Drought halts tunnel project

Reservoir levels very low

By Manor Ink Staff

Neversink, NY – The Delaware Aqueduct, a vast underground water tunnel, is part of a 2,000-square-mile watershed that provides clean drinking water to 8.8 million people in New York City, and to an additional million people north of the city. The Aqueduct starts at the Rondout Reservoir and is 600 feet underground, providing half of the water supply to the city from the Catskills. It is the longest tunnel in the world, at 85 miles in length, and was last drained and inspected in 1958. Since that time, serious problems have developed within the tunnel.

Nearly 35 million gallons of water have been leaking daily from the Aqueduct under the Hudson River, and the state’s Dept. of Environmental Protection has been planning repairs for over two decades. After a decade of work, a 2.5-mile bypass tunnel has been completed under the Hudson River from Newburgh to Wappingers Falls. The final phase of the project will connect the Aqueduct to this bypass, sealing off the leaking section so that water will flow at full capacity.

The switchover process to slow the flow of water from the Neversink, Pepacton and Cannonsville reservoirs that feed into the Rondout started in June. Between then and September, water levels in the reservoirs were lowered by design, but drought conditions caused more severe impacts.

On Sept. 30, the DEP announced the kickoff of the project’s final phase, the shutoff of the Delaware Aqueduct above the bypass. Construction was given a green light to begin the five-to-eight-month bypass connection.

Then, on Nov. 18, the DEP paused the final phase of the project because of drought conditions that would have impacted the Croton and Catskill Aqueducts’ capacity to meet New York City’s demand for water during construction. The DEP began releasing water back into the Delaware Aqueduct, bringing it back online, and will try again next year to resume the final phase of repairing the leaks in the Aqueduct.

Deputy Director of Outreach Heidi Haynes of the city’s Environmental Protection Bureau of Water Supply explained that current low water levels are not the result of the bypass. “The reduced levels of the Neversink Reservoir are primarily due to a historic lack of rainfall and the required releases down the Delaware River, rather than the project itself,” she said.