LAKE MILES AWAY TO SUPPLY WATER FOR NINE CITIES

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6815, 19 January 1929, Page 3

LAKE MILES AWAY TO SUPPLY WATER FOR NINE CITIES

Pardee Dam in California Will be Enormous Project CONCRETE MADE FROM GOLD-NUGGET SAND I Gold nuggets in the place of small |stones for concrete are being used in 11be construction of the Pardeo Dam, | on the Mokelumnc River, in the Sierra I Nevada Mountains, for the East Bay ! Municipal Utility District of Oakland, 1 California. The specifications for concrete do not require these nuggets, and (he contractor does all he cau to keep the nuggets out of the concrete, but as all the sand and gravel in this region is intermixed with gold and gold-bear-ing quartz it is impossible to furnish aggregate that is free from gold. The Pardee Dam, named in honour of George C. Pardee, former Governor of California and president of tho East Bay municipal utility district, will be one of the largest dams of itskind in the world with a maximum height of 360 feet above the present river bed and a length of crest of 12. M feet and containing 625,000 cubic yards of concrete. Tho sand and "ravel used in the concrete of which The dam is constructed is obtained from gravel beds on the Mokelumnc t River four - or five miles downstream i from the dam, near the cld mining

town of Lancha Plana, where in the days of '49 the river banks were alive with miners with their cradles and long toms gathering tlic precious metal from this very same sand. After; ward this gravel and sand was all turned over again by gold dredges and a further extraction made of the gold from the baser substances. But still there remains Sonic “colour” in this sand although not rich enough to pay for further working, by any known method.

To Supply 500,000 People., This dam which is being rapidly pushed to completion is being built for a. reservoir to furnish the domestic water supply for the cities of Oakland, Berkeley Alameda, Piedmont, Emeryville, Albany. San Leandro, Richmond and El Cerrito, with a combined population of nearly 500,000. The dam is of the curved ’gravity type. It will create a lake with a storage capacity of 72,344,000,000 gallons. This lake or reservoir will cover 2134 acres. Every vestige of brush and trees is being cleared from tho reservoir and a few mines that are still active will be flooded.

The East Bay Municipal Utilities District was organised in 1923 for the purpose of securing a now water supply for the nine municipalities mentioned. After careful surveys and studies extending over more than a year, the Mokelumnc River was selected, in September, 1924, as the most satisfactory and economical source of supply available. On Nov. 4, 1924, the people approved a bond issue of £7,SOO,OOO, and on September, 1925, bids were received for the construction of the principal units of the project. The construction work on the project really divides itself into three parts—(l) the dam and reservoir near Lancha Plana, (2) the aqueduct for conducting the water to the bay cities, and (3) the hydroelectric power station just below the dam. The dam, contracted for at a cost of £1,300,000, is being pushed 16 hours per day, and will no boubt be completed on schedule time. The aqueduct for conveying the water from the dam to the bay is about 90 miles long, and is mostly of steel welded pipe five feet in diameter, laid on top of the ground. There are besides tho steel pipe several concrete lined tunnels, forming part of the aqueduct. The outlet from the reservoir at the dam- is a -tunnel eight feet in diameter and over two miles long. The aqueduct is nearing completion, and will be ready as soon as the reservoir is ready to deliver water, which is expected to be during the summer of 1929.

The capacity of the aqueduct as at present built, operating by gravity, is 31,000,000 gallons per day. This can be inccrased to 60,000,000 gallons when the Walnut Creek booster pumping plant is put in operation. Tho tunnels, the concrete section of the aqueduct and the submerged river crossings have been made large enough for an ultimate daily capacity of 200,000,000 gallons. ■ Tho hydroelectric power station which will be constructed immediately below the dam, will have a capacity of 15,000 kilowatts. Power from this station will be carried by a high tension line into the Bay cities. It is expetted that the East Bay Municipal Utilities District will itself use most of the electric power and no substantial revenue is contemplated from the sale of power. Two hydroelectric, generators of 7500 kilowatts each will be installed in the power station. In addition to the construction ot the supply system from the Mokelumne River reservoir at Pardee Dam to Oakland it was necessary to provide a distribution system for taking the water to the ultimate consumer.. For this purpose tho people of tho district approved a bond issue on Nov. 1, 1927. authorising the East Bay Municipal Utilities District to incur a bonded indebtedness of £5,200,000 for acquisition or construction of a system for distributing the water from the end of the aqueduct to the faucets of the user. This part of the project is being actively carried out and will be ready when the water from the Mokelumnc River begins to flow from the mountains.