formulation studies. Areas of anal- 

 ysis include: (1) evaluating tech- 

 nical methods presently being ad- 

 vanced through other federally spon- 

 sored programs, such as the Coopera- 

 tive Instream Flow Group in Fort 

 Collins, Colorado, (2) appraising 

 the impact of existing compacts op- 

 erating at state and river basin lev- 

 el; and (3) reviewing and apprais- 

 ing emerging instream flow policies 

 being developed. With regard to our 

 Regulatory Functions Program, we will 

 review all existing and potential 

 permit applications to determine: 

 (1) if at the time of permit approv- 

 al, instream flows were cited as 

 a need beyond that identified by the 

 applicant, and (2) if any pending 

 applications during a public inter- 

 est review have recognized the need 

 for instream flows. Conflicts will 

 need to be cited and solutions pro- 

 posed. 



SUMMARY 



Instream flow needs is a con- 

 cept whose time has arrived. Un- 

 fortunately, the problem has not 

 been defined explicitly to allow the 

 development of a corrective uniform 

 methodology. An intensive evalua- 

 tion effort is being made to define 

 the magnitude and extent of the prob- 

 lem so that an action program can 

 be formulated. 



It is conceivable that in the 

 not-so-distant future with expected 

 human population growth in the 

 United States and consequent in- 

 creased demands on consumptive use 

 of stored water, new reservoirs 

 will be planned to satisfy all iden- 

 tified needs. These may include 

 storage and releases earmarked for 

 replenishing freshwater inflows to 

 bay and estuarine areas. However, 



there are many problems that will 

 have to be overcome before this can 

 be done. First, higher priority 

 must be placed on water use for such 

 purposes as fish and wildlife, and 

 second, someone will have to pay for 

 the storage and O&M costs. Further, 

 once you have ironed out these prob- 

 lems, there are other constraints 

 to getting this water downstream to 

 reach the bays and estuaries, such 

 as channel losses, encroachment on 

 water use, etc. The Corps is dedi- 

 cated to work with all concerned 

 parties to best meet all the water 

 needs of our Nation—including 

 freshwater flows to estuaries. 



DISCUSSION 



Comment: 



You mentioned the 



concept of dilution as the solution 

 to pollution. In California we have 

 been told that is one reason we 

 can't have instream flows because 

 dilution is not a solution to pollu- 

 tion. I advise people to counter 

 that by saying that low flows make 

 no shows out of Cohos . 



Comment : I'm Jerry Valence 

 from the California Resources Con- 

 trol Board. One of the concerns 

 that we have had in California re- 

 lates to economics. I get the feel- 

 ing that a lot of people are going 

 to try to quantify economically the 

 benefits of estuaries, and I suggest 

 that there is a potential danger in 

 that you are not going to be able 

 to quantify adequately what we con- 

 sider to be intangible benefits of 

 estuaries. I think that maybe some- 

 thing we may want to consider in our 

 deliberations over the next few days 

 is that there are intangible bene- 

 fits, such as the benefit of being 

 able to take your grandson fishing 

 fifty years from now. What kind of 

 benefit is that for estuaries? I'm 



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