Officials float water-project ideas

State water leaders are looking at the possibility of pumping water from Flaming Gorge Reservoir on the Wyoming-Utah border, around the Uinta Mountains and into Echo Reservoir on the Weber River as one possible solution to meeting the state's anticipated growth.

Larry Anderson, director of the Utah Division of Water Resources, mentioned the $300 million project that would provide over 70,000 acre-feet of Colorado River water to the Wasatch Front as just one of a few water development projects the agency is investigating.

"These are the projects out there that could be built," Anderson told a legislative and governor's task force meeting Friday to discuss alternative ways to fund water. But they are the kind of projects that would need legislative backing in order to get state bonding.

It may have come as a surprise to many leaders since the plan hasn't been discussed with many, including water managers at the Weber Basin Water Conservancy District, Anderson admitted.

But it's all part of trying to figure out how to provide water to meet the needs of an additional million or so people in the next 20 years.

Currently, 82 percent of the water is being used by farmers and ranchers to irrigate their crops and pastures while 18 percent is used by urban residents for drinking or watering their lawns. Water leaders expect that ratio to change as more people move along the Wasatch Front.

There's been much talk about pumping water from the Bear River into Willard Bay at a cost of $260 million. And there also is a $310 million proposal to build a pipeline that would deliver water from Lake Powell in order to meet the needs of a fast-growing Washington County.

Both plans have been controversial, expensive and some say a pipe dream.

The topics have resurfaced now that lawmakers and water officials are exploring water needs and funding. And Anderson surprised everyone on the Gubernatorial and Legislative Task Force on Alternative Revenue Sources for Water Funding by adding the Flaming Gorge pipeline to the mix of potential solutions.

At the heart of the water development discussions is how to pay for an estimated $5 billion in water needs. And who should pay.

Gov. Mike Leavitt, a proponent of doing away with the water subsidies, had wanted to divert some of the water funds generated by the sales tax to other state needs. Last legislative session, lawmakers fought Leavitt on that and in the end the two sides agreed to set up a task force to find alternative sources of funding for water projects.