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o N w;:.. CO Monitoring and Evaluation Report-2001 - for each of the salinity control units currently being implemented by the USDA Colorado River Salinity Control Program. Units Completed Five Reclamation units (Meeker Dome, Las V egas Wash, Grand Valley, Paradox Valley, and Dolores/McElmo) are all essentially completed. Units Being Implemented Paradox Vallev (Reclamation): Local ground water comes into contact with the top of a natural salt formation where it becomes nearly saturated with sodium chloride and surfaces in the Dolores River channel in Paradox Valley, Colorado. The River picks up over 205,000 tons of salt annually from this saline ground water source as it passes through the valley. The Salinity Control Program involves pumping the saline ground water, thereby lowering the water table and reducing saline inflows to the Dolores River. The pumped brine is injected into a deep well in the Paradox Valley. About 109,000 tons of salt are being removed annually by this unit. The injection well, the brine pipeline, the surface treatment building, and the injection building have been completed and tested. The facility went into operation in FY 1997. Grand Vallev (Reclamation and USDA): The area within the Grand Valley Unit in western Mesa County, Colorado, contributes 580,000 tons of salt annually to the Colorado River. Most of the salts 'are leached from the soil and underlying Mancos Formation by ground water that is recharged by deep percolation from canal and lateral leakage and on-farm application. The Reclamation program in the Grand Valley Unit was implemented in two stages. Stage I, encompassing about 10 percent of the unit area, consisted of concrete lining 6.8 miles of the Government Highline Canal (GHC), consolidating 34 miles of open laterals into 29 miles of pipe laterals and installing an automated moss and debris removal structure. This work was completed in April 1983 to test and demonstrate the viability ofthe project. Stage II construction began on the GHC system in the fall of 1986. Construction of the Price and Stubb Ditch systems started in 1991 under cooperative agreements with the Palisade Irrigation District and the Mesa County Irrigation District. Work on the Stage II systems was completed in 1998. The Unit is expected to reduce salt loading by 127,500 tons per year. USDA published its plan for the Grand Valley on-farm program in 1977, and in 1980 prepared a supplement to include improvements to lateral systems. The plan, updated in 1994, identified a salt load reduction goal of 132,000 tons. The USDA program includes the installation of on-farm salinity reduction practices and lining or piping certain off-farm lateral systems which are needed to support the on-farm improvements. Implementation was initiated in 1979 under existing USDA authorities, and in 1987 funding became available under the USDA Colorado River Salinity Control Program, and is continuing under the EQIP. 4-6