Water quality in the Colorado River affects all beneficiaries of the water from the aquatic
ecosystem to municipal, industrial, and agricultural users to recreationists.
The Colorado River Storage Project (CRSP) reservoirs have a large influence on water
quality in the Colorado River.
Reclamation directs and participates in studies to monitor and improve water quality in the
Colorado River Basin.
One of the long-recognized water quality concerns of the Colorado River is salinity, which affects
agricultural, municipal, and industrial use in both the United States and Mexico.
Congress has enacted several Acts related to investigating, monitoring, and implementing
measures to deal with the salinity concerns of the Colorado River.
In addition to salinity, other water quality constituents are monitored on the Colorado
River and its tributaries and in the storage reservoirs.
A network of 20 stream gages and field sampling activities are funded in full or in part by
Reclamation.
In the CRSP reservoirs, water quality constituents are monitored through regular sampling programs.
At Lake Powell, for example, water quality monitoring is funded by Reclamation and performed
by the USGS in cooperation with Reclamation and the National Park Service.
Monitoring is conducted monthly for samples above and below the dam and quarterly for
lake-wide samples.
This monitoring provides valuable information for programs such as the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive
Management Program.
The activities relating to water quality are summarized in the report from the Secretary
of the Interior to Congress and the states of the Colorado River Basin known as the 'Quality
of Water Colorado River Basin Progress Report', which has been issued every two years since
1963.
The Colorado River Storage Project was authorized by Congress with the passage of the CRSP Act
of 1956.
The CRSP Act authorized the construction of the initial units Flaming Gorge, Navajo, and
Glen Canyon and participating projects.
Colorado River operations, including CRSP operations, are governed by a complex set
of authorities referred to as the 'Law of the River.'
Each year the Secretary of the Interior prepares an annual operating plan describing among
other things, the projected operations for Colorado River reservoirs for the upcoming
year.
The 24-Month Study is the operational study that uses forecasted inflows and expected
operations to project future Colorado River reservoir volumes and releases for the next
24-month period.
Reclamation updates the projections each month using the previous month's reservoir volumes
and the latest inflow forecasts and water use forecasts.
The updated results of the 24-Month Study model run are published in the 24-Month Study
report which is issued monthly.
Working groups for the Aspinall Unit, Flaming Gorge Reservoir, Fontenelle Reservoir, and
Navajo Reservoir meet two to three times annually to discuss past, current and proposed reservoir
operations.
These meetings, led by either the Provo Area Office or the Western Colorado Area Office,
are open to the public, and participants are encouraged to comment.
Operational decisions are not made during the working group meetings; rather the meetings
provide a forum for information exchange.
At these meetings, stakeholders can also share information about specific resources of interest
and the relationship between reservoir operations and these resources.
The working groups provide input to Reclamation as well as educate various constituencies
on operations of the reservoirs.
The Colorado River Storage Project Act passed on April 11, 1956, authorized the construction
of four initial units and the first 11 participating projects, to regulate the flow of the Colorado
River.
These units provide water storage for beneficial consumptive use, reclamation of arid and semi-arid
land, control floods, and generate hydroelectric power.
Three of the four initial CRSP units?
are Glen Canyon Unit, Flaming Gorge Unit, and the Wayne N. Aspinall Unit?
including hydropower plants.
Reclamation generates power at these facilities by harnessing the kinetic energy of flowing
water as it moves downstream and converting it to electricity?
resulting in enough clean, renewable hydroelectric energy to assist in serving the needs of nearly
5.8 million customers in seven Western states.
The CRSP facilities alone have the capability to generate over 5 million MW*hrs of energy
annually.
Energy generated at CRSP power plants that are surplus to Reclamation's project needs
is sold to serve the electrical demand of customers in the states of Arizona, Colorado,
Nebraska, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming.
Reclamation, through its marketing partner, the Western Area Power Administration (Western),
offers low-priced CRSP energy to cooperatives, municipalities, publically owned utilities,
state and federal agencies, or tribes that meet specific criteria to be considered preference
customers.
These preference customers are typically in disadvantaged markets due to their location
or dispersed population bases.
For-profit utilities typically have little incentive to invest in the infrastructure
necessary to service these customers.
Reclamation, through Western, offers this energy at rates that are based on Reclamation's
production costs (cost-based), which are very low in comparison to electrical resources
available on the open market.
By Reclamation supplying this low-priced CRSP surplus energy to preference customers, the
economies of these rural areas of the Southwest have benefitted greatly.
For example, the wholesale composite rate for CRSP energy has ranged from $20.17 to
$29.62 over the past two decades.
For comparison purposes, the average wholesale market price between 2001 and 2013 at the
Palo Verde Hub was about $49.
Revenue generated from the sale of surplus energy is used by Reclamation to repay the
U.S. Treasury for the initial construction costs of CRSP facilities.
To date, nearly $600 million in power revenue has returned to the Treasury, leaving less
than $233 million to be repaid.
Power revenue also funds the continued operation and maintenance of CRSP dams and power plants.
For example, over the past 10 years, Reclamation has replaced the eight turbine runners at
Glen Canyon Dam with new high-efficiency turbine runners, resulting in more efficient and reliable
power generation at no additional cost to the American taxpayer.
This enables Reclamation to continually update and improve power generating equipment.
Soon after the Reclamation Service came into being, the potential for, and benefit of,
hydroelectric power generation at Reclamation facilities was recognized and the agency's
responsibility was expanded to include hydropower production.
Today, Reclamation is the second-largest producer of hydropower in the country, operating 58
hydroelectric power plants that generate over 42 million megawatt-hours of energy per year.
To put it into perspective, that's enough energy to meet the annual residential needs
of 14 million people and is the energy equivalent of over 80 million barrels of crude oil.
Reclamation's Upper Colorado Region operates nine of those 58 power plants in Arizona,
Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming, producing over 5 million megawatts of energy per year.
Throughout the 20th century, the hydroelectric power generated by Reclamation facilities
helped stimulate tremendous growth and opportunity across the West.
The clean, inexpensive electrical energy provided by these hydropower facilities has become
increasingly more influential in determining the function, benefits, impacts, and scale
of Reclamation projects.
Capturing the energy produced by falling water and converting it to electricity provides
the necessary power for domestic and industrial users while generating revenues that helped
finance larger irrigation projects as part of the comprehensive river basin development.
One such comprehensive river basin development in the Colorado River Storage Project.
The Upper Colorado River Basin Fund was established under Section 5 of the CRSP Act.
The CRSP Act 'authorized a separate fund in the Treasury of the United States to be known
as the Upper Colorado River Basin Fund. for carrying out provisions of this Act other
than Section 8'.
Money appropriated for the construction of CRSP facilities, except recreation and fish
and wildlife facilities constructed under Section 8, is transferred to the Basin Fund
from the General Fund of the Treasury.
Revenues derived from the operation of the CRSP and participating projects are deposited
in the Basin Fund.
Most of the revenues come from sales of hydroelectric power and transmission services.
The Basin Fund also receives revenues from M&I water service sales, rents, salinity funds
from the Lower Colorado Basin, and miscellaneous revenues collected in connection with the
operation of the CRSP and participating projects.
Revenues and appropriated funds are accounted for separately in the Basin Fund.
Basin Fund revenues must first be used to repay costs associated with the operation,
maintenance, and replacements of, and emergency expenditures for, the CRSP initial units.
Today, the water storage and other benefits of the CRSP contribute significantly to the
needs of the growing population of the West.
The CRSP provides long-term carry-over storage that has a leveling effect on erratic Colorado
flows varying from four to 22 million acre-feet annually.
The dams associated with the CRSP initial units (Glen Canyon, Flaming Gorge, Blue Mesa,
Morrow Point, Crystal, Navajo) have a total combined live storage capacity of 30.6 million
acre-feet, providing for the water needs of millions of people in the seven Colorado River
Basin states.
Glen Canyon Dam and Lake Powell, the key feature of the CRSP, function like a bank account
of water that is drawn upon in times of drought.
Without it, during drought periods, the Upper Basin states would realize additional shortages
in order to meet Lower Basin delivery obligations.
The CRSP is a key factor in finding solutions to increasing demands for limited water supplies.
The CRSP system is adaptively managed with an eye toward changing public values and greater
societal awareness about the importance of healthy ecosystems.
Hydropower provided by CRSP facilities contributed to the modernization and urbanization of the
West.
CRSP hydropower facilities provide enough clean, renewable hydroelectric energy to assist
in serving the needs of approximately 5.8 million customers in seven Western states.
CRSP facilities have the capability to generate over four billion kilowatt-hours of energy
annually.
Revenues collected from hydropower generation at CRSP facilities are credited to the Upper
Colorado River Basin Fund and used for several beneficial purposes including Repayment of
the initial construction costs of the project Help repay the construction costs of the participating
projects allocated to irrigation, that are beyond the irrigators' ability to pay.
Pays for operation and maintenance of initial units.
Pays for several important environmental programs such as the Upper Colorado River Endangered
Fish Recovery Program and the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program.
Purchases additional power to meet contractual obligations when CRSP power supplies are insufficient.
CRSP facilities provide a host of scenic and recreational opportunities that have significant
economic benefits.
Recreation use at CRSP's initial facilities totaled over four million visitor days in
FY2005/2006, demonstrating the high value placed on outdoor recreation opportunities
in the West.
To date, 16 of the currently authorized 22 projects have been completed or are in the
process of completion.
The five remaining participating projects were determined to be infeasible and were
not built.
The participating projects supply more than 554,000 acre-feet of water for irrigation
with an annual gross crop value of more than $49 million.
These projects also provide more than 110 billion gallons of water annually to meet
all or part of the needs of more than 1.2 million people.