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<br /> <br />t~'" <br />'.--) <br />'".) <br />CJl <br /> <br />The Investigation Commission of the <br />Colorado Nater Conservancy Board <br />Denver, Colorado <br /> <br />Gentlemen: <br /> <br />a- <br /> <br />In 1949, I was. employed as a consulting engineer with Ford,Bacon and <br />Davis, art engineering firm in New York City, to handle their water use <br />problems. One of the jobs the company had was under a contract with <br />the Corps of Engineers to make a report on the possibilities of synthetic <br />fuel production from coal, oil shales and tar deposits in the United States. <br /> <br />The four upper basin states in the Colorado River Basin are rich in coal <br />and oil shale deposits and the amount of water available for the processing of <br />these in the fo~r states was very important. <br /> <br />The Corps of Engineers had prepared a summary report on synthetic fuel <br />possibilities in northwestern Colorado, taking into account the Colorado <br />River Compact, the Upper Basin Compact and transmountain diversions, <br />and concluded that if a synthetic fuel program started as of present date <br />there would be a certain amount of firm water available for it, but each <br />year thereafter the .amount of available water would decrease and by the <br />year ZOOO, if no program weresta:rted, no water would be available. <br />The Bureau of Reclamation in Washington approved this conclusion. .Judge <br />Stone, Director of the Colorado. Water Conservancy Board,' however, objec- <br />ted to this line of reasoning and sent in a suggested water supply statement, <br />the last three paragrap. of which read as follows: <br /> <br />"On the basls of these e.stimates,there will remain in 196'3 'over 600,000 <br />acre feet ofColora40 River water. apportioned to Colorado subject to <br />appropriation for beneficial use less the amounts that may have, at that <br />time, already been appropriated for the processing of synthetic fuel or <br />other industrial uses. Because of the provision of the Colorado River <br />Compact, Article III (f) and III (g) quoted above for the apportionment <br />of unappropriated waters after 1963, there is no firm basis for estimat.- <br />ing the quantity of such unappropriated water which may be allocated <br />either to the Upper Basin or to Colorado. Therefore, no effort has been <br />made to appraise the availability of such water. <br /> <br />"It must be made clear that even under present conditions, in most in- <br />stances, storage will be required to permit the processing of any large <br />amoudts ofs)'Ulthetic fuel even though there is a large amount of unappro- <br />priated water in the stream. This is because, in some instances, during <br />periods of low water supply the water in the stream is fully appropriated <br />by existing uses. . <br /> <br />"At some time in the future it is reasonable to assume that all' water :Of <br />