Here’s the release from Western Resource Advocates (Bart Miller), Trout Unlimited (Drew Peternell) and the Colorado Environmental Coalition (Beck Long):
Western Resource Advocates (WRA), Trout Unlimited (TU) and the Colorado Environmental Coalition (CEC) today released a plan that outlines how Colorado Front Range communities can meet projected human water demands through 2050 while keeping rivers healthy. In the new report, “Filling the Gap: Commonsense Solutions for Meeting Front Range Water Needs,” the conservation groups detail an approach that relies on low-impact water supply projects, conservation, water reuse, and agricultural-urban water cooperation to meet Colorado’s growing water demands.
Colorado is currently working through the Interbasin Compact Committee (IBCC) process to determine how the state’s river basins can meet their future water needs. The IBCC is considering a number of new storage projects, transbasin diversions, and moving of water over long distances. The “Filling the Gap” report offers an alternative plan showing how Front Range communities in the South Platte River Basin, home to some of Colorado’s largest municipalities including Denver, Boulder, and Fort Collins, can meet future needs without new major diversions of water from other river basins. The plan outlined in the “Filling the Gap” report is designed to be less expensive than traditional water supply approaches.
“Filling the Gap” identifies some water projects that the conservation groups could accept, if they were developed using a set of economically and environmentally- sound principals for minimizing the harm to streams and rivers. Some of these projects include the Chatfield Reservoir Reallocation, the Windy Gap Firming Project, Beebe Draw Aquifer Recharge, East Cherry Creek Valley’s Northern Project, as well expansion or enlargement of the Halligan Reservoir, Seaman Reservoir, and Gross Reservoir.
Coloradans are increasingly recognizing the critical importance of healthy flows to Colorado’s rivers and streams, which provide substantial economic and public benefits. For decades, many of these rivers and streams have been overtapped and pushed to the brink of collapse by multiple diversions.
“Many of Colorado’s rivers and streams are depleted to the point that they no longer support robust fisheries or recreational opportunities,” said Drew Peternell, director of TU’s Colorado Water Project. “Additional diversions from these streams could be devastating. ‘Filling the Gap’ charts a responsible path for meeting our water needs while protecting our state’s high quality of life.”
The report recommends that expanded conservation should play a key role in meeting future water demands. More than 50 percent of municipal water use is devoted to lawn watering, a use with low economic benefits when compared to other uses. By offering comprehensive incentives for consumers and industry to use water more efficiently, Front Range communities can achieve considerable water savings that can be used as new supply.
“This is low-hanging fruit,” said Drew Beckwith, the report’s primary author and WRA water policy manager. “Conservation is often the cheapest, fastest and smartest way to gain ‘new’ water supply.”
“Front Range communities are projected to double in size by 2050 so we must use water more wisely.” said Beckwith. “It is remarkable that increased water conservation and reuse efforts could nearly fill the gap between Front Range water supplies and growing demand.”
Agriculture, the largest sector of water use in the state, has been viewed as a target of water transfers to meet growing urban and municipal water needs. The report acknowledges that water sharing agreements can be beneficial to both sides, but “buy and dry” practices that permanently retire active farmland and reduce open space are the least desirable option. Instead, the report advocates voluntary and temporary market-based water transactions.
“By balancing competing uses and protecting rivers and streams, Colorado can sustain its growth and economy without harming its outdoors heritage and quality of life,” said Becky Long, Water Caucus Coordinator for the Colorado Environmental Coalition.
The “Filling the Gap” report provides a realistic and achievable blueprint for meeting the water demands of a population that is expected to double by the year 2050.
The report and supporting materials are available at http://www.westernresourceadvocates.org/gap
More coverage from Chris Woodka writing for The Pueblo Chieftain. From the article:
The groups presented their own version of a “four-legged stool,” mimicking the imagery the Interbasin Compact Committee chose in presenting its plan to Gov. John Hickenlooper in December. The report, “Filling the Gap: Common Sense Solutions to Meeting Front Range Water Needs,” omits using new supplies of water and reduces the number of acceptable projects in favor of adding heavier emphasis on urban conservation and reuse. It also stresses cooperative ventures between agricultural water rights holders and cities, and using energy-efficient, environmentally responsible projects. “Many of Colorado’s rivers and streams are depleted to the point that they no longer support robust fisheries or recreational opportunities,” said Drew Peternell, director of Trout Unlimited’s Colorado Water Project. “Additional diversions from these streams could be devastating. ‘Filling the Gap’ charts a responsible path for meeting our water needs while protecting our state’s high quality of life.”[…]
The report identified 575,000 acre-feet of potential water supply without building new pipelines or tunnels, which were labeled as “old ideas” by Bart Miller, water projects director for Western Resource Advocates…
While cities have resisted characterizing conservation savings as a source of future supply because they are not reliable during droughts, Miller said that Western cities, in practice, are using conservation savings as a way to stretch permanent water supplies…
Other than small expansion of a few transmountain projects, Filling the Gap stays away from transbasin solutions. Additionally, it puts emphasis on cooperative ways to share ag water that keep water rights tied to the land, Miller said. “We are very much proposing no more buy-and-dry, but instead looking at voluntary, short-term ways to share the water,” Miller said.
More coverage from the Summit County Citizens Voice (Bob Berwyn):
The report focuses on conservation, re-use and conversion of agricultural water as cost-effective alternatives to developing new pipelines and reservoirs. Colorado is currently working through the Interbasin Compact Committee process to determine how the state’s river basins can meet future water needs. The committee is considering a number of new storage projects, transbasin diversions, and moving of water over long distances. The “Filling the Gap” report shows how Front Range communities in the South Platte River Basin, home to some of Colorado’s largest municipalities including Denver, Boulder, and Fort Collins, can meet future needs without new major diversions of water from other river basins…
The report recommends that expanded conservation should play a key role in meeting future water demands. More than 50 percent of municipal water use is devoted to lawn watering, a use with low economic benefits when compared to other uses. By offering comprehensive incentives for consumers and industry to use water more efficiently, Front Range communities can achieve considerable water savings that can be used as new supply…
The report identifies some water projects that the conservation groups could accept if they were developed using a set of economically and environmentally- sound principals to minimiz the harm to streams and rivers. Some of these projects include the Chatfield Reservoir Reallocation, the Windy Gap Firming Project, Beebe Draw Aquifer Recharge, East Cherry Creek Valley’s Northern Project, as well expansion or enlargement of the Halligan Reservoir, Seaman Reservoir, and Gross Reservoir (the Moffat firming project). The key to making those projects acceptable is timing the diversions and releases to minimize impacts to aquatic life, Peternell said during a March 2 conference call…
“By balancing competing uses and protecting rivers and streams, Colorado can sustain its growth and economy without harming its outdoors heritage and quality of life,” said Becky Long, Water Caucus Coordinator for the Colorado Environmental Coalition.
More coverage from Janice Kurbjun writing for the Summit Daily News. From the article:
The report combats utility company planning efforts that lean toward dams, diversions, pumps, pipelines and other traditional measures to provide the much-needed water and instead suggests using technology and creativity to solve the water shortage problem…
Tourism accounts for vastly more state revenue than agriculture, said Becky Long of the Colorado Environmental Coalition. “It’s huge,” she said. “We need to make sure we have water for tourism.”[…]
But, is it possible to minimize impacts with these types of projects? “Yes and no,” [Jim Shaw of the non-advocacy Blue River Watershed Group] said. “Ecosystem development is based on natural flows. But, the natural variation is great enough that if we take water in high flow periods, impacts are far less than taking water from low-flow periods,” which can result in even lower flows and warmer stream temperatures. “You can do it better or worse, but you can’t do it perfectly,” he said.
Which seems to be the case with other measures, like cooperation between agriculture and urban water uses. The group proposes enhancing municipal supplies by granting financial benefit to the agriculture community through various measures such as water leasing. Shaw said reducing agriculture water consumption by 15 percent could create enough water to satisfy needs through 2050. “But with water law, that’s easier said than done,” he said, referring to the “use it or lose it” mentality that currently exists…
One main component of the approach is conservation — something both Front Range residents and mountain folk can be doing simultaneously, Long said. The report states that a 34 percent reduction in per-capita demand would result in a reduction of 362,000 acre-feet of water demand annually by 2050, some of which can be applied to new water demands.
More conservation coverage here.