Memorandum Report - Lower Colorado River Project

Document: United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation, Memorandum Report, Lower Colorado River Perfection, Region 3, A.B. West, Regional Director, Boulder City, Nevada, March 1963, page 11will be required in future years. For the State of Arizona alone, these future population estimates range from a conservative 4 million in the year 2020 to over 10 million. Similar projections exist for all of the Lower Basin and southern California areas. While the highest of these estimates may appear unrealistic to some, the fact that they have been made by responsible authorities creates a tremendous problem for the entities who are charged with providing the services required to care for the future expansion. With the extended time interval usually involved from planning status to physical existence of these services, planners must act now to estimate the magnitude of these future requirements and to locate the basic resources from which to obtain them. The State of California has committed itself to a long-range billion-dollar-plus program to develop Sacramento River Basin water resources as a step toward providing for the expected population expansion in southern California. Faced with an ever-diminishing basin water supply under today's accelerating water demands and the population projections for the future, it is imperative that steps be taken now that will assure full utilization of existing water supplies as well as provision for the water supply to be demanded by future generations. Central Arizona Project reanalysis--The reanalysis of the 1947 Central Arizona Project Report, which was recently completed with funds provided by the Arizona and New Mexico Interstate Stream Commissions to reflect today's changed conditions, brought to light many serious aspects of the water supply problems of central Arizona. 5Epson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 8 bit, 1,162,459 byte