LOWER COLORADO RIVER AUTHORITY

LOWER COLORADO RIVER AUTHORITY. The Lower Colorado River Authority is a multipurpose public agency instituted by the Texas legislature in 1934 as a conservation and reclamation district with a statutory authority covering ten counties through which the Texas Colorado River flows. These counties extend from San Saba in Central Texas to Matagorda on the Gulf Coast. The LCRA receives no state tax money and cannot levy taxes. It operates on revenues from wholesale electricity and water sales and other services. It supplies electricity to more than 800,000 Texans through forty-four wholesale customers, including eleven electric cooperatives and thirty-three cities, in fifty-three counties. It also serves numerous water customers, including cities, farms, and municipal utility districts. The LCRA operates fossil-fueled power plants in Fayette, Bastrop, and Llano counties, as well as six hydroelectric facilities on the Colorado River. Its total generating capacity was about 2,240 megawatts in 1994. As of early 1995 the LCRA owned and/or maintained a total of nearly 3,200 miles of power lines and 260 electric substations. To diversify its energy sources the LCRA became a partner in the first commercial-sized wind-power project in the state in early 1994. The LCRA board of directors, appointed individually by the governor for six-year terms, consists of fifteen members. In the fiscal year ending June 30, 1994, the LCRA had 1,732 employees and operating revenues of $417,302,000.

Over the years, amendments to the original legislation have brought new responsibilities to the LCRA. In 1995 the authority operated five lines of business: energy services, water and wastewater services, regulatory services, parks and land, and economic and community development. In 1971 the legislature widened the LCRA's powers to include pollution control of ground and surface waters and water-quality monitoring. A year later the authority inaugurated a program of inspecting and licensing sewage-disposal systems. In 1982 it established a new monitoring system to examine water quality along the lower Colorado. Since 1988 the LCRA has sponsored the Colorado River Watch Network, a volunteer-based environmental-education and data-collection program along the Colorado River and its tributaries. More than 500 volunteers take part in the program. Under the Clean Rivers Act of 1991, the LCRA conducts a comprehensive assessment of the region's water quality. The authority has been named by the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission to coordinate a biennial assessment of the entire Colorado River watershed.

In early 1995 the LCRA became one of the first utilities in the nation to sign an agreement with the federal government to participate in a voluntary national program to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. The program, called the Climate Challenge, is designed to control emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that some scientists say cause global warming. Among other measures, the LCRA plans to control emissions by expanding its efforts to encourage the efficient use of energy in its service area. It operates a number of programs with its wholesale electric customers to encourage the efficient use of energy in residential and commercial buildings. Another growing function of the LCRA has been in providing water and wastewater utility services to local communities. These include designing and building new facilities, purchasing and operating existing facilities, and checking water systems for leaks. As of early 1995 the LCRA operated water-supply systems at Buchanan Dam and in western Travis County. It operated a wastewater-treatment facility at Camp Swift in Bastrop County. Meanwhile, the agency also continued its traditional functions of water and river management. Between 1935 and 1951 the LCRA built six dams along the Colorado River above Austin. The dams help control the river in floods and give the residents of the basin a reliable supply of water in dry times by forming the chain called the Highland Lakes. Hydroelectric facilities at the six dams are capable of generating 239 megawatts of electricity, thus making the LCRA the largest supplier of renewable energy in the state. Two of the Highland Lakes, Travis and Buchanan, provide water supplies that serve more than 500,000 people as well as businesses, power plants, and agriculture. The river supports a $300 million rice industry on the Coastal Plain.

The LCRA also operates parks and recreational facilities along the Colorado River, at the Highland Lakes, and at downstream lakes with power plants. There are more than twenty-five parks on LCRA property along the lower Colorado. The Highland Lakes attract nearly a million visitors a year. To increase tourism the LCRA established the Colorado River Trail program in 1992 in cooperation with communities along the river. The trail has increased public access to the river and has encouraged people to visit the interesting and historic communities near and along the Colorado. Besides encouraging tourism in the region, the LCRA also works with local communities to bring new businesses and to help existing businesses expand. Between 1990 and 1995 the LCRA helped add more than $23 million in capital investment in and around Central Texas.