“We can make the biggest changes when we work together” — Katharine Hayhoe
Day: February 10, 2017
@Northern_Water will revisit boat inspection dough at March 2 meeting
From The Loveland Reporter-Herald (Pamela Johnson):
The board discussed the issue at its Thursday board meeting and will revisit contributing to the $300,000 program at its March 2 meeting.
The inspections are to prevent invasive mussels from getting into the water via boats. If these mussels get into the water, which is used for drinking and agriculture through the region, they can affect aquatic life as well as the infrastructure that stores and moves the water.
Previously, Colorado Parks and Wildlife paid for all the inspections statewide at a cost of $4.5 million, but the agency lost its funding this summer due to a Colorado Supreme Court decision that changed the face of oil and gas severance taxes.
The parks agency is working on legislation for new fees to cover the program as soon as 2018, but the funding for this summer is up in the air.
Stakeholders proposed a three-way split of the total $300,000 cost at the two reservoirs. Larimer County agreed to pay one third from its parks fees, Colorado Parks and Wildlife agreed to pay one third from its reduced budget, and officials with both agencies had hoped Northern Water would kick in the final piece.
After its meeting Thursday, the board released the following statement: “The Northern Water board was briefed … regarding the funding challenges for ongoing boat inspections on the reservoirs associated with the Colorado-Big Thompson Project. Following significant discussion, the board directed staff to continue discussions with the various aquatic nuisance species (ANS) stakeholders. It is likely staff will provide a related resolution and a 2017 ANS funding plan to the board at its March planning and action session.”
US Rep. Jason Chaffetz pulls public lands sell-off bill
From The Fort Collins Coloradoan (Jacy Marmaduke):
About 94,000 acres of the land targeted for disposal is in Colorado. Seven parcels totaling 560 acres are located in Larimer County.
The future of public lands has been in the spotlight post-election, especially after President [#45] picked Montana Congressman Ryan Zinke for the U.S. Secretary of Interior post. Some conservationists said Zinke’s voting record on public lands conflicted with his verbal opposition to selling them off.
Conservationists say public land preservation is crucial to Western lifestyle, recreation and environment. Others argue the government maintains too much land that could be more valuable if developed or handled by local authorities.
At his confirmation hearing, Zinke vowed to protect America’s public lands — and then headlines started cropping up about Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz’s bill.
Chaffetz has introduced similar bills in previous sessions, but some thought this year’s iteration stood a better chance in the Republican-controlled U.S. House and Senate. The crux of the bill was a 1996 federal report that identified 3.3 million acres of public land for potential transfer to states…
Strong backlash prompted Chaffetz to kill the bill last week, a decision he announced through an Instagram post.
“I am withdrawing HR 621,” read the post. “I’m a proud gun owner, hunter and love our public lands. The bill would have disposed of small parcels of lands Pres. Clinton identified as serving no public purpose but groups I support and care about fear it sends the wrong message. The bill was originally introduced several years ago. I look forward to working with you. I hear you and HR 621 dies tomorrow.”
Killing the bill was a good call, said Jeremy Nichols, climate and energy program director at WildEarth Guardians, an environmental group. He added the 1996 report was a “complete hypothetical idea” produced back when the U.S. government was weighing funding options for restoration of the Florida Everglades.
“It speaks to just how haphazard and ill-conceived this idea was,” Nichols said. “Putting this hypothetical into legislation to mandate the sale of these lands — it was just stupid.”
Alamosa: Colorado Ag Water Alliance to hold meeting Feb. 28
From the Colorado Cattleman’s Association via FencePost:
The next Colorado Ag Water Alliance Ag Producers’ Water Workshop will be held Feb. 28 at the Rio Grande Water Conservancy District in Alamosa from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The event is free, and the organizers hope to have a good turnout of producers in the Rio Grande Basin region.
» The Colorado Water Plan aims to address the water needs of cities, agriculture and the environment in light of projected shortages. Agriculture is a focus.
» What are alternative transfer methods? What’s the motivation for farmers and ranchers to participate in leasing or to improve irrigation efficiency? What are the barriers?
» Brief, highly focused presentations and panel dialogue will cover the basics, followed by opportunity for ag producers to ask questions and engage in dialogue about what they see as opportunities and barriers — and how those barriers and opportunities might best be addressed.
To register, go to http://www.eventbrite.com/e/rio-grande-ag-producers-water-future-workshop-tickets-29413132471
#Snowpack news: “It’s definitely been a very interesting pattern this season” — Karl Wetlaufer
From The Greeley Tribune (Nate Miller):
Snowfall in January on the state’s mountains more than doubled its normal amount. This helped boost the state’s snowpack into healthy territory. Mountain snowfall melts in the warmer months and provides much of Weld County’s water.
“It’s definitely been a very interesting pattern this season,” said Karl Wuetlaufer, assistant snow survey supervisor for the Natural Resources Conservation Service. “We did have a notably late start to the snow accumulation season.”
The significant snowfall in January boosted the state’s snowpack to 157 percent of average on Feb. 1 from 114 percent of average on Jan. 1, according to data released this month by the Natural Resource Conservation Service. In the river basins that affect Weld, the Colorado and South Platte, snowpack also jumped. In the Colorado basin it hit 154 percent of average on Feb. 1, up from 117 on Jan. 1. In the South Platte basin, snowpack hit 156 percent of average on Feb. 1, up from 105 percent of average…
“We’re definitely positioned very well for having ample water supply this year,” he said, noting that statewide as of Feb. 1 the snowpack had already hit 93 percent of its normal peak value for the entire season. That mark is usually hit in the first weeks of April. “We have already achieved near a normal peak value. That’s what you could think of as in the bank.”
Additionally, reservoir storage looks strong, the South Platte and Colorado river basins were at 105 percent of average reservoir storage on Feb. 1.
He said the state would only need to see 19 percent of its normal mountain snowfall over the next couple of months to achieve a normal snowpack.
“We’ll likely have ample water supply. The flipside is if we do continue to build more and more snowpack and it gets bigger, then it becomes more of a concern of flooding,” he said. “There’s a lot of winter left and a lot can happen, but we do have a pretty substantial snowpack for this time of year.”
Stormwater is a big problem for Gore Creek
Gore Creek is healthy as it emerges from the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area, but has problems soon after, via The Mountain Town News. All photos by Jack Affleck.
This revegetation project uses log cribbing to hold the bank of Gore Creek in place while the plants get established. The logs will slowly decay. Photo credit Jack Affleck via The Mountain Town News.
Riparian areas were crowded or completely eliminated as the town was developed. In this, Vail is hardly alone. Photo by Jack Affleck via The Mountain Town News.
Streets and other artificial impervious areas result in rapid runoff of pollutants into the creek. Photo via The Mountain Town News and Jack Affleck.
The creek long ago was put into a channel to accommodate the golf course, highways and roads. – See more at: http://mountaintownnews.net/2016/04/27/vail-takes-aim-at-pollution-in-gore-creek/#sthash.TPoKUlk4.dpuf
Kayaking Gore Creek via Vail Recreation
Gore Creek through Vail golf course summer 2002
Gore Creek
From the Vail Daily (Scott N. Miller):
A host of problems threaten Gore Creek in Vail, but one of the biggest is what runs through the town’s storm drains.
Some of the problem will take years and a lot of money to solve. For instance, much of the runoff in town is no longer filtered through the soil, which has been replaced by pavement, concrete and rooftops throughout the years. But a number of problems may be due to people simply not knowing what happens when something runs into a storm grate.
Vail Watershed Education Coordinator Pete Wadden recently updated the Vail Town Council about state of stormwater and its treatment in town.
IMPROVED FILTRATION
There are a number of ways to treat stormwater, including catch basins that can capture sand, oil and other material before it flows into the creek. There are 27 of those basins in town at the moment, and they’re cleaned out a couple of times every year, Wadden said. Upgrading those basins would be effective, but expensive, Wadden said.
Filtration has been improved at the town’s snow storage site, and improvements are planned for this year at the East Vail Interstate 70 interchange.
But the basins don’t catch everything.
There are also more than 2,000 storm drains, many of which flow directly into the creek. Slowing the runoff is a good start at cleaning up those areas. Creating zones where runoff could filter through rocks and soil before going into the creek could be effective.
Then there’s the problem of people dumping stuff into the storm grates.
During his presentation, Wadden went through a small list of stuff that people dropped into storm grates in 2016. That list includes cooking grease, paint and window cleaner.
A member of a construction crew in Vail Village dumped a bag of cement into a storm drain.
Town crews had to vacuum out the storm grate to catch as much of the powdered cement as possible. Wadden said the construction company wouldn’t name the employee who dumped the cement, so no ticket was issued.
In a separate incidence, no ticket was issued to a vendor at the 2016 GoPro Mountain Games who dumped 120 hot dogs down a storm drain, which resulted in another good-sized cleanup.
“People just don’t know where the water goes,” Wadden said.
Council members said that needs to change.
An education campaign is already under way that includes advertising on town buses, and a proposal to create awareness-raising art on town storm drains. There’s also a town hotline, 970-476-4673 (GORE), to report dumping into storm drains. But that phone is only answered during normal business hours.
Council member Dick Cleveland asked if the phone could be routed into the town’s emergency dispatch center.
‘EASY TO UNDERSTAND’
Cleveland also asked Wadden if the education campaign could be expanded to include some sort of notice at virtually every storm grate in town. Cleveland said that’s the case in a California town near the beach.
Rio Grande: Special Master rules in Texas v. New Mexico
From The Las Cruces Sun-News (Diana Alba Soular):
Special Master Gregory Grimsal declined New Mexico’s request to toss out Texas’ lawsuit — essentially reaffirming draft rulings he issued in mid-2016 that was seen as a blow to New Mexico’s case.
The rulings are not the end of the case. They must now be reviewed by the Supreme Court, attorneys involved in the case said. And the entire matter could end up in a trial if not settled.
After the draft rulings, Grimsal took feedback from the parties involved and could have modified his stances in the document released Thursday. Instead, the final conclusions were the same as in the draft.
An attorney for Las Cruces-based Elephant Butte Irrigation District, which has been at odds with the state of New Mexico over the lawsuit, said the rulings represent a “victory” for the irrigation district. He said they recognize that “EBID members’ surface water rights are senior to all water rights in the basin” and that “the state engineer is obligated to protect that water as EBID delivers that water.”
[…]
The lawsuit arose out of the nature of the 1938 Rio Grande Compact, which apportioned river water among three U.S. states, experts have said. New Mexico’s measuring point for delivering water to Texas was the Elephant Butte Reservoir — roughly 100 miles north of the Texas state line. The river water released from the reservoir serves farmers in New Mexico-based EBID and Texas-based El Paso County Water Improvement District No. 1, as well as in Mexico. The groundwater pumping in that same 100-mile stretch, however, has been the purview of the New Mexico State Engineer’s Office.
Texas has argued New Mexico has over-pumped groundwater, undermining El Paso irrigators’ share of river water. EBID attorneys have said Grimsal’s rulings indicated New Mexico not only was obligated to deliver river water to Elephant Butte Reservoir for downstream users, but also had to protect it from being undermined before reaching the Texas state line.
Hernandez said the special master’s decision from Thursday must now be reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court, which could take a few different approaches. The court could accept it outright or allow the states involved to make written — or possibly oral — arguments regarding Grimsal’s decision.
If the court affirms the ruling and sends the case back to Grimsal, the case would then be scheduled for a trial, which Grimsal would oversee. The outcome of the trial also would have to be reviewed and signed off upon by the Supreme Court, Hernandez said.
New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas announced last week he had met with stakeholders and is hoping to negotiate with Texas toward a resolution of the case.
In addition to declining New Mexico’s motion to dismiss the case, Grimsal on Thursday declined motions by EBID and EPCID No. 1 to become official parties in the case, alongside New Mexico, Texas and Colorado. Also, he specified the federal government couldn’t file a claim against New Mexico based on the 1938 Rio Grande Compact but that the federal government could make an argument against New Mexico under federal reclamation law, according to the document.
Battlement Mesa: Ursa Resources re-thinking well pad location
From The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel (Dennis Webb):
The company believes it can do without a pad that would be located adjacent to Battlement Mesa’s golf course.
Cutting the pad would reduce to four the total number of pads Ursa would drill from within the community of several thousand people. Antero Resources earlier had proposed drilling from 10 pads within the community. Ursa, which subsequently bought Antero’s local assets, has worked to cut the number of pads needed, in part through directional drilling from pads outside the residential development’s borders.
Ursa has Garfield County and state approvals to drill from two pads so far in Battlement Mesa and plans to begin drilling this year. It also has begun the process of seeking approvals for additional pads.
Don Simpson, vice president of business development for Ursa, said Ursa will eliminate the pad by the golf course from its plans if it can get approvals for two additional pads it is proposing, and for a wastewater injection well for one of them.
This week, it dropped efforts to obtain approvals for the injection well close to the community’s water intake on the Colorado River. The proximity and the potential for impacts from spills drew objections from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment and county planning staff.
Simpson said the pad now proposed is downstream from the water intake and 2,000 feet from the river. He said changing the location probably will mean extra truck traffic for a while because Ursa doesn’t have approval yet and may not be able to begin injecting wastewater until next year. Trucks would have to haul wastewater out of Battlement Mesa in the meantime. Reducing truck traffic is a key reason Ursa wants to have an injection well.
If the injection well is approved, that would be one less reason for Ursa to need the pad near the golf course.
Simpson said the two additional pads Ursa is pursuing are now planned to be larger, which will allow for more wellheads.
“We think this is a big win for everybody except for the people that don’t want you in (Battlement Mesa) regardless of what you do,” he said.
Dave Devanney of the group Battlement Concerned Citizens, said he’s a bit conflicted on how to react to the latest Ursa developments.
“As somebody said recently, name your poison. Do you want truck traffic or do you want injection wells? The citizens of Battlement Mesa don’t want either,” he said.
Meanwhile, Ursa Resources held a meeting with Battlement Mesa residents yesterday. Here’s a report from Alex Zorn writing for The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. Here’s an excerpt:
The meeting, one of Ursa’s regular sessions with residents, came a day after a zoning change proposed on Ursa’s behalf was withdrawn.
Thursday’s meeting lasted nearly two hours, and Ursa representatives spent nearly the entire time fielding questions from concerned residents.
A conversation that began as an outline for development ended with residents demanding to know if Ursa will leave the community in better shape than they found it.
“Do you see any benefit for the Battlement Mesa citizens from oil and gas?” asked one audience member.
Ursa owns mineral rights under the 5,000-person community and last year won Garfield County and state approval to drill for natural gas inside the Planned Unit Development. Wednesday, a request to place an injection well to dispose of wastewater within the PUD was pulled back after county staff urged rejection.
The state Department of Public Health and Environment earlier urged rejection because the well would be within about 600 feet of the municipal water intake.
The Planning Commission granted a continuance so that Battlement Mesa Partners, which requested the zoning change for Ursa’s natural gas operations, can alter its plan. The hearing was moved to the March 8 Planning Commission meeting.
“The reason for last night’s continuance is to allow us to present all of the changes we’ve made, which will allow us to move the injection well from the BMC B Pad to the BMC A Pad,” Ursa Resources Operations Superintendent Matt Honeycutt said. “We wanted to get it right, and part of that was by talking with many of you.”
Moving the injection well from the B Pad to A Pad will eliminate the threat of any runoff leaking into the Colorado River and contaminating the water supply, he said.
Instead of placing the injection well upriver from the intake, which it would be in the B Pad, Ursa will seek to place the injection well downriver at the BMC A Pad.
Furthermore, he said, shifting focus to the A Pad will eliminate the impact to the area surrounding the B Pad, which will reduce the area of the project by nearly 50 percent. Rather than rezoning 37 acres along the north end of the community by the north end of the Colorado River, the new plan will include closer to 22 acres.
The plan will still be to drill 24 wells in the BMC B Pad, but having an injection well in the community will greatly reduce truck traffic, according to Honeycutt.
Construction will begin for the B Pad on Feb. 21, the company said, with as many as 14 wells to be located there.
Now, 100 wells are in operation out of approximately 200 wells that Ursa plans to drill in Battlement Mesa, though the company has not yet begun to drill within the PUD, representatives said.
Drilling for a pipeline has begun, with 15 of 24 wells already in operation. Drilling is expected to be completed by March 23. Once the drilling is completed there, Ursa will begin drilling at the D Pad.
One resident was frustrated, asking, “Of all of this land, how come you have to do this right here?”