Arkansas - LAVWCD - SuperDitch_SummarySheet

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Alternative Agricultural Water Transfer Methods -Grant and Loan Program Project Summary Sheet Applicant: Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy Water Activity Name: Lower Arkansas Valley Super Ditch Company Amount Requested: $480,371 Matching Funds: Yes ($53,375) Drainage Basin: Arkansas River Water Source: Arkansas River Background The Goal The purpose of the "Super Ditch Company" is to create an alternative to historical "buy-and-dry" of irrigation water rights for M&I uses. More specifically, the Super Ditch Company would create a viable alternative to historical M&I purchases, permanent transfers, and dry-up of irrigated land that would both make irrigation water rights available for municipal use and also preserve irrigated agriculture, the economic lifeblood and future of rural communities in the Lower Arkansas Valley. The Problem. The Statewide Water Supply Initiative ("SWSI") estimates that water demand in the Arkansas River Basin will increase by 98,000 acre-feet by 2030. CDM, SWSI Executive Summary, at ES-10 (Nov. 2004). SWSI further estimates that 22,000 to 72,000 acres of additional irrigated land will be dried up in the Arkansas River Basin as M&I water providers continue to acquire and transfer agricultural water rights from outside their service area for use inside their service area. Id., at ES-10 - 11. This additional dry up would come on top of the more than 78,169 acres of irrigated land in the basin already dried up by the acquisition and transfer of agricultural water rights by M&I water providers. Charles W. Howe, The Regional Economic Impacts of Transfers of Water from Irrigated Agriculture in the Arkansas Valley of Colorado to in-Basin and Out-af-Basin Non-Agricultural Uses, at 6 (Dec. 2, 2002). To put these numbers in perspective, SWSI estimated the Arkansas Basin had 538,100 irrigated acres in 2004. Thus, additional M&I demands could dry up a further 13.4 percent of irrigated land in the basin, an top of the 94.5 percent already dried up. In short, the Arkansas River Basin could lose well over a quarter of its irrigated lands to M&i water providers by 2030. Significant on-going residential development in El Paso, Douglas and Arapahoe counties depends an Denver Basin groundwater. Development is "mining" the ground water resources of the four aquifers, which are evidencing declining water levels. Water providers throughout the Denver Basin are working to develop renewable water supplies #o recharge the aquifers to maintain water levels and extend aquifer life. Lower Valley irrigation water rights are principal options for this purpose. See, e.g., South Metro Water Supply Authority, "Regional Water Master Plan" (2007).