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Douglas County -Water Information • Pazker Water & Sanitation District • Pinery Water and Wastewater Sanitation District • Roxborough Park Metro District • Stonegate Village Metro District and Willows Water District • Ex-Officio Member: Silver Heights Water and Sanitation District Douglas County Water Facts http://www.douglas.w.us/DC/W aterlnfo.htm • Denver Basin aquifers (Dawson, Denver, Arapahoe, Laramie-Fox Hills) contain an estimated total of 467 million acre-feet of water, 269 million of which are recoverable (USGS Professional Paper 1257, 1987). These 269 million acre-feet of water are more than 1,000 times the water in the Dillon Reservoir. • An acre foot of water is approximately 326,000 gallons of water. In familiar terms, an acre-foot would be the equivalent of one foot of water on top of a football field (not including the end zones). A family of four uses about 1/2 to 2/3 of an acre-foot of water per year. • In 1995, 94°/a of Douglas County housing built was urban. Only 6% of the housing units built were on individual wells. For the last several years, over 90% of the homes built in the County are served by central water systems. • The average excess run-off each year on the South Platte River, which runs through Denver, is 50,000-70,000 acre-feet. In wet years, this number can be much higher. In 1995, for example, 500,000 acre-feet of excess water flowed down the river. • In Colorado (and elsewhere in the United States) agricultural water use accounts for approximately 95% of all water usage. Domestic usage (showering, flushing toilets, watering lawns, etc.) accounts for less than 5% of water usage. • The service area of the DCWRA member providers is approximately 134 square miles, 37 of which are developed today. In the developed areas, these water providers supplied 37,107 acre-feet of water in 1996. The demand is expected to nearly quadruple at buildout, to an annual demand of 146,167 acre-feet. • The water providers plan to meet demand with a combination of nontributary groundwater, surface water and reuse of these supplies. • Available Denver Basin groundwater supplies within the boundaries of the current water supply entities amount to 115,012 acre-feet. • Reuse of the Denver Basin water supplies is planned to provide an additiona127,661 acre-feet of water. • • Adjudicated surface water rights for use by water supply entities amount to 28,930 acre-feet of water. • Today's demands of 37,107 acre-feet tap only about twenty-five percent of the water supply 2 of3 9/15/00 8:14 AM