday.

“The cost is massive and the cost of not doing it is massive,” LaFrance said. “Household bills will go up as the costs keep coming. AWWA is trying to figure out how to do it so the customers aren’t stymied by costs.” The largest costs of water investment are not the dams, pumping stations and other parts visible to the naked eye, but the pipes buried underground.

The bulk of that infrastructure was installed after World War II, and will continue to deteriorate, LaFrance said.

AWWA is working to secure national funding to pay the costs, since 85 percent of the water systems in the U.S. are considered very small. A challenge for larger utilities will be to ensure that costs do not unduly burden poorer customers, he added.

The group also named Sterling native Diane Hoppe, a former state representative and now a member of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, as the Wayne Aspinall Water Leader of the Year.

Congrats to Reagan Waskom new @cowatercongress President & thanks to Mike Gibson for your past service #2013CWC

— Leonard Rice Engr (@LREwater) February 1, 2013

From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):

One of the high points of a water conference that stressed getting future generations interested in water invoked a figure from a century ago.

J.C. Ulrich, an engineer who designed Rio Grande Reservoir, read a few of his letters from the period of 1905­ 1912 during construction. He described the surveying work, conditions for the workmen, disputes with contractors and even the quality of food during construction. Well, actually it was Colorado Supreme Court Justice Greg Hobbs in character — complete with a stout black moustache and bowler hat — reading the letters at the Colorado Water Congress Friday.

Some of the presentations at the conference looked at how younger people can be persuaded to enter careers in water-related fields. Hobbs, a fine actor known for dramatic reading of his own poetry, reprised the role of Ulrich that he created for the 100th anniversary of the reservoir last summer.

The reservoir’s construction came after an 1896 embargo on building reservoirs in the Upper Rio Grande was lifted. This year marks the 75th anniversary of the 1938 Rio Grande Compact among Colorado, New Mexico and Texas.

Water attorneys Bill Paddock and Dave Robbins explained how the compact divides water among the states. A treaty with Mexico also affects the river. Disputes over the Rio Grande date back to the 1880s, when a drought, railroad and canal development converged on the upper portion of the river in Colorado. A 1906 treaty lifted the embargo and allowed the construction of the reservoir.

More infrastructure coverage here.

Flaming Gorge Task Force meeting recap: Concern that Colorado does not have the ‘courage’ to build projects

Here’s a recap of the recent Flaming Gorge Task Force meeting, from Chris Woodka writing for The Pueblo Chieftain. Click through and read the whole article. Here’s an excerpt:

“I’m left with the feeling that other states have the courage to embark on water projects. We don’t have that,” said Mike Gibson, president of Colorado Water Congress and manager of the San Luis Valley Conservancy District.

The task force reviewed projects that other Western states have undertaken — including California’s state water project, started in late 1950s, and a $19 billion project to manage demands in the Sacramento-San Joaquin delta; Arizona’s water bank program and Central Arizona Project; and Utah’s proposal to build a $1 billion Lake Powell pipeline similar to the Flaming Gorge proposal…

…the state lacks a water plan and unlike other states, has no way to centrally plan projects or allocate water.

More Flaming Gorge Task Force coverage here and <a href="

The Rio Grande Roundtable ponies up $99,564 for a hydrgeologic study in the San Luis Valley near oil and gas exploration sites

From the Valley Courier (Ruth Heide):

After an alternative proposal by roundtable member Charlie Spielman was defeated with only two votes supporting it, the roundtable voted to fund the study for $99,564 out of its basin account, with Spielman casting the only dissenting vote.

Rio Grande Roundtable Chairman Mike Gibson said the basin account had $263,000 in it as of April 12 and would probably be receiving more money when the state begins its new fiscal year this summer.

Rio Grande County Commissioner and roundtable member Karla Shriver, who represented the applicants on Tuesday, abstained from voting. She told the basin-wide water group the county wants to rely on scientific data to make informed decisions. While welcoming economic development, the commissioners want to ensure water quality, public safety and the agricultural economy that is the foundation of Rio Grande County, she explained. “We need economic development, but we need to do it in a prudent manner. That’s why we need information.”

She said the county is working closely with the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC.) For example, the county leaders contacted the COGCC with concerns about leakage at the old Jynnifer well up Old Woman’s Creek. The site has been abandoned since 1987 but still has the well head and storage tanks there, where a leak has developed.

More IBCC — basin roundtables coverage here.

Colorado Water 2012: Water conservancy districts and water conservation districts explained

Here’s the current installment of their Colorado Water 2012 series from The Valley Courier (Mike Gibson). Click through and read the whole article. Here’s an excerpt:

Water Conservation Districts determine policies, own water rights and other real property, coordinate local engineering and legal studies, and assist in the development of water resource projects. They may levy ad valorem taxes for the expenses of the organization…

In contrast, Water Conservancy Districts are formed at the request of communities and are local instrumentalities of state government. They are organized under procedures in state district courts and remain under their jurisdiction. These are formed in conformance with the Water Conservancy Act of 1937 and Colorado State Statutes 37-45-10 and have the powers of a public or municipal corporation.

More Colorado Water 2012 coverage here.

San Luis Valley: Area growers try to assess the potential impact of withdrawing acreage irrigated by groundwater pumping

From The Denver Post (Bruce Finley):

…the commercial agriculture that built up the valley is large-scale and competitive, and relies on center-pivot irrigation devices that pump heavily from underground aquifers. Commercial production of potatoes and hay — using 6,000 wells and 2,700 center-pivots to irrigate 120-acre crop circles — exploded after the 1950s. The pumping has depleted aquifers by more than 1 million acre-feet since 1976 and now is affecting surface streams…

By May, center-pivot farmers must activate a plan to reduce the water pulled from the aquifer by about 30,000 acre-feet a year. “They’ve got to start to restore it,” state engineer Dick Wolfe said. To avoid state shutdowns of wells — as happened in 2009 in northeastern Colorado — commercial farmers propose to pay to pump or purchase new surface-water rights and use these to offset pumping from aquifers…

“These communities, and no doubt other communities around the world, are coming to the realization that business as usual has to change,” said Mike Gibson, manager of the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District and chairman of the Rio Grande roundtable that participates in statewide planning…

But the time has come for commercial farms “to pay for the impacts they are causing to the river,” said Steve Vandiver, manager of the Rio Grande Water Conservation District and the leader of efforts to find water to replace water pumped from wells.

More Rio Grande River basin coverage here.

The Rio Grande Roundtable approves funding for the Flaming Gorge task force, members emphasize that they want a seat at the table

From The Pueblo Chieftain (Matt Hildner):

The move, which includes $5,000 roundtable members approved Tuesday, was done earlier this week with the idea of making sure the Rio Grande had a voice on the committee. Both Mike Gibson, the roundtable’s chairman, and Travis Smith, who represents the basin on the Colorado Water Conservation Board, told members that the funding did not represent an endorsement of the project…

Gibson said the Rio Grande had an interest in being at the table because of the potential impacts of Front Range water use on the San Luis Valley, which has the second-highest amount of irrigated ground in the state with 622,000 acres. The South Platte River basin is first with 831,000 irrigated acres. While the valley has not suffered from the water transfers that have sent Arkansas Valley water to cities like Aurora, the threat of a Front Range water grab is a not-too-distant memory. The region spent part of the 1980s and 1990s fighting off separate proposals from American Water Development and Stockman’s Water Company that would have piped the valley’s groundwater north.

More Flaming Gorge task force coverage here.

Energy policy — solar: Water requirements dictate solutions in the San Luis Valley

From The Pueblo Chieftain (Matt Hildner):

In Alamosa County, where three plants have secured power purchase agreements with Xcel Energy since 2009, companies have chosen to use photovoltaic technology largely because of its low water requirements. “The water has been one of the main determining factors to go with photovoltaic over some other types of solar plants,” said Craig Cotten, the division engineer in the valley for the Colorado Division of Water Resources…

The water needs for the photovoltaic plants have been met by the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District, which normally provides augmentation water for business and residential developments. The augmentation water is used to replace the depletions to the system caused by the new uses and ensure senior users are not injured. Mike Gibson, the district’s manager, said supplying the photovoltaic plants was no different than how it supplies its other clients, with the exception that additional agreements were needed with ditch companies to move the water to the plants. Moreover, the district also struck agreements with neighboring landowners to build recharge pits, where the replacement water filters back into the aquifer.

When solar companies began flooding the San Luis Valley with proposals that never made it off the drawing board, a number of them called for utilizing concentrated solar power, also known as solar thermal technology. Those types of plants gather the heat from the sun and use it to heat water to power a turbine. In the cases where those plants deploy a water cooling system, the need for water is large. And in the valley where all the water is already tied up, local water managers were uneasy with the proposals…

California-based SolarReserve had submitted a proposal to Saguache County that had originally called for their plant near Center to use up to 1,200 acre-feet per year. The company told the county in October that it would switch to a dry-cooling system, although it would still require up to 300 acre-feet per year. It has yet to offer details to the county on how it will get that amount of water.

More solar coverage here and here.

Rio Grande Basin Roundtable meeting recap

From the Valley Courier (Ruth Heide):

“We are very concerned in the Del Norte area and should be for the whole of the Valley for pollution of our underground water,” Wiescamp said. Wiescamp said a Houston-based firm, Dan A. Hughes, owns mineral rights up San Francisco Creek and may seek permission to drill. Wiescamp said the potential drill site is next to an area drilled in the early 1980’s when an exploratory well was drilled about 4,200 feet. Wiescamp added that Owen Scherzer of Twin Pines Ranch remembered when artesian geothermal water with a temperature of 110 degrees was hit at 4,100-4,200 feet, so it could be possible that exploratory oil and gas drilling could hit underground water sources. “That tells me we are playing with fire,” Wiescamp said. “There’s a lot of our water running underneath … We are very concerned about the punching into our source of water with hydraulic ‘fracking’ chemicals that they use … We just hope they run into a dry hole…

Colorado Division of Water Resources Division 3 Engineer Craig Cotten said he had also been contacted by several people who were concerned about this, and he had been contacted by the drilling company. “The Division of Water Resources doesn’t really have any say in these types of wells unless they produce water,” he said. However, he has contacted the oil and gas commission to recommend precautions be taken during any drilling, should it occur.

Rio Grande Roundtable Board Chairman Mike Gibson said representatives from the oil and gas company came to his office as well. He is district manager for the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District. Gibson suggested the roundtable board set up a sub-committee, and Wiescamp and others volunteered to sit on it.

More IBCC — basin roundtables coverage here.

Restoration project on the Rio Grande through Alamosa

From the Valley Courier (Julia Wilson):

“The river was broken into small sections and a study that included hydrologic, capacity and floodplain, geomorphology, riparian habitat, and diversion structure analyses were made of each section,” [Mike Gibson, manager of the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District] said. “Local planning issues were taken into consideration and integrated into the studies. Then the consulting team doing the study and the technical advisory committee were ready to prioritize projects.”[...]

Gibson said the information from the study gave guidance on how to restore the health of the river and provided seven goals:

• Maintaining and/or improving the quality of the water in the Rio Grande River is the first goal set out in the restoration plan.

• Have stream flows mimic a natural stream flow in rivers.

• Implement diversion structures to encourage the best use of the river.

* Protect the channel and 100-year floodplain.

• Maintain or enhance the river for recreational use.

• Lead local groups that support the project in best use improvements.

• Seek funding from state, federal and grant sources.

The projects along the river are all aimed at improving the way the river functions, he said. There will be multiple benefits from the work being done on the local stretch of the Rio Grande River. These benefits include stabilized stream banks, reduced erosion and sediment loading, reconfigured channel, re-establishment of native vegetation (willows), and an improved stream flow.

More Rio Grande River basin coverage here.

High Country Hustle recap



From The Mineral County Miner (Toni Seffens):

The High Country Hustle began as a school project for 17-year-old Forrest Getz from Creede. When he contacted Heather Messick and told her he wanted to organize the walk, she decided to co-organize the event with him. Getz and Messick both spoke to the participants about the worldwide Live Earth project and the global water crisis…

Former Colorado Senator Lewis Entz and Mike Gibson of the Rio Grande Headwater Restoration project also spoke at the event. Race participants walked from the Creede Ball Park to Airport Road then down to Deep Creek Bridge. The hustle was organized in conjunction with The Live Earth series of 6k run/walks taking place over the course of 24 hours in 150 countries across the world.

The 6k distance is important because it is the average distance many women and children throughout the world walk every day to secure drinking water.

More Rio Grande Basin coverage here.

Rio Grande roundtable meeting recap

From The Pueblo Chieftain (Matt Hildner):

The basin’s projected water demand is expected to rise from 19,900 acre-feet in 2008 to between 28,450 and 34,000 by 2050…

The [draft state report on future statewide water needs] calculates that population would grow in the basin from 49,000 now to 88,000 in 2050, based on formulas used by the Colorado State Demography Office. The draft said the Rio Grande basin may see increased demand from industry for water in the future because of oil and gas and solar energy development, although it did not quantify the demand as it did for other industries in other parts of the state. Mike Gibson, the roundtable’s chairman, said the demands of solar power on the valley’s water supply would be minimal compared with agriculture. He cited a proposal from Tessera Solar, which is one of a number under review by Xcel Energy, that would consume 10 acre-feet per year to run a 200 megawatt concentrated solar plant near Moffat. He noted that a 120-acre field of potatoes would consume 164 acre-feet annually while a similarly sized field of alfalfa that sees two cuttings would consume 310 acre-feet in a year.

More Rio Grande Basin coverage here.

Interbasin Compact Committee meeting recap

Here’s a recap of Monday’s meeting of the IBCC, from Chris Woodka writing for The Pueblo Chieftain. From the article:

The Interbasin Compact Committee, working with the Colorado Water Conservation Board, has begun crunching numbers in looking at how the quest to satisfy future water demands will affect current uses.

The group also vented on issues of growth and water at its meeting Monday. “Rather than plan for one future, we are trying to look at multiple futures,” said IBCC staffer Eric Hecox, as he explained a computer tool that anticipates a mix of existing projects, new supplies, conservation and agricultural transfers…

The IBCC looked at several alternative portfolios – the mix of strategies needed to meet a variety of growth scenarios – in an attempt to hit a moving target. Most of the alternatives include new water from the Western Slope, dry-up of farmland in all parts of the state and conservation or reuse of urban water supplies. The model itself can change over time as basin roundtables sharpen their estimates of consumptive and nonconsumptive needs…

At its last meeting, the Arkansas basin group put the final brush strokes on a plan it will submit to the state to look at strategies to meet future water needs. The IBCC will collect similar information from the state’s other eight basin roundtables to fill in the blanks for a statewide picture…

Melinda Kassen of Trout Unlimited said the overall goal of meeting water needs is not as important to the environment as when and where the water is used. “It’s about ecosystems,” she said. “What do we have to do to protect the important ecosystems of the state?”

Mike Gibson, of the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District, said the potential dry-up of 10 percent or more of the state’s agricultural land foreseen in almost every scenario of the model is not uniform. Most of the land to be dried up is in either the Arkansas or South Platte river basins, and some communities could see complete dry-up, having a much more devastating impact on the local economy, he said. “Ag producers want to be able to sell their water, but they’re not always real happy when their neighbor sells his,” Gibson said.

Even conservation and reuse strategies have to be applied carefully, said Mark Pifher, director of Aurora Water. If cities conserve water, as Aurora has with outside water restrictions in place long after the drought, they cannot depend on it to increase future supplies, Pifher said. And reusing water, as Aurora is doing in the Prairie Waters Project, is at cross-purposes with conservation. “The more water we conserve every day, the less I have to recapture,” he said. Eventually, cities will have to raise rates or take other unpopular measures if they continue to grow, he said. “The point will be reached where you have to remove lawns and where you have to use less water on public landscapes,” Pifher said. “Who makes the call?”[...]

[Jeris] Danielson said if cities cannot bring growth under control themselves, the state at least should look at implementing zoning density requirements, to ensure more efficient use of water. [Harris] Sherman said that question would be addressed later this month at a three-day seminar in Denver hosted by the CWCB.

More IBCC coverage here.

South Fork: Get to know South Fork Water

From The South Fork Times (Stan Moyer):

Residents and business owners in the South Fork area are facing a definite need to make decisions about water use and methods of supply in the relatively near future, according to several experts in the field who made presentations to an estimated fifty to sixty attending a “Get to Know South Fork Water” meeting at the Community Center on Highway 149 the evening of Monday, July 13. Although it would be nice to say, the issues discussed at the get-together promoted by Town Manager Todd Wright are not simple. The free handouts alone available at the meeting total 34 pages of detailed information from the Colorado Division of Water Resources, the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District, and the District Court, Water Division No. 3, State of Colorado…

No political stand absolutely dictating one solution or another to South Fork future water supply problems was made by experts Mike Gibson, Manager of the San Luis Valley Water Conservancy District, headquartered in Alamosa, along with other presenters seemed to emphasize that the town needs to have either a large, centralized water system or a smaller alternative system to ensure that the town has a water supply at a reasonable cost in the near future. Estimates for a residential water bill ranged from $44 to $84 a month, as an average figure, depending on the size of the water distribution system.

More Coyote Gulch coverage here.

The San Luis Valley Agricultural Conference and Trade Fair recap

From the Valley Courier (Ruth Heide): “The final session was scheduled to discuss the status of the Valley’s first water management sub-district, but the group still had no decision from District Judge O. John Kuenhold regarding the sub-district’s management plan that was the issue of a trial before Kuenhold last year. Earlier this week Rio Grande Inter Basin Roundtable Chairman Mike Gibson told that group that in a recent lunch with Kuenhold, the judge had told him he was not yet ready to release his decision but when he did, nobody would be happy with the result.”

More Coyote Gulch coverage here.