BOARD00116 ‎(2)‎

• Board Meeting Date: 1/24/2007
• Description: WSP Section - Colorado River Future Consumptive Use Projections - Future Depletions Schedule
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

/"

.

.

.

STATE OF COLORADO

Colorado Water Conservation Board

Department of Natural Resources
1313 Sherman Street, Room 721
Denver, Colorado 80203
Phone: [phone]
FAX: [phone]
www.cwcb.state.co.us

MEMORANDUM

Bill Ritter, Jr.
Governor

TO:

Colorado Water Conservation Board Members

Harris D. Sherman
Executive Director

FROM:

Randy Seaholm
Andy Moore
Water Supply Protection Section

Rod Kuharich
CWCB Director

Dan McAuliffe
Deputy Director

DATE: January 15,2007

SUBJECT: Agenda Item 18, January 23-24, 2007 Board Meeting:
Water Supply Protection - Colorado River Future Consumptive Use
Projections

Backeround

The purpose of this agenda item is to follow-up on the presentation of this information
made to the Board in November and to ask for the Boards authorization to convey the updated
information to the Upper Colorado River Commission (UCRC) for their use and consideration.

To refresh everyone's memory, every 5-years or so each Upper Division State, working
through the UCRC, provide estimates of their anticipated future consumptive uses of Colorado
River Basin water. These projections are used by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, (as well as by
other federal and public entities on a routine basis for planning purposes only) for studies such as
projecting when to bring on a new water supply or salinity control project, evaluating reservoir
operations, determining likely surpluses and shortages, and for conducting Western Area Power
Administration power-rate studies.

Colorado develops its future depletion estimates by sub-basin, first evaluating the trends
in the consumptive use of water over the last several years. This trend analysis is based on the
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Consumptive Uses and Losses Report's since 1970 and is given
the most weight in projecting uses into the future. We then consider the maximum historic uses
and other factors such as unused capacity in existing projects, reservations of water in certain
sub-basins made as part of a Programmatic Biological Opinion pursuant to a Recovery Program
(60,000 AF for the Yampa, 120,000 AF for the Colorado) and the estimated consumptive uses
from potential new uses of water such as oil shale. This process leads to the State's future
consumptive use projections provided to the UCRC. The last revision to the projections was
adopted by the UCRC on December 15, 1999 (Attachment 1). The 1999 future depletions table
adopted by the UCRC suggests Colorado and the other Upper Division States consumptive uses

Flood Protection. Water Supply Planning and Finance. Stream and Lake Protection
Water Supply Protection. Conservation and Drought Planning