“Guy urges ND to build pipeline for water needs” from The Forum, January 9, 2008
Wednesday, January 9th, 2008
by Patrick Springer
North Dakota’s dreamy founders have been accused of committing what has been called the “Too Much Mistake”: too much infrastructure to support a population that peaked in 1930.
But former Gov. Bill Guy, addressing a Red River Valley water board, urged officials Tuesday to think far into the future or risk committing a “too little” mistake in planning to meet the valley’s long-range water needs.
Guy, who served as governor from 1961 to 1973, asked members of the Lake Agassiz Water Authority to build a pipeline as the means to transfer water from the Missouri River to the Red River to augment water supplies during times of drought.
“I don’t think many people realize we are at another pivotal point for North Dakota,” Guy said, noting comparisons to earlier watersheds, including homesteading, the first railroad, and rural electrification.
Guy said state officials should look beyond projected costs to ensure long-range needs are met. Instead of planning for the year 2050, they should think far ahead, to 3050.
The Lake Agassiz Water Authority, composed of 13 eastern North Dakota counties and three Minnesota communities, has endorsed an option that would use an existing pumping station and open canal, as well as pipeline sections, to transfer water.
Estimated cost: almost $660 million for construction, with annual maintenance and operating costs of $4.9 million.
The pumping station and canal were built for the now-defunct Garrison Diversion Unit, a system of canals to deliver Missouri River water to central and eastern North Dakota for irrigation and other needs.
Instead, Guy and Sen. Tim Mathern, D-Fargo, who also spoke at Tuesday’s meeting, favor an option that would build a pipeline from Bismarck to Fargo, roughly paralleling Interstate 94. That option would cost more than $1 billion, with annual operating and maintenance costs of $6.6 million.
The less costly option, which would use the 60-mile McClusky canal would require more water, losing some to evaporation and seepage, and would be more susceptible to pollution or deliberate contamination, from terrorists or others, Guy and Mathern said.
Either option would require a water treatment plant, at a cost of $150 million, to remove organisms to address concerns by officials in Canada and Minnesota about the transfer of species from the Missouri River system to the Red River system, which flows into the Hudson Bay.
Dave Koland, manager of the Garrison Diversion Conservancy District, which is working with the authority, agreed a complete pipeline system would have many advantages.
“I would love to build the pipeline option,” Koland said. But he added that water users in Fargo and other communities along the Red River must be able to afford the system. Unless the state or federal government could step in with the roughly $500 million in extra cost, the pipeline option won’t happen, he said.
The authority hopes to offer proposed service contracts to communities in about a year, with an ambitious goal of having a system in place within five years.