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. ,, ;,F ' i III IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII ~ Er~viror~~~l~~li., Ir~c. LARRY E. O'BRIAN ~R[~IDlMT December 12, 1979 Mr. James B. McArdle Mined Land Reclamation Division 723 Centennial Building 1313 Sherman Street Denver, CO 80203 s~ ~~- 79-/95 Dear Mr. McArdle: Y.. . D~C1 ~19i9 9989 WEST 80TH AVENUE ARVADA,COLORA00 80004 303-423-7297 ~ti`IP1' D i_ ..'iU ^E':LAiIiAT!OM Colu. D;;)`.. c! i;.iu'al F::gn~IrCBs lde appreciate you forwarding the letter signed by Dr. Danielson that was written by Mr. Simpson. We shall answer Mr. Simpson's letter in paragraph order as it was written. It was Suburban's understanding when these properties were purchased that they also purchased the wells and water that was being used to irrigate the existing crops. And, that these wells were in operating order both mechan- ically and legally. Suburban has turned this item over to their water attorney, h1r. Jack Ross of Saunders Snyder Ross & Dickson. It does not appear that this is a concern of the MLRB. Suburban stated in its application on page 21, lines 5, 6 and 7, that they were investigating the possibility of converting two wells to an industrial use. Fir. Ross is now in the process of that conversion. Mr. Simpson knows, better than most, these conversions area bit slow in being processed. Again, this does not appear to be an item of concern to the MLRB. We are always impressed with Mr. Simpson's one-sided diatribe on new water losses through evaporation. But, as usual, Mr. Simpson has conveniently failed to take into consideration the discontinuance of agricultural uses and the eventual abandonment of wells on the same property. The 175 acres that will now be 141 acres of lake plus 34 acres of bank area was originally a commercial grass farm in part, and later part of the 175 acres was used for alfalfa production. Five wells with decrees totaling 7.51 cfs (5,437.24 ac.ft./year or 4,853,502.70 gallons per day) service these 175 acres. It should be noted that by the time there are 141 acres of lake to evaporate, there will no longer be 175 acres of alfalfa, nor will there be a possible use of 7.51 cfs of water from the irrigation wells. It does appear to us that the evaporative loss of 1.5 cfs claimed by Mr. Simpson is more than offset. Thus, any possible disturbance to the hydrologic balance is minimized. Mr. Simpson uses an evaporation loss of 300 acre feet per year which con- verts to about 0.414 cfs, and then asks us to use a figure of 1.5 cfs in July, August and September which converts to 89.25 ac.ft./month, or 267.75 acre feet for the three months in question. This leaves 32.25 acre feet for the remaining nine months, which calculates to be 3.583 ac.ft./month. He also converts 1.5 cfs to 1,039,260 gallons per day, which is ineorr2ct as 1.5 cfs converts to 969,408 gallons per day or also, interestingly, to .0000229 acre feet per second. This really has nothing to do with the reclamation problem but may need to be commented on since the DWR brought it up.