From the Fort Collins Coloradoan (Bobby Magill):
In letters written to Million in January, the Fort Collins-Loveland Water District and the East Larimer County Water District both said they each want 5,000 acre-feet of water from the pipeline annually. In his Jan. 5 letter, Fort Collins-Loveland Water District general manager Michael DiTullio said water use in the district is expected to increase from 10,000 acre-feet per year to 17,000 acre-feet annually, and Million’s pipeline would help the district meet that demand. DiTullio said the district can’t commit to the pipeline water until a price can be negotiated. “What that letter says is we’re interested in any water storage project that could bring additional waters to Northern Colorado,” DiTullio said Thursday.
Loren Maxey, president of the East Larimer County Water District, or ELCO, said his district is interested in water from the project because the district’s water demand is expected to grow from 3,700 acre-feet per year to 11,000 acre-feet per year within the next 40 years.
The city of Brighton and a handful of other water users in northeast Colorado and in Adams, Douglas and El Paso counties also have said they are interested in Green River water…
Because it’s so unclear how much water is left to be developed in the Colorado River, Million’s project has the potential to create friction among people with different ideas about how to use the river’s remaining water. “That’s the center of our concern,” said Chris Treese of the Colorado River Water Conservation District. “How do we develop whatever’s left, or do we rush headlong into pursuing and approving very large projects that race us off the edge of the cliff before we know how close we are with regard to the Colorado River Compact? You don’t want to ever be in a deficit position. The Million project is perhaps taking us over the edge of that cliff.” Treese said he also wonders how the project can be regulated because Colorado has no power to control or regulate the pipeline’s diversion of the Green River’s water because it’s occurring in a different state.