Washington area's came concomitant increases in area water demands, demands that placed increased burdens on the existing systems. About three quarters of Metropolitan Washington area's supply comes from an unregulated, no natural or manmade storage area source, the Potomac River. Although the average daily flow in the Potomac River of 6,000 million gallons per day far surpasses the amount of water needed to satisfy the water demands within the Metropolitan Washington area, the foreseeable future shortages may occur when conditions of low flow exist in the Potomac during the summer months.

In contrast to this, other large metropolitan regions can cope more readily with drought situations because they can supplement low flow from existing reservoir storage.

WASHINGTON AQUEDUCT SYSTEM

In regard to your question: While Fairfax County Water Authority customers were on water use restrictions, how much surplus treated water capacity existed across the Potomac at Dalecarlia? What would have been required to have made the water available to Fairfax County Water Authority? What is the maximum potential capacity of Dalecarlia reservoir.

The Washington Aqueduct system can supply water at maximum rates of at least 375 million gallons per day. During June, July, August, and September of 1977, the average production was 223 million gallons per day. The maximum 24-hour production for this period, 260.3 million gallons, occurred on July 6, 1977. Considering this maximum, 115 million gallons per day capacity were left available. During this period, water was being supplied to Fairfax County Water Authority at rates of only 10 to 15 million gallons per day, the capacity of existing distribution lines. Additional water mains and pumps would be required to make more of the surplus Washington Aqueduct capacity available to Fairfax County Water Authority. Mr. HARRIS. Excuse me, General, for interrupting you at that point, but those are amazing figures for a water system whose average daily requirement is 55 million gallons a day. You're telling us that there's a surplus capacity at the date of highest use, which was July 6, of 115 million gallons a day at Dalecarlia right now? General JOHNSON. Yes, sir, total capacity.

Mr. HARRIS. That's twice the total water needs of the whole Fairfax County Water Authority system, and that capacity already exists at Dalecarlia?

General JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. HARRIS. Thank you, sir, go ahead.

AQUEDUCT ACTIONS RE TOXIC SPILLS

General JOHNSON. With reference to the question what emergency procedures does Washington Aqueduct Division have for dealing with a toxic spill in the Potomac, or a system outage that prevents water from being withdrawn from the river? What would be the effect of either of these events on your ability to meet the water needs of Washington, D.C., Arlington, and Falls Church?

With regard to toxic spills, the Washington Aqueduct system has two separate and independent intake facilities, one at Great Falls, Md., and one at Little Falls, Md. These intakes are approximately 10 miles apart. In the event of a toxic spill, our plan is to operate the upstream intake at Great Falls until the toxic material is just above that point. This intake would then be shut down and the downstream intake would be used until the material had passed the upstream intake, at which time it would be reopened. If the pollution should be dispersed over more than a 10-mile stretch of the river, the lower station could be put in service sooner in order to fill all raw and finished water storage reservoirs. In the unlikely event that both intakes had to be closed simultaneously, we would then have an adequate supply to last an additional 36 to 48 hours while the material flowed past the upstream intakes. If the toxic spill were not detected until it gets into our system, then we'd have a problem. We would have to stop all service and purge the system.

AQUEDUCT'S VIRGINIA CUSTOMERS

With respect to your next question relating to the aqueduct's relationship with Virginia customers-if a situation arose that significantly reduced the amount of water the Washington Aqueduct system could distribute, would the District of Columbia receive preference over Arlington County and Falls Church, Va.? The corps has a congressional mandate to serve Washington. How does Virginia fit into that mandate in an emergency situation?

Statutes establishing the corps responsibility speak of supplying an adequate water supply to meet the wants of the general government. Further, while it is true that other statutes which authorize the sale of water to Arlington County and Falls Church would permit the Secretary of the Army to discontinue sales to these customers at any time, the Washington Aqueduct has assumed the role of wholesale purveyor of water in these localities. The communities supplied throughout the Washington Aqueduct have become dependent on it for their water supply. Summary interruption or discontinuance of water service to Virginia on short notice would be unthinkable. Washington Aqueduct has in the past supplied water to its various users on a fair and equitable basis. Thus, the interruption of water service to Arlington County and Falls Church, Va., would be a serious policy question that would have to be decided at a very high level of government.

Mr. HARRIS. That answer sounds a little military, General.
Maj. Gen. JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

In respect to the final question: Would the public better be served in terms of water supply management, if F.C.W.A. could serve Arlington County and Falls Church as a backup to Dalecarlia?

During normal circumstance, the public is well served by the existing system and there is adequate capacity available to meet its needs. However, during certain emergency situations in whch the supply from the Washington Aqueduct might be curtailed, for example, a break in one of the major water mains crossing the river, a backup from F.C.W.A. could provide valuable service to those areas. Sir, this concludes my highlights of my formal presentation.

POTOMAC'S SURPLUS WATER

Mr. HARRIS. Thank you very much, general. I'd like to ask just one or two questions. We may pursue that 115 million gallons daily surplus treatment capacity, and I also note the ability to expand to a 500-million gallon capacity if it was necessary at Dalecarlia. Those are strange figures in a period of shortage. I was impressed a great deal this past summer to note we were on water restrictions when anywhere from 300 to 400 million gallons daily of surplus is flowing down the Potomac, but I didn't realize the extent of the excess capacity for

treatment.

Secretary Alexander, I know that you have a busy schedule and I appreciate very much your coming here. I'd like to just ask you one question before, perhaps, you may want to leave and turn the questioning over to the Corps representatives here. At our meeting on October 19, we set up a time frame for the two of us together for completion of the E.I.S. on Fairfax County's Potomac River intake. We said the draft was going to be completed no later than December 15, and I appreciate the corps delivering me that draft the morning of December 15. The dates were taken seriously and performance I thought was very remarkable. We also agreed that the hearings would be held in the January-February time frame with regard to the E.I.S. and the hearing was scheduled night before last.

Mr. ALEXANDER. That's right.

Mr. HARRIS. And they have been held now and January isn't over yet. The other date we set was no later than July for the leasing of the permit. I would like to ask you what that schedule looks like at this time, whether we're going to be able to meet that schedule in you opinion, or whether we may be able to accelerate that schedule?

Mr. ALEXANDER. Well, as you know from our meeting in October, which I consider to be a very important one in this entire processyour interest and knowledge, and I know on behalf of the committee as well, making the Government do what it ought to do we set certain timetables. We've met those timetables with the issuance on December 15 of the Draft E.I.S. Also, we have held the first public hearing on January 23. The process will continue at public hearings. We will meet our deadlines. If we can, it will be accelerated. It will not be accelerated at the expense of the process of public hearings, but, indeed, we will meet those promised deadlines.

Although this isn't a part of the question, I'd like to build on a comment that you made about the corps delivering you the product on December 15. Over the months I think the corps has gotten some "bum raps." I've found that in working with General Morris, General McGinnis, General Johnson, who was a part of this region before at Fort Belvoir, and Colonel Withers, that they've worked hard to accomplish our mutual goals of being fair and equitable to the entire region. So, I'd like to say a good word on behalf of those who really do the work and don't often get as much positive credit as they ought. to, I think, for it.

WATER PRICING METHODS

Mr. HARRIS. Mr. Secretary, in furtherance of that, and it has not been mentioned at the hearing yet, but as long as my colleague Mr. Fauntroy is here, as we worked together on so many things and we talked about work we have done together in the District of Columbia. One of the things I discovered about 11⁄2 years ago was that the cost of this water from Dalecarlia to Virginia was more than the cost of the water to the District of Columbia, because of the pricing methods that were being used. I introduced legislation to correct that situation, and before that legislation got adopted, the corps made the correction in their pricing formulation so that the pricing is presented to both Virginia and the District of Columbia on a nondiscriminatory basis, and that legislation never had to be adopted. I think this is another example where those with responsibility, given the correct policy guidance, perform extraordinarily well, and the fact that we now are seeing a system where this performance is and should be recognized, I think we have to recognize the policy leadership that's been given that is causing this.

There is no question about it, in my opinion, and I'll say this bluntly, that the "bum raps" that the corps has gotten in the past, often has been due to poor policy guidance from the top-counter-type of policy proposals and pressures-and I know the situations that they've been in often, of wondering which way they're really supposed to move when the policy guidance isn't clear, and the fact that they have performed well, proves their capability of performing well, but I think also proves that maybe the policy guidance has been better. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Thank you. I appreciate it. I appreciated appearing before the committee.

WATER RATES

Mr. HARRIS. I was just making the point, General, the beginnng of the Congress I did file a bill to correct inequity with regard to the water rates paid by D.C., Arlington, and Falls Church. After a consultant study which supported the objectives of our legislation, the Army did revise the rates. What has been the impact of that? Do you have that information with you?

General. JOHNSON. Yes, sir. May I, Mr. Chairman, ask permission to go to the pros for the specific question if, in fact, it's of that nature?

Mr. HARRIS. Any time we can get testimony from a pro like Harry Ways, I'm willing to do it.

General. JOHNSON. Yes, sir. I know he's appeared before you before.

Mr. WAYS. Mr. Chairman, as a result of your inquiry to the Secretary of the Army, we retained the firm the Haskins & Sells, one of the outstanding public utility accounting firms in the Nation on public utility ratemaking procedures, to advise us and prepare a report on

what whould be done in this matter. They did provide a new procedure, a cost of service method of computing rates through the Arlington County and Falls Church service areas that are supplied from the Washington Aqueduct, and we have implemented that. Secretary Alexander signed the new rate structure on the 10th of January of this year, and the rate went into effect on that date. To Arlington County, there was a reduction in rates. Prior to that, the rate was $175.85 per million gallons. The new rate, effective 2 weeks ago, is $168.02. For Falls Church there's a slight increase. The rate was $174.85 prior to January 10. It's now $177.02. The difference in those results from peak use rates. The consultants recommended that there be a factor on peak use since we do have to build plant capacity to meet peak uses, and as a result, the peak use factor makes the Falls Church rates slightly higher than the Arlington County rate.

Mr. HARRIS. About how much was the reduction to Arlington? Could you estimate that for me, not in rate, but in dollars? Mr. WAYS. It was $7.83 per million gallons.

Mr. HARRIS. Basically how many million gallons?

Mr. WAYS. Basically, on an annual basis it'll amount to about $100,000 to $120,000, 14 billion gallons per year.

BLOOMINGTON RESERVOIR

Mr. HARRIS. Very good. Thank you. With regard to your testimony, General, as authorized, the Bloomington Reservoir has some 12 billion gallons reserved for flood control. Would it be possible to convert some of this storage for the purpose of water supply, assuming that the benefits would outweigh the costs?

General JOHNSON. Yes, sir, but I suspect it would take an act of Congress to so do that, because the way the dam was formulated to begin with, and the cost sharing and the way that it was received as appropriatons was based on the Federal participation for flood control, local partiicpation for water storage.

Mr. HARRIS. I'm just thinking that when the danger of floods is very limited and is usually the same time when water supply is very needed, it would be possible to operate the dam that way?

General JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. HARRIS. Are there any other reservoirs that are operated that way?

General JOHNSON. Do you mean around the country, sir?

Mr. HARRIS. Yes, around the country that you're familiar with. General JOHNSON. I would say it would be a technique that could be used, and I would not be surprised to say yes that they were, there were some.

Mr. HARRIS. It would be your opinion though that this would take an amendment to the legislation?

General JOHNSON. Either that or a reimbursement to the Federal Government for the cost of that particular water, but if it were to be used all the time, it would have to take an amendment to the resolution.

Mr. HARRIS. I'm going to direct subcommittee staff to investigate this, and I'd appreciate your cooperation with regard to developing the facts on this. It may be something we should look into. Would you agree it's worthy of looking into?

General JOHNSON. Yes, sir.