U. S. Army Corps of Engineers Water Management for Environmental Sustainability

As one of the nation's largest water resource agencies, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) manages over 600 dams located throughout the United States. These dams are operated for multiple purposes such as water supply, flood control, hydropower, navigation, recreation, and others. Throughout its history, the Corps has focused on being good stewards of the environment. To reaffirm it's commitment to the environment, the Corps issued a new set of Environmental Operating Principles in 2002 to guide its emphasis on improving environmental sustainability. The Environmental Operating Principles focus on improving environmental sustainability. The Corps also operates water resource projects in accordance with numerous other laws, regulations, and other guidelines focused on the environment. These include the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the Clean Water Act (CWA), and many others. In achieving environmental sustainability, a wide variety of different approaches are used. This paper will describe a broad range of examples of these efforts to manage water resource projects across the nation in an environmentally sustainable manner. The focus of the paper is to provide a sampling of efforts the Corps has recently been making to enhance the environment through various types of water management activities across the country. These efforts range from changing the project operations, to replacing equipment with new equipment that is more environmentally friendly. They include actions such as: (1) reallocating reservoir storage to maintain flows for fish and wildlife; (2) changing project operating criteria to improve conditions for fish and wildlife; (3) incorporating new equipment designed to improve water quality and fish survival; and other similar actions. The paper will also describe the effects of these efforts in terms of environmental restoration, hydropower generation, economic effects, and others.