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<br />30 <br /> <br />! <br /> <br />West slope would receive compensation for lost water from the Green Mountain <br /> <br />Reservoir that would also be constructed. The C-BT received federal approval <br /> <br />from Interior secretary Harold Ickes and eventually from President Roosevelt <br /> <br /> <br />in 1937.104 TIle Bureau began construction in December of 1935.105 <br /> <br />In 1947, the first transmountain diversion of Colorado River water was <br /> <br />delivered by the C-BT through the project's main conveyance, the Alva B. Adams <br />Tunnel. So I.hile most of the C-BT' s features were not completed until 1954,106 <br /> <br />it was operating and taking I~ter from the Colorado at the time of the UCRBCC's <br /> <br />final meetings. While the Alva B. Adams Tunnel was not delivering an~lhere near <br /> <br />its planned capacity, it was vell-known to the Upper Basin, particularly Wyoming, <br /> <br />that the C-BT had the pot2ntial to reach this capacity in the matter of a fev <br /> <br /> <br />years. In fact, by 1954 the tunnel was delivering 302,070 acre-feet of llater,107 <br /> <br />just S,OOO acre-feet short of its capacity. <br /> <br />At an estimated cost of $165,410,000 <br /> <br />t1lis largest of Upper Basin transmountain diversions was also one of the most <br /> <br />extensive and complex irrigation projects undertaJ,en by the Bureau of Reclamation. <br /> <br />The C-BT vas discussed in various contexts in Meeting Five but first in <br /> <br />terms of Wyoming's view of transmountain diversions. Commissioner Bis]lOp of <br /> <br />Wyoming called the issue of such diversions "the most troublesome item that con- <br /> <br />, "lOS <br />fronts thlS commlSSlon." <br /> <br />Part of the reason for his fear of the capacity of <br /> <br />Upper Basin transmountain diversions must have been rooted in Colorado's history <br /> <br />of diverting water out of its natural basin to Wyoming'S detriment, such as with <br /> <br />the Laramie River. And while Colorado and Utah transmountain diversions were <br /> <br />rapidly increasing in number and scope, Wyoming had very few of such diversions <br /> <br />from the Colorado. In fact in the Engineering Report of the Commission exists <br /> <br />a summary of Upper Basin transmountain diversions from the river, in I~lich only <br /> <br />Utah's and Colorado's are listed. Wyoming had none listed and had no major ones <br />