Cover Letter

Wed, November 15, 2023

David Beckham, Chairman
Water Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona
Dbeckham@bg-ventures.com

Dear Chairman Beckham and Members of the WIFA Board:

The desire for Southwest water augmentation has been around for over sixty years. The issue surfaces and then recedes, surfaces and recedes. There have been many engineering solutions to bring water from where it is to where it isn’t: from the Colorado River, the Columbia River, the Mississippi, the Pacific Ocean, the Sea of Cortez.

There’s a Colorado River Compact where the affected states that rely on water from the Colorado River agree to share it. We ask, “Why don’t the Northwest states and tribes, those in the Columbia River watershed, form a Water Trust or Compact and sell a portion of the Columbia River water to the Southwest states?”

The Columbia River water under consideration to divert is not being used for agriculture or urban areas, but is being discharged into the Pacific Ocean, unused, unnecessary, unwanted. Additionally, it’s not necessary to divert all the discharged water to the Southwest states but rather a small percentage of the water, five to ten percent. (The Columbia River discharges 192 MAF into the Pacific Ocean annually according to a USGS report.).

With all these viable engineering solutions presented over the decades, why haven’t any been adopted and executed: Politics, primarily. And money.

Certainly, Western Water Project’s proposal, bringing 10 MAF of water from the mouth of the Columbia River to the Southwest in an undersea pipeline, has a huge price tag: Western Water Project estimates it will cost $125B to build. But, this project would supply California and Arizona with additional water and plans to eventually reach additional Southwest states: Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, and Utah. At current estimates, water can be delivered for $1,573 per AF: 4 MAF for Arizona, 3 MAF for San Joaquin Valley, 3 MAF for Imperial Valley.

WWP also believes that providing some of the water from the Columbia River to California will initially relieve California’s present demand and entitlement on the Colorado River allowing the other six states access to more Colorado River water. Once a water supply line is established to California, pipelines are built to carry water directly to Arizona and other Southwest states.

The WWP proposal is noteworthy in a few ways:

1. Recognizes that the Columbia River discharge into the ocean is water that is unused, unnecessary, unwanted.
2. Seeks to use a small percentage of the annual Columbia River discharge into the ocean, 5% - 10%. (6% of Columbia River discharge provides 10 MAF of fresh water.)
3. The Columbia River watershed states and tribes can form a Water Trust to own and control the water and sell it to the Southwest.
4. The proposed pipeline from the Northwest to the Southwest is undersea, not overland, avoiding private property rights and imminent domain issues and other jurisdictional considerations. (The undersea portion is 1,100 miles, the overland portion is 530 miles.)
5. Though no study has been performed at this point in time, it is likely the environmental impact would be less with an undersea pipeline compared to an overland pipeline.

In response to Arizona’s WIFA Long Term Water Augmentation RFI, this proposal provides a solution to Arizona’s water needs that offers a long-term plan for a water supply opportunity that imports water from outside Arizona’s state boundaries.

An initial funding of $25 million would allow this project to move forward. These funds, as described in detail in the RFI, would strategically prioritize and pay for the project’s various components. We estimate the initial capital funding would be expended within 18 months.

We welcome the opportunity to engage in further discussions, feasibility studies, and the necessary steps to transform this proposal into a reality that impacts Arizona’s water supply portfolio for anticipated customer needs. Together, we can unlock the potential of the Columbia River and address the pressing water resource challenges of our time.

Western Water Project appreciates the opportunity to present our RFI to WIFA for Long Term Water Augmentation for Arizona.

Sincerely,

David Doremus, Director
Western Water Project, LLC
doremus@westernwaterproject.org
702/630-2229