Aquaduct Magazine

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On the cover Water. That's what Metropolitan is all about. Though the energy shortage has made it necessary to still these fountains at District Headquarters, in operation they seem a fitting symbol

for taking a last look at 1973 -the year in review.

Lake Perris

.

Water blending

.

Chlorine

.

Control facility

.

Algae. Lake Skinner

.

Revenue bonds. Energy

.

Certainly all

familiar terms at Metropolitan last

January. But all have taken on added

meaning as 1973 draws to a close.

It was a very good year

...

a year of

excitement

,

of experimentation

,

of

innovation

,

an active year of moving

forward.

There was construction. About $65

million

in

bids were advertised

.

Most of

it

for distribution of state water. Though

the peak years of construction have

passed

,

there is still much to be done.

Sections of several feeders -

West

Valley

,

Calabasas, Foothill

...

Live Oak

Reservoir on the Rialto Pipeline

.

.. the

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Robe

r

t A

.

Skinner Filtration Plant to

primarily serve agencies in San Diego

and Riverside counties

...

the Perris

Control Facility

,

controlling the flow of

water from the lake to agencies

i

n

these same counties

.

These all saw

construction begin this year

.

All right on

schedule

,

working toward some 300

miles of tunnels and pipelines

,

reservoirs

and water filtration works planned for

construction through 1990

.

Experimentat

i

on and future planning

are always important at Metropolitan

.

Will reverse osmosis be the answer to

demineralizing water? What about its

economical feasibility? Five different

types of units were set up at

Metropolitan's Weymouth plant for a

Lake Skinner

two-year study

.

Units manufactured by

such well-known names as

Westinghouse

,

Philco-Ford

,

DuPont

,

Gulf Envirotech and one developed

at U

.

C.L

.

A. Innovation

.

Lake Skinner-completed

in April and now more than half full

-will later be opened for public recreation

.

A first for Metropolitan. Boating

,

fishing

and camping

.

Picnicking

,

hiking and

horseback riding. Visitors to scenic Auld

Valley

,

with its gentle, rolling hill terrain

,

will enjoy all these activities

.

Riverside

County's Parks Department signed an

agreement with Metropolitan for this

recreational development and operation

.

Perhaps eventually there'll even be a

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Colorful baton unit helped celebrate completion of initial phases of State Water Project at Lake Perris.

w

i

ldlife preserve w

i

th access to the water

and a museum for exhibits of Indian

art

i

facts and valley history.

Lake Skinner

w

il

l hold water from

both the Colorado

River and the California Aqueduct.

Energy became an ever-increasing

concern across the country. In March,

Metropolitan agreed to supply Colorado

River water -

a maximum 100

,

000 acre-feet of cooling water annually -

for

nuclear power plants in the eastern

Mojave Desert proposed by Southern

Cal

i

fornia Edison, Department of Water

and Power and San Diego Gas and

Electric Company

.

The utilities will need

approvals from various other

govern-mental agencies

.

But efforts are

underway

.

The many faces of 1973 continued

.

Excitement

,

celebration

,

Lake Perris.

And the completion of the initial phases

of the longest and largest aqueduct

system in the U

.

S

..

.

the California

State Water Project. A system designed

to lend a hand to nature

, a system

requir

i

ng 12 years of plann

i

ng and 13

years of construction

. The May 18th

festivities were colorful. Hot air balloons,

daring sky divers, stunt flying, marching

bands, floats

,

musical groups

,

show

business and sports celebrities

,

leading

political figures

.

And nearly 12

,

000 spectators

.

Now the distribution of this

water in Southern California is up to

Metropolitan

.

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A better blend

,

a higher quality water

for Southern Californians. Metropolitan

announced new studies, new plans. To

set as its goal a 50-50 blend of Colorado

River and Northern California water as

soon as possible

.

And for as much of its

service area as possible

.

Target date

is 1976.

A new method of financing major

con-struction of distribution facilities became

a possibility

.

Mid-1972 had brought

approval by the California legislature

,

and last month Metropolitan's Board

voted to seek voter approval to sell

revenue bonds

.

In the past, such

construction relied heavily on general

obligation bonds

,

backed by property

taxes

.

Revenue bonds would instead be

paid off from income from water sales

.

The issue will appear on the ballot next

June 4 as Proposition W.

Crisis

,

a prominent word in 1973

.

Chlorine. Would there be enough? Algae

in Castaic. The flexibility of Metropolitan's

distribution system which allowed

Colorado River water to replace northern

water while the problem was being

cleared up solved that one. Energy

.

The

crisis continues to grow

.

Metropolitan

wants to help

.

Power saving steps are

being taken in reducing aqueduct pumping

and also in its offices and other facilities

,

gasoline saving in its District cars.

A year of contrasts. A year of coping

and adjusting. A year of planning and

moving. A very good year.

Metropolitan looks forward to 1974."""""'

A 50-50 blend of Colorado River and

Northern California water by 1976 will result from mid-year Board action.

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Energy

and the Colorado River

Downtown and along the fabulous strip in Las Vegas, Nev., the lights were dim. Action had been taken by business to save energy.

President Richard Nixon had just announced plans to ban Sunday gasoline sales, allocate home heating oil and jet fuel and cut motorists'

driving speed to 50 m.p.h.

The news registered immediately on faces in this city heavily depen-dent on tourist trade. The energy crisis had come to roost - and was apparently here to stay for some time.

That was the environment at Caesars Palace when 350 represen-tatives of water and power users of the Colorado River met to examine the future of natural resources development of the seven Basin states. In the Upper Basin, Wyoming,

Colorado, Utah and New Mexico; Arizona, California and Nevada in the Lower Basin.

Energy needs and water needs related directly to that, plus a score of other complicated problems along the river, keynoted the addresses and the hallway talk at the 30th Annual

Meeting of the Colorado River Water Users Association (CRWUA).

The speeches were thought-pro-voking. The horrendous challenges ahead were deemed incredible opportunities to better serve some 17 million people who rely most directly on the mighty river. Reliance for their basic necessities and the comforts bestowed by a strong,

progressive economy. Colorado Governor John

Vanderhoof voiced what became the theme words of the meeting.

"We are today living in a country of incredible contradictions. We have on one hand a governmental agency which requires that certain tobacco products be labeled as injurious to health, and on the other hand a federal agency which provides price supports for the growing of

tobacco ....

"Earlier this year, we were blessed with a report from the blue-ribbon National Water Commission decrying crop surpluses and excesses in irrigation of agricultural land. Almost simultaneously, another federal agency was urging our farmers to plant greater acreages and produce more crops.

"And now perhaps we have

Downtown Las Vegas before ...

encountered the greatest contradic-tion of all. In a nacontradic-tion containing an abundance of energy resources, we have stumbled into an energy crisis."

Governor Vanderhoof warned that large-scale extraction and conversion of resources of the Upper Basin -natural gas, coal and oil shale -will

require immense amounts of water. "The people of the Upper Basin States cannot ignore the fact that, in this era of the energy crisis, they may well become a new Arabia ....

"If the Upper Basin states are to furnish energy for the rest of the United States, then the already depleted water allocations may have to be re-examined .... "

Whether for clean hydroelectric power, cooling nuclear generating plants, farm production or the extraction of fossil fuels, it all spells more water from an over-taxed river supply. And it made especially important strong hopes expressed by U.S. Bureau of Reclamation officials to supplement the river's relatively meager, dependable flow of 14 million acre-feet a year. That,

to boost not only the total quantity that could be put to work but also to reduce salinity and make each drop

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stretch farther.

A bill in Congress to enlarge the size of the Grand Canyon National Park sparked a call by the CRWUA delegates for protection of sites between Lake Mead and Lake Powell, aside from the current park area, where dams and hydroelectric plants could be built. One such proposal for Bridge Canyon Dam died in Congress in 1968 when under severe attack by environmentalists.

It could have provided installed capacity of up to five million kilowatts of peak-use period power, more than doubling the "instant" generation of the river during such times.

Delegates reaffirmed their support for bills in Congress to undertake salinity control projects in the Upper Basin to remove 400,000 tons of salt a year from the river, enough to fill 5000 railroad gondola cars. The same measures also provide funds for additional studies along nearly the entire river to remove even more salt in future years.

And the CRWUA asked for a complete re-evaluation of the Water Commission report, declaring it obsolete in the face of farm product shortages and the need for a strong

... and after.

program of exports to other countries from this nation.

The Bureau's studies for supple-menting the river deal principally with geothermal development in California's Imperial Valley and cloud-seeding in the Upper Basin.

"The Bureau has made history by being the first to desalt geothermal water in the Imperial-Valley," Commissioner Gilbert G. Stamm, said.

"And if cloud seeding proves out as we expect, it could be the key to adding one to two million acre-feet of water annually to the river."

One of Stamm's top field men, Edward A. Lundberg, regional director at Boulder City, explained how the salty hot water beneath the Imperial Valley, estimated at one billion acre-feet, could provide fresh water, electricity and mineral byproducts.

He said tests with wells drilled thus far will initially lead to the design and construction of a prototype desalting plant producing up to three million gallons of fresh water daily.

Less than

10

per cent of the recoverable heat energy from beneath the crust of the valley is required in the water desalting

process. The remainder would be available to produce electricity.

At the close of the session, Myron B. Holburt, vice president, was elected president for the coming two years, succeeding C. C. Tabor. Holburt is chief engineer of the Colorado River Board of California. and Tabor is manager-secretary of the Wellton-Mohawk Irrigation and Drainage District near Wellton, Arizona.

Roland Fisher, secretary-engineer of the Colorado River Water

Conservation District at Glenwood Springs, Colo., was named the new vice president and Lowell 0. Weeks, general manager of the Coachella Valley County Water District, Indio, Calif., the new secretary-treasurer. The CRWUA officers and many other water leaders of the basin states will in the coming year be coping daily with nagging problems, and, yes, contradictions discussed at the annual meeting.

They know the solutions will not be easy.

For the Colorado blesses with life on farms and in the cities, and never seems to run out of energy to defy mortal men to put it to its best work.

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VOLUME 40 NUMBER 12 DECEMBER, 1973 Editor JoAnn Lundgren Associate Editor Jerry Mclain Photography Bob Grosh Dave Cicero Graphic Design Will Burlingame