Bridge and Marble Canyon Dams

Document: Bridge and Marble Canyon Dams, Anthony Wayne Smith, August 30, 1965 (mimograph), page 8-8- and fertilizing purposes. This Subcommittee might consider safeguards against unreasonable speculative advantages going to persons who do not deserve them; Commissioner Dominy might be able to shed some light on this question. There will also be some exchanges of water among these various projects in Arizona: Salt River, municipal effluents, and the CAP, which become rather complex; in view of the amount of land speculation likely to be involved, you might wish to question the Commissioner on these points. Bridge Canyon dam and reservoir would be highly destructive in texms of the scenic, recreational, ecological, and cultural values of the Grand Canyon in both the monument and the park. It is not needed, and it is of questionable desirability, as a money-making project. It will not store any water for irrigation anywhere, but will, on the contrary, evaporate water; it will do little, if any, pumping. Its only value, if any, would be for generating power, and I would now like to turn to this point. About a year ago a spokesman for the Bureau of Reclamation stated that the cost of power generated at coal-fired thermal plants in the Colorado Basin was being brought down to 5 mills a kilowatt hour or less. Just a month ago the Commissioner stated that it was coming down, in larger plants, to 3 or 4 mills or less. Bridge Canyon dam will produce peaking power at 6 mills; with firm power at 3 or 4 mills or less, it would behoove this Subcommittee to inquire very carefully into the profitability of peaking power at 6 mills. The Department of the Interior has not yet demonstrated, as far as we know, that Bridge Canyon dam would pay its way, pricipal and interest, over the 50-yearEpson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 24 bit, 1,397,772 byte