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Platte River Recovery Implementation Program The Water Plan Water and the Endangered Species Act Changes in the Platte River The waters of the Platte River serve the people of Historically, flow from snowmelt runoff was so Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska in many ways. large and full of sediment that it helped to remove Federal and non-federal water projects in the Platte vegetation from the Platte River and kept the river River Basin, including 15 major dams,provide wide and shallow with bare stretches of sand. It municipal and industrial water supplies for about provided a safe place for cranes and other birds to 5 million people, irrigate millions of acres of rest at night, allowing the birds to keep predators farmland, and generate millions of dollars of in sight. Terns and plovers also used the sandbars hydroelectric power. These projects also provide for nesting and raising their young. flood control, recreation, and fish and wildlife habitat. Over the past century, 70%of the water that was originally in the Platte has been removed or Under the Endangered Species Act(ESA), federal retimed by storing it in reservoirs. Without these agencies must ensure that water projects do not flows and the sediment load carried, sandbars and harm the continued existence of any threatened or riverbanks have become overgrown with endangered species or adversely modify critical vegetation and the channels confined and narrow. habitat. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) concluded that the threatened piping To restore the habitat, the Program will clear trees plover and the endangered whooping crane, least and other vegetation, increase flows at critical tern and pallid sturgeon, could be affected by times, and augment sediment volumes in the river. water diversions and other changes in land use The Program,together with the USFWS will also throughout the Platte River Basin. release "pulse flows" of water, a flow of 5,000 to 8,000 cubic feet per second(cfs) for three days in the spring,to help clear sandbars and maintain a The Platte River Recovery Implementation braided river. Such pulse flows would on average, Program(Program)brings together the states be planned for two out of three years. One (1) cfs (Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska), federal equals about 450 gallons per minute. government, water users, and environmental groups to work collaboratively to improve and maintain the associated habitats for the designated species. The Program is intended to address the ESA concerns including loss of habitat in Central Nebraska by managing key land and water resources in the central Platte region and in the process avoiding harm to the lower Platte River stretch. 12/11/08