Fall ESPA Re-Charge

 The Idaho Water Resource Board (IWRB) recently approved a plan for late-season recharge of the Eastern Snake Plan Aquifer (ESPA). Between 30,000 and 60,000 acre feet of water could be recharged from mid-October to mid-November, depending upon water availability, canal system availability and weather conditions.

 The Board allocated $200,000 and agreed to pay water conveyance fees of up to $3 per acre foot.  Bob McLaughlin, Public Information Officer for Idaho Department of Water Resources explains the fee: “They also call it a wheeling fee, that’s basically to transport the water through the canal system. It’s like their transportation fee. In the spring the emphasis was above American Falls Reservoir this time around the emphasis will be below. The process will be using natural-flow water under the Board’s water right. Some recharge will take place above American Falls at Egin Lakes using storage water leased by the Board from Fremont-Madison Irrigation District. The 2009 ESPA late-season recharge project is possible due to average or above-average snow accumulation last winter; a cool, wet spring that reduced irrigation water demand, and the expectation that there will be sufficient carryover storage in the Upper Snake Basin reservoirs this winter.

 Net net as they say in the corporate board rooms…the water picture is improving in Idaho.