Two San Diego water districts plan $200 million aquifer project
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 14, 2008 at 7:06 amFrom the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Squeezed by the most severe drought in at least two decades, a pair of water districts in East County is accelerating an unusual plan to generate more drinking water and restore habitat along the San Diego River.
The idea, modeled after a much larger project in Orange County, is to pump purified wastewater from the Padre Dam Municipal Water District into percolation ponds along a portion of the floodplain owned by the Helix Water District. Helix would store the water underground for later use, creating a drought-proof supply of about 5,000 acre-feet a year, equal to about 10 percent of the district’s deliveries. The aquifer also would provide water for trees and shrubs in a stretch of the river that usually is dry.
The Helix board is expected to authorize an environmental review of the roughly $200 million project at its meeting Wednesday. It will probably take 10 years to complete all aspects of the proposal – assuming it passes the review and survives opposition from residents who would have to endure several years of sand mining related to the project.
“Not only are we helping our own district, but we are helping the statewide reliability of the water supply,” said Charles Muse, president of the Helix board. “If we can provide the district with new water, that is water we don’t have to buy from” wholesalers such as the Metropolitan Water District and the San Diego County Water Authority.
Read more from the San Diego Union-Tribune by clicking here.
Yucaipa-Calimesa plan would recharge underground water basins
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 12, 2008 at 5:50 amFrom Riverside’s Press-Enterprise:
Homeowners in Yucaipa and Calimesa will pay about $2.50 more per month beginning Nov. 1 as part of a new water-banking strategy being implemented by the Yucaipa Valley Water District. The long-term conservation strategy aims to protect residents and businesses from continuing drought and uncertainties about water availability from the Sacramento Delta, said Joe Zoba, general manager of the water district, which serves about 50,000 customers in a 50-square-mile area.
The district will tack on a 15 percent surcharge to be paid by residents and businesses. The money will be used to purchase more water from the California State Water Project, which can be stored underground as reserves. “It will not only help us protect our customers from future water shortages but give us the ability to replenish our local groundwater basins,” Zoba said.
In recent years, the district has had to pump more water than can be naturally recharged, drawing down area groundwater basins, Zoba said.
The district’s water-banking plan also will require developers and others wanting to build new homes or businesses to deposit enough money to purchase 7 acre-feet of water per proposed home or business.
That is, of course, assuming there is water available from the State Water Project to buy … Read more from the Press-Enterprise by clicking here.
States battle pesticides in groundwater: EPA registers pesticides, but environmentalists say leadership lacking at federal level
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 11, 2008 at 6:45 amFrom ABC News:
Should we be worried about pesticides in groundwater contaminating the water we drink and the food we eat? According to many public health and environment officials nationwide, the answer is yes.
In the last year and a half, public interest law firm Earthjustice has filed four federal lawsuits against the Environmental Protection Agency concerning the use of pesticides. Many of the pesticides at the center of those legal battles are the same pesticides that recently surfaced as cause for concern in the state of Oregon. Of seven pesticides highlighted as contaminating groundwater in Oregon — three of which are listed as possibly or likely to cause cancer by the EPA — only two are are not subjects of Earthjustice’s pending lawsuits.
“There are several pesticides on the market that pose extreme risks to human health — through the water, air and food,” said Joshua Osborne-Klein, an attorney for the Earthjustice. “Our lawsuits say that the EPA has not fully assessed these risks.”
Concerns about groundwater come at the same time as several safety concerns — whether about tainted peppers or the presence of drugs in drinking water — that have left many people wondering what else is in our food and water that we don’t yet know about.
Used largely to irrigate crops, as well as by more than half of the people in the United States as drinking water, groundwater is a critical natural resource for people throughout the country. But according to information posted on the EPA’s Web site, it is also “highly susceptible to contamination from septic tanks, agricultural runoff, highway de-icing, landfills, and pipe leaks.” Contamination from pesticides is among those concerns. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, about 1 billion pounds of pesticides are used in the United States every year.
Read more from ABC News by clicking here.
Antelope Valley groundwater adjudication: Best water deal won’t flow from courtroom, says editorial
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 11, 2008 at 6:15 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press, this editorial:
After nine years of legal maneuvering over rights to pump water from the Valley’s underground aquifer, Antelope Valley water districts, cities, farmers, property owners and others go back to court next month for a new phase of trial - but still no conclusion is in sight. It’s time for the Valley’s leaders to stop this slow, costly, cumbersome attempt to rely on a judge to solve the Valley’s water problem and solve it themselves.
Farmers and Lancaster city officials have endorsed a proposal that is a worthwhile starting point for a negotiated settlement.
The proposal is to allow pumping to continue at current rates while an independent expert monitors well levels. If well levels drop, that would indicate what’s called an overdraft, in which more water is being pumped out than is replenished from rain or other sources. Water districts, farmers and other well users then could meet again to agree how necessary cutbacks in pumping should be shared.
Using observations of well levels, taken over several years, would provide hard evidence that well pumping is too great, as opposed to the theoretical calculations of replenishment rates advanced - and disputed - by numerous studies over past decades.
Collecting data on well levels could mean no final apportionment of well pumping rights for 10 years or so, but the court battle is unlikely to provide a final resolution before then, at the rate it is progressing.
Read more of this editorial from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
Dry times put extra focus on groundwater
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 9, 2008 at 1:38 pmFrom the California Farm Bureau Federation:
Some rely on it as their sole source of supply. Others count on it as a crucial supplement when alternative sources are restricted. And many farmers describe groundwater as an increasing source of worry.
The combination of drought and court-imposed water cutbacks has put more pressure on the state’s groundwater resources. Farmers like Tulare County walnut grower Terry Langiano say they must dig deeper to find water and they worry that not enough is being done to assure reliable supplies from both underground and surface water sources.
Tulare County walnut grower Terry Langiano checks his farm’s soil profile with a tensiometer to determine the optimum timing and duration for irrigating his trees.“The water level has dropped 23 percent in the last two years and right now the pumping level is the lowest it has been since I’ve been recording this information, at 121.5 feet. In 1987 it was 52.5 feet pumping water level,” said Langiano, a director of the Tulare County Farm Bureau. “Our irrigation well, within inches of breaking pump suction, had to be extended by 10 feet to the well bottom. We plan a new well after harvest in October that will cost in excess of $60,000.”
Langiano, who relies 100 percent on groundwater to irrigate 40 acres of walnuts, said he hopes he can stretch the supply far enough to complete two more irrigations, one prior to walnut harvest at the end of the month and another after harvest. The reduced amount of water has resulted in increased cost and more time needed to complete the irrigation.
“Overall, things are looking OK for the remainder of the season; I just have my fingers crossed,” said Langiano, who is among nearly 200 farmers and ranchers who described how the state’s current water crisis is affecting them in a survey conducted by the California Farm Bureau Federation. “When surface water is curtailed, you see it and you know it immediately. But groundwater is out of sight, out of mind for a majority of people.”
Coso Geothermal Project close to ruling on groundwater pumping from southern Inyo county
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 4, 2008 at 7:37 amFrom Bishop’s Inyo Register:
Coso Geothermal Project is closer to a possible ruling on its controversial proposal to pump water near Little Lake in Southern Inyo, about 19 months after initially seeking approval from the county. Running out of the water it needs to operate, the electrical generating plant isn’t the only entity with a vested interest in the county’s decision.
Little Lake Ranch, LLC and others are worried the pumping project will have a “devastating impact” on the lake and surrounding riparian areas. A public comment period on the groundwater pumping proposal comes to an end Saturday, Sept. 6.
The Coso Operating Company, LLC, is seeking a 30-year conditional use permit from the Inyo County Planning Commission to extract groundwater from two existing wells on the Coso Hay Ranch property in Rose Valley at the southern end of Inyo County. The permit is asking to withdraw 3,000 gallons per minute or 4,800 acre-feet per year and construct a nine-mile long pipe from the wells to the plant to supplement a shrinking geothermal reservoir.
Coso argues the pumping plan is the only economically feasible way to keep the plant generating at capacity. The plan calls for mitigation guidelines and “trigger levels,” such as a decrease in the lake level of 10 percent, to prevent any permanent damage.
Opposing the project is Little Lake Ranch, and specifically Gary Arnold, the ranch’s legal counsel, representing Arnold, Bleuel, LaRochelle, Matthews and Zirbel. Arnold is also a member of the 1,200-acre ranch and private hunting club. The property includes Little Lake, a 1.6-mile riparian corridor and five ponds. Arnold and the ranch are arguing that the proposed pumping will suck Little Lake dry, leaving it to face a very long-term recovery. Arnold noted he is using statistics from the Hydrology Model included in the Draft Environmental Impact Report to argue his claim.
Read more from the Inyo Register by clicking here.
Tulare County homeowners call drilling companies to find water sources
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on September 2, 2008 at 7:35 amFrom the Visalia Times-Delta:
Business has never been better for Loudie Crisp — but you won’t find her bragging about it. As one of the owners of Visalia’s Crisp Well Drilling, Crisp has been running from site to site all summer as wells throughout the Valley start to run dry. “I received eight calls today,” she said. “Everyone’s running out of water. It’s the worst I’ve ever seen it.”
The problem: A water table that has been steadily dropping throughout the Valley, a situation made worse by the exponential growth during the last decade. And this year’s early spring and hot weather have meant hundreds of homeowners have put in calls to local well drillers —and have been given a spot on the waiting list. “A lot of them have old wells that are too shallow now, maybe 80 to 120 feet deep,” she said.
This year drillers are boring down to more than 250 feet to find reliable water supplies — and in many cases that means drilling an entirely new well. The pipes in older wells can be incompatible with simply drilling an existing well farther down.
The price tag for a 200-foot well can run more than $13,500. “I don’t take payments,” Crisp said. “It’s really difficult because I know people are really hurting now — but they have to pay it in full or use a credit card.”
Crisp is booked solid for the next six weeks — a new record for the 30-year-old company. Other Visalia well drillers are in the same boat.
Read more from the Visalia Times-Delta by clicking here.
Knock, knock–they’re coming to take your softener!
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on August 12, 2008 at 6:41 amFrom Capitol Weekly:
There’s a threatening-looking man in a dark suit is at the door holding a very large plumber’s wrench. “Knock, knock!” says the graphic. “Who’s there?” “Sacramento politicians coming to take you water softener away,” reads the answer. “Don’t let them!”
This ominous web ad has been running on numerous California political websites, including Capitol Weekly’s The Roundup. It’s part of the late-stage battle over a water recycling bill that has been moving forward with bipartisan support.
AB 2270 by Assemblyman John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, would expand the targets set out in the Water Recycling Act of 1991. It would also expand the powers of the Department of Water Resources and local water agencies to control what is going into the water system. This is where the opposition comes in. The bill “would authorize any local agency that maintains a community sewer system to take action to control residential salinity inputs, including those from water softeners.”
Water softener systems use salts to remove minerals, mainly calcium and magnesium, which “harden” water. These systems run anywhere from a few hundred dollars to over $4,000 according to Gene Erbin, a lobbyist representing Culligan International Company with the firm Nielsen Merksamer. Erbin estimates between 10 and 15 percent of Californians households have these systems.
Hard water, Erbin said, reduces the life of appliances, causes buildup on sinks and showers, leaves dishes spotty when they come out of the dishwasher, can worsen skin conditions like eczema, and damages clothing when it’s washed. It can even raise bills for heating water, because mineral-rich in hard water has a higher thermal mass than softer water.
The problem, Laird said, it the amount of salt water softeners are adding to the water supply. For instance, he said, without this bill, the city of Dixon, population 15,000, will have to spend $20 million on a reverse osmosis filtering plant to take out these salts. AB 2270 allows local agencies to decide whether they want to build large, centralized facilities, or go the route of buying out water softeners from homes.
“One percent of water users are creating 10 percent of the salinity that 100 percent of us have to pay to clean up,” Laird said.
Read more from Capitol Weekly by clicking here.
Beyond wind plan, Pickens eyes water pipelines in drought-ridden U.S.
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 27, 2008 at 8:13 amFrom Popular Mechanics (hat tip to the Sisweb):
Legendary Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens recently detailed his plan to wean America off foreign oil by blanketing the Great Plains with wind turbines. But Pickens also has a lesser-known plan that is centered on another commodity, one every bit as vital to America’s future as energy—water. If it all works out, his water plan could remake Pickens as a whole new kind of baron.
Pickens is in the planning stages of a $1.5 billion initiative to pump billions of gallons of water from an ancient aquifer beneath the Texas Panhandle and build pipelines to ship them to thirsty cities such as Dallas. So far, no city has taken up his water company, Mesa Water, on the offer. But company officials and experts agree that a continuation of the drought impacting large portions of the United States could turn Pickens into something of a water baron. His yet-to-be-built pipeline would follow the same 250-mile corridor as electric lines carrying power from his wind farms. Pickens prompted the creation of a public water supply district, run by his employees, that can claim private land for the pipeline route through eminent domain.
A drought has drained water from Texas and much of the rest of the United States. That could make water an increasingly profitable commodity for those who hold the rights. According to his Web site, Pickens owns rights to more water than anyone else. “In general, there’s a lot of it, it’s just not in the right place,” says Robert Stillwell, legal counsel for Mesa Water (and board member of the water supply district), which continues to acquire water rights in rural Texas. He dismisses questions about whether the water would be cost-competitive. For cities looking at their future water needs, he says, “cost becomes irrelevant.” As far as Mesa’s pipeline snaking across the Texas heartland, Stillwell insists that “it’s going to happen, it’s just a matter of when.”
Read more from Popular Mechanics by clicking here.
Antelope Valley groundwater adjudication case drags on for nearly a decade, racking up millions in lawyer’s fees
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 23, 2008 at 6:51 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
After nearly 10 years, millions of dollars and at least 26 studies, the players in a legal battle over water pumping rights are still haggling. More than $5 million has been spent on the litigation by public agencies, with Los Angeles County Waterworks Districts at the top, spending about $2 million, and Palmdale Water District in second place at $903,799.
“It could buy a hell of a lot of water,” attorney Bob Joyce, whose client Diamond Farming Company launched the legal battle in 1999, said about the spending. “It could go a long way toward solving the problem.”
“This thing is an unfortunate waste of resources in my view, not only for taxpayers but for private capital. I’ve seldom seen money put in lawyers’ pockets that generates anything positive to the community or anything constructive. It is money that goes down a hole that never benefits anybody,” Joyce said. “Litigation is a poor vehicle for addressing and solving political problems.”
In a court document, Joyce accused water district officials of trying to wear down the landowner parties by making the groundwater-rights litigation - technically called adjudication - costly and lengthy. “This litigation pits the might and funding resources of the government against the separate individual property rights and limited resources of hundreds of separate landowners,” he stated.
A water district attorney denied the charge.
Attorney Tom Bunn, who represents Palmdale and Quartz Hill water districts, said adjudication is expensive, and water officials were surprised when Joyce’s client started this one. “We were brought into it against our will,” Bunn said. “Palmdale Water District did not favor an adjudication, in part because of the costs, but the direction we’ve had from our clients is to minimize the costs for all sides.” Bunn added: “We’re looking for a quick resolution, by settlement if possible, but otherwise by a judge determination.”
City and water officials said they dislike the case’s length, as well. “The only people who like adjudication are attorneys. We don’t like it,” said Jeff Storm, Palmdale Water District director. “It is a lawyer’s retirement act right now, like a fox in charge of the henhouse. When it stops being a cash cow, it will be settled,” Palmdale City Councilman Mike Dispenza said.
While the water districts and other public agencies have spent millions, the amount spent by farmers, property owners and others isn’t clear. Attorneys for Diamond Farming and Bolthouse Farms, which filed the original lawsuits over groundwater pumping rights in 1999 and 2001, respectively, would not disclose how much their clients have paid.
However, according to court records, Diamond Farming has spent more money on the legal battle than its land is worth “by a sum in the multiples.” Joyce said the sum is less than $1 million.
Aside from the carrot growers, other area farmers have spent tens of thousands of dollars on court costs. But they complain that as taxpayers in Los Angeles County and the Antelope Valley-East Kern Water Agency, they are also indirectly paying the costs of attorneys on the other side.
“Every entity that we’re fighting, whether it’s the county or the cities or the water purveyors, all their attorneys are being paid for by the taxpayer. And nobody wants it done faster than we do because we’re having to foot the bill ourselves,” said onion and carrot farmer John Calandri. “Nobody’s helping us. Believe me, when we get a bill, we’re scratching our heads wondering how long we can hold on.”
Grain and alfalfa farmer John Pierre Maritorena agrees. “We’re paying them to fight us.”
Read more from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
At war over Valley water rights; Farmers fear they’ll get short straw in court fight
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 21, 2008 at 6:38 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
A farmer needs two things to produce his crops: his land and his water.
In the long, often contentious court battle to determine water rights in the Valley, local farmers are seeking rights to the water under their land and the ability to sell water from their wells for use within the Antelope Valley. They are suspicious of efforts to restrict access to the groundwater, which has allowed many of them to farm the Antelope Valley successfully for generations.
Last year, more than 16,000 acres of the Antelope Valley were farmed, producing crops that included alfalfa, onions, carrots and peaches. The Valley’s 2007 crops were worth more than $53 million, according to the Los Angeles County Agricultural Commission. Success of those crops depends on a reliable source of water - groundwater pumped through wells or water imported from north of the Sacramento Delta through the California Aqueduct.
Farmers are at odds with Los Angeles County, Lancaster, Palmdale and water purveyors, all of whom are fighting for their own water rights to satisfy a growing demand by residential customers, businesses and industrial users.
Farmers are also at odds among themselves regarding the right to sell well water. Most farmers want the ability to sell excess water under their land. But carrot growers, who lease much of the land they farm, fear water transfers will unfairly limit their access to available land by making water sales more lucrative to landowners than leasing.
Some purveyors and city officials think farmers want access to all of the groundwater, while the farmers believe the cities and purveyors are making a grab for water that belongs to them.
One source of conflict among farmers is the county’s claim that it has higher priority to the water in the Valley’s basin than farmers. But farmers claim owning land and drawing water for their own use outweighs this appropriation by the county.
Farmers are still bristling over comments made four years ago by Los Angeles County in a lawsuit brief alleging that using water “for irrigation purposes is unreasonable in the arid Antelope Valley and constitutes waste and unreasonable use … and is thereby unlawful.”
“I think there’s a lot of people who eat food that would probably disagree with that,” said John Calandri, a third-generation farmer who has been farming on the east side of Lancaster for 43 years.
The Calandri farm produces onions and carrots and ships onions across the United States and as far away as Australia and Italy. Local farmers scoff at the notion that the dry, windy Valley is not a good place to raise crops. “It’s a very difficult place to farm. But if you can get through the elements you can raise a really good commodity for the consumer,” Calandri said. “Quality-wise, it’s one of the most recognized areas in the United States for onions,” he said.
Read more from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
Antelope Valley groundwater adjudication: Farm Bureau offers equitable water plan
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 21, 2008 at 6:33 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
The Los Angeles County Farm Bureau wants Antelope Valley farmers to get a guarantee that they can pump groundwater at historic levels, plus a right to sell water from their wells to water districts or others inside the Valley. Written by five local farmers, a policy adopted by the local bureau seeks to settle a nearly decade-old legal battle over groundwater pumping rights by establishing plans to manage the groundwater basin and ensure transferable water rights. Transferable water rights would allow farmers to sell the rights to the water under their land to a water purveyor or private party for use within the Valley.
Under the policy, landowners who are using water on their property would receive a share of the benefits of the use of storage space in the basin. Reserving water to replenish the basin would be a top priority, but water could also be stored for use by overlying property owners, such as farmers or other water users. Water storage could be rented to entities outside the Valley, or water could be imported and stored for future use.
“I’m afraid a lot of (water) suppliers want to cut landowners back to less than 50% of historical pumping,” alfalfa farmer Gene Nebeker said. “It’s going to be economically devastating to the Valley. I also believe that would stimulate court action that could go on for a decade, probably.”
Nebeker estimates that farmers pump about 105,000 acre-feet of water per year. (An acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons, enough to supply an average Antelope Valley household for a year.)
Additional court action would delay efforts to monitor groundwater pumping Valleywide, as well as delay storing water in the basin. It could also force water agencies to withhold water for new development and force them to recharge the groundwater basin, he said.
Most of the Valley’s farmers are squarely behind Nebeker’s assessment, but Nebeker has his detractors. “Nebeker is a very intelligent man, but he has his own agenda,” Palmdale City Councilman Mike Dispenza said. “We must all get past our own agenda. Everybody is not going to get their way.”
Read more from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
In the Antelope Valley, drilling deep wells for water faces myriad problems
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 13, 2008 at 11:45 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
Antelope Valley may be sitting on 52 million acre-feet of water, enough to cover the Valley floor 30 feet deep. Enough, some say, to quench the needs of a growing population for 300 years, maybe more. But at what cost?
Sinking wells thousands of feet deep to reach the deepest water means higher pumping costs, and also draws up water more likely to be contaminated with naturally occurring arsenic and other substances.
In addition, pumping more groundwater than is replenished by rainfall or other sources can result in subsidence: a slow compaction and sinking of the earth’s surface, which can damage buildings and roads and permanently reduce the water storage capacity in the Valley’s aquifers - underground layers of rock and sand that hold water in their pores.
“There will always be water in the aquifer,” said Adam Ariki, Los Angeles County Waterworks assistant deputy chief. “If we extract all of it … the soil’s going to crash on us and we’re all going to sink.”
However, water officials, farmers and others disagree about how much water can be safely pumped from wells without damaging the aquifers and leading to subsidence. Estimates vary from 30,000 acre-feet to as high as 120,000 acre-feet, Ariki said, but most people seem to accept a range of 70,000 to 80,000 acre-feet. (An acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons, enough to supply an average Antelope Valley household for a year.)
If water districts, farmers and other well owners collectively agree to pump about 90,000 acre-feet per year, it will be equivalent to the amount returned to the groundwater basin from rain and manmade activities, Ariki said. “Logically the amount should be equivalent to how much water is being put in the groundwater basin,” he said.
But farmer Gene Nebeker, a former water-quality official, says: “Nobody really knows how safe the yield is, until we take better data over a period of time.”
Accessing the water requires drilling deeper wells and requires more electricity to pump the water out. The deeper water in the aquifer is of poorer quality, of a higher salinity, and possibly tainted with arsenic. Read more from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
Water dispute may get more hostile as the long-standing adjudication case in the Antelope Valley continues
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 12, 2008 at 11:07 amFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
Hostility is likely to grow worse between farmers and public water providers as the Antelope Valley groundwater adjudication case rages on unless all parties can reach an amicable solution, one Valley alfalfa rancher says.
In order to achieve satisfactory results for everyone, Lancaster alfalfa rancher Gene Nebeker has asked the Palmdale Water District board of directors to “minimize the role of lawyers and technical advisers” in the adjudication, which has dragged on nearly a decade.
The legal snarl began in October 1999 when Diamond Farming Co. filed suit against Lancaster, the Antelope Valley Water Co., the Palmdale Water District and three other water purveyors. Since then, hundreds of entities and individuals have joined the suits and counter-suits.
People lack confidence, Nebeker told the board, that “the judge or any court” could arrive at a knowledgeable ruling to establish equitable groundwater pumping rights.
“They will come knocking at your door, incredibly angry, if they realize your board will set them back to less than 50% of their pumping,” Nebeker said.
In a show of unity, members of the Los Angeles County Farm Bureau and other landowners packed the water district boardroom on Wednesday night as Nebeker presented their position to the board. He said farmers and other landowners, whether or not within the water district boundaries, will be adversely impacted by this case, especially if limited to half of their current pumping capacity.
Nebeker estimates that between 150,000 and 160,000 acre-feet of water gets pumped from the ground each year; others in the Valley put the figure closer to 120,000 acre-feet. Each acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons, the amount of water used in an average Antelope Valley home in one year.
The alfalfa rancher wants his estimate used as a basis for the adjudication equation, and then raised or lowered depending on data gathered from a monitoring system.
He admonished the water district for joining forces with a group dubbed Public Water Suppliers, which includes the Quartz Hill Water District, Littlerock Creek Irrigation District and Rosamond Community Services District. Nebeker claims the group has waged battle with or will initiate a lawsuit against the owners of 190,000 parcels of land in the Valley.
More from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
In a related story also from the Antelope Valley Press, farmers are infuriated that their water might be cut 50%:
Half the normal amount of water to grow crops means half the yield at harvest, which amounts to a 50% financial loss, according to some Antelope Valley farmers. They worry their livelihood will take a huge hit if the judge’s determination in the Antelope Valley groundwater adjudication case favors the counties, cities and water suppliers such as the Palmdale Water District.
Julie and Gailen Kyle raise hay and alfalfa on nearly 1,600 acres at several sites on the east side of Palmdale and Lancaster. Richard Miner grows alfalfa and hay on 400 acres in the Willow Springs area of Kern County. They’ve heard talk that once the court rules on groundwater rights, they will be restricted to 50% of their current pumping capacity. “If you cut my water in half, you cut my income in half,” said Gailen Kyle, whose family has farmed in the Antelope Valley for 75 years.
Though Miner’s “hay operation” is about a quarter the size of the Kyles’, he said his concerns are just as significant. Miner has been working his farm on Tehachapi Springs Road since 1975. Each year he uses an average of 7 acre-feet per acre of groundwater to grow alfalfa. For 400 acres, that totals roughly 2,800 acre-feet of water in a year. An acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons, the amount used in the average Antelope Valley home in one year.
Julie Kyle said they use about the same amount of water per acre each year as Miner does but have nearly four times the land.
“If the cities think the farmers will accept a 50% cut, this (adjudication) will go on a long time,” Gailen Kyle said.
Read the rest of this story from the Antelope Valley Press by clicking here.
Who should get underground water? Good question to ponder as Nevada wants to pump from aquifers on border
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on June 7, 2008 at 6:36 amFrom the Deseret News:
As Nevada jockeys for water to quench a thirsty, growing Las Vegas, officials in Utah have spent about half of a $3 million budget to study valuable aquifers along the border.
Utah Geological Survey researchers are midway through a project that involves digging monitoring wells south of the Dugway Mountain range and near Nevada’s Great Basin National Park to study the quality, quantity and connectivity of aquifers that for decades have supplied Utah water rights holders. “Westerners realize water is limited,” said Lucy Jordan, a UGS hydrogeologist. “So, as a Westerner we all need to make the most out of those supplies.”
Utah lawmakers appropriated $3 million for the study after the Southern Nevada Water Authority filed for rights to 110,000 acre-feet of water on their side of the border:
Does Nevada have the right to go after 110,000 acre-feet of water so close to the border? “That’s an interesting question,” Jordan said. “It depends on who you ask. That’s where the big problems come in. Whose water really is it?”
In talks about who should have access to groundwater that flows underground on both sides of the state line, Jordan said. Nevada officials have maintained water is flowing from their state into Utah. Jordan noted in an interview Friday that Western water historically has gone to whomever began using it first.
Monitoring will continue, with results up until now showing that two aquifers studied are flowing from one to the other and that the quality is good. Jordan said they’ll be looking closely at how spring runoff impacts the volume of those aquifers, which have yet to be tested by any large-scale pumping project.
Read the full text of the story from the Deseret News by clicking here.
Indian reservation asks judge to determine their water entitlement; ruling could affect 6 water agencies & 2900 property owners
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on May 29, 2008 at 6:26 amFrom Riverside’s Press-Enterprise:
On the edge of a dirt road, Anthony Madrigal Jr. peers over the same sage-covered, boulder-strewn land that his Cahuilla ancestors have lived on for thousands of years. But it’s not the tribal land that’s got residents of Southwestern Riverside County so concerned as much as the water beneath it — and who will get the right to use it.
Cahuilla Creek, a mostly dry riverbed that snakes through the reservation near Anza, belies the amount of water in an aquifer below. Concerned that development in the area will draw on groundwater that belongs to them, the Cahuilla Band of Indians and a smaller nearby tribe asked a federal judge to establish just how much water they’re entitled to.
Although it is unclear what that amount will be, the tribes’ request comes at a time of drought and legal restrictions that have cut water supplies to the Inland region. The ruling could affect thousands of property owners and as many as six major water agencies across much of the 750-square-mile watershed of the Santa Margarita River that stretches from the Anza Valley to Camp Pendleton.
The tribes recently notified the agencies and some 2,900 property owners along the rural back roads of Anza, Aguanga and Sage to the vineyards and avocado groves of Temecula and beyond that they are being added as defendants in the decades-old court case.
Madrigal said tribal members want to legally define the amount of water they are entitled to so they have certainty and the necessary resources to live on their homeland for generations to come. “The tribe can’t sell the reservation. We don’t have the luxury of picking up and moving,” he said.
Some homeowners who are nervous about losing some of their water have formed groups to share legal fees and hire attorneys. The Anza-Aguanga Citizens for Water Rights already counts 1,700 members. The rural areas near the tribal reservations depend solely on local water supplies for drinking and to irrigate crops, and don’t have the infrastructure to import supplies like most urban areas.
“More than anything else, there is this honest fear they have their life savings in their home and they’ll be left without water,” said Jackie Spanley, who used to be an Anza Valley Municipal Advisory Council member and is organizing another citizens group.
Read the rest of this story from Riverside’s Press-Enterprise by clicking here.
Borrego Spring’s aquifer is drying up; residents ponder their dry future
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on April 4, 2008 at 6:24 am
From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
The desert oasis of Borrego Springs has long seemed immune to Southern California’s periodic water shortages, thanks to an aquifer that keeps the town’s groves, yards and golf greens lush even in the searing summer heat.
Borrego Springs residents use about twice as much water on average as homeowners elsewhere in San Diego County, according to the Borrego Water District. The agency has some of the lowest residential rates in Southern California, giving its customers little financial reason to cut back.
The search for a stable water supply has pitted farmers, homeowners and developers against each another. Each year, water users in the Borrego valley remove roughly five times more water from the aquifer than it collects. “People have taken the idea that there is plenty of water here pretty seriously,” said Richard Williamson, the district’s new general manager.
But Borrego Springs’ mentality about water is changing as the volume of its aquifer – the town’s sole source of water – is shrinking rapidly. In recent months, the push for conservation and the search for ways to secure a stable water supply have sometimes pitted farmers, homeowners and developers against one another.
The community’s water officials have held several public meetings to discuss possible solutions for the water crisis. They’re looking at raising water rates and tapping water from the Colorado River, which would require spending about $60 million to install a major pipeline.
“Borrego is a microcosm of what’s happening through the Southwest,” said William Mills of Yorba Linda, a consultant for the Borrego Water District. “There is just a conflict over water being used for the environment, water being used for agriculture and water being used for the growing population.”
Read the rest of this article from the San Diego Union-Tribune by clicking here. For more on the Borrego Springs water situation, visit The Borrego Water Underground.
Picture of Borrego Springs by flickr photographer kbaird.
Yucaipa City Council approves $3.6 million for project to provide flood protection, recreation, and aquifer recharge
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 27, 2008 at 8:10 pmFrom the Inland Daily Bulletin:
Yucapia - The City Council approved a contract for about $3.6 million to begin building the Oak Glen Creek Basins Project - a string of three holding ponds that will catch rainwater and improve the area’s flood-drainage system.The primary purpose of the project - near Bryant Street and Oak Glen Road - is to provide flood-control protection for residents near the area. It will also add trails and rest areas for visitors.
Including design work, the cost to build the first phase of the project is estimated at $5.4 million, said Ray Casey, director of public works.
“With this project completed, the Dunlap area should be removed from the (Federal Emergency Management Agency) flood map,” he said. “But the most important thing is it will prevent the flooding in Dunlap.”
The project also provides another purpose - an eventual source of drinking water. The retention basins are designed to collect rainwater runoff in three basins. The water will leach into the ground, flow into the aquifer, and eventually be tapped as a source of drinking water by the Yucaipa Valley Water District, Casey said.
Corona-based KEC Engineering is set to begin construction in mid-April.
Read the rest of this article from the Inland Valley Bulletin by clicking here.
City hopes Antelope-Valley East Kern Water Agency will help fund recharge project
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 17, 2008 at 12:54 pmFrom the Antelope Valley Press:
City officials continue on their mission to lure partners for the design and construction of a water recharge project. In that quest, they hope help will come in the form of money. So Leon Swain, Palmdale’s director of Public Works, presented the city plans for the Upper Amargosa Recharge and Nature Park to the Antelope Valley-East Kern Water Agency board of directors at their meeting Tuesday night.
That project carries a price tag of $14.5 million, and Palmdale has committed to paying $2.5 million of the cost. Swain said the city is seeking $3 million from Proposition 50 funds and hoping for another $350,00 in an Environmental Enhancement and Mitigation Grant from the state for highway landscaping and urban forestry projects.
But an $8.6 million shortfall remains and the share sought from partners has not yet been determined.
Swain described the merits of the water recharge project. “It meets all five water management strategies” cited in the Antelope Valley Integrated Regional Water Management Plan, he said.
The plan involved a meeting of the minds of representatives from all Valley water suppliers, government agencies at city, county and state levels as well as members of the building industry.
Swain identified the following management strategies the Upper Amargosa project would satisfy: water supply management; water quality management; flood management; environmental resource management; and land use management. “This is exactly what the Valley needs,” Swain said.
The project could help close a deficit in between water supply and demand in the valley that, if nothing is done, could mean not enough water in the Antelope Valley in 2035. To read the rest of this story from the Antelope Valley Press, click here.
Measuring groundwater in Nevada: an inexact and controversial science
Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on February 28, 2008 at 5:13 pmFrom Las Vegas City Life:
An interesting story on how things have changed in last 50 or so years. Nevada’s groundwater basins were originally mapped back in the 1960’s, using techniques of the time. Basically back then, they spent a couple of months in a basin studying vegetation and making crude estimates of how much water might lie beneath.
“They spent a couple months in a given basin using a standard approach, but they didn’t have a lot of data to go by,” says Andrew Burns of the Southern Nevada Water Authority. “In terms of an estimate, it’s pretty decent, and since that time a lot of additional data has been collected.”
The statewide “reconnaissance” survey from the ’60s was a piece of thumbnail-sketch science that went broad, but not very deep. But the results are nothing to sniff at; heck, they’re what the state engineer uses as a guide when deciding how to dole out groundwater rights. The comprehensive water portrait shows that Nevada has more than 230 groundwater basins. Now, more than 40 years later — in a rapidly growing state where water is gold — scientists still refer to that dated snapshot of our groundwater situation. There hasn’t been a statewide inventory of water since the ’60s. Since then, a patchwork of studies have offered updates here and there, but the overall picture isn’t as clear as you’d think.
“The interesting thing is that, obviously, some of that data is old,” says Allen Biaggi, director of Nevada’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. “And there are some new methods of evaluating basins.”
To date, only 81 of Nevada’s groundwater basins have been mapped using modern technology. The need exists for a more comprehesive evaluation, but finding the funding is difficult. Several bills have been introduced in the state’s legislature, but none have passed as of yet. Another attempt is planned for 2009.
Meanwhile, not only our techniques for mapping groundwater basins has improved, so also has our understanding of groundwater dynamics:
While water officials and scientists offer reassurances that there’s plenty of water out there in Nevada — in fact, many studies have found there’s more than previously thought — the most recent research has shed further light on a new conception of groundwater. It’s decidedly different than the popular idea of groundwater as big bathtubs of liquid, static and placid, just waiting for someone to dip in.
Even when the money’s there to plumb the desert depths for water, the science isn’t always crystal clear. A case in point resides to the north, where from 2005 to 2006, federal scientists were dispatched to study the area where the Southern Nevada Water Authority wants to tap rural groundwater. The $6 million study scrutinized 13 basins straddling the Nevada-Utah border. The Basin Area Regional Carbonate Aquifer System Study (aka BARCASS), paid for by an amendment to the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act, was seen by critics of the rural pipeline plan as a scientific sop to skeptics and a Pass-Go card for the water authority — There, there, now. There’s plenty of water in the area, see?
The good news is there seems to “extra” water flowing out of the 13-basin study area. But the study also had the perhaps ironic effect of reinforcing another idea that’s quickly gaining traction — and one that might make water authority officials squirm. The emerging idea is that groundwater, scientists are finding, isn’t merely confined to a basin as though it were sitting in a sink. Rather, the water slips and slides around beneath the earth in larger patterns called regional flow systems. The inconvenient result: Pumping water at Basin A could spell trouble for Basin Z — or, say, the endangered species of fish that call Basin Z home. Indeed, some critics think BARCASS raised more questions than it answered.
“These aquifers are all connected, and they’re the source for surface water, including rivers that feed Lake Mead, and springs and seeps that are critical habitat for rare plants and animals,” says Launce Rake of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, a foe of the rural pipeline plan. “We don’t understand what’s happening out there. Some scientists are getting a grasp, and the more we know, the more fragile those interconnected environments look.”
Read the full text of this story from Las Vegas’s City Life by clicking here.
Photo illustration by Bill Hughes and Las Vegas City Life.
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