Nov. 10, 2022

Colorado River Water Rights

For all of the earthwork necessary to construct a dam, for all of the energy required to weld pipelines, and for all of the effort needed to maintain good air quality during construction, in the end, Chimney Hollow Reservoir is all about storing Windy Gap Project water. 

The project’s Final Enviromental Impact Statement describes the need for the reservoir and where the water will come from to fill it.  

During the 1960s six growing communities along Colorado’s Front Range became aware that the Colorado-Big Thompson Project had available and unused capacity to bring additional West Slope water east to meet their needs. This recognition eventually led to construction of the Windy Gap Project, including Windy Gap Reservoir and a pump plant just below the confluence of the Fraser and Colorado rivers, as well as a 6-mile pipeline to Lake Granby. The Windy Gap Project has been in operation since shortly after its dedication in 1985. 

Upper Colorado River.

Because the only dedicated storage for Windy Gap water within the C-BT Project is Lake Granby (where Windy Gap water is junior to C-BT Project water), there are years during which the Windy Gap Project has been unable to operate and bring water east to the Front Range communities. Construction of Chimney Hollow Reservoir will create a dedicated storage space for Windy Gap Project water that has been part of communities’ water portfolios for decades, thereby increasing the project’s year-to-year efficiency and reliability. 

In recent years, ongoing overuse of the Colorado River by Lower Basin states, in addition to reduced precipitation, has brought the basin’s water resources into sharp focus. Windy Gap Project managers are keenly aware of the challenges facing the basin, and they recognize that additional water storage such as Chimney Hollow Reservoir will offer greater resilience in the future. The ability to capture water when it is available and store it for dry periods has been a hallmark of water projects for millennia, and Chimney Hollow Reservoir joins in that tradition.