KITTITAS COUNTY — Aspen leaves quake in the clearing between a pair of basalt cliffs 100 feet high. An osprey soars overhead and cattle low on the dry, rolling hills above.
The ground is hard and dry this time of year. Tall grass takes on a golden hue and sways in the wind. Keep a close watch for rattlesnakes. Check for ticks.
The scene might not last. Before long, the whole thing could be underwater. This particular basin, just off the south banks of the Yakima River, is the proposed site of Washington’s newest reservoir.
The state is plunging deeper into yet another drought, a phenomenon hydrologists expect in perhaps 40% of the years ahead, and communities across the American West are watching their water reserves sink lower and lower.
The antidote to these water woes — for one unlikely alliance in Washington — is to build a new reservoir, the state’s first in generations.
It’s a common enough refrain. Store more water in the wet months or years so it’s available when farmers, cities and fish need it most.
What makes this proposal unique is that it’s further along than similar attempts. The land is already bought and millions of dollars are at work in studying whether the site could hold billions of gallons of water. The work also has broad support from state legislators and the federal delegation, including Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell.
Questions remain, though. Despite the millions already spent, the group behind the project still isn’t sure how large the thing might be or how much it would cost.
The work is bound to require hundreds of millions of dollars more, and there are those who ask whether a new reservoir would be worth such a high cost when so many similar projects were not.
In an era when many still call to tear down long-standing and deadbeat dams across the Columbia River Basin, why build another? What makes this project different from all the others?
For some, a new reservoir is a dream; for others, it’s a red flag and a money pit.
For Urban Eberhart, perhaps the highest-profile face of the project, it’s all but an inevitability.
He stood before the aspen grove in a dark, woolen suit, bowler hat atop his head, proud to share his vision that would bring more water to the arid landscape of Central Washington.
“Here we are,” Eberhart said, arms outstretched. “Underwater.”
Springwood Ranch
The 3,600-acre Springwood Ranch, just north of Interstate 90, has changed hands several times in recent decades.
There’s a party barn on the property for high school graduations, weddings, you name it. In a more remote plot near the Yakima River, abandoned buildings molder, remnants of a long-defunct boxing camp. For years, the property was owned by the founders of the Black Angus Steakhouse chain.
Now much of the property remains a working cattle ranch.
The ranch is in flux yet again as Peter Dykstra, an attorney representing the Trust for Public Land, and a slew of local and state officials draw and redraw new dividing lines across the acreage.
The trust bought the Springwood Ranch last March, an expense that will be reimbursed by Washington after the Legislature set aside $24 million (over two years) for the purchase.
The plan, Dykstra said, is to split the property into several portions going to the Kittitas Reclamation District, Kittitas County, the Yakama Nation and the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Each group holds a vision for their parcels, which will be transferred to them in the weeks ahead. But the 1,600-acre plot on the property’s northwest side — earmarked for the Kittitas Reclamation District — is where the new reservoir would sit.
Eberhart, who manages the reclamation district, said the idea is to build a relatively small dam between the basalt cliffs, just off the Yakima River. This would enclose the natural basin.
Then, earthen embankments raised around the perimeter would make for a consistent elevation around the site, he said.
Water would flow into the reservoir from an upstream intake site already in use by the reclamation district, and it would flow back into the Yakima River through the dam, which could potentially include hydropower turbines, Eberhart said.
There’s a bit of labyrinthine process involved before the water starts flowing, though. Multiple studies are needed, as is federal approval. But if it all goes according to plan and the reservoir is indeed built, Eberhart said his district would eventually hand over the site to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which would then own and operate the reservoir, and possibly have a role in constructing the project.
A new reservoir
Ask any of the folks huddled around Eberhart the central question behind the reservoir and they’ll each cough up the same answer.
What’s the water for?
For fish, of course, they say.
How could this be? Don’t dams and reservoirs typically block migratory routes for salmon, trout and others? Certainly that’s the case with other dams in the region, which have long devastated salmonid populations.
Climate change also exacerbates the issue. As the Earth’s atmosphere warms, precipitation that once fell as snow will increasingly fall as rain.
We’re already seeing the phenomenon. It’s posing a risk to the state’s water supply and posing a risk to farms and hydropower operations. Washington’s system of waterways isn’t designed to capture as much winter rainfall as is needed, so much of that extra rain runs out to sea. This translates to dwindling stream flows in the summer months and, in turn, fast-rising stream temperatures, both of which severely threaten aquatic species.
Another reservoir could capture that extra water during the wet months and hold it for later in the year when it’s most needed, said Phil Rigdon, superintendent of the Yakama Nation’s Department of Natural Resources.
The project would avoid blocking fish on the Yakima River because it would be built outside of the waterway in what’s called an off-channel reservoir.
This way, by the time the snowpack is melted and stream flows dwindle, federal officials could release the extra water and give declining fish populations an added boost, Rigdon said.
If it all comes together as planned, that added water could mean “big runs” of sockeye, spring Chinook and steelhead back in the Yakima River, Rigdon said.
“Twenty years from now, with this thing running, we’re going to start seeing hundreds of thousands of fish coming back,” Rigdon said.
Fish served as a main draw for the Yakama Nation to sign on to the project. In past years the tribe often stood on opposite sides of the reclamation district or the county, Rigdon said. Banded together, the group makes for a stronger coalition in favor of the reservoir.
Plus, Rigdon noted, the Yakama Nation will also receive a portion of the Springwood Ranch, which it will use to gather traditional medicines and culturally significant foods.
Fish aren’t historically a forefront issue for high desert farmers, like those depending on water from the reclamation district, but they’ll get something out of this deal too: billions of gallons of water.
Water released for the fish likely won’t come from the Springwood Ranch reservoir, Eberhart said. Rather, it would come from farther upstream.
It helps to think of all the lakes on the Yakima River — like Keechelus, Kachess and Cle Elum — as one big pool of water, held in storage for when it’s needed. Adding another reservoir would increase the total amount of water available for fish, cities and farmers. Whether a particular drop of water comes from one lake or another is less important, Eberhart said. It’s all part of the same system.
So in this case, water added into the storage system for fish would also mean more water for irrigators downstream, Eberhart said.
Indeed agriculture is a major sector of the economy in the Yakima River Basin, and many of those farmers face substantial cuts to their water supply in the increasingly frequent dry years, with some expecting half their normal supply.
A new reservoir at Springwood Ranch would be mutually beneficial for fish populations and those farmers, Eberhart said.
But therein lies the catch for those who question the project. They point to a longer history within the basin of pie-in-the-sky proposals with questionable benefit.
The Yakima Basin Integrated Plan
The Springwood Ranch project and a slew of others are all part of a larger vision for the region, all outlined in a massive and controversial document called the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan.
The document is more than a decade old at this point, built on research stretching back even further. Within it are many projects, like expanding Bumping Lake, raising the water level at Cle Elum, a pumping plant at Kachess Lake and yet another reservoir at Lmuma Creek, all of them meant to increase the amount of water storage in the region.
Despite the ambitions, only one relatively small project is underway.
The whole plan meant to add enough water to the Yakima Basin to nearly fill a site the size of Kachess Lake by next summer, but that was overly optimistic, said Tom Tebb, director of the state’s Office of the Columbia River.
There was another problem, too. A 2014 analysis commissioned by the Legislature found that none of the projects would provide enough value to justify their high costs. The total package would cost $2 billion more than the benefits it would provide.
Tebb, Eberhart and many others take issue with that analysis, led by Jonathan Yoder, director of Washington State University’s Water Research Center. They say his math was faulty and he failed to examine the projects as pieces of a whole, instead only examining them at face value.
Either way, the Springwood Ranch reservoir wasn’t included in the analysis; the project came on the scene much later. But for Jay Schwartz, a member of the local group Friends of Lake Kachess group, Yoder’s logic still applies.
If the objective is to help fish, the money (almost certainly hundreds of millions of dollars) would be better spent on fisheries, conservation programs or other projects, Schwartz said.
Schwartz also questioned the value of heavy public subsidies for a project that will benefit farmers growing forage crops like hay or alfalfa. The water to grow them often costs more money than the crops themselves return, he said. Plus, much of the crop is exported anyway.
Eberhart acknowledges that the majority of land in his district grows pasture crops like hay, but that demographic is changing to include more profitable crops like cherries. He pushed back on Schwartz further.
To keep the agriculture sector alive in the Yakima River Basin, the reservoir is a necessity, Eberhart said. In turn, the construction of towns, highways, railroads and more over past centuries has blocked the flow of smaller streams and tributaries throughout the region, he said. Irrigation from farms is now needed to keep that water flowing and to maintain the new hydrologic balance on which the ecosystem relies.
“You’ll never make it like it was before,” Eberhart said. “Fish need farms, farms need fish.”
For his part, Yoder stands by his analysis. He also largely abstained from presenting an opinion on the Springwood Ranch reservoir. The project could be proven as cost-effective, but, he said, that’s a high bar to clear.
What’s next?
Aside from the existential question of whether the Springwood Ranch reservoir would be worth the money, even more basic questions remain for David Ortman, a retired environmental lawyer.
How big would the reservoir be? How much would it cost? Who would pay the bill? What would be the environmental impact of a new body of water near the eastern foothills of the Cascade Mountains?
All in due time, Eberhart said. A nearly $21 million feasibility study (funded half by the state and half by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation) is underway. That study will show just how much water could be stored on-site.
The current estimates range from 30,000 to 90,000 acre-feet, Eberhart said. That would be about 10 to 30 times the volume of Green Lake in Seattle. Even on the high end, the new reservoir would hold less than half of a full Kachess Lake.
The potential size of the reservoir will give way to the cost, Eberhart said. From there, the feasibility study and the options it lays out will head to the U.S. secretary of the interior for approval. Then, a cost-benefit analysis and an environmental-impact statement would be needed.
However it shakes out, the project would almost certainly cost hundreds of millions, a bill that would be split down the middle by Washington state and the federal government.
The feasibility study should be finished in the next three years, and, if everything works out, Eberhart said a portion of the Springwood Ranch could be underwater within a decade.
