Reservoirs at Headwaters of the Mississippi River; Use and Administration
Federal Register, Volume 78 Issue 135 (Monday, July 15, 2013)
Federal Register Volume 78, Number 135 (Monday, July 15, 2013)
Proposed Rules
Pages 42030-42034
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office www.gpo.gov
FR Doc No: 2013-16877
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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Department of the Army, Corps of Engineers
Reservoirs at Headwaters of the Mississippi River; Use and Administration
AGENCY: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, DoD.
ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking and request for comments.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is proposing to amend the rules regarding use and administration of the reservoirs at the headwaters of the Mississippi River by deleting from the Code of Federal Regulations all references to minimum discharges and to operating limits for the reservoirs. Following extensive public input and environmental review, the St. Paul District of the Corps of Engineers recently adopted an updated operating plan for the Mississippi River Headwaters reservoirs containing minimum flow values that differ from those currently codified in the Code of Federal Regulations. Deleting all references to minimum flows in the regulations will eliminate the current discrepancy between the regulations and the approved operating plan for the reservoirs. The operating limits are also contained in the operating plan for the reservoirs, and eliminating both the minimum flow values and the operating limits from the rule will make it unnecessary to amend the regulations each time the values are modified in the operating plan in the future.
DATES: Submit comments on or before September 13, 2013.
ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by docket number COE-
2013-0008, by any of the following methods:
Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments.
Email: Jerry.W.Webb@usace.army.mil and Chandra.S.Pathak@usace.army.mil. Include the docket number, COE-2013-
0008 in the subject line of the message.
Mail: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Attn: CECW-CE (Chandra S. Pathak), 441 G Street NW., Washington, DC 20314-1000.
Hand Delivery/Courier: Due to security requirements, we cannot receive comments by hand delivery or courier.
Instructions: Direct your comments to docket number COE-2013-0008. All comments received will be included in the public docket without change and may be made available on-line at http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information provided, unless the commenter indicates that the comment includes information claimed to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Do not submit information that you consider to be CBI, or otherwise protected, through regulations.gov or email. The regulations.gov Web site is an anonymous access system, which means we will not know your identity or contact information unless you provide it in the body of your comment. If you send an email directly to the Corps without going through regulations.gov, your email address will be automatically captured and included as part of the comment that is placed in the public docket and made available on the Internet. If you submit an electronic comment, we recommend that you include your name and other contact information in the body of your comment and with any disk or CD-ROM you submit. If we cannot read your comment because of technical difficulties and cannot contact you for clarification, we may not be able to consider your comment. Electronic comments should avoid the use of any special characters, any form of encryption, and be free of any defects or viruses.
Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or
Page 42031
comments received, go to regulations.gov. All documents in the docket are listed. Although listed in the index, some information is not publicly available, such as CBI or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Certain other material, such as copyrighted material, is not placed on the Internet and will be publicly available only in hard copy form.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Jerry W. Webb, Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Engineering and Construction Community of Practice, Washington, DC at 202-761-0673; Mr. Chandra S. Pathak, Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Engineering and Construction Community of Practice, Washington, DC at 202-761-4668; or Mr. Kenton Spading, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, St. Paul District, at 651-290-5623.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Executive Summary
The purpose of this action is to amend the current rule regarding minimum discharges and minimum operating limits of the reservoirs at the headwaters of the Mississippi River to ensure that the regulations do not conflict with the current operating plan for those reservoirs.
The Corps' authority to amend the minimum flow values and minimum operating limits for the reservoirs of the headwaters of the Mississippi River is Section 7 of the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1917 (40 Stat. 266; 33 U.S.C. 1) and Section 216 of the Flood Control Act of 1970 (84 Stat. 1830; 33 U.S.C. 549a).
Background
The Rivers and Harbors Acts of June 14, 1880, and August 2, 1882, authorized the construction of dams at each of the six Mississippi River Headwaters lakes for the purpose of augmenting Mississippi River flow for navigation. The lakes affected by these acts are Winnibigoshish, Leech, Pokegama, Sandy, Cross (Pine River), and Gull. Following authorization of the reservoirs, the Secretary of War prescribed regulations governing operation of the reservoirs on February 11, 1931, which were codified at 33 CFR 207.340. The current regulations list minimum discharges for each reservoir at 33 CFR 207.340(d)(2). The current regulations also list minimum operating limits, or the lowest level at which the Corps may operate each reservoir, at 33 CFR 207.340(d)(7).
The Corps' procedure adopting and publishing regulations related to reservoirs has changed since the aforementioned regulations were originally codified in 1931. The present-day practice is to include minimum flow values, operating limits and other related information in Water Control Manuals that are adopted following an extensive public and environmental review process, as outlined in Engineer Regulation (ER) 1110-2-240. Moreover, the operating limits in the Water Control Manuals prescribe not only the minimum level at which a reservoir may operate but also the absolute upper limit on reservoir operations, effectively providing a band within which the Corps may operate a reservoir.
As a precursor to updating the Water Control Manuals for the Mississippi River Headwaters reservoirs in 2009, we completed a study known as the Mississippi River Headwaters Reservoir Operating Plan Evaluation (ROPE). The primary purpose of the ROPE was to evaluate alternative operating plans for the Headwaters reservoirs in an attempt to improve the operation of the system while balancing tribal trust obligations, flood risk reduction, environmental concerns, water quality, water supply, recreation, navigation, hydropower, and other public interests.
On January 19, 2010, after thoroughly assessing potential environmental impacts and involving the public in the process, the District Engineer for the St. Paul District signed a Record of Decision approving the ROPE's recommended operating plan for the Headwaters reservoirs. The ROPE's recommended plan adopts minimum discharges that were scientifically developed using a habitat in-stream flow analysis (Tenant 1976), as described in the ROPE. The minimum discharges in the ROPE's recommended plan differ from the minimum discharges listed in 33 CFR 207.340 as it is currently written. We are in the process of updating the Water Control Manuals for the Headwaters reservoirs to implement the recommendations from the 2009 ROPE. Once the Water Control Manuals are revised, the minimum discharge values in the revised Water Control Manuals will also be in conflict with 33 CFR 207.340 if the regulation is not amended.
Table No. 1 illustrates the differences between the current regulations and the 2009 ROPE study minimum flows.
Table 1--Mississippi River Headwater Reservoir System Operating Limits and CFR Versus ROPE Minimum Discharges
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Winni-bigoshish Leech Pokegama Sandy Cross L. Pine R. Gull
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Total Operating Limit........... 1294.94-1303.14... 1292.70-1297.94... 1270.42-1278.42... 1214.31-1221.31... 1225.32-1235.30... 1192.75-1194.75
Minimum Flow: 33 CFR 207.340.... 150 cfs........... 70 cfs............ 200 cfs........... 80 cfs............ 90 cfs............ 30 cfs
Minimum Flow: 2009 ROPE......... >=1294.94......... >=1292.70......... >=1273.17......... >=1214.31......... >=1225.32......... >=1192.75
100 cfs........... 120 cfs........... 200 cfs........... 20 cfs............ 30 cfs............ 20 cfs
