San Luis Unit Project

Related Facilities

General

The San Luis Unit, a part of the Central Valley Project and also part of the State of California Water Plan, was authorized in 1960. Reclamation and the State of California constructed and operates this unit jointly. Some features are `joint-use facilities` of the Federal Government and the State. The principal purpose of the Federal portion of the facilities is to furnish approximately 1.25 million acre-feet of water as a supplemental irrigation supply to some 600,000 acres located in the western portion of Fresno, Kings, and Merced Counties. The major portion of the San Luis Unit is a combined effort of the Federal and State governments; 55 percent of the total cost is contributed by the State of California and the remaining 45 percent by the United States. The joint-use facilities are O`Neill Dam and Forebay, B.F. Sisk San Luis Dam, San Luis Reservoir, William R. Gianelli Pumping-Generating Plant, Dos Amigos Pumping Plant, Los Banos and Little Panoche Reservoirs, and San Luis Canal from O`Neill Forebay to Kettleman City, together with the necessary switchyard facilities. The Federal-only portion of the San Luis Unit includes the O`Neill Pumping Plant and Intake Canal, Coalinga Canal, Pleasant Valley Pumping Plant, and the San Luis Drain. San Luis Reservoir serves as the major storage reservoir and O`Neill Forebay acts as an equalizing basin for the upper stage dual-purpose pumping-generating plant. Pumps located at the base of O`Neill Dam take water from the Delta-Mendota Canal through an intake channel (a Federal feature) and discharge it into the O`Neill Forebay. The California Aqueduct (a State feature) flows directly into O`Neill Forebay. The pumping-generating units lift the water from the O`Neill Forebay and discharge it into the main reservoir. When not pumping, these units generate electric power by reversing flow through the turbines. Water for irrigation is released into the San Luis Canal and flows by gravity to Dos Amigos Pumping Plant where it is lifted more than 100 feet to permit gravity flow to its terminus at Kettleman City. A State canal system continues to southern coastal areas. During irrigation months, water from the California Aqueduct flows through the O`Neill Forebay into the San Luis Canal instead of being pumped into the San Luis Reservoir. Two detention reservoirs, Los Banos (http://www.recreation.gov/detail.cfm?ID=23) and Little Panoche (http://www.recreation.gov/detail.cfm?ID=22) control cross drainage along the San Luis Canal. The reservoirs also provide recreation and flood control benefits. Plans to build the San Luis Drain to dispose of agricultural drainage on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley did not materialize, allowing the drainage to accumulate at Kesterson Reservoir. These joint Federal/State facilities are located on San Luis Creek near Los Banos, California. Completed in 1967 and dedicated on April 20 of that year, B. F. Sisk Dam is a zoned earthfill structure 382 feet high with a crest length of 18,600 feet; it contains 77,656,000 cubic yards of material. The dam`s crest is 30 feet thick; the maximum base width is 2,420 feet. In the United States, only the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers` Fort Peck and Oahe Dams along the Missouri River Basin carry greater mass. Five layers, or zones, of material make up the B. F. Sisk Dam. The core of the embankment, Zone 1, consists of 41 million yards of clay, silt, sand, and gravel. Twelve passes by tamping rollers compacted the conglomeration into six inch layers. Zone 2 comprises sand, gravel, and cobbles compacted to 12-inch layers. Shale, sandstone, conglomerate fragments, clay, silt, sand, and gravel tamped by rollers into 12-inch layers form Zone 3. Zone 4 is made up of rock fragments ranging between 3/16 inch and 8 inches compacted by a crawler-type tractor in 12-inch layers. The outside surface, Zone 5, is more than 3 million cubic yards of rock fragments ranging from 8 to 36 inches, taken from nearby Basalt Hill. Work on San Luis Dam concluded two months ahead of schedule, in August, 1967. The reservoir has a capacity of 2,041,000 acre-feet and is used to store surplus water of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Releases are made through the San Luis Pumping-Generating Plant, using its power generating capacity. The lake filled for the first time on May 31, 1969. The reservoir offers facilities for fishing, boating, water skiing, and camping. B. F. Sisk Dam is near two seismic faults. It is twenty-eight miles from the San Andreas Rift, and 23 miles from the Calaveras-Hayward Faults. Designed to withstand the effects of an earthquake comparable to the one that leveled San Francisco in 1906, the dam`s core material is resistant to progressive erosion and its appurtenant structures were built on a firm rock foundation. A hydraulic junction point for both Federal and State waters, the B. F. Sisk Reservoir serves as a forebay for the Gianelli Pumping-Generating Plant. The dam`s spillway incorporates an ungated morning-glory hole, shaft, conduit, chute, stilling basin, and riprap-lined channel. The spillway functions as a safety device to release any excess storage. Excess is a consequence of flooding when the reservoir is at normal water surface elevation or continued pumping after the reservoir fills. The entire inflow design flood of 24,500 acre-feet can be stored in two feet of excess reserve in the reservoir. After a reservoir drawdown in 1981, 400,000 cubic yards of embankment slid down 177 feet along a 1,100 foot section near the crest of the dam. On September 15, a State maintenance crew first discovered movement on a hill butted against the dam. Three days later, rocks and dirt continued to creep down the dam`s face. Reclamation`s Mid-Pacific Regional Director, Mike Catino, described the potential of a disaster at San Luis as `a one in five chance of happening.` Repairs, completed in August 1982, required 1.4 million cubic yards of select material to stabilize the embankment. Reclamation moved quickly, and `not one acre-foot of water was lost to the farmers.` On July 30, 1984, a crack opened along the embankment, parallel to the dam`s centerline, but it eventually stopped of its own accord. No other movement or cracks have been reported at the dam since 1984. These joint Federal/State facilities are located on San Luis Creek, 2.5 miles downstream from San Luis Dam. O`Neill Dam, completed in 1967, is a zoned earthfill structure with a height of 87 feet and a crest length of 14,300 feet. It contains 2.8 million cubic yards of material, the dam was completed in 1967. The top 20,000 acre-feet act as re-regulator storage necessary to permit offpeak pumping and onpeak generation by the main San Luis Pumping-Generating Plant. The O`Neill Forebay Inlet Channel extends 2,200 feet from the Delta-Mendota Canal to deliver water to the O`Neill Forebay. The forebay holds 56,000 acre-feet, part of which is used for regulator storage to permit off-peak pumping and on-peak generation. Six pumping units of the O`Neill Pumping-Generating Plant lift water 45 to 53 feet into the forebay. The forebay, with a capacity of 56,400 acre-feet, is used as a hydraulic junction point for Federal and State waters. Recreation facilities (http://www.recreation.gov/detail.cfm?ID=37) included at the forebay for picnicking, camping, swimming, boating, water skiing, and fishing. O`Neill Pumping Plant This Federal facility consists of an intake channel leading off the Delta-Mendota Canal, 70 miles from the Tracy Pumping Plant, and six pumping-generating units. The plant was under construction from 1964 to 1967. These units operate as pumps to lift water from 45 to 53 feet into the O`Neill Forebay. When water is occasionally released from the forebay to the Delta-Mendota Canal, these units operate as generators. When operating as pumps and motors, each unit can discharge 700 cubic feet per second (cfs) and has a rating of 6,000 horsepower. When operating as turbines and generators, each unit has a generating capacity of about 4,200 kilowatts. This joint Federal/State facility, located flush against the San Luis Dam, lifts water by pump-turbines from the O`Neill Forebay into San Luis Reservoir. During the irrigation season, water is released from San Luis Reservoir back through the pump-turbines to the forebay, and energy is reclaimed. Each of the eight pumping-generating units uses 63,000 horsepower when puumping or will develop 53000 kilowatts when generating. As a pumping station to fill San Luis Reservoir, each unit lifts 1,375 cfs at 290 feet total head. As a generating plant, each unit passes 1,640 cfs at the same head. It became California`s largest hydroelectric plant at its completion in 1967. This joint Federal/State facility is a concrete-lined canal with a capacity ranging from 8,350 to 13,100 cfs. Public access sites are provided for fishing. The San Luis Canal is the biggest earth-moving project in Reclamation history. It is the federally-built and operated section of the California Aqueduct and extends 102.5 miles from the O`Neill Forebay, near Los Banos, in a southeasterly direction to a point west of Kettleman City. The 138-foot-wide channel is 36 feet deep, 40 feet wide at the bottom, and lined with concrete. Before computers were available, field surveyors and engineers spent the better part of a day converting a mile`s worth of raw field data into working cross-sections and engineering material. Keypunch cards and magnetic tape fed into a Reclamation computer in Denver cut the calculating time for San Luis Canal by an estimated 26.6 man-years. The first release of water from the O`Neill Forebay to the initial reach of the canal was on April 13, 1967. Water was pumped from Dos Amigos Pumping Plant into the second reach in October of that year, and by December, water reached Kettleman City at the end of Reclamation's canal. At that point, the conduit becomes the State`s California Aqueduct. This joint Federal/State facility, 17 miles south of the Forebay, is a relift plant in the San Luis Canal. The plant contains six pumping units, each capable of delivering 2,200 cfs at 125 feet of head. Pleasant Valley Pumping plant is a Reclamation facility which pumps water into the Coalinga Canal. Westlands Water District operates and maintains this pumping plant . This Federal facility lifts water 180 feet from an intake channel leading from the San Luis Canal at mile 74. Three 7,000-, three 3,500-, and three 1,250-horsepower units are used to deliver 1,135 cubic feet of water per second to the Coalinga Canal and 50 cubic feet of water per second to a distribution lateral serving adjacent lands north of the pumping plant. This Federal facility, formerly called Pleasant Valley Canal, carries water from the turnout structure on the San Luis Canal to the Coalinga area, in Fresno County. The system includes a 1.6-mile intake channel to the Pleasant Valley Pumping Plant and 11.6 miles of canal. The initial capacity of the canal is 1,100 cfs, decreasing to 425 cfs at the terminus. Reaches 1 and 2 of the canal are operated by the Westlands Water District (WWD). Los Banos and Little Panoche Detention Dams are southwest of the town of Los Banos on Los Banos and Little Panoche Creeks. These joint Federal/State facilities are required to protect the San Luis Canal by controlling flows of streams crossing the canal. Los Banos Reservoir (http://www.recreation.gov/detail.cfm?ID=23) has a capacity of 34,600 acre-feet. It protects the city of Los Banos and adjacent areas from damaging floods and provides recreation facilities for picnicking, camping, swimming, fishing, and boating. Little Panoche Reservoir (http://www.recreation.gov/detail.cfm?ID=22) detains floodwater collected over 81.3 square miles of mountainous drainage area and provides limited recreation facilities. Both are zoned earthfill detention dams. Los Banos Detention Dam, completed in 1965, is 167 feet high with a 1,370-foot-long crest. It provides 34,500 acre-feet of flood control capacity with a maximum controlled release of 1,000 cfs. Little Panoche Detention Dam, completed in 1966, contains a little more than a million yards of earthfill in its 151-foot-high embankment. The dam`s crest is 1,440 feet long and 30 feet wide. The reservoir`s capacity is 5,580 acre-feet. The San Luis Drain, a Federal facility, is designed to convey and dispose of subsurface irrigation return flows from the San Luis service area. Construction began in April 1968. The drain was designed to collect subsurface drainage from 8,000 acres in the San Luis service area, and transport the water for disposal in the west Delta. The design capacity was 300 cfs. Of the planned 188 miles of drain, 87 miles were completed; construction was halted in 1975 because of mounting costs and concerns about the quality of the agricultural drainage that would go into the Delta. The concrete lined canal ran from the town of Five Points to a series of twelve shallow ponds formed by earthen dikes. Kesterson Reservoir is a collection of ponds outside the town of Gustine, in Merced County, where water was ponded, regulated, and allowed to evaporate pending approval and construction of an outlet for the San Luis Drain. The reservoir served in the conservation and management of wildlife and recreation and was designated as a national wildlife refuge. Reclamation is constructing a system of laterals and relift pumping facilities to take water from the San Luis Canal and convey it to over 583,000 irrigable acres. Is the distribution system complete? Could we get specifications (how many miles of laterals, what kind of relift pumping plants, etc.)

History

As long as the problem of over-pumping remained unseen and underground, it did not weigh heavily on the minds of most in the valley. But, by the early 1950s, overdraft on the aquifer was up to 500,000 acre-feet per year and a solution had to come quickly. In addition to headaches brought by a draining aquifer, studies found that the sodium content of the local groundwater ranged between 20 percent and more than 90 percent. In 1952, as overdraft problems worsened and the quality of groundwater declined, farmers on the west side formed the WWD. A 1954 Federal investigation recommended construction of a storage facility. Reclamation favored a site along the Pacheco Pass Highway encircled by the eastern foothills of the Diablo Mountains. Reclamation believed this spot would make an excellent location for a gigantic reservoir. In December 1955, Reclamation submitted the San Luis Unit feasibility report to the State of California. In March of the following year, the State offered its recommendations on the report. California conceived their own venture, the Feather River Project at Oroville. Feather River would store water to flow down the Sacramento River where the State would transfer it southward by canal. With passage by the State legislature of the Burns-Porter Act of 1959, authorizing the State Water Projects' initial facilities, it was apparent the State needed off-stream reservoir capacity to supply the WWD acreage already in production. California took the unusual step of offering to work with the Federal government to design a much grander facility along Los Banos Creek. The State Director of Water Resources lobbied Washington for a State/Federal partnership. Through persistence, the unusual notion of a Federal/State partnership gained increasing acceptance during Federal congressional hearings in 1956, 1958, and 1959. On May 16, 1960, Reclamation and the State of California entered into an agreement for coordinated operation of the Federal Central Valley Project and the State Water Facilities, later known as the California Aqueduct. A first in Federal-State relations, the contract agreed to construction of `joint-use facilities,` and a 55-45 spilt of costs between the State of California and the Federal Government. The San Luis authorizing act (Public Law 86-488, 86th Congress) was signed into law by the President on June 3, 1960. In November, California`s voters agreed to a $1.75 billion general obligation bond issue to begin building the Project`s dams, pumping plants, and aqueducts. The State Water Project, like the CVP, takes surplus water from northern California streams and redirects it toward the south. Now in partnership with the State, Reclamation increased the reservoir`s design capacity to twice the size originally contemplated. The State okayed the San Luis Agreement on December 29, 1961. The Secretary of the Interior signed for the Federal Government the following day. By the mid-1990s, all WWD acreage holders had agreed to abide by the provisions of the Reclamation Reform Act (RRA) of 1982. Water pricing in the wake of RRA has changed for all CVP water users, but within Westlands, the cost of water varies on category of service. In 1988, six years after the enactment of RRA, water cost WWD users $42.03 per acre-foot including capital, operation and maintenance and interest. That same year, there were 584 WWD water users spread over a total irrigable acreage of 528,718, averaging 905 acres per user. The introduction of the first motorized pump to the San Joaquin Valley brought with it an agricultural revolution. Pumping California`s underground warter saved many owners of overgrazed ranch land. Within two decades, this new form of irrigation drastically changed local agriculture, providing an impetus for fruit, nut, and cotton production as grazing and grain production slowly fell out of favor. In 1922, 33,000 acres were irrigated directly from pumping. Despite the hard times brought by the depression, by the end of the 1930s, approximately 90,000 acres received water from underground. The growers` increasing dependency on pumping led to a ten foot per year drop in the underground water table, and wells were drilled as deep as 2,000 feet beneath the surface. America`s entry into World War II placed additional stress on the water table, as the national demand for cotton, flax, wheat, and vegetables expanded. In 1942, the modern era of Westside water development began. That year, landowners in western Fresno and Kings Counties formed the Westside Landowners Association. According to a 1945 Department of Agriculture report, a select few each owned over 1,000 acres in the San Joaquin Valley. These owners sought Reclamation`s help in drawing Central Valley Project surface water to the west side of the valley. In 1945, Reclamation prepared a plan detailing the multiple-purpose development of the water resources of the entire Central Valley. The report noted the rapid growth of agriculture on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley and the need for importation of a new water supply. Unfortunately, much of the CVP`s progress had been halted by a Federal order suspending completion of nonessential projects.

Construction

All California productions demand a spectacular premiere, and the beginning of construction on San Luis Dam was no exception. The still morning of August 18, 1962 grew warm as the sun rose over 15,000 people driving the two-lane Pacheco Pass Highway leading to the site of the San Luis Dam. They gathered to view President John F. Kennedy as he presided over the dam`s groundbreaking ceremonies, and at 11:30 a.m., the presidential helicopter landed near the 100-foot-long speakers` platform. In good spirits after a night spent at Yosemite, Kennedy opened his remarks with a quip, `It is a pleasure for me to come out here and help blow up this valley in the cause of progress.` The President, and California Governor Edmund Brown, proceeded to push separate brass plungers, touching off an explosive charge. Two puffs of smoke rose three-and-a-half miles apart marking the future shoulders of the dam, igniting a line of smoke grenades along the dam`s axis. Green, red, and purple smoke raced from each side to meet at the dam`s midpoint. At that moment, a helicopter flew across the canyon trailing red smoke 320 feet above the floor, `with the precision of a draftsman`s pencil` to show the crowd how high the dam would stand five years hence. A rainbow of smoke hung in the air for 20 seconds before the breeze carried it away. The effect provided a `show never forgotten by anyone who was there.` The first contract on the San Luis Unit, awarded the same month as the groundbreaking, went to reroute the Pacheco Pass Highway around the reservoir site. By then, the men responsible for guiding the contractor`s and government forces were in place. John Buchholz led Reclamation as construction engineer, based in the project office in Los Banos, and T.P. Bixby served as the field engineer. Morrison-Knudsen`s Harold L. Gourlie was the contractor`s project manager and Alfred M. Petrofsky served as project engineer. A year into construction, in 1963, prevailing wages ranged from $3.32 an hour plus 25 cents fringe benefits for common laborers to $4.76 an hour plus 39.5 cents fringe benefits for heavy machinery operators. The greatest number of people hired on the San Luis Unit was 2,304 in October, 1965. In the mid-1990s, a number of veterans in Reclamation`s Sacramento office remembered their first jobs with the Bureau were at San Luis. Their memories of the endless summers of 1965 and 1966 were of working days where the hours reached the double-digits and of often times being paid more in overtime than what they took home in regular salary. An impressive stockpile of machinery dug, lifted, and compacted the dam into shape. Resembling a giant amusement park ride, a wheel excavator burrowed and loaded more than a hundred tons of earth a minute for the embankment`s core. Designed by Bucyrus-Erie of Milwaukee, the 30-foot-diameter excavation wheel was similar to those used in strip mining. Each of the wheel`s ten bucket shovels scooped more than 2.5 tons of earth. The buckets emptied their loads onto a 3,200 foot long conveyor belt. The conveyor -- one of the fastest and steepest ever built -- transported 14 million tons of basalt. At the end of the belt, at 45 second intervals, 100-ton-capacity bottom-dump wagons hauled the volcanic rock to the fill. The wheel`s 900-horsepower motor-generator also powered other construction equipment. In addition to the excavation wheel, four hundred pieces of heavy equipment valued at $12 million moved 100,000 cubic yards of embankment each day by early 1964. This collection included 33 of the largest earth hauling rigs west of the Mississippi. Other important devices included 100-ton and 75-ton capacity hauling units, 15-cubic-yard electric shovel, and a giant quarry drill. Both the contractors and Bucyrus-Erie stocked about $250,000 worth of spare parts to avoid as much repair downtime as possible. According to original specifications, the dam would contain 75 million cubic yards of earth. However, as digging and placement progressed, a good sized embankment of 77,656,000 cubic yards of clay, sand and stone rose. That material forms a crest 18,600 feet long and a hill 382 feet high. The dam`s crest is 30 feet thick with a maximum base width of 2,420 feet. In the United States, only the Army Corps of Engineers` Fort Peck and Oahe Dams along the Missouri River Basin carry greater mass. Five layers, or zones, of material make up the San Luis Dam. The core of the embankment, Zone 1, consists of 41 million yards of clay, silt, sand, and gravel. Twelve passes by tamping rollers compacted the conglomeration into six inch layers. Zone 2 comprises sand, gravel and cobbles compacted to 12-inch layers. Shale, sandstone, conglomerate fragments, clay, silt, sand, and gravel tamped by rollers into 12-inch layers formed Zone 3. Zone 4 is made up of rock fragments ranging between 3/16 to eight inches compacted by a crawler-type tractor in 12-inch layers. The outside surface, Zone 5, is more than 3 million cubic yards of rock fragments ranging from 8 to 36 inches, taken from nearby Basalt Hill. San Luis Dam is near two seismic faults: twenty-eight miles from the San Andreas Rift, and 23 miles from the Calaveras-Hayward Faults in the earthquake hexed Hollister Valley. Designed to withstand the effects of an earthquake comparable to the one that leveled San Francisco in 1906, the dam`s core material is resistant to progressive erosion and its appurtenant structures were built on a firm rock foundation. A hydraulic junction point for both Federal and State waters, the San Luis Reservoir serves as a forebay for the Gianelli Pumping-Generating Plant. The dam`s spillway incorporates an ungated morning-glory hole, shaft, conduit, chute, stilling basin, and riprap-lined channel. Flow in the San Luis Creek is insignificant except for spring runoff, so the spillway functions as a safety device to release any excess storage. Excess is a consequence of flooding when the reservoir is at normal water surface elevation, or by continued pumping after the reservoir fills. The entire inflow design flood of 24,500 acre-feet can be stored in two feet of excess reserve in the reservoir. On misty days common to central California, the 7.5 mile reservoir is `like an ocean, with seagulls, five-foot waves, and its horizon lost in infinity.` The hilly, 65-mile shoreline, marked with inlets and coves, is dotted with such colorfully named landmarks as Honker Bay, Dinosaur Point and Catfish Flats. Work on the San Luis Dam concluded two months ahead of schedule in August, 1967. The price tag for all of the San Luis Unit`s joint-use facilities reached $312.5 million, well under the $433 million estimated for construction. Reclamation credited the savings to competitive bidding for construction and equipment, substitution of a siphon for an additional detention reservoir, plus good weather, and quick planning and execution. The split of this bonus amounted to a savings of $66.3 million for the State and $54.2 million for the Federal Government. The Bureau`s economists also predicted that for every dollar spent in construction, operation, and maintenance, the Unit would return more than $6. Lamentably, the project`s value was diminished by six worker fatalities between 1963 and 1965. In an era when the national sense of wonder redirected itself from earthfill and concrete to liquid nitrogen rocket fuel, Reclamation could only describe the magnitude of the San Luis Canal in the reflected glory of another major Federal endeavor. In the mid-sixties, the Bureau explained to the nation the canal would be `one of the few manmade structures expected to be identifiable by astronauts who reach the moon.` Back on earth, the biggest earth-moving project in Reclamation history remains impressive. The San Luis Canal is the federally-built and operated section of the California Aqueduct, extending 102.5 miles from the O`Neill Forebay, near Los Banos, in a southeasterly direction to a point west of Kettleman City. At a cost of about $90 million, the 257-foot-wide channel cut 36 feet deep through the brown hills of central California. The excavation of 57 million cubic yards of earth and rock was the equivalent of digging a 16.5 foot wide, 10 foot deep trench from Denver to Boston. The 36-foot deep trapezoid is 40 feet wide at the bottom, 138 feet at the top, and lined with concrete, and able to carry 13,100 cfs of water. The San Luis Canal was constructed in five separate reaches. The longest reach, No.3, ran for 65 miles. The Guy F. Atkinson Co. of South San Francisco won the initial `$1 million a mile` contract to build the first reach. Atkinson`s bid of $16.5 million for the 15.8-mile-long Reach 1, covered an area from the O`Neill Forebay to the Dos Amigos Pumping Plant. The trade journal, Engineering News-Record, predicted in May 1963, excavation of `3 million yards of clay will be the contractor`s headache on this section of the job.` In the Bureau`s Denver headquarters 900 miles to the east, a systems computer lessened the blows of those predicted migraines, printing out engineering and construction data for crews digging the canal. Before computers, field surveyors and engineers spent the better part of a day converting a mile`s worth of raw field data into working cross-sections and engineering material. Eighty survey stations for each mile along the canal allowed crews to compile cross-sectional field notes before sending the data to Denver. Key-punch cards and magnetic tape fed into the computer cut the calculating time down to less than a minute, saving an estimated 26.6 man-years of labor. Overall, some 738,000 pieces of information were processed during construction. Three stages of labor -- muscle, machinery and technology -- brought the first release of water from the O`Neill Forebay to the initial reach of the canal on April 13, 1967. Water pumped from Dos Amigos Pumping Plant into the second reach started in October of that year, and by December, water reached Kettleman City at the end of Reclamation`s canal. At that point, the conduit becomes the State`s California Aqueduct. As impressive as San Luis Dam, Reservoir and Canal are as individual features, they would be helpless giants without a litany of essential support structures. Flush against the dam, the William R. Gianelli Pumping-Generating Plant houses eight pump-turbines with a maximum lift of 10,000 gallons of water at 320 cubic feet per second (cfs). When the flow of water is reversed, the plant`s dual purpose pump-generator can generate up to 424,000 kilowatts, immediately becoming California`s largest hydroelectric plant at its completion in 1967. Morrison-Knudsen, Utah Construction Co., and Brown and Root won the pumping-generating plant contract in 1964 with a bid of $38.3 million. O`Neill Dam and Forebay is a joint Federal-state facility a half-mile downstream from the San Luis Dam. O`Neill Dam is a zoned earthfill structure standing 87 feet tall with a crest length of 14,300 feet. Containing 2.8 million cubic yards of material, the dam was completed in 1967. The O`Neill Forebay Inlet Channel extends 2,200 feet from the Delta-Mendota Canal to deliver water to the O`Neill Forebay. The forebay holds 56,000 acre-feet, part of which is used for regulator storage to permit off-peak pumping and on-peak generation. Six pumping units of the O`Neill Pumping-Generating Plant lift water 45 to 53 feet into the forebay. Construction of the plant lasted from 1964 to 1967. Two zoned earthfill detention dams along the canal control the flow of streams crossing the conduit`s path. Los Banos and Little Panoche Detention Dams are situated southwest of the town of Los Banos on identically named creeks. Located in a narrow gorge of Los Banos Creek above the San Luis Canal, Los Banos Detention Dam is 167 feet high with a 1,370-foot long crest, providing 34,500 acre-feet of flood control capacity with a maximum controlled release of 1000 cfs. The dam controls flood water which would otherwise endanger the San Luis Canal. The Los Banos Reservoir contains a capacity of 34,600 acre-feet. Approximately 20 miles south of the town of Los Banos, the Little Panoche Detention Dam detains floodwater collected over 81.3 square miles of mountainous drainage area, and also prevents damage to the San Luis Canal. A little more than a million yards of earthfill formed the 151 feet high embankment. The dam`s crest length is 1,440 feet, and it is 30 feet wide. The like-named reservoir`s capacity is 5,580 acre-feet. Completed in 1965, final cost of the Los Banos Detention Dam came in at $5.1 million, while Little Panoche totaled $3.3 million at its completion in 1966. Dos Amigos Pumping Plant is on the northwest edge of the San Joaquin Valley, 17 miles south of the O`Neill Forebay. First known as Mile 18 Pumping Plant, it was renamed to commemorate the partnership between Federal and state governments. The plant lifts San Luis Canal flows 125 feet, permitting the water to travel southward by gravity for irrigation and municipal water supplies. The plant lies at the foot of the Laguna Seca Hills, and contains six pumping units, each capable of delivering 2,200 cfs combining for a total capacity of 13,200 cfs. The plant`s foundation was first excavated in 1963, and by the time it was finished five years later, it cost $23 million. America was undergoing a process of painful transformation in the spring of 1968. The nation`s mood and sense of excitement had changed since the San Luis Dam`s groundbreaking six years previous. On April 20, three thousand people -- a fraction of those who witnessed the spectacle presided over by President Kennedy -- attended the dam`s dedication. In the same spot where Kennedy spoke six years earlier, the dedication crowd heard Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall claim, `Nowhere else has the Federal Government co-operated so closely with the government of a State on so large a development,` and predict `I anticipate there will be other such joint ventures.` However, the ceremonies surrounding a dam lacked the spark of anticipation for even greater achievements that charged the air in April 1962. Almost a year before the dedication, the reservoir first began to take on water. The first water delivered by the State Department of Water Resources through the California Aqueduct reached the O`Neill Forebay in January 1968. It took two years until the man-make lake was finally filled on May 31, 1969. The sense of stability provided by a massive dam and a secure source of water were at last in place. But, the stability and security San Luis promised during its construction would be tested by an increasingly demanding and anxious populace.

Contact

Organization: San Luis-Delta Mendota Water Authority
Phone: 209-832-6245

Contact

Title: Public Affairs Officer
Organization: Mid-Pacific Regional Office
Address: 2800 Cottage Way E-1705
City: Sacramento, CA 95825-1898
Fax: 916-978-5114
Phone: 916-978-5100

Contact

Title: Public Affairs Officer
Organization: Commissioner`s Office
Address: 1849 C Street NW
City: Washington, DC 20240
Fax: 202-513-0575
Phone: 202-513-0305

Contact

Organization: Cachuma Conservation and Release Board
Address: PO Box 5037
City: Santa Barbara, CA 93150-5037
Phone: 805-969-2271

Contact

Organization: Cachuma Operations and Maintenance Board
Address: 3301 Laurel Canyon Road
City: Santa Barbara, CA 93105
Fax: 805-569-5825
Phone: 805-687-4011

Contact

Organization: Camrosa Water District
Address: 7385 Santa Rosa Road
City: Camarillo, CA 93012
Fax: 805-987-4797
Phone: 805-482-4677

Contact

Organization: Carpinteria Valley Water District
Address: PO Box 578
City: Capinteria, CA 93014
Fax: 805-684-3170
Phone: 805-684-2816

Contact

Organization: Casitas Municipal Water District
Address: PO Box 37
City: Oak View, CA 93022
Fax: 805-649-3001
Phone: 805-649-2251

Contact

Organization: Goleta Water District
Address: 4699 Hollister Ave.
City: Goleta, CA 93110-1999
Fax: 805-964-7002
Phone: 805-964-6761

Contact

Organization: Montecito Water District
Address: PO Box 5037
City: Montecito, CA 93150
Fax: 805-969-7261
Phone: 805-969-2271

Contact

Organization: Santa Barbara, City of, Public Works Department
Address: 630 Garden St
City: Santa Barbara, CA 93102
Fax: 805-564-5467
Phone: 805-564-5397

Contact

Organization: Santa Barbara County Water Agency
Address: 123 E. Anapamu St., Ste 240
City: Santa Barbara, CA 93101
Fax: 805-568-3434
Phone: 805-568-3540

Contact

Organization: Santa Maria Valley River Water Conservation District
Address: PO Box 364
City: Santa Maria, CA 93456
Fax: 805-739-0763
Phone: 805-925-5212

Contact

Organization: Santa Ynez River Water Conservation District
Address: PO Box 157
City: Santa Ynez, CA 93460
Fax: 805-688-3078
Phone: 805-688-6015

Contact

Organization: United Water Conservation District
Address: 106 N. 8th St
City: Santa Paula, CA 93060
Phone: 805-525-4431

PROJECTS & FACILITIES

San Luis Unit Project

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More Information about the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation