Day: May 25, 2010

H.R. 5320 (pdf), the Assistance, Quality, and Affordability Act of 2010: Congresswoman DeGette hopes to add frac’ing amendment to Waxman’s bill

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From the Colorado Independent (David O. Williams):

DeGette, who last summer introduced the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act, has been trying to remove a Safe Drinking Water Act exemption for hydraulic fracturing – a processed used by oil and gas companies – that was granted in 2005 during the Bush administration.

Dubbed the “Halliburton Loophole” for the oil and gas drilling services company that perfected hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” the 2005 exemption allows companies to keep secret the chemicals injected deep into natural gas wells, along with water and sand, to fracture tight geological formations and free up more gas.

Industry officials claim the process has been used for decades with no known cases of groundwater contamination and that the chemical formulas are proprietary. Environmentalists, some residents of energy producing area and an increasing number of politicians say the process is tainting drinking water and needs to be more closely regulated.

Here’s the Govtrack link for HR 5320 (pdf), the Assistance, Quality, and Affordability Act of 2010.

Desalination and Advanced Water Treatment Research Grant Funding Announcement Available

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Here’s the release from the Bureau of Reclamation (Peter Soeth):

The Bureau of Reclamation has announced the availability of funding for research and laboratory studies, pilot scale projects, and demonstration scale projects in desalination and water purification. Reclamation anticipates awarding a total of up to $1 million under this funding opportunity announcement.

The funding is being made available by the Desalination and Water Purification Research and Development Program. Through this program, Reclamation is partnering with private industry, universities, water utilities, and others to address a broad range of desalting and water purification needs.

The program has three major goals. The first goal is to augment the supply of usable water in the United States. Second, it is to understand the environmental impacts of desalination and develop approaches to minimize these impacts relative to other water supply alternatives. The third goal is to develop approaches to lower the financial costs of desalination so that it is an attractive option relative to other alternatives in locations where traditional sources of water are inadequate.

Eligible applicants that may submit proposals include individuals, institutions of higher education, commercial or industrial organizations, private entities, state and local governments, and Indian tribal governments. Foreign entities, other than the United States-Mexico binational research foundations and inter-university research programs established by the two countries, are not eligible for funding.

Reclamation will make up to $150,000 available for each research and laboratory study for a duration of 13 month, $200,000 a year for each pilot scale project for a duration of up to 25 months, and $500,000 a year for each demonstration scale project for a duration of up to 37 months.

The Desalination and Water Purification Research and Development Grant Funding Opportunity, posted on May 21 at grants.gov, can be found by searching Funding Opportunity Number R10SF80251. The deadline for applications is Tuesday, July 7, 2010 at 3:00 p.m. MDT.

It is anticipated that awards will be made in September 2010, with an anticipated project start date on or around October 1, 2010.

Many eyes are on the 1250 cfs Shoshone water right

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From The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel (Gary Harmon):

Shoshone generates 14 megawatts of electricity from water that is diverted from the Colorado River to spin its turbines. It then is returned to the main channel. Its 1902 water right ensures that the Colorado flows to — and through — Glenwood Canyon, so its value to Western Slope water users hardly can be overstated. Shoshone “is the primary controlling senior right on the Colorado River,” Colorado River Water Conservation District spokesman Chris Treese said.

Primary control over the water right, however, resides with Shoshone’s owner, Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy. Xcel operates in Denver under a franchise agreement with Denver, whose mayor appoints Denver Water’s board of commissioners. Denver Water depends on the Colorado River to supply its customers, sometimes in conflict with Western Slope water interests. Denver Water and the River District have been engaged in what are termed “global settlement talks” for years about the management of the Colorado River from its headwaters to the Utah state line. The operations of Shoshone “have inevitably arisen” in the global settlement discussions, Treese said.

Western Slope interests are hoping to include Shoshone in the global settlement talks, theorizing that Denver would be willing to influence Xcel to cede some control over Shoshone. Denver in return would get greater certainty about its share of Colorado River water…

Shoshone isn’t for sale, Xcel spokesman Tom Henley said, and if it were, “We wouldn’t be negotiating in the newspapers.” Plus, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would have to be involved, Henley said…

Denver, Treese said, “wants long-term certainty of the water it will get from the Western Slope and how much effort it will have to put into getting it.” One way for Denver to gain the assurances it wants could be to aid the River District with its interest in influence on the operations of Shoshone.

Shoshone was shut down from June 2007 to May 2008 when one of the pipes, or penstocks, ruptured. The $12 million repair job included installation of a system that allows for remote operation of the plant. It also gave Western Slope water users a peek into a future without Shoshone, and they didn’t like it. Farmers, ranchers and fruit growers depend on the Colorado River water that passes through Shoshone for their products, and domestic-water providers such as the Clifton Water District depend on it for quantity and quality, he said. “If Shoshone is shut down and the water taken elsewhere, we would greatly miss it,” Proctor said…

The idea of a global settlement includes meeting environmental, recreation and water-quality goals, in addition to accommodating future growth on both sides of the Continental Divide, Lochhead said. Both sides hope to reach a conclusion to the talks soon, within the next couple months, [Jim Lochhead Denver Water Manager] said.

More Colorado River Basin coverage here.

Dolores River update

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From The Denver Post (Scott Willoughby):

During what served as the peak of whitewater season elsewhere in southwestern Colorado, the scenario is indicative of the conundrum that the Rio Dolores — The River of Sorrows — has become. Once one of the longest undammed rivers in the lower 48 states and a perennial candidate for federal Wild and Scenic River designation, the 250-mile Dolores now loses about 40 percent of its water, an average of 100,000 acre-feet each year, to irrigation withdrawals and trans-basin diversions centered on the McPhee Dam and Reservoir built in the mid-1980s. The result is a boon to agriculture and municipal and industrial water users around the city of Cortez, but at significant cost to the recreational and ecological interests the river once supported. Management is a complex issue that involves several federal, state and local agencies, but many believe there’s ample water to share among these often-conflicting interests.

The first step — already begun by the Cortez-based Dolores River Coalition — is raising awareness of the river. “It really is the forgotten river,” said Bureau of Land Management ranger Ryan Mathis from the Montrose field office, one of three BLM offices…

With just more than 50 cfs trickling out of McPhee Reservoir, there’s little reason to make the once popular trip upstream of the San Miguel confluence anymore. The former gold medal trout fishery below the dam long ago had that designation revoked, and water managers from the Bureau of Reclamation and Dolores Water Conservancy District rarely release enough water for boaters to navigate the 185 miles of river below the dam, despite a study by Trout Unlimited showing an annual shortage of 3,300 acre-feet in the river (leaving nearly 25,000 acre-feet of water in the reservoir unused). Although hope remains for a Memorial Day weekend release, McPhee has yet to spill this year. From 2000-05, it didn’t spill at all…

The Dolores River Coalition is stressing protection of those undeveloped landscapes and increased river flows in order to balance resource management for the full spectrum of human uses and preservation of the ecosystem.

More Dolores River watershed coverage here and here.

Runoff/snowpack news

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From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):

Flows through the Boustead Tunnel, which brings water from the Fryingpan River through the Continental Divide into Turquoise Lake, began to increase Saturday and were running at a peak of more than 660 cubic feet per second. Flows in the Arkansas River increased dramatically by Monday as well, with temperatures in the Leadville area climbing into the 60s and staying above freezing overnight. Those flows remain below average, however, as cooler weather stuck around later into the year for the first time in a decade. As of Monday, flows at Parkdale, west of Canon City, on the Arkansas River were 1,260 cfs and climbing. That’s close to average and twice what was in the river a week ago…

He said the Fry-Ark Project should bring over an average amount of water, roughly 56,000 acre-feet, despite a variable snowpack that started off heavy in the southern mountains, melted off somewhat in April and returned at more typical rates into May. The Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District made allocations last week based on those projections, but held back 20 percent of the water to account for uncertainty. Snowpack in the state is now at 79 percent of average, but has rebounded in the northern mountains to average levels. The Colorado River basin is at 86 percent, and the Arkansas River basin is at 91 percent of average.