CHEYENNE — Environmentalists and others question why the Army Corps of Engineers plans a formal study of a Colorado entrepreneur’s plan to build a 400-mile water pipeline from Wyoming to Colorado’s bustling Front Range without knowing who would use the water or where it will go.
Aaron Million, a Fort Collins businessman, has been pushing for years to develop the pipeline from Flaming Gorge Reservoir on Wyoming’s Green River. The Corps has meetings planned this month in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah to get public comment on what an environmental study should address.
Critics say it’s impossible to evaluate the project without knowing who the end users are. And if Million has reached any firm deals to supply water, he’s not saying.
Million says the privately funded pipeline could deliver water to Colorado within five years at an estimated cost of $3 billion or less. He said he anticipates no trouble raising the money.
Rena Brand, project manager for the Corps of Engineers in Littleton, said Million’s application for a permit to draw water triggered the agency’s decision to proceed with the detailed environmental study.
Brand said the study could take up to five years.
