The Utah Division of Water Resources released its latest update to the state water plan this month and the Uintah Basin is its focus. Over the last 26 years, the state has devised statewide water plans as well as individual plans for each of the state’s 11 major hydrological river basins, of which the Uintah Basin is included. The new 127 page document released this month explains the current status of the water resources in the Uintah Basin and estimates the future demands that are expected to be placed upon those resources. The report estimates that approximately 9,113,000 acre-feet of precipitation falls on the Uintah Basin each year and nearly 8 million acre-feet of that is absorbed by natural systems leaving the Basin’s total yield or supply at about 1.1 million acre-feet. The report covers many factors including oil shale and tar sands water needs, municipal and industrial water conservation and management, and environmental matters, among other topics. The report can be downloaded at
www.water.utah.gov
.
