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INTRODUCTION <br />This report describes a cumulative mass analysis performed in response to a' <br />suggestion made by Mr. J. Michael Jess, Director of the Nebraska Department <br />of Natural Resources (NDWR), at a Nebraska Water Resources Association <br />Round Table meeting held on June 26 in Lincoln, Nebraska. At that meeting, <br />Mr. Jess suggested that a cumulative mass analysis of the historic annual <br />flows recorded at the USGS gage in Julesburg, Colorado, would be the only <br />appropriate method of determining long term trends of flows entering <br />Nebraska from Colorado. <br />While we were in the process of finalizing this report we were provided <br />with a copy of a document entitled, Nebraska's Concerns Regarding the Two <br />Forks Project and the State's Reaction to "Facts and Myths: Two Forks <br />Impacts on Nebraska ", by the NDWR dated July 18, 1989. As a result this <br />report also contains our comments on the cumulative mass analysis exercise <br />performed by the NDWR which was described in that Nebraska document. <br />CUMULATIVE MASS ANALYSIS <br />A cumulative mass analysis is completed by accumulating flow values from <br />the beginning to the end of a flow record. The cumulative values are <br />plotted, and the resulting line examined for changes in slope (steepness) <br />which extend over a significant time period. This type of analysis is <br />useful in determining long term flow trends, in that it tends to minimize <br />the effects of short term variations in flows. An increase in slope is <br />