'Like an ocean': $1 billion Caloosahatchee River Reservoir should be operational by 2023
Chad GillisTom McKernan's dusty white Toyota 4Runner bounced along a deserted sandy road last week in a remote stretch of Hendry County along Highway 80 and south of the Caloosahatchee River.
"It will take several months until we can actually get water in here, about two months with the pumps on full bore to fill it up," he said while driving through the 11,000-acre property.
"It's 50 billion gallons of water, 170,000 acre-feet of water. It's a lot of water. It will just look like an ocean out here," said McKernan, principal construction manager at the South Florida Water Management District.
This old citrus grove is being transformed into a water storage facility that will help restore some of the dry season flows to the Caloosahatchee River that have been lost since the area was ditched and drained for farming and development.
At six miles by three miles, the Caloosahatchee River Reservoir, often called C-43, will be one of the largest bodies of fresh water in Southwest Florida when it becomes operational in December of 2023.
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That's more than two years away, but residents and visitors in Southwest Florida have been waiting on the $1 billion project for a generation.
First approved in a suite of projects in the federal-state Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, or CERP, C-43 is the largest Everglades restoration project for the Lee County area, and it's expected to help attenuate damages to the river and estuary during the dry season while absorbing some excess storm water in the summer.
It's all about water flow
"The main purpose of the project is to try to recreate historical flows to the estuary to help maintain salinity levels; and conversely, during the summertime, when so much water is coming down the river, we’ll try to pump it into the reservoir," McKernan said. "During the dry season, you have a lot of people using water off the Caloosahatchee and there’s not as much water."
The reservoir will be composed of two massive cells that will range in depth from about 15 feet to 25 feet, McKernan said.
"The level in the reservoir will fluctuate based on the weather and seasonal rainfall and there will have to be something written up to determine how this thing gets operated," McKernan said.
The reservoir should help grasses better grow in the river, and that, in turn, will lead to better water quality, the theory goes.
This land has been home to many things, from a variety of species to a massive farming operation.
"With threatened and endangered species, we’ve got everything out here," McKernan said. "If you’ve seen it in Florida, chances are we’ve seen it on the job site, from panthers to eagles to black bears to manatees to indigo snakes. We’ve had manatees come into the site and we’d have to stop work."
Each time a threatened or endangered species is observed, the sighting must be reported to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
"It’s kind of become it's own science project out here," McKernan said.
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The reservoir, McKernan said, is a "high-risk" project and required special designs, like pumping the water up and over the reservoir walls rather than through them.
A clay layer about 20 feet beneath the reservoir footprint will keep water from soaking into nearby aquifers and keep all the water contained in the reservoir.
The banks of the reservoir are mostly part of an earthen berm system, but there's a specialized wall within the banks of the reservoir that ties directly to the clay layers, sealing the bathtub-like structure.
So not only does the reservoir help balance critical brackish levels in the estuary, it may also contribute to the re-establishment of lost sea grasses throughout the Caloosahatchee system.
Retired planner and biologist Jim Beever was involved in the planning of the project and reviewed designs.
A question of balance
"The project overall is a good project, but it's just part of the overall solutions," Beever said. "It's not going to solve all of the pollution problems for the Caloosahatchee. They're pulling water from the agriculture lands in Hendry."
River advocates say the project will help the river and estuary but that more needs to be done if the estuary is going to recover to pre-2000 conditions.
"The estuary has experienced minimum flow exceedances almost very year since the regulations went into place into 2001," said Calusa Waterkeeper John Cassani. "So it's primarily for freshwater flows to the estuary to get to the correct envelop."
The minimum flow for the Caloosahatchee River is 457 cubic-feet per second as measured at the W.P Franklin Lock and Dam, or S-79, in Alva. A certain amount of fresh water is needed to keep the delicate estuary balanced, especially during the dry season.
The Caloosahatchee reservoir will help ensure that number is met during dry-season conditions and help offset a drainage system that doesn't allow much water to naturally absorb into the shallow-water and drinking water aquifers.
But although the reservoir will provide 170,000 acre-feet of storage to provide for that 457 cubic feet per second at Franklin Lock, Cassani and other river and estuary advocates have said the Caloosahatchee needs more water flowing than that to recover from past damages.
"What some of us had suggested was around 650 to 800, in that range," Cassani said. "And we're finding now, based on actual measured data, that in some cases 800 (cubic feet per second) won't maintain that salinity envelop."
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The watershed, Cassani said, needs 400,000 to 450,000 acre-feet of storage to recover to – and maintain – historic conditions.
"There's a widely held misconception that the reservoir is going to restore the estuary and we don't believe that's going to be the case," Cassani said.
Barry Rosen is a Florida Gulf Coast University professor and researcher who spent most of his career working for the U.S. Geological Survey.
He's watched the C-43 project from the initial stages as he was involved with Lake Okeechobee management with USGS.
"You've got to do something," Rosen said of the reservoir. "It's not as if you're building another Lake Okeechobee. And when are those peak discharges? Most of the time that's during the rainy season and will the reservoir be empty when we need it?"
Rosen said just because there are lingering questions about reservoir capacity timing and even water quality issues, the reservoir is a good project for the region.
"It doesn't mean it's not worthwhile to do," he said. "We do have some water to feed into the Caloosahatchee when the lake level is too low."
A destination for hiking, fishing
And the giant reservoir will be more than just a big water storage area.
There will also be recreational opportunities at the reservoir, from horse riding to fishing and canoeing.
"You’ll have 19 miles of hiking along the crest of the dam, there’s a perimeter maintenance road that the horses will be able to use and there’s a horse wash and restrooms," McKernan said. "So hopefully that will keep the public happy and they’ll utilize it."
Randy Smith, spokesman for the water district, said the recreational aspect is a key component to all projects in the 16-county district.
"About 15 or 20 years ago the governing board passed a policy that said you can’t have a project without having a recreational component to it," Smith said. "It’s just as important as the walls are. The people paid for it. They ought to be able to use it.
"I can see Lee County people coming out here to go fishing all the time. It’s not that far."
Connect with this reporter: @ChadEugene on Twitter.