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Army Corps plans release of water on Missouri River

Missouri River
KBIA

After weeks of lobbying, the Army Corps of Engineers now plans to release extra water from reservoirs upstream on the Missouri River. But the releases are not for the benefit of downstream navigation on the Mississippi.

 
Jody Farhat is with the U.S. Army Corps Northwest District.  She says the extra water is needed to compensate for water locked up in ice for the winter months: "We have a number of cities and also coal-fire and nuclear power plants that use the river," says Farhat. "The cities use it for drinking water, and the power plants use it for cooling the plant."
 
Farhat says the releases are authorized according to the corps' master manual because the water will be used within the Missouri River basin.
 
She says the extra water likely won't make it to the Mississippi River until the spring thaw.

Adam grew up on a cherry farm in northern Michigan. He holds a BA in economics from Kalamazoo College. Adam's radio career began in 2003 at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in Portland, Maine. He went on to cut his teeth filing stories for Maine Public Radio. Before coming to St. Louis Public Radio in 2006, Adam was was an international journalism fellow at Deutsche Welle in Bonn, Germany. He has regularly filed features for various shows and networks including NPR, PRI, Marketplace and the BBC. He received a Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellowship for the 2011-2012 academic year.
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