WSP02976

• File Number: 8271.300
• Description: Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Program - General Information and Publications-Reports
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Water Division: 5
• Date: 12/1/1979
• Title: An Economic Evaluation of the Salinity Impacts From Energy Development - The Case of the Upper Colorado River Basin
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

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Navajo field, the Toadlena area, the Newcomb
area and portions of Bisti and Chaco Canyon
a reas are in San Juan County of New Mexico.
The strippable coal areas lie along the
western and southern part of the basin. San
Juan County has large strippable reserves in
the Fruitland Formation. The major produc-
t lve coal areas are the Navajo field and
Fruitland areas. In 1970, the Navajo mine,
developed at the northern end of the Navajo
.f ield, was the largest mine in the United
States with production slightly over six
million tons (Shomaker et al. 1971). San
Juan County, New Mexico, in 1974 produced the
most stripped coal of any county in the Upper
Colorado River Basin.

Other Coal Areas

Some coal is found in the Dakota sand-
stone of southwestern Colorado. This coal has
lower quality than the coal of the Uinta and
San Juan River regions. The major coal areas
are the Cortez area in Montezuma, and the
Nucla Naturlta field in Montrose.

The Middle Park field in Grand County
and the Tongue Mesa field in Gunnison, Ouray,
and Montrose Count ies in Colorado belong to
the Denver coal region. The Henry Mountains
field in Wayne and Garf ield Count ies in Utah
contains high volatile C bituminous rank coal
in a large underground deposit. Construction
of Glen Canyon Dam has stimulated exploration
and utilization of coal in the Kaiparowits
Plateau. The coal is of high volatile
bituminous rank and is relatively low in ash
and sulfur.

The estimate of the coal reserve base
used in th is study is the coal resource for
which both quality and quantity have been
reasonably determined and wh ich is deemed to
be mineable at a profit under existing
market conditions. After the Environmental
Protection Agency established the maximum
emission limit of l.2 pounds of sulfur
dioxide per million Btu of heat input, most
industrial companies looked for low sulfur
and high heat value fossil fuel. Hence, the
coal reserve estimated by the Bureau of Mines
(l976a) is a more appropriate estimate to use
at present market conditions. The reserves
are based on measured and indicated coal to a
depth of 1,000 feet. By th is method of
estimation, total coal reserve in the Upper
Colorado Basin is nearly 22 billion tons, and
strippab1e coal accounts for 5 billion tons.
The coal reserve by County and water resource
subarea is presented in Table l7.

Coal in the Upper Colorado River Basin
is well suited for electrical power gener-
ation, the production of a variety of syn-
thetic petroleum gas products, and such
industrial uses as coking for steel produc-
tion. The locations found to have a mineable
coal reserve are shown in Figure 8. The
amounts of present and projected extract ion
are given in Table lB. The values per ton of
each are different among locations due to

quality and mining methods.
are presented in Table 19.

These values

In order to estimate the net return per
ton of coal in each study area, aggregate
prices and costs are used. The extraction
cost for each specific mine site is not
available; thus, the cost of coal as deliv-
ered (f.o.b. prices) to steam-electric plants
(Federal Power Commission 1974a and 1976b) is
chosen to represent the estimated extraction
costs. The net return per ton of coal in
this study may be low since "extraction cost"
possibly includes normal profit. The average
values of coal, cost, and net return per ton
of coal are aggregated and shown in Table
20. The average values of underground coals
are higher than stripped coals due to quality
differential both in heat content as well
as sulfur content.

Petroleum and Natural Gas

Total crude oil resources in the Upper
Colorado region is estimated at roughly 6.7
billion barrels, of which 0.845 billion
barrels are called reserves and nearly 6
billion barrels are predicted additional
resources. Total natural gas is estimated to
be as much as 103 trillion cubic feet.
Approximately 10 trillion cubic feet are'
estimated as reserves and 93 trillion cubic
feet are predicted (U.S. Water Resources
Council 1971). The major oil and gas pro-
ducing areas are located in five basins
(Figure 9).

Green River Basin

The Green River Basin is a large sedi-
mentary basin found mostly in Southwestern
Wyoming with a thin strip extending into
Northeastern Utah along the northern flank of
the Uinta Mountains. The field has been
a more important source of natural gas than
of petroleum (University of Arizona 1971).
The field contains four major stratigraphic
subdivisions: Cambrian-Permian, Triassic-
Jurass ic, Cretaceous, and Tert iary. Total
future oil and gas predicted (in 1968) are
7,668 million barrels and 24,152 billion
cubic feet (Keller and Thomaidis 1971),
respectively. Major oil and gas fields are
Big Piney-LaBarge and Pinedale in Sublette
County; Church Buttes in Uinta; Baxter Basin,
Patric Draw, Nitchie Gulch and Wamsutter in
Sweetwater~ Vermillion Basin~ Powder Wash
and Cherokee Ridge between Sweetwater and
Moffat Counties.

Uinta and Piceance Basins

The Uinta Basin is in the northern part
of the Colorado Plateau province in North-
eastern Utah. The Piceance Basin is located
in Northwestern Colorado. The two basins are
rich in hydrocarbons. Commercial production
of oil and gas is obtained from strata of the

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