Elephant Butte Reservoir

Hello Recreationists of Elephant Butte Historic District and Elephant Butte Lake State Park. Reclamation is seeking input to help determine priority areas for recreation improvement. This is your opportunity to tell us what you enjoy about recreating at Elephant Butte Reservoir and areas that could use improvements in the future.

There are two separate surveys – one for EBHD and one for EBLSP.  The questions vary slightly on each survey. If you have been to both areas, please start with the EBHD survey. The purpose of both surveys is to provide information to the Bureau of Reclamation and New Mexico State Parks for evaluating and improving the recreation services and opportunities both agencies provide to the public.

The EBHD survey will be used to determine what additional commercial services/recreational opportunities, if any, are desired at the EBHD for the purposes of developing a commercial services plan and subsequent possibility of a future concessions contract.

The EBLSP survey will provide valuable insight into your experiences and opinions of recreation opportunities and facilities within the state park, enabling us to work with NMSP to improve any perceived deficiencies.

The surveys are available in English and Spanish. If you would like to request a paper copy of the survey in either language or if you have any questions, please reach out to the recreation team at IBR4ALBDRecreationNM@usbr.gov or by phone at (505) 462-3540.

Las encuestas están en inglés y español. Para acceder a la encuesta en español, haga clic en la palabra 'Inglés' en la parte superior izquierda y toque en Español. La encuesta debe traducirse al español. Si desea solicitar una copia impresa de la encuesta en cualquiera de los dos idiomas, comuníquese con equipo de recreación IBR4ALBDRecreationNM@usbr.gov o por teléfono al (505) 462-3540.

• Elephant Butte Historic District Survey
• Elephant Butte Lake State Park Survey

GENERAL

• Elephant Butte Dam and Reservoir (originally called Engle Dam) is on the Rio Grande, 125 miles north of El Paso, Texas, can store 2,210,298 acre-feet of water to provide irrigation and year-round power generation. This is a concrete gravity dam 301 feet high and 1,674 feet long including the spillway. It contains 618,785 cubic yards of concrete. The dam was completed in 1916, but storage operation began in 1915.
• The power system consists of a 24,300-kilowatt hydroelectric powerplant at Elephant Butte Dam. A system consisting of 490 miles of 115-kilovolt transmission line and 11 substations totaling 81,750 kilovolt-amperes, which was developed and operated by the Rio Grande Project until 1977, has been sold to a private electric company.

**** All data are provisional and subject to revision as final data are collected and analyzed. ****

Contact

Please contact the Operations Group via e-mail at ResourceMgr@usbr.gov for additional information.