Jalisco Governor Aristoteles Sandoval and National Water Commission (CNA) Director David Korenfeld signed an agreement Thursday to construct the Purgatorio Dam on the Verde River, a project that could eventually satisfy almost two-thirds of thirsty metro-area Guadalajara’s potable water needs.
Located midway between Ixtlahuacan del Rio and Zapotlanejo, the 30-meter curtain dam will have a capacity to hold 3.5 million cubic meters of water. The estimated cost of the dam and its corresponding hydraulic pumping system is 6.8 billion pesos (85 million dollars) and it has a targeted finishing date of 2016. The state government has agreed to provide 50 percent of the funding of the dam.
The cost is around one-third of the cost of the project Purgatorio has replaced: the polemic Arcediano Dam that was planned for the Santiago River (just after its convergence with the Verde) to the north of Guadalajara. This project was shelved in 2009.
Purgatorio was first suggested in 1992 and rejected because business leaders believed it would cost way too much to pump water from the dam some 15 miles to the metropolitan area of Guadalajara.
That no longer seems to be a problem and CNA officials confirmed this week that the system will be able to send 5.5 cubic meters of water a second to Guadalajara via a complex system of pumps.
“For 24 years we have postponed this project that little by little would have solved the metropolitan zone’s water shortage problems,” Sandoval said at a ceremony held Thursday at the planned site of the dam.
This flow may include additional water from two other sources upstream on the Verde: the Zapotillo and El Salto dams, both still under construction.
The CNA believes the triple combination of El Purgatorio, El Zapatillo and El Salto, together with water already obtained from the Calderon Dam and existing wells in the region, would significantly reduce extractions from Lake Chapala.
Purgatorio will allow Lake Chapala (currently the metro area’s largest water source) to “relax,” CNA Regional Delegate Jose Elias Chedid Abraham said this week, while adding that the next two or three years would nonetheless be “critical” for the lake.
Jalisco Water Commission Director Felipe Tito Lugo Arias said the Purgatorio Dam was a higher priority than the Zapotillo Dam in the northeastern region of the state. That is not such a surprising comment since most of the water to be stored in that reservoir will be pumped to the city of Leon in the neighboring state of Guanajuato. Only a small percentage will be used locally in Jalisco’s Los Altos region. It is still not totally clear how much of Zapotillo’s water, if any, will be sent to Guadalajara.
Although initially skeptical about the idea, Lugo Arias now appears to support Jalisco Governor Aristoteles Sandoval’s proposal to reduce the height of the Zapotillo Dam by 30 meters to avoid flooding the town of Temacapulin, many of whose residents oppose being forcibly relocated from their homes.