Everglades restoration reached a new milestone with two recent developments in the plan for water storage. Construction is scheduled to begin this summer on a reservoir that is key to the health of the Caloosahatchee Estuary, west of Lake Okeechobee. And a study released in June after more than a decade of research found that deep-aquifer storage of freshwater for recovery and discharge is feasible and can help to restore essential water flows in the River of Grass.
Lump-sum bids will be opened on July 30 for site preparation on the Caloosahatchee River West Basin Storage Reservoir, also known as the C-43 Reservoir, on 10,500 acres about five miles southwest of LaBelle, Fla. The site was a citrus farm, and the contract, with an engineer’s estimate of $15 million, covers about 15 million cu yd of earthmoving, demolition of agricultural citrus facilities and installation of settlement-monitoring instrumentation. It is the first of four construction packages to complete one of the reservoir’s cells, the western cell, at an estimated cost of $304 million. Completion of the eastern cell, a fifth contract that has not yet been scheduled, will bring the total cost of the reservoir to about $500 million, says Jeff Kivett, director of operations, engineering and construction for the South Florida Water Management District.