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<br />g.... <br />~ <br />'J <br />~ <br />~ <br /> <br />:~ <br />~1 <br /> <br />Grande Project is the responsibility of the Water and Power Resources Service <br />(WPRS), however the distribution of stored water for irrigation and other uses <br />is determined by local districts under provisions of recent agreements be- <br />tween the districts and the United States. Annual releases from Elephant <br />Butte and Caballo Reservoirs are subject to Compact provisions and the stipu- <br />lations of the United States-Mexico Treaty of 1906. <br /> <br />~ <br />'1 <br /> <br />~:1 <br /> <br />~ <br />\ <br /> <br />The third major mainstem impoundment in New Mexico is Cochiti Reservoir <br />located about 200 miles upstream of Elephant Butte. This project was con- <br />structed by the Corps of Engineers primarily for flood control and sedimen- <br />tation purposes, however 50,000 acre-feet of permanent pool storage are <br />allocated for recreation. <br /> <br />~ <br />, <br />. <br />~ <br /> <br />As a result of a treaty between the United States and Mexico in 1944, <br />the surface waters of the Rio Grande below Fort, Quitman, Texas, were allo- <br />cated between the two countries and three major storage reservoirs were <br />authorized for construction in this reach to provide for water supply, flood <br />control, and generation of hydroelectric power. Two of these reservoirs have <br />been built, Amistad and Falcon, and together they provide a total of over <br />eight million acre-feet of conservation and flood control storage capacity. <br />Releases from the reservoirs are used primarily for irrigation of farmland in <br />both the United States and Mexico portions of the lower Rio Grande valley. <br /> <br />At the end of 1980, the ten major reservoirs in the Region with conser- <br />vation storage allocations, as indicated in Table 3, contained a total of <br />approximately 7,200,000 acre-feet [4,9] of water, or about 75% of their com- <br />bined conservation storage capacity. Almost three-fourths of this quantity <br />was stored in Amistad and Falcon Reservoirs in Texas. <br /> <br />Surface evaporation from reservoirs in the Region varies appreciably. <br />About 70 to 80 inches per year are lost to evaporation along the Rio Grande <br />mainstem from Falcon Reservoir upstream to Elephante Butte and in the Pecos <br />River basin from its mouth at Amistad Reservoir upstream to Lake Sumner. <br />Reservoirs located at higher elevations on tributaries of the Rio Grande <br />(Heron, El Vado and Abiquiu) and in the headwaters of the River in Colorado <br />(Rio Grande, Platoro and Sanchez) typically lose 40 to 50 inches per year to <br /> <br />21 <br /> <br />l-'.r: ,~ <br />U~~~L~ <br />