The Impact of Energy Development on Water Resources in Arid Lands: Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography Item Type text; Book Authors Bowden, Charles Publisher Office of Arid Lands Studies, University of Arizona (Tucson, AZ) Download date 04/10/2021 05:21:56 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/238692 Arid Lands Resource Information Paper No.6 University of Arizona OFFICE OF ARID LANDS STUDIES Tucson, Arizona 85719 1975 ADDITIONAL PUBLICATIONS ON ARID LANDS Office of A rid Lands Studies: Seventy-Five Years of Arid Lands Research at the University of Arizona, A Selective Bibliography, 1891-1965 Arid Lands Abstracts, nos. 3, 1972- to date J ojoba and Its Uses, An International Conference, 1972 Remote Sensing Conferences, Proceedings of the 2d (1971) - 4th (1973) Arid Lands Resource Information Papers Nos. 1-5 University of Arizona Press (*= OALS Authors): *Deserts of the World *Arid Lands in Perspective *Food, Fiber and the Arid Lands Coastal Deserts, Their Natural and Human Environments Polar Deserts and Modern Man *Arid Lands Research Institutions: A World Directory Arid Lands Resource Information Paper No. 6 THE IMPACT OF ENERGY DEVELOPMENT ON WATER RESOURCES IN ARID LANDS Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography by Charles Bowden Research Assistant Office of A rid Lands Studies University of Arizona The work upon which this publication is based was supported in part by funds provided by the United States Department of the Interior, Office of Water Research and Technology, as authorized under the Water Resources Research Act of 1964, as amended. University of Arizona OFFICE OF ARID LANDS STUDIES Tucson, Arizona 85721 1975 CONTENTS Page Foreword Author's Preface Abstract iii A cknowledgments iv I.Water and Energy in the Past 1 1.Ancient Energy Systems 1 2.Energy Appetites and Resources 7 3.The Problem of Aridity 16 II. Water Needs of Various Energy Systems 20 1.Coal, Oil, and Natural Gas 21 2.Oil Shale 30 3.Solar Energy and Its Variants 32 4.Fission, Fusion, and Geothermal 36 III. The Colorado River 51 IV. The Missouri River 83 V. Conclusion 98 Supplementary List of References 103 Bibliography 123 Author Index 263 Keyword Index 267 LIST OF FIGURES Page 1.U.S. Energy Consumption Growth: Hydro, Coal, Oil, Gas, Nuclear 8 2.U.S. Energy Consumption Growth: Population vs. B.T.U. 9 3.Fossil Fuels in Human History 14 4.Epoch of Industrial Growth in Context of Longer Span of Human History 15 5.Coal Fields in WINB Member States 22 6.Principal Uranium Producing Areas for 87% of U.S. Production43 '7.Potential Geothermal Fields in the West 48 8.Colorado River Water Shortage (in acre -feet per year) 53 9.Southwest Energy Study: Energy Use Area; Energy Production Area (Colorado River Basin) 58 10.Southwest Energy Study: Load -Centers 1970 59 11.Southwest Energy Study: Total Primary Pollutant Emission Estimates, Phases I -IV 61 12.Black Mesa and the Peabody Mining Area 63 13.Effect of Rate of Shale -Oil Production on Spent Shale Output 77 14. Upper Colorado River Basin Water for Energy 1974 to 2000 80 15.Navajo Strip Mines near Four Corners 86 16.Stripping and Reclamation on Federal and Indian Leases 89 17.Northern Great Plains Power Development 92 FOREWORD The Arid Lands Resource Information Paper presented here is the fifth prepared for the Water Resources Scientific Information Center (WRSIC) of the U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of Water Research and Technology, on Grant No. 14- 31- 0001 -4258, to the University of Arizona, Office of Arid Lands Studies, Patricia Paylore, Principal Investigator.[A sixth (No. 5 in the series) was funded by another Federal agency.] Of the four preceding this one, most are out -of- print, attesting, we like to believe, to their timeliness and popularity. Like the others, this review addresses itself to an issue of considerable import in this year on the eve of our bicentennial celebration. While we do not offer hard - and -fast black -and -white answers, we do present the facts about the demands of energy developments on a diminishing water resource in the arid lands of the west- ern United States, as they are revealed in a massive study of the literature cited in the nearly 500 references displayed herein, including a number of environmental impact statements and Federal reports. We gratefully acknowledge National Science Foundation support in the development of the computer program that enabled us to manipulate successfully this substantial bibliography. The author travelled extensively throughout the states concerned with these potential developments, attending meetings and briefings, visiting plants, and dis- cussing with technicians, scientists, managers, and environmentalists the problems of energy developments as they relate to our water supplies and their demands upon this resource. The resulting interpretation, as it evolved from this nearly year -long task, and as expressed herein by Mr. Bowden, is one that in no way should be con- strued as the official view of either the U. S. Government or the University of Ari- zona's Office of Arid Lands Studies, but is rather a synthesis of views held with some conviction by him, as the author, and by myself, as the Principal Investigator. Mr. Bowden, in the Preface following, admonishes us to recognize the almost daily changing events that often determine policies in this fast -moving arena. Yet the reader would do well, we believe, to acknowledge the overriding constraints of our water resources here in this arid land, that persist throughout the variables of weather, politics, discovery, public opinion.If this cautionary view can prevail, perhaps in the decade ahead events themselves will be shaped on the basis of infor- mation, knowledge, application, rather than the reverse.Such is the motivation of this paper. Patricia Paylore Assistant Director Office of Arid Lands Studies University of Arizona January 1, 1975 Tucson, Arizona 85721 -i- AUTHOR'S PREFACE In August 1974 the Federal Energy Administration held Project Independence hearings in Denver. Although John Sawhill, the Agency's head, participated in the discussions, Project Independence was little mentioned, its target date of 1980 all but ignored.The Project as earlier mandated by President Nixon was by then dead.Instead, the talk turned to the problems of exploiting energy resources in the Rocky Mountain region, especially coal, coal gasification, and oil shale. By late fall of 1974, all had changed again.Oil shale had been shelved, by inflation among other things.Coal gasification was in limbo as companies de- bated whether the method could pay back its cost.Mr. Sawhill had been dismissed by a new president.Project Independence had issued its long - awaited and quickly- forgotten report. Such are the swift changes facing discussion of energy in this nation.For there is no real policy, there is only an appetite. The nation and its leaders are committed to maintaining what is called the American way of life.This means Americans will continue to consume one -third or so of the Earth's energy resources.In the hope of feeding this hunger for power, various ideas are periodically floated and periodically punctured. For years nuclear power was touted as an endless source of cheap power. Now the atomic industry is at best a troubled in- dustry, and the Atomic Energy Commission has been divided into two separate, perhaps weaker, parts.Currently, bills in the Congress are pushing solar energy, geothermal resources, wind power.Fusion reactors continue to have their champions.In this manner policy makers lunge to- ward some magic resource that will replace petroleum. And replaced it must be, for it is growing scarce and expensive. Such pivots of Federal thinking have a limited effect on the basic elements of water and energy in arid lands.The same problems always remain. Arid lands in the United States are pretty much dry, empty, pollution -free.Energy exploitation usually demands water, moves in human beings in numbers, threatens to dirty the air, land, water.Thus, while a paper such as this faces the prospect of being outstripped by events and proclamations, the prospect is often merely a mirage. The basic facts and problems of exploiting the arid lands remain, like the deserts them- selves, waiting. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Research for this paper gave me the opportunity to visit many mines, powerplants, institutions of higher learning, libraries, environmental groups, and government agencies, both Federal and state. Without excep- tion, I was always shown what I wanted to see, and my questions were always answered.I especially want to thank the Peabody Coal Company, Tucson Gas and Electric Company, the Tucson office of the U.S. Geological Survey, the Colorado Plateau Environmental Advisory Council and the Lake Powell Proj- ect of the Museum of Northern Arizona, Flagstaff; and Kathy Fletcher of the Environmental Defense Fund, Denver. The University of Arizona Library documents staff protected me from much peril by guiding me through the jungle of Government publications. To those members of the staff of the Office of Arid Lands Studies involved with me in the preparation of the paper: Kathleen Stanley, Nancy Ferguson, Mary Michael, and Julie V. Garrettson, who struggled mightily to bring sense and order to the bibliography I fashioned and who suffered through many a conversation about water and energy in arid lands; Lynn Lybeck, Systems Analyst, who masterminded the computer program that produced the bibliography; and Cecilia Chavarnwho typed the final version with such care and interest, I owe more than can be expressed. Patricia Paylore, my editor and counselor, while giving me a great deal of freedom in putting this paper together, also periodically saved me from myself. Charles Bowden Tucson, Arizona December 11, 1974 SELECTED WATER RESOURCES ABSTRACTS \ / / INPUT TRANSACTION FORM / ÿ THE IMPACT OF ENERGY DEVELOPMENT ON WATER RESOURCES IN ARID LANDS, Bowden, C.