FINAL REPORT
AGRARIAN PROJECT
OWENS LAKE 1996-2000
I. Project Conception and Process
The Agrarian Project was initiated as a demonstration project at the scale of a
prototype for the development of managed vegetation as a dust control measure at the
Owens Lake. Agrarian Research and Management Company was retained to develop the
project in its entirety.
Agrarian uses the design spiral concept for project development, and this concept was
utilized fully in the managed vegetation project. The spiral assumes that project
development should progress in an orderly fashion from small-scale phases at low cost
with limited goals, through larger scale phases that address increasingly complex criteria
for success. The spiral initiates with a paper study that identifies the issues that would
need to be addressed for the project’s success, and researches available data pertinent to
the project. Data gaps are met through field work and additional research at this phase if
necessary. Following the paper study, the spiral enters the model and design phase. This
phase must determine if the project proposed is effective, technically feasible, and
potentially sustainable. Some of these first two phases had already been completed by the
Great Basin Unified Air Pollution Control District (District) in prior work on soils,
groundwater, and small-scale vegetation projects on the Owens Lake playa. The model
projects had indicated that managed vegetation would be effective, technically feasible,
and potentially sustainable. Agrarian fully utilized these available data and experiences.
The next phase of a design spiral is a prototype or demonstration project, which must be
large enough to demonstrate economic feasibility, provide estimates for life cycle
costing, and explore levels of acceptable risks. It was this phase of the design spiral that
was carried out by the Agrarian Project described here.
The central goal for the project was to be able to effect successful reclamation of the
highly saline-sodic soils of the playa to a state where saltgrass could be successfully and
reliably cultivated. Although the Owens playa is a very extreme environment, there are
soils elsewhere that have presented sufficiently similar challenges as to make them
suitable models for extrapolation of promising methods. These areas included the Great
Salt Lake region, the Imperial Valley, and the Tulare Basin. Agricultural methods used in
these areas were fully explored during the scoping process for this project.
For the planning and design, Agrarian used an interdisciplinary team that consisted of
drainage engineers, agronomists, soil scientists, and earthwork specialists. The team also
included resource economists, as one goal of the project was to develop full absorption
costing estimates and life cycle cost assessments for the full-scale implementation of the
managed vegetation dust control measure. These data are critical in the determination of
economic feasibility and risk assessment. In addition, Agrarian used appropriate experts
for the conceptual development of an entity that could successfully and efficiently
implement the full scale program, in the form of a joint powers authority.
During the planning process, effort was made to identify and proactively manage
problems that could be anticipated in the project. A short time frame (the project had to
be constructed, operated, and the data reported in an eight-month time period) made such
anticipation especially necessary. The entire project was therefore characterized by a high
level of adaptive management.
The purpose of a prototype is to fulfill a standard phase of the design spiral, which
has the specific goals of determining economic feasibility, efficiency, and risk
assessment. In addition, however, a prototype must fulfill the role of proof of concept and
of demonstration of feasibility to the general public. When a project is entering an area
where its purpose is comparatively novel, proof of concept and demonstration become
very important. In this case, the cultivation of saltgrass in clay soils was not as especially
new proposal; grass grows in irrigated pastures throughout the American West. To
establish and maintain the grass in such an extremely inhospitable environment, and for
the purpose of large-scale dust control, however, was a completely novel application of
this agricultural method. A very important role of the Agrarian Project was to
demonstrate convincingly that such cultivation would meet the goals of the larger dust
control effort effectively and with economic viability.
Specifically, this prototype had the following goals:
(1) to validate existing NRCS specifications for certain agricultural infrastructure
elements on the soils and the environment of the Owens Lake,
(2) to monitor and evaluate each infrastructure component for technical and
economic efficiency, thus evaluating the performance and limitations of the
infrastructure elements;
(3) to demonstrate to stakeholders a working model of managed vegetation as a dust
control measure;
(4) to prove the viability of the concept of using plant growth, soil salinity
measurements, and ground water levels to substantiate the viability and
sustainability of a vegetation measure over a project horizon of four to five years.
The scoping process that preceded design was fairly exhaustive. Initial
reconnaissance efforts included a substantial set of soils collections and evaluations,
which led to the determination of a suitable site for the project. Potential problems
associated with the soils included the fact that they consisted of very heavy (70 %) clays
that were wet, salty, full of permanent cracks resulting from dewatering of the soil, and
that there were two very distinguishable soil types at the project site. Environmental
variables that presaged construction and maintenance challenges included weather
(temperature extremes, salt content of soils, water content of soils, etc.).
Scoping then proceeded from the identification of environmental variables to the
definition of an appropriate solution that could obtain approval from the stakeholders
concerned. The project was conceived to test saltgrass vegetation as a dust control
measure, so issues of plant material, water management both for reclamation and for
irrigation, and data on salt equilibrium as impacted by drainage over the long term were
important areas of concern. Smaller scale model projects already implemented on the
playa indicated the critical importance of water distribution management and drainage,
and special expertise was devoted to these issues by the design team. The development of
appropriate plant material took place at this point, including the specifications of a
saltgrass plug, as well as exploring alternatives such as rhizomes and stem planting.
Finally, it was determined that the project should be operated by the implementer
(namely, a farmer in charge) rather than by a scientific team. This implementation
strategy seemed to have the highest probability of permitting rapid solution of problems
through adaptive management, maintaining control of the project with a single qualified
manager.
Once the project had been thoroughly scoped, and the goals clearly articulated in
terms of the position in the design spiral, the activities of design and construction
proceeded rapidly. The specifications used by the NRCS were used to guide the design,
as this was essentially an agricultural project, and the design specifications for contour
irrigation, open drains, and earthen water delivery structures were highly appropriate as
well as economically suitable for this project. Following construction, Agrarian
developed training protocols for the staff that were to operate the project, and initial
testing of the project’s operation was begun. As mentioned above, adaptive management
was used aggressively to solve problems in the shortest time possible, sot that
confirmation of the methods for soil reclamation could be made with confidence in the
time period required. The project was operated for initial soil reclamation research during
a period of about 2 months, after which retrofits to the systems were scoped, designed,
and constructed in order to improve efficiency. The project was operated over a period of
five years, during which the specific goals and objectives were continually modified, and
the operational parameters along with them. The overall objective remained, however, to
test the parameters under which optimal development of saltgrass cover could be
obtained at the least life cycle cost.
This report covers the entire five year period of the project, and presents results for all
objectives. It covers the activities carried out by the project proponents for construction,
testing, and operation, including preliminary experiences and outcomes, and how they
were addressed with changes in both infrastructure and operational strategies. We explore
the various outcomes of these activities, and describe why the outcomes that were
observed occurred, and what the effects were of the changes. We also discuss additional
alternatives that could be pursued that have potential to increase both efficiency and
effectiveness.