Central Begins Funding Center Pivot
Upgrades

May 14, 2008

Starting this year, CCWCD will fund center pivot upgrades as part of a newly developed water conservation program

The program, CACO (the Colorado Agricultural Conservation Outreach), creates a network of water conservation demonstration sites which focus on irrigation technology and crop management.

“Central has received state and nation-wide support for the program, so we’re all very excited to start work” says Christopher Schall, CCWCD conservation researcher and lead developer of CACO.

Over the next two years, CCWCD constituents will have an opportunity to volunteer center pivots for a variety of conservation technology retrofits including nozzles, telemetry control, wind shut-off switches, and more.

Once pivot retrofits are complete, demonstrations will be scheduled at the site, allowing hosting irrigators to talk to the community about their technology.

“To be eligible, the implemented technology should increase crop yields without increasing water use, and this year we will accept 15 individual sites, with funding up to $10,000 per site” says Chris.

The program was recently funded through Congress with assistance of Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave and U.S. Senators Wayne Allard and Ken Salazar. The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is providing federal oversight.

Applications will be available on the CCWCD website beginning July 15 at www.ccwcd.org.

For more information on CACO please contact Christopher Schall at cschall@ccwcd.org or 970-330-4540.