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Final Draft - Preferred Storage Options Plan Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District June 8, 2000 2.0 PROJECT PURPOSE AND NEED 2.1 Overview The native water resources of the Arkansas River Basin have been intensively developed to meet municipal, agricultural, and industrial water needs. In response to growing demands for water, irrigators and municipal water suppliers have completed projects to divert water from the Colorado River Basin. One of these trans-mountain diversion projects is the Fryingpan- Arkansas (Fry-Ark) Project, which was completed during the 1964 to 1990 period. The Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District (the District) was created in 1958 to sponsor implementation of the Fry-Ark Project. The District (Figure 2.1) covers a large area and parts of 9 counties supplying imported water to 69 municipal water providers (cities, towns, and special districts), 30 ditch companies irrigating 280,600 acres, and 4 well augmentation organizations. Current (1997) population within the District is approximately 621,000 persons. Projections made during Phase I (GEl, 1998) indicate that by 2040, District population will be between 1.2 and 1.6 million persons. Population growth and increased demand for water, primarily in the Fountain Valley and Pueblo areas, but also in smaller communities within the District, will require that existing water management infrastructure be improved and expanded. In 1996, CSU approached the District to request that a portion of the storage space in the Fry- Ark Project, currently allocated for Project water storage, be dedicated for use by CSU. Studies completed by consultants for CSU indicated that a pipeline from Pueblo Reservoir, together with dedicated storage space, would be a viable, cost-effective element of a long-range plan to meet water needs iJ! the CSU service area. This project is known as the Southern Delivery System, which would bring water from Pueblo Reservoir in a new pipeline, parallel to the Fountain Valley Pipeline, and terminating at a new storage facility on Jimmy Camp Creek. Before acting on CSU's request, the District completed a study of District-wide water and storage needs. The District is the legal agency responsible for repayment of the reimbursable costs of the Fry-Ark Project and for making Project water available for agricultural and municipal uses. The GEl Study included forecasts of future population and water needs within the District. Both municipal and agricultural water needs, and associated water storage requirements, were identified on a District-wide basis through the year 2040. As described in subsequent sections, additional water storage capacity is required in order to meet the future water needs of the District's water users. Rather than having each water provider or water user pursue its own storage project independently, the District believes that a regional storage solution, benefitting the District as a whole, will be more cost-effective and have less environmental impact. J \PROJECTS\9906I\Reporu\Prefcrn:dSOP Final wpd 2-1 ID GEl Consultants, Inc.