The Weld County city of Evans has become the latest member to back out of the $2.7 billion, two-dam Northern Integrated Supply Project, following departures of two other cities from the decades-long effort to bring drinking water to high-growth areas of northern Colorado.
Before voting Oct. 7 to leave Northern Water’s NISP project, the Evans City Council heard staff reports of frequent 20% annual increases in project costs, including far higher than expected prices for moving U.S. 287 to make way for the Glade reservoir northwest of Fort Collins.
“We fully acknowledge the complexity of this project; however, the escalating costs of the project are of great concern to the City Council. The unfortunate reality is the costs have grown beyond what is sustainable for our community, potentially putting an unacceptable burden on Evans’ water utility ratepayers,” Evans City Manager Cody Sims said, in an email Thursday.
Despite the latest desertion, Northern Water said it will continue with final designs for the permitted project at the same scale, after reviewing plans for the past three months and concluding there is no way to significantly reduce costs while still serving remaining or new members. Northern Water has asked the 15 original NISP shareholders to indicate by Dec. 31 whether they will continue to participate and at what level, agency general manager Brad Wind said.
“There’s just some things that cost a lot of money,” Wind said. “So with the encouragement of our board, I’m moving forward with the full size of the project, as we’ve thought it to be for years now.”
Northern Water has heard some interest from other communities and water agencies who might consider taking up the shares others are dropping, Wind said.
The city of Evans has previously held 1,200 acre-feet in water shares of the 40,000 acre-feet NISP is developing, and had spent $5.7 million for its share of costs so far, an investment it will now lose. Earlier, Fort Collins-Loveland water district, with 8,100 acre-feet or 20% of the shares, and Eaton, with 500 acre-feet, had said they wouldn’t continue with NISP at its current size and cost.
Evans officials said the price of NISP would cause local water rates to soar so high that developers wouldn’t build new houses, and existing and new businesses would find other locations. Among other surprise project increases, Evans cited the $100 million environmental mitigation settlement with Save the Poudre and other nonprofits.
“We thought the drama was over after we reached the settlement agreement, but a new chapter of drama appears to be playing out,” Save the Poudre founder Gary Wockner said.
Fort Morgan, which holds the third-highest percentage of NISP shares at 3,600 acre-feet, declined to comment on whether it is reconsidering its participation.
Erie, the second-largest shareholder at 6,500 acre-feet, said it was still in.
“At this time, the Town of Erie is committed to the NISP project at the same level as we have been for more than 20 years, and we have indicated this to Northern Water as well,” city spokesperson Gabi Rae said.
Northern Water officials say they are unfazed by changing decisions in a disparate handful of communities, some with faster growth, some with slowing growth, some searching for alternative water supplies. Similar second thoughts happened along the way of Northern Water’s previous big projects, such as Windy Gap reservoir and firming project, and the original Colorado-Big Thompson project.
“If you kind of read the history, this kind of trepidation isn’t a new thing,” Wind said. “Folks realized it was a commitment for the long haul. There were folks doing a lot of shifting of ownership levels right to the end of those projects. And I shouldn’t be surprised that we’re sensing the same thing here.”
Northern Water had been full speed ahead with NISP after winning the key federal construction permit it needed from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2022, when the project was priced at about $2 billion. Planning and applying for the permits and local approvals took decades.
The first work for NISP if it moves forward would be moving U.S. 287 to the east out of a valley northwest of Fort Collins on the way to the Wyoming border. That valley will be dammed to make the new Glade Reservoir, with water to fill it pumped in from the Cache la Poudre River. Construction of the dam and reservoir at Glade could begin in 2027 or 2028, Northern Water has said.
The project also calls for a new reservoir northeast of Greeley, called Galeton, to store South Platte River water, and pipelines to exchange water rights and supply farmers and cities along the way.
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