Page images
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

Mr. MAXWELL. Yes.

Senator ASHURST. Yes; he is an engineer.

The CHAIRMAN. Very well, the report may be included at this point.

(The report referred to is made part of the .record, as follows:)

COLORADO RIVER PROJECT

Estimated cost, storage and diversion dams, and the Arizona-California all gravity canal from Bridge Canyon dam, by the River route, along south bank of Colorado River, across Grapevine and Hualpai Washes, past Squaw Peak, across Detrital Wash, through Black Mountain Pass east of Eldorado Ferry, along the valley west of Black Mountain to Yucca, thence through and across Sacramento Valley to the Arizona-California forks of canal at the Needles Mountains near Topock, Ariz.:

Canal and tunnel capacities, 22,000 second-feet.

Grades: Tunnels, 11⁄2 feet; canals, o to fo feet per mile.

Estimated Cost

For Glen Canyon storage dam, with capacity of 40,000,000 acre-feet,
complete..
For Bridge Canyon dam and head-gate system, constructed to give
maximum elevation of water surface at dam of 2,040 feet plus a
draw-down of 50 feet, all complete-----

$50, 000, 000

60, 000, 000

For canal system (193 miles), Bridge Canyon dam by the river route to the Arizona-California "fork" at Needles Mountains, near Topock, Ariz., consisting of 29 miles of twin tunnels, 98 miles of canal in rock (lined), 68 miles of canal in earth (lined), and with bridges, drainage, engineering and contingent costs. 137, 000, 000 Total

247, 000, 000

Estimated cost, storage and diversion dams and the Arizona-California allgravity canal, by the Bridge Canyon dam to Yucca, 72-mile tunnel route, thence through and across Sacramento Valley to the Arizona-California forks of canal at the Needles Mountains, near Topock, Ariz. Canal and tunnel capacities, 22,000 second-feet.

Grades: Tunnels, 1% feet, and canals to feet per mile.

Estimated cost

For the Glen Canyon storage dam and the Bridge Canyon di-
version dam and head-gate system, complete_-.
For canal system (106 miles), Bridge Canyon dam, by the tun-
nel route, to the Arizona-California "forks" at Needles Moun-
tains, near Topock, Ariz., consisting of 72 miles twin tunnels,
complete, and 34 miles of cement-lined canal in earth and
rock_

Total cost---

$110, 000, 000

154, 000, 000 264, 000, 000

Estimated cost of an all-Arizona transmission canal from the "forks" of the Arizona-California all-gravity canal at Needles Mountains, via Signal, Santa Mari River, Butler Valley, Harquahala Pass to Lone Mountain Pass, and from Harquahala Pass through Harquahala Plain, through Big Horn-Hassayampa Plain, North of White Tank Mountain, across Aqua Fria and New Rivers, along north side of Paradise Valley to Granite Reef, across Salt River by bedrock siphon, southerly to the east of Gilbert, Higley, and Magma stations to Gila River below Florence; thence southwest to a point about 3 miles south of Casa Grande; thence westerly to a point 8 miles southwest of Maricopa. Estimated cost of this main canal from Needles Mountains by the route above described, a distance of 415 miles (of unlined canal), including all river crossings, roads, bridges, drainage, engineering, overhead and contingent costs--.

$75, 000, 000

COLORADO RIVER BASIN

Estimated cost of irrigation and power canal from Harquahala
Pass to Lone Mountain Pass and on to Gillespie dam, with 4
power drops of 800 feet in this canal, constructed as unlined
canal, and including roads, bridges, drainage, engineering,
overhead and contingent expenses---

Total for these two main transmission and power canals
in the Arizona distribution system_---

Hon. GEO. H. MAXWELL,

11, 000, 000

86, 000, 000

PHOENIX, ARIZ., November 19, 1925.

Executive Director National Reclamation Association,

DEAR SIR: Herewith please find estimate sheets showing the approximate Washington, D. C. cost of

(a) Storage dam at Glen Canyon with capacity of 40,000,000 acre-feet. (b) Estimated cost of diversion dam at Bridge Canyon, constructed to a height to discharge water into the transmission canal system at the head gates at a water surface elevation of 2,040 feet, plus a drawdown of 50 feet from the Bridge Canyon storage.

(C-1) Estimated cost of transmission canal (by the river route) from Bridge Canyon head gates to the Arizona-California forks of canal at the Needles, near Topock, Ariz.

(C-2) Estimated cost of the Bridge Canyon-Yucca Tunnel route, thence by canal to the Needles near Topock, Ariz., as in (C-1).

(d) Estimated cost of an all-Arizona canal from the California forks at the Needles Mountains to Sandy River near Signal; thence to and across Santa Maria River, through Butler Valley to a point on the west side of the Harcuvar Range between Butler and Raingras Valleys (herein called Har cuvar power plant), due to a necessary drop of 200 feet in the canal about 10 miles north of Vicksburg station on the Santa Fe Railroad. This drop of 200 feet will produce over 220,000 horsepower, listed later herein under "available power"); thence via Harquahala mine and a short tunnel to Lone Mountain Pass; thence from the Harquahala Tunnel across Harquahala and Big Horn-Hassampa Valleys to and across the Hassayampa, Agua Fria, and New Rivers along the northerly or upper edge of broad and extensive irrigable valley lands for the greater portion of nearly 170 miles to the Granite Reef Dam of the Salt River project; thence by a bedrock siphon across Salt River: thence southerly and well to the east of the auxiliary eastern district, east of Higley and Magma stations, through the lower Queen Creek Valley, to and across the Gila River below Florence; thence to a crossing of the Southern Pacific Railroad about 3 miles south of Casa Grande and westerly to a point about 8 miles southwest of Maricopa station. Almost the entire distance of 100 miles along and under the canal from Granite Reef to the terminus near Maricopa is through valley lands of highly exceptional fertility, equal to any in the Southwest.

(e) Am also sending in attached sheet the estimated cost of the Lone Mountain Pass to Gillespie Dam irrigation and power canal.

Please be advised that the estimated quantities on which all these estimates are based were made after personal inspection of nearly every mile of the lines described and estimated herein.

The classification as between earth and rock excavation can not be much, it any, in error, and certainly no one has any more information on that subject than this office.

The unit costs used in all these estimates are 15 per cent in excess of contract costs on similar classes of work under contract during the past year and more than 20 per cent in excess of work done by force account within the past two years.

We will stand on and by our unit prices and quantities on this work. Exact quantities can only be known after careful location surveys and final estimates have been made.

We desire especially to call your attention very briefly to the great injustice sought to be done a properly designed Arizona-California all-gravity canal by enemies of the project and for almost criminally ulterior motives.

In the discussion of this subject as briefly outlined in the Sturtevant-Stam report the "special board of engineers" (hand picked for the purpose) insisted on including the entire mileage from the Colorado River Forks at

Needles Mountains to Maricopa as a part of the proposed flood-control irrigation and power project.

In doing this they forget that the entire cost of all canals from the ArizonaCalifornia "fords at the Needles should, and probably will be, charged to more than 3,000,000 acres of land in Arizona, which acreage may be divided into 30 of more separate irrigation districts. In that event the entire cost of such transmission canals will be prorated over and against the acreage receiving water service therefrom.

You will note from estimate sheet No. 1 that the total estimated cost of Glen Canyon Dam, Bridge Canyon Dam, and complete transmission canal by the "river route" is $247,000,000, and that the cost of the same two dams for the storage, stabilization, and diversion of the Colorado River waters, as shown on estimate sheet No. 2, plus the cost of carriage of these waters by the Bridge Canyon-Yucca Tunnel route, with canal from Yucca to the Arizona-California forks" at the Needles Mountains, is $262,000,000.

We wish to say of these estimates that in all items which are at all comparable with similar cost items in the Morman Flats Dam and other work recently completed or now under construction in the mountain West, and more especially that under the very efficient management of Messrs. Reed and Cragin, of the Salt River Valley Water Users' Association, our estimated costs in the attached estimates are more than 15 per cent in excess of those for similar classes of construction recently completed or now under construction in Arizona and in other localities throughout the West.

We find no warrant or justification for the excessively high unit costs used by the " special board of engineers" or other critics who have sought by unjust, unfair, and misleading professional and political methods, or by positively "padded" and misleading estimates, such as were resorted to in the review of the preliminary report of the Arizona high line all-gravity canal, by the "special board of engineers," in their attempt to discredit the accuracy of preliminary estimates of the cost of that project and to destroy all hope for and of a maximum development of the Colorado River.

If our engineer and other critics can not or will not "keep step" with up-to-date methods of construction to reduce construction costs below the unit costs resorted to in the misleading estimates used in their report and criticism of the Arizona high-line canal project, it is surprising that they have not been "let out" of the United States Reclamation Service even more rapidly than has been done in the past few years, and "still there's more to follow."

APPORTIONMENTS OF WATER

Assuming a 40 per cent water apportionment or allocation to California at the Arizona-California forks of the high-line canal at Needles Mountains, we find that California can irrigate all its available land in the Imperial and adjoining districts, some 840,000 acres, and can transmit by gravity over or through the divide into the Los Angeles-San Diego district more than 2,000,000 acre-feet of water.

This amount of water west of the divide will irrigate nearly 2,000,000 acres of land, a total of over 2,840,000 acres in California.

At the power drop of over 3,000,000 acre-feet near Indio, Calif., for irrigation of lands in the Imperial and adjoining districts there may be generated more than 450,000 horsepower of electric energy.

From the 2,000 to 2,500 second-feet of water available to California west of the divide there may be generated over 200,000 horsepower.

SUMMARY OF BENEFITS AVAILABLE TO CALIFORNIA FROM THE COLORADO RIVER ALL GRAVITY HIGH-LINE CANAL

Lands irrigable in California from Colorado River water, 2,840,000 acres. Power available to California from Colorado River water, over 650,000 horsepower.

Diversion of 60 per cent of Colorado River waters at the Arizona-California Forks of a high-line canal will irrigate something over 3,500,000 acres of land in Arizona, allowing only a minimum of benefits from reuse of return seepage and surplus waters.

From water diverted to Arizona at the Arizona-California Forks of a highline canal, there may be developed, at 15 or more power drops" well dis

[ocr errors]

tributed along transmission and lateral canals in the southwestern portion of the State, over 650,000 horsepower of electrical energy.

SUMMARY OF BENEFITS TO ARIZONA FROM THE COLORADO RIVER ALL-GRAVITY HIGHLINE CANAL

Flood control along the lower Colorado River.

Lands irrigable in Arizona, 3,500,000 acres.

Power available to Arizona, over 650,000 horsepower.

Now compare the foregoing summaries of benefits presently available to Arizona and California from an all-gravity high-line canal with the maximuin of benefits possible from the proposed Boulder Canyon dam.

MAXIMUM AVAILABLE FROM BOULDER CANYON DAM

(a) Flood control to the lower Colorado River districts.

(b) Irrigation of only 280,000 acres in Arizona.

(c) Irrigation of 840,000 acres (by gravity) in California.

(d) One thousand five hundred or two thousand second-feet of water to California for municipal or irrigation uses. This water to be pumped to a one thousand four hundred feet lift at or near Topock, at an annual cost of more than $30,000,000 for electric energy, interest on pump equipment, repairs, maintenance and operation of pumping plants.

With this maximum use of water from the Boulder or Black Canyon Dam, there will be a stabilized flow of surplus or waste or unused water which can only be used on Mexican lands or go to waste into the Gulf of California. Please note that the annual charge of $30,000,000 or more per year for pumping high-lift water to California, when capitalized on a 5 per cent basis, represents an investment of more than $400,000,000, a sum largely in excess of the cost of the Glen Canyon and Bridge Canyon Dams, and the high-line transmission canal from Bridge Canyon to the Arizona-California forks at Needles Mountains.

With the Arizona high-line all-gravity canal efficient irrigation water will be supplied to more than 6,000,000 acres of land in Arizona and California with ultimate available power output of over 1,300,000 horsepower, about equally divided between Arizona and California.

Or more briefly summarized on a basis of the comparative ration of benefits available as between the Arizona high-line all-gravity canal and the porposed Boulder Canyon dam, with its maximum benefits, we find the former (and only feasible) plan yet suggested will furnish gravity irrigation to more than three times as much land in Arizona and California as the latter plan and will produce more than twice the amount of electrical energy ever possible by the Boulder Canyon project.

Under the high-line all-gravity canal plan the expense of one year's pumpage of water over the California divide to the west coast districts will pay the entire cost of the bedrock gravity siphons to convey California's entire water supply from the Colorado River to the west side of the river.

I trust the foregoing will at least give you some enlightenment on new phases of the Colorado River problems which will prove helpful in the great work to which you are devoting the best years of your endeavor.

Yours truly,

GEORGE W. STURTEVANT.

Mr. MAXWELL. Now, another matter, Mr. Chairman, it seems to me there ought to be something in this record to illustrate what Asiatic settlement is, and what they would do with the 1,600,000 acres for which the effort is now being made to secure the Colorado River for its reclamation.

The CHAIRMAN. What is that, a book or an extract from a book? Mr. MAXWELL. An extract from The Yangtze Valley and Beyond, showing that on 1,600,000, acres, all under one system of irrigation, the Chinese support a population of 4,000,000 by agriculture alone. The CHAIRMAN. Very well, that may be inserted.

(The extract referred to was made part of the record, and is as follows:)

« PreviousContinue »