RGBRT Minutes 8-14-07 Final - Laserfiche WebLink

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JB -But if they get it by the end of the year they'd be ok, right? MG - It's a continuous balancing act. If there is a big flow on the river he can't necessarily get it through the system. Physically, it's the river that decides. Vandiver -explained -there's no place to put it. You can't deliver water in Nov and Dec. we'd have ice jams.. Have to deliver water throughout the season. Robert -Don't want to mess with lawsuits. MG - As soon as the actual increase in the flow was clear, the % of flow we have to deliver goes up. That's the way the Compact works. Mike S. - as we go up the freight charge gets higher and higher; nobody likes or anticipates this -but we don't know in advance. We had 1,800 cfs on the RG and I've got to deal with that water as it comes in. I can't just wait till the end of the year. MG - I<7 everytlung we do the Compact is the driving force to irrigation, recreation, all uses. We can't forget this. Doug - We don't just do this arbitrarily. The Rio Grande and Conejos water users are included in discussions about this process. (For a discussion on flows, diversions, go oiiline to the Division of Water Resources. You can pickup Del Norte gauge, all the canals, etc.) Mike S - We don't just do this on the back of a napkin. We study this in the context of trends and pick the best option. We only deliver the last drop that we have to over the state line. We don't want to have lawsuits, nor do we want to get into a credit situation. We re-evaluate and remeasure about every ten days. I don't have much reservoir space to store large amounts of water. There are some risks. Carryover to next year. Rio Grande - Conejos (discussion of calculations, risks, penalties) High flows continue to affect the index. Higher index means higher obligation to the downstream states. Trying to limit the impact by storing some compact water in the reservoir lowers the index (and the obligation) and keeps water in the basin if we "miss the target." Every time it rains it changes the index. Try to keep a balance. Platoro is a "post compact" reservoir. Mike S. has to count that water when it comes into storage because it is "post compact". (Built after the Compact was executed) Article VII - "you shall not store water in any post compact reservoir." If we drop below 400,000 AF in Elephant Butte, we can't store water under Platoro's priority. Have to keep count of every drop in Platoro and must release it. 294,000 AF in Elephant Butte so Article VII in effect as of July 4 as project stores less than 400,000 AF. Minutes, August 14, 2007 6 Rio Grande Basin Roundtable