We could fill Lake Powell in less than a year with an aqueduct from Mississippi River

It was a joke, but evidently not a very good one.

More than just the Rocky Mountains. The Mississippi River as it flows to the Gulf of Mexico reaches close to sea level as it runs through Louisiana. As you travel West from New Orleans, it’s uphill all the way. For example, El Paso, TX is surrounded by mountains, but the elevation in the valley is about 3600 ft. There is a reason that all rain that falls onto the Continental Divide and eastward until you reach the Mississippi flows into the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River.

Reduce almond acreage in the San Joaquin.
That’s where all the water goes.

The Mississippi is at 300 feet above sea level, Lake mead is 1,049 feet above sea level. Lake Power is at 3650 feet above sea level.

Imagine the energy needed to force that mush water up 749 feet to reach Lake Mead. Mind you, we would still need to get the water over higher elevations just to get where the topographical area drops to Lake Mead. We dam rivers too create energy, we would in effect be reversing the process to bring water up to such an elevation just to fill a lake that the Judges will again order to be emptied to save the salmon.

Then as HartleyMBaldwin mentioned, Lake Powell is currently about 3650’, that would be a whole different impossibility, since pumping costs to raise 13.5 trillion gallons of water more than 3600 feet would be astronomical. Especially considering on the way one must take into consideration the continental divide which is directly responsible for which Ocean the water flows into in North America flows to.

If elevation was not so high, it would be a great idea, but then we could then also send water from the Great Lakes to water the desert. Ideas like this are just that, ideas, but ones that will never come to fruition.

All this is just the tip of the iceberg of what is involved in such an endeavor.

Still the best solution is mass execution of all liberal politicians who created the current water problems in the West by trying to send the West back to the old days when we all struggled to live, but then again they think we should go back to living as one with nature as the Indians did.

My hydraulics engineering is quite rusty, but luckily there's "The Engineering Toolbox" website. It would take a lot of power to pump that water up to the lakes. See below. The cost is at a wholesale price of power at $0.15/kWh, a motor efficiency of 90%, and a pump efficiency of 90%.

The calculation ignores friction loss in the pipe -- it's just the power required to lift the water flow the specified head. You can use the "Hazen-Williams Friction Loss Equation" to calculate the equivalent head loss due to friction. You'd have to determine the diameter and number of pipes needed to transport the water in the fully developed turbulent regime. I would expect the friction loss to be at least equal to the head pumping requirement.

I have no idea if The Engineering Toolbox site is accurate.

Yes, that is 1.2 TRILLION DOLLARS of pumping power cost to pump the water uphill to fill the reservoirs. I have no idea what the draw-down rate is. If it's 50%, you have an on-going annual cost of $600 billion to pump the water up to the lakes. You'd probably double that to account for friction loss.

There are hydro generators on the dams, so some of that power spent pumping the water uphill would be recovered when the water is released.

This system is somewhat an analog of a Pumped Hydro Storage System. The Round-Trip Efficiency (RTE) of pumped hydro is in the range of 70%-87%. But, instead of pumping the water to a much higher elevation than the generator location, you are filling lakes behind dams which might have a head of 800 feet. So you are not recovering much energy from the water discharge.

this is correct. you don’t transfer water all year long. just in the flood season.

why?

the federal government spends 4 billion annually on flood control clean up and fema.

better to spend that money on shipping the water west during spring floods. as a side benefit —there is less flood control dollars that need to be spent.

I hear tell they can be persuaded quite easily with the right bribe -

Why do I always get a warped one?

Because you forgot to “HARUMFF!” fast enough.

Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown.

Details! Details!

LOL

Denver already has multiple bores through the Rocky mountains to access Colorado River basin water they take more than Las Vegas does from the Colorado River basin on an annual acre foot too acre foot basis. Denver takes water from a tributary of the Colorado River pumps it slightly uphill then into a tunnel bored right through the mountain divide and let’s gravity then flow it out of the Colorado River basin into Denver’s gaping maw of water use. People don’t understand how watersheds work as is clearly evident by the idiot’s saying you need 1500+ miles of pipe directly to Lake Mead or Lake Powell. You need an aquaduct to any point inside the Colorado River basin including any one of it’s tributaries gravity will then carry any water added at that point down stream to Lake Powell if above it in the capture basin, ANYWHERE in that capture basin. To get Mississippi River water to the Colorado basin the shortest and easiest route it to go to where the Mississippi River and the Ohio River join just south of there set your divert point. That’s just south of St. Louis, from there you go directly to Denver a distance of just over 800 miles and an elevation gain of 5000 ish feet since St. Louis is already 460 MSL. Once you are at Denver you can use the existing tunnels through the Rocky mountains to access the Colorado River basin by reversing the flow that Denver already built and takes. Once you are at the other side of those tunnels it’s all gravity downhill to Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Ask the Boring Co. to use their new boring machines to bore two more larger tunnels parallel to Denver’s existing ones why parallel? Because all the geologic data is identical a feet hundred feet North or South of existing tunnels plus the Boring company has machines that are ten times cheaper than existing TBM machines that’s what they set out to do and succeeded. The Ohio River and the Mississippi River at St. Louis routinely floods there is plenty of water to send to Denver and the CO basin which is the destination no need to go all the way to Lake Powell let alone Lake Mead gravity does the work as soon as you cross the continental divide not over it through it. The same could be done from the North via Wyoming bringing Canadian and or Montana waters you just need to vote under the divide and get into the watershed.

https://denverite.com/2020/01/02/from-high-in-the-rockies-to-the-south-platte-heres-where-denver-gets-its-water/

“Boring company has machines that are ten times cheaper than existing TBM machines that’s what they set out to do and succeeded.”

Informative reply. Thanks. I question the above statement because thought “Boring” tunnels were so much cheaper because the tunnels, which are for moving cars, are much smaller in diameter than conventional ones.

Are you saying it’s feasible to get water from the Mississippi to out west?

It’s been feasible since the 1960s to pump water uphill in the quantities needed. The central California project and the Arizona water project both pump water uphill thousands of feet multiple.thousands. The energy use is high but they use nukes and bc coal or at least they did and it was not break the bank expensive.

It’s not just the diameter of the tunnel it’s how the TBM operates. An all electric TBM not using rails for much transport, on the fly tunnel segment placement and continually advance of the TBM. There is no less than three very promising and in testing technologies that will make hard rock drilling and tunneling which is really just drilling with multiple cutter heads all at once.
The top competitor is using millimeter waves to flash heat the rock.face instantly to a thousand degrees C then rapidly move the MMW source and hit it with cold air or drilling mud this thermal shock literally explodes the top layer of the rock face away from the rest into dust sized particles that are carried aqay by the fluid flow. For a TBM face multiple MMW emitters would be used that tracked a spiral of helix across the rock face.

The second most promising is a hydro fracture system that does something similar in softer rocks high velocity fluids erode the rock face just like the Colorado River carved the Grand Canyon but with thousand mile per hour fluid flows very few rocks withstand this for long they fracture and fleck off into tiny particles which get entrained in the fluid flow further acting as abrasive media it’s a snow ball effect. For very hard rocks the fluid is heated via hydrogen oxygen combustion under supercritical conditions there is no flame just 3000+ degrees supercritical fluid at several thousand mile per exit velocities this flow instantly heats the rock face and the following cool gets cool it same thermal shock.effect rock instantly to pulverized. With a large face TBM you again have multiple nozzles tracing a spiral or helical pattern using the fluid.outflow to carry away your muck.

The last method and one I personally am working on as a geologist is using ultrasonic sound to induce cavitation in a moving fluid jet with the right frequency those cavitation zones will collapse at a stand off distance from the emitters/ nozzles anyone who has ever seen what cavitation in fluid can do to hardened steel or bronze ship propellers or turbine impeller will.immediately see what this would do to much softer rock when within a few mm to cm from the rock face not even quartizite the hardest rock on earth can withstand supersonic cavitation it disagrigates to sand and clay sized particles rapidly and cleanly.

To move a 3 million acre feet per year you need to move 117 cubic meters per second. Water flows in enclosed pipes and tunnels acceptable resistance losses from 1 to 5 meters per second. At one meter per second a pipe with a cross section of 120 meters would be sufficient. This would mean a 12.5 meter wide TBM could cut a tunnel with a cross section area of 122m^2 flowing at one meter per second that’s over 3 million acre feet per year. For comparison the largest TBM face to date is Bertha at 17.5 meters across.

So yes humans have the technology to move a river’s worth of water across the great Plains. You don’t need to get to Lake Powell you need to get to the shortest distance to where you can tunnel under the continental divide and come out the other side in the capture basin of the Colorado River system any one of it’s tributaries works. The steepness of the Rockies benefits you in this case as it’s only 15 to 20 miles across the divide if you choose a Denver like starting elevation of 5500 feet. You pipe to Denver let them take some and pay dearly for it helping to fund the project. You enter the tunnel at 5500 feet and bore right through the divide aiming for 5500 feet on the other side down in a river valley let it spill out and gravity takes it the rest of the way to Lake Powell and Lake Mead. You don’t go over the Rockies you go through them. The only pump power you need at the tunnel entrance is enough to over come friction to the outlet on the other side with a down slope in the tunnel it would be gravity driven but this would make the tunnel one way. There will be years that the Colorado River system has a surplus you want a bidirectional tunnel so you can export water to.Denver or the high Plains using gravity to send water down hill in that case all the way back to the Mississippi River if you wanted too. Since you have a huge elevation difference from that outfall at 5500 feet and Lake Powell it makes sense to have a couple read half a dozen run of the river hydro plants along the way using the flow and gravity to generate electricity feed that back into the grid and you can recuperate all the energy some 80% of what it took to pump up from 3700 feet to 5500 by capturing the energy when it falls on the other side down to 3700 minus pipe friction and turbine losses of course. Given that there is more water on the west side due to snow melt than what you pumped up the east side it would be possible to have a net gain of energy offsetting some of the energy needed to pump from 500 feet at Mississippi River up to 3700 feet.

Forgot the link to the Boring Co advancements. Cool stuff , as a geologist I’d work for them in a heart beat if I still had to work.

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2021/08/boring-tunneling-cost-predicted-to-be-4-5-million-per-mile.html

AGREED; and I’m a Native Californian!

“Forgot the link to the Boring Co advancements”

I went there and sure enough, should have taken your advice.

I respect Musk but can’t evaluate his performance claim until see a comparison of tunneling machines BORING THE SAME DIAMETER TUNNEL THROUGH THE SAME MATERIAL.

Even at conventional TBM prices a 12.5 meter wide tunnel through the Continental divide is not only possible but economically viable as well. Longer tunnels exist in the Alps bored right through some of the hardest metamorphic rocks in the world. The chunnel between the UK and France is not only longer it’s three tubes not one. Even at 10 million a mile for a single tunnel that is around 200 million for a 20 mile cross divide path.

The U.S.just gave Ukraine $200MM in top of the 40 billion already given. That 40 would more than cover a 800 mile long concrete pressure tube set in a shallow trench on the surface. You don’t bore 800 miles you surface trench 1/3 of the pipe diameter or 1/4 set the pipe in that trench so it’s stable and leave the rest above ground. To cross valleys it’s a pressure tube down and up is not an issue. River’s are crossed with either viaducts like a railroad bridge or using dredge and cover like you would lay a submerged tube tunnel.

Since you are starting on the west banks of the Mississippi that River doesn’t need to be crossed. From the desired take point you are south of the Platte and Missouri river’s and North of the Arkansas River only minor tributaries need to be crossed these are not navigable so viaducts would be the way to go no need for ship clearances.

An alternative and much closer take point is the confluence of the Platte and Missouri river’s it’s 300 miles closer to Denver and higher in starting elevation. You loose access to Great Lakes water at that take point. The Chicago River was reversed in the 1890s and takes up too 3200 cubic feet per second from the great Lakes and puts it into the Mississippi River system via the Ohio River that is the sole reason to take water from the confluence of the Ohio River and the Mississippi. 3200 cubic feet per second is 2.31 million acre feet per year just from the great Lakes water shed going down the Ohio River. Plus you broaden the capture area above your take point to include the very wet east side of the Mississippi River basin. Taking 3 or 4 million acre feet from that point is a drop in the bucket.

The U.S.could void our treaty with Canada and push more water down the Chicago River system via the sluce gates and locks doubling the flow too 6400 cubic feet per second wouldn’t increase the current above what is safe for barge traffic nor cause much increased erosion. That’s well over 4 million acre feet per year plenty enough would make the trip down to the confluence to be sent West. The goal should not just to get 3-4 million acre feet to Denver it should be to send ten million west into the bread basket of the world. Concrete pipes are cheap double or triple the pipes and lay them side by side in that 1/4 diameter deep trench row.

Three 15 meter wide pipes would take 12 million acre feet west a year right across the heart of the great Plains and the fast depleting ogallala aquifer. Less than 100 mile nearly horizontal in elevation branch lines would allow the core of the bread basket to use water from the wet East in perpetuity plus banking some via injection directly into the ogallala as recharge. This would also allow for the taking of waters from the Platte and Missouri and Arkansas Rivers leaving just enough to be navigable since the down stream users could be on branch lines from the Great American River project flowing west.

Those River straddle the ogallala and the Plains shorter diversion lines from then recharge the aquifer and grow crops once the water rights downstream are covered by imported waters. For about what we the American tax payers just sent to Ukraine we could build a great artificial River flowing west and solve the water crisis forever not only in the west but the coming crash of the ogallala aquifer too. Pumping power would be in the gigawatts to make the greens happy off peak wind at night which howls across the great Plains nearly every night could be used to do most of the pumping.

Every few hundred miles you already need a off line capture basin to hold water between the pumping stations. These should be ring dyke Lakes. You dredge around a circle or polygon piling up the earth into a ring wall with additional materials taken from the center of the podder if needed ask the Dutch to come show you the right way to do this they have a thousand years of experience with exactly this. Size that podder to take at least 12 hours of full flow.

You know have the equivalent to a storage pumped hydro facility you can run your pumps full bore for 12 hours all night when electricity is in bulk cheap as the winds howl filling that podder up. During the day you turn the pumps or severely limit tham so as to drop energy use and demand shift the pumping energy to off peak times. At any point should a need to consume energy during the day happen those pumps are a massive energy sink it’s like having a pumped hydro system in the grid. Those podders are also your local distribution points for irrigation/recharge waters your branch lines take from those points. Once you get to Denver the limit is the cross divide tunnel it should be at least 12 to 15 meters wide and bidirectional.

The elegance of this type of system is it’s bidirectional over it’s whole length. Should there be heavy snow fall and the Colorado is running high you can pull water into the divide tunnel and push it to Denver’s side let it fall into the existing Denver area podder from there it can flow via gravity with some pumping to over come friction in places back down all the other podders sending that water into the heart of the great Plains. It’s win win and more win.

“Even at conventional TBM prices a 12.5 meter wide tunnel through the Continental divide is not only possible but economically viable as well”

Well, maybe the West will get some Mississippi River (or Great Lakes) water one day.

My original post wondered about the claim the Tesla’s Boring tunneling machine could tunnel at 1/10 the cost of conventional tunneling. I wondered about tunnel diameters. You mention a 12.5 meter wide tunnel. Tesla’s Boring machine does 3.6 meter diameter tunnels. The earth volume ratio between those two diameters is 12. That being the case, the 1/10 the cost ratio sounds like it’s all due to the difference in bore sizes.

Im not buying it. Seems Mexico is getting our water.

https://www.nrdc.org/onearth/colorado-river-delta-proof-natures-resiliency