Dallas' plans to build a reservoir on the Neches River make this East Texas waterway one of the country's "Ten Most Endangered Rivers", according to American Rivers, a national conservation group.
Last summer the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service established a National Wildlife Refuge along the upper reaches of the Neches. The Neches is home to some of the largest and least disturbed tracts of bottomland hardwood forests left in Texas.
The City of Dallas and the Texas Water Development Board, however, are suing the Fish and Wildlife Service to try and overturn the refuge designation so they can build a reservoir known as Fastrill.
On Monday, the National Wildlife Federation released a report showing that water conservation could provide more water than the Fastrill reservoir. The report, available online at www.texaswatermatters.org <http://www.texaswatermatters.org/> , states that additional water conservation, beyond existing proposals, could provide 225,000 acre-feet of water for Dallas Water Utilities annually. The reservoir could provide Dallas with up to only half that amount of water.
In addition to Fastrill, two other reservoirs are proposed for the Neches, which together would inundate more than 135,000 acres.
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