Summerland orchardists offers to help pay for Aeneas Dam fixes, in exchange for some water

Photo: District of Summerland

A Summerland cherry orchardist has a proposition for the municipality, offering to help pay to maintain one of the district's dams in exchange for being allowed to pump directly from one of its reservoirs to water their trees during dry years.

Keith Carlson of Savanna Ridge Cherries Ltd. pitched his idea to council Monday. His 75-acre facility has two ground wells on the property, a water license for the property that includes runoff water from Acland Mountain and a storage lagoon that holds 43,000 cubic metres.

"We want to be a water-sustainable operation, and having our own storage makes that possible," Carlson said.

"But each year the amount of water that comes to us is quite different. We're never guaranteed that we'll fill up our whole lagoon."

The current local dam network includes Aeneas Dam, which lets water into Aeneas Creek, to feed Garnet Lake. Aeneas Creek is difficult to access and in need of repairs.

Carlson believes that for the sake of water storage needs in the district in the future, which are unknown, it should not be decommissioned, which is an option that has been floated.

Instead, he offered to help pay for the Aeneas repairs in exchange for being allowed to pump water from Garnet Lake for his nearby orchards.

He anticipates his operation would need anywhere from 40,000 to 80,000 cubic metres per year from the district's Garnet Lake, depending on the runoff.

To put that in perspective, he said, the flood mitigation releases at Garnet Dam are about 1,200,000 cubic metres per year to mitigate flooding.

"All we're asking is to pump a small bit of that," Carlson said.

District staff did not have immediately on hand the approximate future costs for maintaining the dam, but noted that some of the issues that need addressing include improving access, repairs and reconstruction to the spillway, erosion control and looking at the slide gate and control wheel.

Some councillors worried that Carlson pumping during a dry summer would be taking water away from municipal users, but he proposed the solution of pumping and filling his reservoir in the fall to be used for next year.

Works and utilities director Kris Johnson concurred that was a possibility.

"At that time of year we are typically releasing water anyways," as snowpack builds, Johnson explained.

"It would be water that is likely otherwise, in a typical year, diverted down Aeneas Creek."

Coun. Richard Barkwill said the idea was sounding feasible to him so far.

"There has to be a way to make this work," he said.

Council directed staff to investigate further the costs associated with repairing and maintaining Aeneas dam, and possible deals that could be struck with Carlson, to be discussed at later meetings.

Coun. Erin Carlson sat out of the presentation due to a conflict of interest, as the company is her family's orchard.