REPORT ON WATER PERMIT APPLICATION NO. 2793-2 ‘TransCanada Keystone Pipeline LP December 7, 2018 Application No. 2793-2, proposes to appropriate 50.44 acre-feet of water annually at a maximum. pump rate of 0.67 cubic feet of water per second (cfs) from the Bad River located in the W'4 Section 3-TIN-25E (Haakon County) for use in pipeline construction, which includes dust control along the project right-of-way and land SD, South Dakota Codified Law SDCL 46-2A-2 directs the Chief Engineer to make a recommendation to the Water Management Board on a permit application. The Chief Engineer needs to consider four criteria in making a recommendation on whether a permit should be approved, approved with qualifications, denied, or deferred. They are: 1) there is reasonable probability that there is unappropriated water available for the applicant’s proposed use, 2) the proposed diversion can be developed without unlawful impairment of existing rights, 3) the proposed use is a beneficial use, and 4) itis in the public interest. This report will analyze the available information and make a recommendation to the Chief Engineer on the first two criteria the Chief Engineer needs to consider in making an official recommendation to the Water Management Board. Proposed Pro ‘The applicant, TransCanada Keystone Pipeline LP, is proposing to construct and operate a crude oil pipe line from Hardisty, Alberta Canada to Steele City Nebraska. TransCanada proposes to build a portion of this pipeline through western South Dakota entering the state from Montana in the northwest comer of Harding County approximately 32 miles northwest of the town of Buffalo. The pipeline is to run in a generally southeasterly direction, exiting the state into Nebraska in the southeastem comer of Tripp County approximately 20 miles southeast of the town of Colome. The applicant filed three applications from the Cheyenne, Bad and White rivers to be used in pipeline construction. This application is for appropriation of water from the Bad River. ‘The applicant proposes to divert water from the Bad River at a rate of up to 300 gpm for construction of the pipeline including dust control and horizontal drilling during the annual period January 1 through December 31. The annual volume requested is up to 50.44 ac-ft of water. This equates to pumping just over 10 percent of the time at a rate of 0.67 ef (300 gpm). Review of the Water Source The proposed source of water for this project is the Bad River, a prairie stream, located in westem South Dakota. The Bad River Basin lies in west central South Dakota between theCheyenne and White rivers, Figure 1. The Bad River headwaters originate in western Jackson and eastern Pennington counties and drain approximately 3,150 square miles before discharging into the Missouri River at Ft Pierre SD (SDDNRD. 1975). J Yj yj es ° 2 = soume Figure 1. Area Map for Water Permit Application No, 2793-2, Staff relies on historical streamflow records to give an indication of the flow characteristics of a particular stream throughout the year. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) maintains a long term stream gaging monitoring network in South Dakota providing real-time flow information that can be accessed by the public. The USGS provides a repository for several years of historical daily flow data and statistical daily, monthly and annual flow information. Mean, often referred to as average, and median, otherwise referred to as 50 percentile, are statistical terms having a similar role in understanding the central tendency of a set of statistical results. Mean is ofien used to describe a middle value of a set of data values and is calculated by determining the sum of the data values and dividing the sum by the number of data values. Median can be described as the value separating the higher half of a set of data values from the Jower half and may be thought of as the central value of a data set. ‘The disadvantage of using ‘mean to describe flow is the mean value can be significantly affected by any single value in thedata set being very high or very low compared to the rest of the data values. In the analysis of Jong term flow data, large flood event data values skew the calculated mean value giving an unreasonable expectation of a higher flow value for a period of time. An example of this is shown in Figure 2, which is a comparison of the daily mean flow value versus the monthly median flow value for the USGS Bad River gaging station, Bad River near Midland SD (USGS (06441000). ‘The USGS intermittently collected daily flow data at this gaging station for 33 to 44 years during the period the station has been operated (USGS. 2018). Large spring runoff events can cause the mean values to be much larger than median values in those months. This is why using median tends to give a more representative measure of a mid-point value compared to ‘mean when analyzing river flow data. Figure 2. USGS Bad River near Midland, 1945-2017; Mean versus Median monthly flow values ~ 33 to 43 years of record, 1945 to 2017, Contributing drainage area of 1466 mi2 (USGS.2018), ‘The proposed Bad River diversion points situated on opposite banks of the river are located approximately 3 miles east of the town of Midland in the W % Section 3-TIN-2SE. United States Geological Survey (USGS) maintains two stream flow gaging stations on the Bad River in the river reach just upstream and downstream of the proposed diversion points. The USGS Stream Gaging No. 06441000 near Midland, SD is located approximately 8.5 river miles upstream from the proposed diversion point. Figure 3 shows two statistically derived flow levels consisting of the daily median or 50 percentile and the 25 percentile daily flow values for this, stream gage. A percentile is a measure used in statistics to indicate the value below which a given percentage of observations in a group of observations fall, in this case daily flow, The percentiles shown correspond to flow scenarios during drier conditions when water would be in short supply.