Agenda - 11-15-2011 - Information Item 2

Browse Search

amount of water required to be released from Lake Orange was reduced and the level was 3 maintained higher for longer. Even though the Lake was down around seven feet below spilling that year, it would have been much worse if not for the voluntary release from the WFER. It is important to note that the Town was only willing to do this because they calculated they did not need the water themselves given their demand at the time and because OAWS and Piedmont Minerals were using very little of their available Eno River allocation. When the Agreement was first established, Lake Orange was only about 20 years old, which is equivalent to middle-age for the dam, the spillway, the intake structure and other appurtenances. At that time and during much of the intervening two decades, very little maintenance has been required to maintain the functionality of the dam and related structures. However, the dam is now more than 40 years old. In 2009, due to staff concerns about the safety of the dam, an engineering firm was hired to do an inspection of the dam and spillway structures. While the inspection did not uncover any immediate safety concerns, there were approximately $225,000 dollars of repairs identified that were recommended to occur over the next few years. Other issues were mentioned that should be completed within approximately five years, along with a more rigorous inspection and preventative maintenance schedule to monitor the success of the repairs and keep other potential issues in check. Staff hired an engineering consultant to design the first round of recommended repairs to the dam. The design is complete and staff has let the project for bid. In addition to these repairs, Lake Orange has recently been outfitted with a remotely operated gate and other remote monitoring equipment. This. has greatly increased the operational efficiency of dam and releases, but the total project cost approximately $100,000, of which the County paid $75,000 and the Town of Hillsborough volunteered $25,000. No financial arrangements to help Orange County pay for these types of repairs and upgrades were a part of the original Agreement. The County maintains and operates Lake Orange at its sole expense, but receives no direct financial benefit. The Agreement may not be the proper avenue for a financial arrangement related to the repairs and maintenance of Lake Orange, but staff thinks the cost of maintaining Lake Orange is evolving into an important element in the dynamic between the major parties to the Agreement and should be mentioned. Finally, DWR has made available in the last year a watershed model of the entire Neuse River basin. Using this model, the effect of changes to any of the operating rules for water systems in the Neuse River basin can be modeled throughout the basin. This is especially important for the Upper Eno watershed, since this watershed is one of the major headwaters of the Neuse River. Potential Obstacles DWR staff made it clear that the Agreement will have a better chance of being reviewed if more than one of the parties to the agreement make the request. They have suggested that the stakeholders come to some agreement on the portions of the agreement which need to be reviewed before submitting the request. Both the Town and OAWS have expressed their opposition to re-opening the Agreement for review. It is staff's opinion that they want to keep their current water allocation from the Eno as a "bank" against future growth of their systems. Because their current demand is less than it was in 1988, they are concerned that their current allocations might be reduced if a review was conducted. In addition, the Town built the WFER to provide water over and above their Eno River allocation under the Agreement. They made this clear during the permitting process for the reservoir and this figured heavily into their costlbenefit analysis for constructing the reservoir in the first place. The