Bow River Irrigation District Tour

I went on a great tour with the Bow River Irrigation District today.
We saw where water is diverted from the Bow River at Carsland, goes through 2 siphons, and moves through storage reservoirs before coming to us 200 km away for irrigation, drinking, recreation and habitat.

We looked at an area where canals will be changed to pipelines, will save 10,000+ acre feet of water from spilling back to the river.
And stood on what may end up being the bottom of Dead Horse Reservoir, where the district may create water storage and delivery flexibility while adding irrigation acres.

Some interesting notes I took today:

• 30 years ago the district returned back to the river up to 100,000 ac feet a year, now its about 40,000 a year
• The district is now 40% bigger & using less total water (pipelines, pivots, less return water)
• 3100 cubic feet per second max outflow from Travers Reservoir 
  • But the most they have used was 2500 cubic feet per sec.
• Little Bow River water comes in and goes out of Travers Dam
• Travers dam has 85,000 ac feet usable water
• McGregor Lake is largest off stream reservoir in Alberta (water is diverted into it) at 285,000 ac usable water
• McGregor Lake dam and causeway was upgraded in mid 2000’s to allow full 2800 cfs flow to Travers Dam
• The Carsland diversion can receive up to 1800 cf per second from river into the main canal
• Water flow from Carsland diversion to McGregor Lake in about 1 day of flow
• Siksika Nation irrigates about 5000 ac from the canal along with many other farms along the way 
• Siphons are used in 2 spots on the main canal moving water to McGregor Lake and are 4 meters inside and 5 m outside diameter and made of concrete 
• The first version of this irrigation district was completed in 1914 and a major expansion was done in the 1950's and major upgrades around the year 2000