Saturday, Jan. 14, 2006 | 7:46 a.m.
Launce Rake
Population growth, environmental issues and drought are confronting the West with unprecedented water woes, but collaborative efforts can overcome the issues.
The bad news: It will cost you. And don't look to the federal government to pay for expensive solutions.
That was the message of speakers at a water conference at the Bellagio last week that drew an audience of about 100 lawmakers, water-agency officials and businessmen. It was organized by the Center for the New West, a conservative think tank in Idaho, and aside from addressing issues of the day, the discussion provided a primer of sorts on the often highly complex issue of water in the West.
Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, said collaborations between local, state and federal agencies, and private and public sources, are critical to paying for new projects. But don't look to the federal government for financial help, he said. Congress will offer either "no money for water, or ... very little money for water," he said.
Failure to do work today to develop new water sources will mean that customers will hear a "hissing sound at the tap a decade from now," said Craig, a former rancher and a member of the center's board of trustees.
"People will pay more for water in the future ... When it comes to cheap water, most people recognize that it is a commodity worth wasting."
Other speakers echoed Craig's themes. Andrew Richardson, president of the American Water Works Association, which represents 4,700 utilities nationwide, said the cost of repairing and building new water delivery systems over the next three decades -- not including wastewater treatement -- would total $300 billion nationwide.
Richardson said there's still room for federal assistance, but it would probably not be in the way of straight grants for big water projects.
"We believe that federal assistance should be a helping hand, but not a continuous stream of support," he said.
This week the Salt Lake Tribune reported that Utah officials also are working to find $700 million to fund big water projects in that state--and they are not counting on federal support. Projects there include a 127-mile pipeline that would connect the Colorado River at Lake Powell to St. George and other water users in three southwest counties. Water officials hope to have the pipeline delivering water by 2020.
In Nevada, water officials estimated in May that the cost of a host of big new projects could top $5.5 billion. But Pat Mulroy, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, told the group that her agency, the sole water wholesaler for 1.6 million people in urban Las Vegas and its suburbs, does not need federal money for big water projects.
She said the Water Authority is already working with Arizona and California on water-storage efforts. She also said that desalination on the West Coast will eventually be a part of the water resources for Las Vegas, and she said her agency already is on a "pay as you go" basis.
"We have no federal money in our system," Mulroy said. "We have paid for ourselves as we have gone along."
That has an important benefit not always shared by other water systems, she said.
"It gives us an autonomy and freedom," Mulroy said.
Mulroy used the conference to plug the Water Authority $2 billion project to bring water from rural eastern Nevada to Las Vegas. The need sprang from the same environmental challenge that was on the minds of many of those attending the conference: Five years of drought that gripped the West and still hangs on in some areas.
She said that despite population growth of 7,000 people a month, six years ago Southern Nevada's water needs looked safe and secure for decades to come.
"We thought the Colorado River was invincible," she said.
Then the drought hit and the Water Authority had to consider finding other water sources. That sent planners scrambling to bring rural water needs on line within the next decade.
"The potential for shortages is increasing dramatically," she said. "So how do we protect ourselves? We have to have the ability to bring in water from a source that it totally independent from the Colorado River. There is unappropriated water in the state of Nevada available for use where it is needed."
Efforts to develop the rural water is opposed in some of the targeted areas, particularly White Pine County and neighboring areas of Utah.
On Wednesday, the White Pine County Commission listened to Mulroy's offer of unspecified payments in exchange for the rural water, a cooperative management board and a promise to revisit the water rights issue in 75 years. The commission essentially agreed to talk about further talks, a concession that Mulroy characterized as a significant victory from a board that has expressed significant skepticism about the Water Authority plans.
"It went really, really well," she said.
Mulroy said the Water Authority's needs would not threaten water supplies for ranchers or harm the environment. She noted that the federal 1922 Colorado River Compact, which provided the fundamental law allocating river water to seven Western states including Nevada, gave the Silver State just 4 percent of the total.
"We don't want to do to our neighboring counties what was done to us on the Colorado River," she said. The measures outlined to the White Pine County Commission would be "so we don't destroy the environment or economy of the county of origin."
Launce Rake can be reached at 259-4127 or at [email protected].
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