By Heather Willard | Fox31
DENVER (KDVR) — A federal judge ruled on Thursday that Denver Water is permanently barred from expanding the reservoir if an emergency stay is not obtained from the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals within 14 days.
The utility provider has been working to increase the height of the Gross Reservoir dam by 131 feet for over a decade. The project broke ground in 2022 and Denver Water says the project is already 60% complete.
On Friday, the department said that it plans to appeal the order and seek an immediate stay, saying the order “puts at risk our ability to efficiently provide a safe, secure and reliable water supply to 1.5 million people.”
“It’s impossible to reconcile the judge’s order with what is clearly in the broader public interest,” Denver Water wrote in a release. “Denver Water is responsible for providing a safe and secure water supply for 1.5 million people in Denver and portions of the surrounding metro area and has understood the urgency of the Gross Reservoir expansion since the 1990s, when the environmental community recommended expansion of the reservoir as part of a plan to address future supply and water security.”
The judge also ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has to rework environmental documents and a project permit, saying the Corps had made “serious” mistakes while approving the reservoir expansion. She wrote in her ruling that allowing the project to continue without limitations while it is appealed after the court found “serious environmental law violations by the Corps and the imminent environmental harms by construction would render the Court’s numerous findings … meaningless.”