BOARD01567

• Board Meeting Date: 5/1/1975
• Description: Agenda or Table of Contents, Minutes, Memos
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

You will note that some of the concepts that have been expressed by the
oil companies here this morning are fairly new concepts. The Rio Blanco
group in Colorado has come up with a plan for off-channel storage in the
Yellow Creek area of the Piceance. This is a concept that we had not
previously studied.

Today, Mr. Crandall and his staff will bring us up to date on what they 1
are doing and where they expect to go from here. Hopefully, the United
States through the Bureau of Reclamation will play a major role in
assisting in the development of the water resources of the White River
Basin.

I am prompted to make one more observation before I turn it over to Dave.
As I looked at the rather bleak landscape of the leased tract in Utah,
it occurred to me that that is one area of Utah that the Mormons have
no~ been able to irrigate.

Mr. Crandall: Members of the Utah and Colorado Boards, ladies and
gentlemen. Mr. Sparks used the correct word with respect to reclamation
roles here, and this is of assistance. It is obvious that if anything
of significance is accomplished, it will be done in a partnership frame-
work. We are anxious to be a useful and helpful part of that partner-
ship. The partnership would be among the Indians, the two states,
industry and the federal government.

Reclam~tion has a data bank that has been assembled over many years
of the water related development possibilities. We have authority and
funding and technical capabilities which relate to the broad water base
needs for industrial development in the two state White, Yampa and Green
Rivers area.

We pledge our cooperative assistance in every way which is open to us.
Specific information on the water alternatives in future relevant studies
will be summarized for you by three of my colleagues, the first of which
will be a presentation of the alternatives to sources of water for
prototype oil shale development by Mr. Harl Noble. Secondly, a presen-
tation of the current status of the Yellow Jacket prOject investigations
by Mr. Rinckel, and finally by Mr. Wiscombe, our project manager here
who will make a presentation of the potentials of the Upper Colorado
Resource Study. If they will proceed in that order without any further
introductions, we will give you a review of the reclamation information.

Mr. Noble: I am Harl Noble. I am chief of the Planning and Engineering
Branch in the upper Colorado regions of the Bureau of Reclamation. We ,-
first directly got introduced to this subject by a copy of the letter
on August 2, 1974, directed to the chairman of the Oil Shale Environ-
mental Advisory Panel, with the charge that we were to compile factual
data and information and submit it to the panel for its consideration.
We were directed to consider the interests of the two states of Colorado
and Utah, industry, and environmental and socio-economic factors in
making a recommendation to the Secretary of Interior as to what develop-
ment should go ahead in the way of getting water for a prototype oil
shale development.

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