In the thirsty West, where there is a growing need to find new water supplies, large water-diversion schemes have returned to the forefront of planning.

The controversial Yampa Pumpback project in Colorado proposes to divert 2,000 cu ft per second of water, or around 97 billion gallons a year, from the Yampa River into a new 500,000-acre-ft reservoir near Dinosaur National Monument in the northwestern part of the state.