WSP11823

• File Number: 8281.400
• Description: Colorado River Studies and Investigations -- Colorado River Depletion Projections
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Water Division: 5
• Date: 3/25/1955
• Title: Report on Depletion of Surface Water Supplied of Colorado West of Continental Divide
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

o

(-)

w
....
....
~

DEPLETION OF SURFACE WATER SUPPLIES

23

Equally definite estimates cannot be made of the personnel which
might be employed in other industries. If allowance be made for
another 50,000 persons on industrial payrolls, an additional 300,000
population would have to be considered in computations of water
needs.
The round figure of 1 million additional persons on the western
slope should be enough to provide ample margin for greater shale-oil
production' and for all industrial developments which need be
anticipated.

DIVERSION .REQUIREMENTS AND STREAM DEPLETION

Failure to distinguish between. rates of diversion of water and
strearn;flow depletion resulting from industrial developments has been
the SOT,lrce of much misunderstanding. All possible requirements of
industty for the diversion of water could be provided for by the
construction of suitable physical works. Streamflow depletion, on
the other hand, involves the legal limitations imposed upon Colorado
by interstate compacts. The diversion requirements of industry
may be. very large, but actual depletion of the flow of Colorado River
at Lee Ferry will be relatively small.

Oil-shale processing

MinUig operations will naturally require very little water. This is
fortuna~e because the cost of pumping water up to the mines would
be high.' Estimates range from less than 5,000 acre-feet per year to
almost 10,000 aci'e-feet per year for shale-oil developments aggregating
1 million barrels per day. The most recent and probably the most
accurate: estimates are about 5,000 acre-feet per year for this output
of shale oil.
VariouJl estimates have been made by the United States Bureau of
Mines, tl).e National Petroleum Council, and others as to the quantity
of water that would be consumed in retorting oil shale. These range
from an estimate of an actual gain .to as much as 170,000 acre-feet
per year :of streamflow depletion for an output of 1 million. barrels
daily of shale oil. . This large value is based upon a retorting process
requiring \water, There are two basic reasons why this process would
not be us'ed on a large scale: First, the retorts would naturally be
near the mines, approximately 3,000 feet above the level of Colorado
River, so :that the cost of delivering water to the retorts would be
excessive;' second, the process requiring water would result in the
waste from retorts being saturated, which would make it impracticable
to dispose of the spent shale in the tributary canyons to the depth
necessary to accommodate mining operations for an extended period
of years. ,The best estimates are that the actual consumption of
water in the retorting process will be nominal and in any event will
be less thlin 20,000 acre-feet per year for an output of 1 million
barrels daily of shale oil.
Refining ;operations may require the diversion of more than 150
cubic feet of water per second, but the actual consumption of water in
the refineries will evidently not exceed 50,000 acre-feet per year for
the processing of shale oil at the rate of 1 million barrels daily.

Other uses i~ industrial areas

V arious es~imates have been made as to the needs of other industries
for water and of the quantity of water which would have to be pro-

.~, .

i::

~" ,

(-

" :'
,.
*" '-
I,;'. .

t'

..
;;.

-