MOSES LAKE - As many as 60,000 residents who rely on the Odessa Aquifer for water are closer to siphoning from a more reliable source, according to members of the landowner association affected by the project and the firm responsible for its blueprint.
The EL 22.1 Landowner Association and IRZ Consulting says the North I-90 Odessa Aquifer Replacement Project is now 60% designed and engineered, following all the engineering standards and requirements of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
30% design of the project was achieved in April 2021.
The EL 22.1 North I-90 Odessa Aquifer Groundwater Replacement Project (EL 22.1 Project) would help deep well irrigators/farmers in the declining Odessa Aquifer Subarea north of I-90 and east of Moses Lake in Washington State by providing surface water from the East Columbia Basin Irrigation District's East Low Canal to replace groundwater pumping from the aquifer.
The EL 22.1 Project would build a surface water irrigation system (the EL 22.1 System) north of I-90 & east of Moses Lake, WA, which would serve up to 16,000 or more acres of irrigated lands from the East Low Canal to Road W NE, about 10 miles east of Moses Lake. Overall, the proposed EL 22.1 irrigation system would include a new canal turnout infrastructure, a large-scale canal pump station, booster pump stations and approximately 12 miles of large diameter pipeline to provide Columbia Basin Project surface water to various farms and properties.
The EL 22.1 Project is part of the Odessa Groundwater Replacement Program (OGWRP). The purpose of OGWRP is to provide surface water from the Federal Columbia Basin Project (CBP) to replace groundwater from declining irrigation wells in the Odessa Aquifer Subarea, reduce the risk of economic loss to the region's agriculture sector relying on declining and/or failing groundwater wells, and provide relief to the declining water levels in the Odessa subarea aquifer. Additionally, about 50% of the deep well irrigated lands in the Odessa Aquifer Subarea are only marginally irrigated and can only produce lower value crops. Access to surface water from the East Low Canal would allow full irrigation of participating acreage in the OGWRP, thus positively increasing economic impact and benefits as well as tax revenues for the State.
Over the past 50 years, irrigation has taken place in the Odessa Aquifer Subarea in the northern Columbia Basin of Washington State. A large portion of the Subarea is located within the boundaries of the United States Bureau of Reclamation (BOR) Columbia Basin Project, with the landowners utilizing wells to irrigate their properties rather than water provided through Project facilities. Those wells have experienced serious water level declines that have adversely impacted pumping levels to the point that many wells have had to be deepened or abandoned.
As a result, the EL 22.1 Landowner Association was formed in 2017 and significant progress has occurred in obtaining funding from the Washington State Legislature and getting the EL 22.1 Project 60% Designed and Engineered, which is setting the stage to build a surface water irrigation system (the EL 22.1 System) north of I-90 & east of Moses Lake, WA which would serve several thousand acres of irrigated lands from the East Low Canal.