Critics offer water options

By Jeremy Borden

Published: May 21, 2008

Critics of Charlottesville and Albemarle County’s long-term water supply plan have laid out specific proposals they believe will get the community more bang for its buck — both in terms of its pocketbook and the environment.

The community’s $142 million water supply plan — which would construct a new dam at Ragged Mountain Reservoir and new pipeline to fill the expanded capacity — has come under attack in recent weeks because critics say officials aren’t looking at all the options.

The critics this week detailed proposals that assume dredging the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir is much less expensive than officials say it is. The issue is a sore one among environmentalists and some elected officials who say the issue was fully vetted years ago and that the community needs to move on. However, city councilors say they are open to ideas before they are expected to take a position June 2.

The proposals assume that officials’ estimates for how much water the community needs are inflated; that dredging isn’t as complicated or expensive as officials assert; and that there are more options to be considered.

“What we’re showing with this document is if you restore the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir to its initial capacity, that provides at least half, most likely two-thirds of what we need for a 50-year water supply,” said former City Councilor Kevin Lynch, who voted for the plan in 2006 but has said that he wasn’t presented with all the facts.Lynch and others say the community’s future need is not as great as officials say it is.

Lynch says the City Council should move forward with the appropriate surveys and contract a dredging company as soon as possible.

The new proposals’ best-case scenario would cost $80.7 million and the worst-case scenario would cost $111.5 million. The difference between the higher and lower estimates lies in the assumptions on how much water is needed in 50 years.

Officials have suggested that dredging over 50 years could cost upwards of $200 million while the critics, even in the “worst-case” scenario, say it would cost $51 million. The initial dredge would total $30 million while dredging over 50 years would total $21 million, according to the group’s estimates. The group has based the estimates on proposals from dredging companies.

That wide difference in possible dredging costs has helped build momentum for a fresh look at the long-term water supply plan, including more emphasis on dredging as part of the strategy. To get a more palatable price tag, the proposals assume replacing the Sugar Hollow pipeline, instead of relying on a new pipeline to fill Ragged Mountain. Little is known about that pipeline’s engineering, while replacing Sugar Hollow would be easier and less cost prohibitive, Lynch said.

The critics also rely on siphoning some water from the Moormans River, “our cleanest source of water,” the proposal said. Under the current plan, the struggling Moormans would be restored with more additional water and no water would be used from it.

Officials have stood by their estimates and say other proposals are not comprehensive and do not account for how difficult it would be to dispose of tons of sediment dredged every year from the reservoir.

“It appears that this paper is proposing an idea that would deliver significantly less water supply volume,” Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority Executive Director Thomas L. Frederick Jr. said in an e-mail. It would also, he said, provide “significantly less pipeline capacity to move water around, substantially less future water treatment capability than the adopted community water supply plan provides, and less flow release to our local streams.”