WaterWired

Atlanta's Water Task Force: Quo Vadis?

Time once again to please my former Latin teacher, Brother Wallace.

Dorian Roffe-Hammond sure knows how to feed my fix for Atlanta (my favorite Southern city) and Southeast water news. He sent this opinion piece from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Jay Bookman entitled Perdue's water task force closed to the public,

I posted on Gov. Perdue's task force about a month ago.

Here is Bookman's column.

A series of major legal setbacks has finally forced Georgia officials to face reality: Metro Atlanta could actually, really, for sure and no kidding, lose its legal right to draw so much water from Lake Lanier.

The consequences could be dire. If a deal with our neighboring states can’t be cut by July 2012, it won’t be a question of trying to find enough water to support continued growth. Instead, we’ll be scrambling for enough water to supply those of us already here.

With that deadline in mind, Gov. Sonny Perdue has named a Water Contingency Task Force. The group, which held its first meeting last month at the Governor’s Mansion, is tasked with producing recommendations before the Legislature convenes in January.

According to Bert Brantley, Perdue’s spokesman, the task force is searching for options that are “the most readily available and cost-effective available, options that you can bring online as fast as possible.”

“If you had been at the Mansion, you would have heard the governor tell the task force that ‘everything is on the table,’ ” Brantley told me this week. “He told them to look at literally everything.”

Of course, I wasn’t at that meeting to hear the governor say that. You probably weren’t either, because both the press and the public were barred from attending. The task force is being funded with taxpayers’ money; it is producing recommendations that will be critical to the future of the state. But the people of Georgia, the people whose lives, property and jobs are likely to be affected, are forbidden to watch.

It’s also interesting to note the makeup of the task force. In many states, a panel created to do such important work would be thoroughly seeded with experts in the field — hydrologists, people who know water law, environmental experts, scientists. It might also have a broad range of citizens, from businesspeople to community leaders. [Oh, yeah! Emboldening mine]

But this being Georgia, the Perdue task force is dominated by corporate executives. By my count, more than 50 of its 87 members are corporate executives, bankers, developers or utility officials. Sixteen are government officials.

Just four represent environmental groups, and three of those four groups — the Nature Conservancy, the Conservation Fund and the Trust for Public Lands — are land-acquisition organizations with little expertise in water issues.

According to Brantley, the extreme overrepresentation of business interests doesn’t matter.

“You’re assuming that businesspeople can’t be environmentalists, too,” he said, repeating a line also used to excuse the dominance of business interests on the state Board of Natural Resources.

Personally, I think it’s a silly argument. It requires you to believe that personal background and perspective aren’t important in how you assess a situation. A lot of businesspeople are very smart. But I’m not sure what makes them so much more qualified than Georgians of other backgrounds to ponder this issue.

According to Brantley, the task force will look at “every possible idea you’ve seen thrown out, from desalinization to fixing pipes.” It will gauge each according to cost, yield and speed of implementation.

But will corporate executives who are by instinct averse to regulation try to downplay mandated conservation as part of the solution? Will bankers and developers naturally favor the construction of major reservoirs that would also produce thousands of lakeside lots to be sold? Will water-dependent businesses try to push the burden of conservation onto homeowners? Will real estate people oppose the idea of requiring low-flow toilets before a house can be sold?

The makeup of the task force doesn’t exactly ease such concerns. In fact, it seems designed to ensure a certain set of outcomes and preclude others. [Emboldening mine]

Concern about the direction of state policy is heightened by the sudden resignation of Carol Couch, director of the state Environmental Protection Division. Couch, a scientist with a background in hydrology and biology who had been deeply involved in water issues, quit unexpectedly last month with just a week’s notice and without real explanation. She was quickly replaced by Allen Barnes, a law partner at King and Spalding, which often represents corporate interests in environmental cases.

The task force’s job is very important, and its membership includes a lot of good people. But the closed process and membership betray the same value system that helped to create this mess in the first place.

Last month I suggested that the task force was weighted towards the type of people who helped get Atlanta into its current predicament. Bookman's correct; these shovers and makers are not going to get the job done, especially behind closed doors.

Next time Sonny prays for rain, he might try praying for transparency and buy-in from the rest of the stakeholders.

"We don't give a damn how you done it up North." -- favorite bumper sticker seen throughout the South

Lawyers, Guns, and Money...and Water

No, I'm not talking about gunplay here - just thought I would toy with the title of the great Warren Zevon song, Lawyers, Guns and Money. It's apropos.

Dorian Roffe-Hammond sent me the following  items about the involvement of lawyers in the Georgia water issue and Gov. Sonny Perdue's water task force. As Jerry Seinfeld might say, "Not that there's anything wrong with that."

Here are the first few paragraphs of an article by David Beasley from the 9 October 2009 issue of Global Atlanta:

Atlanta law firm Arnall Golden Gregory LLP (AGG) has launched a new water resources team, betting that water, or the lack of it, will be a contentious legal issue for years to come.

"All the rain we had recently didn’t change a thing,” Bruce Jackson, a partner in the law firm who, along with fellow partner John Gornall, is leading the eight-member water resources team, told GlobalAtlanta.

Although heavy rainfall temporarily filled lakes and streams, most of the water flowed downstream and is now on the way to the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic Ocean. “It’s gone,” said Mr. Jackson.

What remains, however, is a federal lawsuit pitting Georgia, Alabama and Florida in a long-ranging fight centering on Atlanta’s main water source, Lake Lanier. Georgia is currently on the losing side of the contest. 

More from the article:

Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue recently named Mr. Jackson to the Water Contingency Plan Task Force, a panel that will figure out what Georgia will do if it is forced to severely cut withdrawals from Lanier.

"While I am confident we will be successful in securing the ability to draw water supply from Lake Lanier, we cannot take that for granted and must plan accordingly,” the governor said when appointing the panel. “We will consider conservation measures as well as opportunities to enhance our water supply options.” 

As the tri-state water wars increase in intensity, Arnall Golden Gregory sees a need for lawyers who specialize in the field. It envisions representing state and local governments and business owners in legal disputes over water while also working for foreign companies seeking to sell their water-saving products and technology here.

“People are going to need lawyers to deal with these issues as they develop,” said Mr. Jackson.

After purchasing retirement property in Colorado, Mr. Jackson developed first-hand knowledge of the water wars in the Western U.S. and knows how intense they can be. He points out that in Colorado, water commissioners, who have the right to shut off water sources, carry weapons when they go into the field.

Mr. Jackson has completed several courses in water law and is licensed to practice law in Colorado.

Someone is preparing for the future (lucrative) water landscape in Georgia and environs.

There was also another article about AGG and Jackson in 13 October 2009 edition of The Fulton County Daily Report. This segment from Andy Peters' article caught my eye:

Jackson is among 80 real estate developers, bankers, politicians, business community representatives and others on the task force, which is planning for the contingency that a water deal with Florida and Alabama is not approved by Congress by 2012.

Again, shovers and makers abound; nine of the eighty are lawyers.

Later in the article Jackson discussed the concept of a water court, like the one that Colorado has, as a mechanism to help Georgians deal with water issues:

Jackson said he has been asked to convene a panel of experts on western U.S. water law to compile a list of the “best practices” of water laws in the western U.S. He said one confirmed member of Jackson's panel is Colorado Supreme Court Justice Gregory J. Hobbs, a noted authority on water law and the author of “The Citizen's Guide to Colorado Water Law.”

Because the western U.S. has fewer water resources available, western states have been dealing with water-law issues for much longer than the eastern U.S., Jackson said. Georgia should be able to learn from how the western U.S. has established its laws to deal with a much lower quantity of water, said Jackson.

The West's reliance on prior appropriation of water has led some states, including Colorado, to establish water courts, and Jackson suggested such an approach may be what's needed in Georgia.

Somewhat like a bankruptcy court, water courts require the holder of a water permit to post a notice if he wants to make a significant change to how he's using the water. Any concerned or affected party has the chance to state their case on whether the proposed change should be approved. The water court judge makes the final determination, although, unlike a bankruptcy court, a water court judge does not have the authority to force all parties to abide by a specific plan, he said.

“Those concepts can easily translate to Georgia, and there are many ways to go about it,” Jackson said. “I like the idea of an adjudicated water system because of its transparency.”

The establishment of water courts in Georgia would require that the state conduct much more extensive measuring of water resources than is currently done, Jackson said.

The fact that Easterners may be looking to the West for guidance on water issues is interesting. It reminded me of a time about ten years ago when a retired University of New Mexico professor headed to Georgia to lead a new water policy institute at a state university.

I soon received a call from a Georgia newspaper reporter inquiring about the reputation and motives of the man, whom I did not know that well. It became clear to me that the reporter was out to do a 'hatchet job', and even expressed amazement to me that someone from the West could even begin to understand Georgia, its people, and its water issues. He even suggested that perhaps the fellow should just take his ideas and return to New Mexico. I realized that whatever I said would be misquoted and/or misunderstood, so I politely extricated myself from the interview.

We sure do live in interesting times.

"Send lawyers, guns and money...the shit has hit the fan." -- Warren Zevon, Lawyers, Guns and Money

Will Sonny's Task Force Answer His Prayers?

In August I posted about the water predicament in Georgia, and specifically, the Alanta metropolitan area (19 August 2009 and 20 August 2009).

Dorian Roffe-Hammond, who is well aware of my interest in all things 'Atlanta water', sent these items my way.

The first is a 7 October 2009 press release from the office of Gov. Sonny Perdue (R-GA), who's been known to pray for rain:

Governor Announces Members of Water Contingency Task Force

ATLANTA – Governor Sonny Perdue today hosted the first meeting of the newly-formed water contingency task force and announced the business, government and environmental leaders from around the state that have agreed to serve on the group.

“I am very appreciative of the time and effort these leaders from across Georgia have committed to the important task at hand,” said Governor Perdue. “I have asked this group to look at any and all possible solutions and let the facts drive their recommendations.”

Today’s first meeting of the task force focused on the history of water litigation and negotiations as well as discussion of the Governor’s four-pronged approach to dealing with Judge Magnuson’s July ruling. One of the strategies includes contingency planning, which is the focus of the task force.

Coca-Cola Enterprises Chairman and CEO John Brock and Tim Lowe of Lowe Engineers are serving as co-chairs of the task force, which will meet throughout the fall and present recommendations before the January 2010 legislative session.

“The Governor has named an outstanding group of leaders to serve on this task force,” Brock said. “We are eager to begin work on the charge the Governor gave us today – to develop a contingency plan that considers both conservation and water supply. This issue will affect Georgia for decades to come.”

“This task force brings together business, conservation and government leaders from throughout our state and it is that equal representation of all interests that will allow us to be successful,” Lowe added. “To a member, this task force is committed to working together to ensure that our state is well-prepared to meet our water needs long into the future.”

More than 80 leaders have agreed to serve on the task force. The members are:

Brock, John, Coca-Cola Enterprises (co-chair)
Lowe, Tim, Lowe Engineers (co-chair)
Amos, Paul, AFLAC
Anderson, Richard, Delta Air Lines
Armstrong, Kerry, Duke Realty
Bannister, Charles, Chair, Gwinnett County Commission
Barella, Jose, Merial
Bennett, John, Chair, Coosa-North Georgia Regional Water Council
Black, Gary, Georgia Agribusiness Council
Blake, Frank, The Home Depot
Blanchard, Billy, Columbus Bank and Trust
Boner, Rex, The Conservation Fund
Cagle, Casey, Lt. Governor
Carruth, Bill, Chair, Georgia Board of Natural Resources
Chase, Donald G., Chair, Upper Flint Regional Water Council
Clark, Chris, Commissioner, GA Department of Natural Resources
Collier, Darin, Worthing SE
Cornelius, Ken, Siemens
Cross, Ron C., Chair, Savannah-Upper Ogeechee Regional Water Council
Currey, Brad, Rock-Tenn Company
Davis, Scott, UPS
Dempsey, Lynn, Dempsey Auction Company
Deriso, Sonny, Atlantic Capital Bank
Dillard, Doug, Dillard & Galloway, LLC
Dunlap, Kit, Chair, Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District
Eason, Darvin, Chair, Suwanee-Satilla Regional Water Council
Eaves, John, Chair, Fulton County Commission
Ellis, Burrell, CEO, DeKalb County
Fischer, Christian, Georgia-Pacific
Floyd, Bill, Mayor, City of Decatur
Fox, John, Emory Healthcare
Franklin, Shirley, Mayor, City of Atlanta
Garrard, Gardiner, The Jordan Company
Garrett, Mike, Georgia Power Company
Gellerstedt, Larry, Cousins Properties
Glover, Taylor, Turner Enterprises, Inc.
Green, Steve, Stephen Green Properties, Inc.
Harbin, Ben, Chair, House Appropriations
Harris, Duane, Sea Georgia Adventures
Hatcher, Bob, MidCountry Financial Corp.
Hays, Richard, Alston & Bird
Hill, Stephen, Solvay Pharmaceuticals
Hodge, Al, Greater Rome Chamber of Commerce
Howard, Pierre, Georgia Conservancy
Hughes, Dale, Cox Enterprises
Hyland, Greg, Mueller Water Products
Jackson, Bruce, Arnall Golden Gregory
Johnston, Bob, MEAG Power
Ketchum, Mark, Newell Rubbermaid
Lakly, Shelly, The Nature Conservancy
Lanier, L. Brinson, Chair, Altamaha Regional Water Council
Lesser, Craig, The Pendleton Consulting Group
Maltese, Joe, City of LaGrange
Markwalter, Jack, Invesco
McSpadden, Richard, Chair, Upper Oconee Regional Water Council
Nash, Al, The Columns Group, Inc.
Nuti, Bill, NCR Corporation
Olens, Sam, Chair, Cobb County Commission
Pate, William, Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau
Poitevint, Alec, Southeastern Materials, Inc.
Price, Mike, Oglethorpe Power Corporation
Rice, John, GE
Richardson, Elmo A., Chair, Middle Ocmulgee Regional Water Council
Royal, A. Richard, Chair, Lower Flint Regional Water Council
Scheible, Dave, Graphic Packaging
Sheldon, Donna, House Majority Caucus Vice-Chair
Sitherwood, Suzanne, Atlanta Gas Light
Smith, Gary, Strategic Value Properties
Smith, Jack, Chair, Fayette County Commission
Smith, Lynn, Chair, House Natural Resources & Environment
Smith, Rick, Equifax Inc.
Stack, Tim, Piedmont Healthcare
Tankersley, Jan, Bulloch County Commissioner
Tapp, Helen, Trust for Public Land
Tarbutton, Charles, Sandersville Railroad Company
Thomas, Mike, Clayton County Water Authority
Thompson, Benjamin, Chair, Coastal Georgia Regional Water Council
Tolleson, Ross, Chair, Senate Natural Resources & Environment
Tuggle, Clyde, The Coca-Cola Company
Weber, Dan Chair, Senate Education
Wells, John, Interface Americas
Wilheit, Philip, Wilheit Packaging
Williams, Virgil, Williams Group International, Inc.
Willis, Betty, Emory University
Windom, Matt, Chair, Middle Chattahoochee Regional Water Council
Wood, Jenner, SunTrust Bank
Wood, Paul, Georgia EMC

Sure looks like a lot of movers and shakers (or shovers and makers) on that list!

The second is an editorial from the 9 October 2009 edition of the Athens Banner-Herald:

Editorial: Perdue's water task force will bear watching

In the Banner-Herald's Oct. 1 editorial headlined "Perdue continues to surprise on water issue," the editorial board credited Gov. Sonny Perdue with "heads-up leadership" in connection with his announcement that he was appointing a task force to develop contingency plans for water supplies.

The governor's appointment of the task force is part of the state's response to a federal judge's recent ruling that metropolitan Atlanta, which draws much of its water from North Georgia's Lake Lanier, should not have access to that water. That's because providing water was not one of the purposes for which the lake, a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project, was created.

The judge's ruling is among the latest developments in the long-standing "water war" among the states of Georgia, Florida and Alabama over access to water from the Chattahoochee River, which was dammed to create Lake Lanier. The ruling gives the states three years to come up with an agreement on the Chattahoochee's water. If no agreement is reached, water withdrawals from Lake Lanier will be cut back to 1970s levels, effectively a "death sentence" for metropolitan Atlanta.

Understandably, the ruling has touched off a flurry of activity at the state level. The governor has opted for a four-pronged approach: appealing the ruling, seeking the help of the state's congressional delegation, negotiating with Alabama and Florida, and developing contingency plans.

As a framework for dealing with the issue, those approaches make perfect sense. But that doesn't mean those approaches shouldn't bear further scrutiny as they move from plan to reality.

For instance, when the governor first announced creation of the task force late last month, his office indicated it would comprise dozens of business, government and environmental leaders. This week, when the names of the 80 appointees were announced, the list seemed a bit top-heavy with business leaders, while environmental interests were less in evidence.

That could be a problem insofar as one of the strategies the task force is likely to consider, according to a Wednesday report in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is looking outside the metropolitan Atlanta area for water.

In some parts of the state, sharing a water supply with metropolitan Atlanta might be an attractive option, inasmuch as it could mean a substantial revenue stream for local governments in areas from which water might be drawn. It is, however, difficult to predict what environmental consequences might arise from such transfers of water.

And, perhaps of more immediate relevance to those locales from which water might be taken, sending water to metropolitan Atlanta might, over time, lessen the ability of those locales to attract economic development.

As this newspaper has noted, setting up the water task force was a good idea. But the question of whether that task force will come up with a set of good ideas remains very much open.

WaterWired's Take
The task force is a good idea. However, it does seem rather underrepresented vis-a-vis environmental/conservation groups and weighted more heavily towards those who might be termed pro-development. I wonder whether such a group would recommend a strong demand-side approach instead of a supply-side one. 

And it strikes me that such a group might be representative of those who are responsible for the Atlanta area's unbridled growth and concomitant lack of enlightened water planning and management that have created the current water situation.  

But then again, business people are real good at planning and managing, right?

"Atlanta has based its growth on the idea that it could take whatever water it wanted whenever it wanted it, and that the downstream states would simply have to make do with less. Following the court's ruling today, this massive illegal water grab will be coming to an end." -- Alabama Gov. Bob Riley, referring to the recent court ruling (thanks to Watercrunch)

Workshop Summary: Water Issues in the ACF and ACT Basins, Southeast USA

Given the hydrometeorological events of the past few days it's hard to imagine a drought in the Southeast USA. But let's not lapse into euphoria because we think the drought is over. For one thing, the torrential rains and flooding have devastated humans and property alike. So even if the drought is over there is too much grief to celebrate.

Last spring there was a workshop on water issues in the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (ACF) Basin and the Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa (ACT) Basin. The workshop was organized by the Water Science and Technology Board of the National Research Council.

Here is a link to the prepublication copy of the workshop summary. Or, you can download a copy below:

Download 12693

My last post on the Atlanta area water woes was 21 August 2009.

Next time Gov. Sonny Perdue (R-GA) prays for rain I won't laugh.

"Political sidestepping will not be tolerated." -- Rep. Nathan Deal (R-GA), to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, concerning releases from Lake Lanier (2007)

The 1000 Blows: Aquadoc's Allegheny Adventure

The title of the post is not meant to channel François Truffaut's masterpiece The 400 Blows, although there is an interesting correlation between the post title and the literal meaning of the French title of Truffaut's film.  

But this isn't Film 101; it is my 1,000th WaterWired post and I've been (w)racking my brain trying to come up with something profound, such as: 1) solving the world water crisis; 2)  complimenting someone I've disparaged (guess who?); 3) admitting that I own stock in a bottled water company; 4) confessing that I serve as a consultant for the SNWA groundwater project.

Unfortunately, none of the above is possible so I decided to describe my impromptu trip from Dulles Airport to western Maryland, then south along/atop the Allegheny (Alleghany, Allegany) Mountains of eastern West Virginia, and then east to Virginia's Shenandoah Valley and finally to Washington, DC, for meetings of our NAWQA Committee on Monday and Tuesday.

My trip is 'impromptu' because I was originally going to spend it with a college classmate and his wife at their summer home southeast of Richmond, but an emergency took them out of town. So I decided to ad lib it. This post comes to you from Fisherville, VA, which is just off Interstate 64 in the Greater Waynesboro area.  I spent Friday night in Cumberland on the Potomac River in western Maryland.

Yesterday morning I headed west on scenic Interstate 68 and after a few miles crossed the Eastern Continental Divide (elevation 2610 feet) that separates the Atlantic Ocean drainage from the Gulf of Mexico drainage. Then a few miles farther I summited this mountain, whose title reflects an earlier era. 

I headed south from I-68 down into West Virginia's Monongahela - Tygart Valley river basin. Here's what the countryside looked like. This view is

to the west, just before crossing from MD into WV. You can see that the leaves are beginning to change color.

I continued south on Highway 219, touched briefly the Elk River basin and then picked up the Greenbrier River basin all the way to Interstate 64.

This is the smallest church in the USA.

I took a brief side trip to WV's Snowshoe Mountain Ski Resort. In between the condos lining the slopes I managed to get a picture looking to the west. I must have been about 4,000 feet above mean sea level when I took this shot. As you can see, some weather was coming in.

Also saw several installations of these as I drove south:

Plenty of wind in WV!

My last picture is that of a dry streambed in the Greenbrier River drainage. It's near the end of the water year, so things should be pretty dry. But the 'farmer' on whose property I took this told me that in the ten years he'd been here he has never seen any season so dry. This particular stream has been dry for a month.

I put 'farmer' in quotes because I've never met a farmer with a Porsche Boxster S in the driveway. It had VA plates, so I suspect he was the type of farmer whose 'crops' were tax breaks.

The trip was thoroughly enjoyable. It brought back 40-year-old memories, seeing lots of folded sandstones, fossiliferous limestones, slates and other familiar 'Appalachian-type' rocks on which I cut my teeth (and a few other things). I had never been along Highway 219 but had been along similar roads with the usual fascinating and at times, inscrutable, geology.

I'd forgotten how difficult it is to "do" Eastern geology, because the vegetation hides the rocks so you are reduced to looking for exposures in roadcuts, stream valleys, excavations, or quarries. I remember my former professors going nuts whenever they heard of a new roadcut or quarry. Off they'd race, with us in tow.

And of course, I had my usual collection of custom-burned doo-wop and car song CDs.

The only things missing were Mary Frances and a ragtop (Hertz had none at Dulles).

And I still know the words to Jan and Dean's Dead Man's Curve!

As for my 1,000th post, I trust I have a few more in me. I remember that when I started this blog in January 2007 my biggest worry was having enough to wrote about. Now my main worry is having enough time to do the subject matter justice, especially with another blog Campanastan, two Twitters, and a Facebook site.

Thanks for reading and commenting!

"Come on - turn it on, wind it up, blow it out G.T.O." -- Ronnie and the Daytonas, Little G.T.O. (1964)

Southeast USA Water: Shoulds, Shouldn'ts, and Some Wouldas, Couldas

Susan Percy published this piece in the September 2009 issue of Georgia Trend. It deals with the current state of water affairs vis-a-vis Georgia, Florida, and Alabama. And, of course, that 800-pound gorilla,  the Atlanta metro area.

Thanks to Dorian Roffe-Hammond for sending this my way.

I've posted a number of items about this issue - the last one on 21 August 2009 called for a watermaster (or special master) to resolve issues in the ACF Basin. That last post contains links to my other posts.

Here's Percy's article:

OK, so a federal judge has said that the Army Corps of Engineers shouldn’t have allowed Atlanta to draw water from Lake Lanier for all these years, and that the metro region should have reined in its rampant growth and even that Atlanta’s leaders should have thrown a little money at the Buford Dam project when they had the chance, back in 1948.

That’s a lot of shoulds and shouldn’ts.

I have a few of my own to add: The governors of Georgia, Florida and Alabama should have been more responsible and aggressive in seeking a resolution to the water dispute – they had nearly 20 years to work on it. They shouldn’t have procrastinated and postured, simply because that was easier and less politically risky in the short term. They shouldn’t have left the matter to be resolved in federal court. They should have exhibited, individually and collectively, some leadership.

Politicians in Georgia and adjoining states who need a scapegoat should check their facts before they claim that any and all problems, water-wise or otherwise, are Atlanta’s fault. They should take the time to figure how much of their economic well-being is tied to Atlanta’s.

And the Army Corps of Engineers, hardly the brightest bulb on the circuit even in good times, should have been a lot smarter about clarifying its authority, its information and its procedures and should have picked up the pace in terms of updating its operating manual.

Three years ago I sat in on a hearing in Gainesville during which Georgia’s Senators Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson and Congressman Nathan Deal took the Corps of Engineers to task over several matters, including its egregiously-outdated operating manual and the 22-billion gallon “mistake” the Corps made that dropped the water level in Lake Lanier by almost two feet during the drought. The Corps attributed the error to a faulty gauge.

Chambliss told the Corps’ South Atlantic Division commander, “If that kind of mistake was made on the battlefield, it would have cost American lives.”

This is not a governmental body with an impeccable track record, as residents of New Orleans might attest to.

But here’s the real point: Some 3.5 million American citizens who happen to live in the Metro Atlanta region are dependent on water released from Lake Lanier. Some were born here. Some moved here for work, for school, for family reasons, or simply because they took a liking to the place. I’m guessing very few of them actively entered into a conspiracy to eliminate mollusks in Florida.

(Understand, I don’t take environmental concerns lightly; any resolution of the water wars, whether it comes from the states or Congress, has to address the impact on the whole region’s environment, as well as the needs of the people who live here.)

Those 3 million-plus Metro Atlantans have a right to be here. Appropriately, they didn’t have to apply for permits or ask permission to relocate. They are not squatters. Very few of them entered the state and took up residence illegally. Some of them probably came from Alabama and Florida. But they are Georgians now, and they deserve their fair share of available water.

So let’s get on with finding a solution, even though that task has been made more difficult by the judge’s ruling and the three-year timeline he imposed.

Gov. Sonny Perdue has indicated Georgia will consider several options, including appealing the judge’s decision, working closely with the state’s Congressional leaders and reaching out to other parts of the country that find themselves in a similarly vulnerable position relating to their water supplies.

But perhaps the most encouraging response came in the form of the special task force the governor has appointed. He might have come late to the water-problem party, but he has brought some 130 business and government leaders, headed by Georgia Power CEO Mike Garrett, to help find a solution.

The business community’s involvement brings to the table a group of people who understand the value of planning, evaluating, negotiating, strategizing and acting – not just putting off decisions so someone else gets to deal with it.

They should make a real difference.

I generally liked her viewpoint. My thoughts on Ms. Percy's column:

• She's not a big fan of the Corps of Engineers (Duhhh...). 
• Does Gov. Sonny Perdue's task force contain only business and government leaders? Didn't they help create this mess? How about a variety of stakeholders? Environmentalists. Academics. Laypersons. Small business owners. Outsiders.
• Is the governor reaching out to his Florida and Alabama counterparts? How about a tri-state task force? Maybe it'll work this time. All three states must develop a solution.
• She seems to hold Atlanta almost totally faultless (see fourth paragraph). Perhaps if the Atlanta metro area's leaders had faced the reality that the local water resources could not support such poorly-planned growth today's situation would not be so grave.
• She's right about the importance of metro Atlanta to the region's economy. and there has been some scapegoating.
• Ain't hindsight wonderful! But let's learn from the past.

Still think a watermaster or special master would be a good thing.

"We don't give a damn how you done it up North" -- popular bumper sticker in the southern USA

The ACF Basin and Metro Atlanta Need a Watermaster

Judge Paul Magnuson's recent decision involving the metro Atlanta water situation could have done more to effect a solution.

What?

Reflecting upon my earlier (16 October 2007; 23 October 2007; 5 November 2007; 16 November 2007; 8 February 2008; 5 August 2008) and last two (19 August 2009 and 20 August 2009) posts on the metropolitan Atlanta water situation  has led me to conclude that the recent decision of Judge Paul Magnuson (see Watercrunch's post) didn't go far enough - he should have appointed a watermaster to oversee the situation.

That is a drastic step, but a watermaster is needed to "persuade' Alabama, Florida, and Georgia to resolve their differences and help metro Atlanta get on a water diet so that three years from now it won't become the world's largest purchaser of bottled water.

So let me explain myself, but first, some background.

About seven years ago I listened to my then-University of New Mexico colleague, law professor Chuck DuMars, talk about the chances that Alabama, Georgia, and Florida would amicably reach a compact agreement for the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint Basin (ACFB).

The accompanying map, from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, also shows the adjoining Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa Basin (ACTB).

Chuck, a brilliant water lawyer, was in the employ of Georgia at the time. He described the efforts to develop a compact, and was optimistic that the three states would reach an accord without more litigation. He noted that the technical people from each state were working together to develop a model (or models) that all could agree upon, thereby bypassing the dreaded 'dueling experts' syndrome ("Mine is bigger than yours."). This approach, he said, was quite different from previous cases in which he had been involved and would facilitate a compact agreement.

I left the presentation optimistic and enthusiastic, believing that the Southeast could get it right, unlike the West.

Boy, did I get it wrong!

Somewhere between then and now the wheels fell off, and the three states are still squabbling over water allocation and use in the ACFB. It's been almost 20 years of disagreements, which is actually short compared to some Western water water law fights. 

I've spoken to some colleagues about why the process failed; I won't go into those reasons here.

I now question whether the three states can reach an agreement in three years, even though there is a gun being held to their (or at least Georgia's) head. Some have opined that the three governors, Sonny Perdue (R-GA), Charlie Crist (R-FL), and Bob Riley (R-AL), each a Republican with about 18 months left in office, can get this on track and leave a legacy of sorts. I don't know all the political dynamics involved, but I am skeptical that three years can accomplish what needs to be done.

That is where a court-appointed watermaster could come in, reminding all involved of the court's looming presence and cajoling or knocking heads when necessary. The ideal watermaster would be someone knowledgeable about water but would not a stakeholder - preferably someone from out of the region who'd be viewed as an 'honest broker' by all three states.

The watermaster would not only help the three states reach an agreement, but would also be in charge of managing the basin's water. That's an unusual dual role - my limited experience suggests that a watermaster is appointed to enforce an agreement, not to help broker one.

This step might be viewed as some as an unwarranted Federal intrusion, but it needs to be implemented; the states have shown that they can't do it alone. The stakes are high. And these are indeed unusual times.

Suggestions? I've got one - Pat Mulroy. Why not? You want someone who can get the job done? A person who won't be intimidated by politicians? Someone without a vested interest in the outcome, right? Her only drawbacks might be too big for some - a go-go-growth philosophy and proclivity for increasing supply instead of managing demand. But if anyone can do it, she can.  

As I said earlier, these are unusual times, and an unusual approach is requisite.

Not to mention unusual people.

"I think the governors all felt they were likely to be victorious. I kept telling them that if you don't settle it, somebody's going to win and somebody's going to lose." - US Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL)

"A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin." -- H.L. Mencken

Takin' Atlanta to the Woodshed

Tom Barton wrote this editorial in yesterday's Savannah Morning News. He spares no rod in his assessment of the metro Atlanta water situation.

You can read my post about Gov. Perdue's meeting with members of Georgia's Congressional delegation, to which Barton refers.

Thanks to Dorian Roffe-Hammond for sending me this item.

If you think I have taken a break from Las Vegas and Pat Mulroy, read on.

Talk about wind power.

If some Georgia officials could inhale as hard as they blow when it comes to metro Atlanta's water woes, the Atlantic Ocean would be lapping at Decatur.

Gov. Sonny Perdue and other Georgia officials expended a considerable amount of energy this week, suggesting there might be a national solution to Atlanta's water shortage problem - a nationwide policy that allows municipalities to stick their straws into all federally managed reservoirs and drink to their heart's content.

"There are some things Congress must address and some things that the state must address," the governor told reporters Monday at the Governor's Mansion after meeting with Georgia's two U.S. senators and eight of the state's 13 congressmen.

To which any reasonable lawmaker in Washington should respond, "You first."

It's true that Congress should take a closer look at how water is used across the country. It's a matter of sound public policy. Large river basins drain across state lines. When water gets tight - for example, during a drought of historic proportions - states that are upriver (in this case, Georgia) enjoy a home field advantage over those downstream (Alabama and Florida).

The feds should set clear ground rules. Then federal judges won't have to play referee when Mother Nature shuts off the faucet.

But spare the statewide pity party for metro Atlanta.

While it's torture to watch the governor's performance on this issue, Atlanta has been waterboarding itself for decades. And many have been drinking up every minute of it.

Experts have warned that Atlanta, which has no ground water and a relative trickle of surface water from the Chattahootchee River, couldn't sustain the explosive growth that saw a doubling of its population in the last 20 years.

Yet these sane voices were drowned out by developers, compliant bureaucrats and civic boosters who would shame P.T. Barnum.

Consequently, a progressive city that once was rightly proud of being "too busy to hate" has morphed into a near-ungovernable megapolis of more than 5 million people, which extends across a whopping 28 counties and is choked by murderous traffic ringing a crime-plagued core.

Yes, fortunes have been made. Thousands upon thousands of jobs have been created, and the quality of life in some areas is quite good.

But the day of reckoning has arrived, thanks to a federal judge who ruled last month that Georgia was illegally withdrawing growth sustaining water from North Georgia's Lake Lanier reservoir.

The new slogan for the Atlanta region should be, "Help, I've fallen and I can't get up."

Except it's not the duty of Washington to lift this glutton from the floor. Instead, that's up to Georgia.

The state's leaders must lead, not enable. They must adopt policies that steer people to where the water exists, not the other way around. They must to do a better job of spreading limited public resources around the state and stop feeding a monster that will only grow and acquire a larger appetite.

It won't be easy. It means saying "no" to powerful interests and "yes" to regions with less clout.

That's why Perdue shouldn't be holding strategy sessions at the mansion to figure out how to motivate Congress. He should schedule an intervention. Get metro Atlanta to kick an unhealthy growth habit that threatens an entire state.

As I read this, I wondered if any newspaper in Nevada outside (or inside, for that matter) the Las Vegas metropolitan area had opined in this manner. Editorial writers have railed against SNWA's 'water grab' but I wonder if any have urged such a brake on growth. My sense is that they have not, simply because I suspect that Las Vegas means more to the Nevada economy than Atlanta does to the Georgia economy. Without Las Vegas and the revenues it generates, Nevadans might have to start paying state income taxes.

It's worth noting that the Las Vegas metro area (1.9M) is about 73% of Nevada's population (2.6M), whereas metro Atlanta (5.6M) is about 58% of Georgia's (9.7M) population.

Atlanta has assumed the mantle of the '800 pound gorilla' (albeit a sick gorilla) of Southeastern water, just as Las Vegas has that well-deserved reputation in the Southwest. The big difference is that metro Las Vegas has options and the money to pursue them, whereas metro Atlanta is more a feckless, bumbling giant, unable to fend for itself any longer. As Barton says, its slogan is "Help, I've fallen and I can't get up."

They could use Pat Mulroy. Really.

"I've always liked Atlanta. And not just for the strip clubs, but the shopping and the food." -- Jon Stewart

Sonny and the Boys Talkin' Water Down 'Lanta Way

Time to take a break from Western water, Las Vegas, et al., and focus on the "Las Vegas of the Southeast", my one-time home of Atlanta, GA.

This is taken from the 17 August 2009 Atlanta Business Chronicle story by Dave Williams. Dorian Roffe-Hammond, whom I had the pleasure of meeting at the National Water Policy Event on 28 July 2009, sent it to me.

Here is the original story. Williams reports on a meeting Gov. Sonny Perdue (R-GA) held at the Governor's Mansion.

Betcha Sonny served up some of that fine Georgia BBQ. Seems I remember this little place near Stone Mountain... 

“There are some things Congress must address and some things that the state must address,” Perdue told reporters at the Governor’s Mansion after sitting down with both of Georgia’s U.S. senators and eight of the state’s 13 congressmen.

U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson ruled last month that water systems serving about 3.5 million metro Atlantans have been withdrawing from Lake Lanier illegally because water supply was not among the uses Congress authorized for the reservoir when it was built.

The judge gave Georgia, Alabama and Florida – which have been waging a legal battle over Lanier’s water for nearly two decades – three years to reach an agreement, which would be subject to congressional approval.

Failing that, the court would order water withdrawals from Lanier dialed back to levels not seen since the mid-1970s, choking off further growth in the region.

Note: at the National Water Policy Event, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin said that mid-1970s water levels corresonded to a metropolitan area population of 1.7M, as opposed to today's 5.6M.

On Monday, Perdue said the ruling did not address how water flowing through the Chattahoochee River basin should be allocated among the three states.

“That’s only something that can be determined from the states’ perspective,” he said.

Toward that end, Perdue announced that Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has offered 20 potential dates for the resumption of negotiations with Perdue and Florida Gov. Charlie Crist. Perdue had given Riley’s office a list of 40 possible meeting dates.

While the governors organize those sessions, Perdue said it’s up to Georgia’s congressional delegation to develop legislation dealing directly with the authorization issue raised in Magnuson’s decision. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said the delegation has yet to decide whether to push a broad bill that would affect federally managed reservoirs across the country or a narrower measure aimed only at Lake Lanier.

“If multiple states are affected, you might take a national scope,” added Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga.

Perdue also announced that he will set up a meeting soon with representatives of environmental groups concerned with the potential ramifications of the ruling. Environmental advocates complained last month that none were invited to a meeting the governor held with 130 political and business leaders.

“The ruling … implies less environmentally friendly efforts than we’ve had and more expensive efforts than we’ve had,” Perdue said. “We’re reaching out to stakeholders in every direction.”

Doesn't sound a whole lot different from Las Vegas' plight. Too many people, too little water, too little time. Worse yet - no Pat Mulroy to lead them to the Promised Land.

Here is a related story by Dave Williams in which business owners are urged to step up on the water issue. Today's quote is from the article, and I think Sen. Isakson has it right.

“The judge may have done us a favor by giving us a deadline.” -- Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA), referring to Judge Magnuson's decision

Sewage-Contaminated Streams Produce Bigger, Faster Mosquitoes in...Atlanta?

When I saw this headline from a recent story, "Sewage-contaminated streams breed bigger and faster mosquitoes', I thought, "Must be from a developing country - maybe in South Asia or sub-Saharan Africa." After all, the story, sent to me by colleague Robert Adamski, was published in Sindh Today, a Pakistani online publication.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the work was done in metropolitan Atlanta by an Emory University researcher.

It was also the kind of story that evoked a "Tell me something I don't know" response, but I have to admit I had never seen any work like this.

From the story:

According to a report in Discovery News, over a 16-week study period last summer, Luis Fernando Chaves, an ecologist at Emory University in Atlanta and colleagues sampled water quality and mosquito larvae from two streams – one that receives contaminated overflows and one that doesn’t – in the Atlanta area.

In every sample they collected from the contaminated stream, they found mosquito larvae. In a clean stream, on the other hand, larvae showed up less than 10 percent of the time.

In a follow-up experiment, the researchers grew mosquitoes in containers that held either normal tap water or polluted water.

The polluted tanks were full of ammonia phosphates, which are abundant in sewage and are known to feed the bacteria and microorganisms that mosquitoes eat.

So the mosquitoes love sewage-contaminated streams because they have more food and fewer predators - fish are less likely to live in such polluted streams.

An earlier study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that bigger floods led to more mosquitoes – particularly Southern house mosquitoes, which are a known carrier of West Nile virus.

The latest research helps explain why.

“We’ve known for a while that it’s likely that these combined sewage overflows were creating not only a mosquito problem but a West Nile problem,” said Rosmarie Kelly, a public health entomologist at the Georgia Department of Community Health in Atlanta.

So whether you live in Atlanta, Bangkok, or Nairobi, watch out for those sewage-laden streams.

“What it means for people is that we need to push to have cleaner streams in cities.” -- Luis Fernando Chaves, lead author 

Meet Linda Stewart, WaterBillWoman. Now Check Your Water Bill!

Have you ever received a water bill you knew could not be correct?

You are not alone!

Did you call the water department about the bill?

How were you treated?

Did you have a hearing?

Was your water bill reduced after the hearing?

So begins Linda Stewart's post on the blog portion of her Water Bills Group Site.

Here's more about Linda:

My name is Linda Stewart. I have concerns about the Baltimore City Water Billing System and the amount of errors that are occurring within the billing system. Errors are in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and are being paid for with taxpayers' dollars.  I have uploaded water bill information that I have been collecting for two years, water bills on many locations throughout Baltimore City and Baltimore County.   The spreadsheets will enlighten you on the amount of errors occurring in the Water Billing System. Locations that are highlighted in pink are the most concerning. One example is Montelbello Water Treatment Facility. Their water bill has fluctuated from $12,752.41 up to $529,074.81 and this quarter is back down to $16,212.53.  Baltimore would not be the first city that has a water billing problem. The New York Times has reported about New York City's broken water billing system.  

If you are having or have had problems with your water company, you ought to check this site out. Linda lives in Baltimore, and given some of the stories on her site, I'd check my bill closely if I lived there and was served by the local utility. In fact, I'd check my bill no matter where I lived.

Linda is also a active Tweeter (Twitter-er), at WaterBillWoman. That is how I first learned of her and her site, when she followed me on WaterWired's Twitter. She Tweets about some egregious examples from other places, too.

Give her a look.

I did, and I'm more appreciative of my service from the City of Corvallis.

"Something is wrong  - everybody's house ain't leaking." -- Baltimore City Councilman Bernard Young    

Eastern Wisdom for Western Water Problems

"Aha," you're saying, "perhaps this post describes some ancient knowledge, arising from India, China, or New Jersey, that will enlighten those of us in the West, and we will solve all our water problems once and for all!"

Nahhhh!

But how about some 'eastern wisdom' from a U.S. District Court judge?

Robert over at Watercrunch had a great post about the recent ruling by Federal District Court Judge Paul A. Magnuson concerning  Georgia, Florida,  Alabama, the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (ACF) Basin, the USACE,  and Lake Lanier:

A federal judge ruled the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been illegally reallocating water from Lake Lanier to meet metro Atlanta’s needs. Georgia basically has three years to seek congressional approval or water withdrawals from the lake are cut and only Gainesville and Buford will be allowed to withdraw water.

And this tidbit from the judge's ruling was sure enlightening:

It is beyond comprehension that the current operating manual for the Buford Dam is more than 50 years old.

Robert noted the following paragraph from Judge Magnuson's ruling, which Peter Gleick later highlighted:

...Too often, state, local, and even national government actors do not consider the long-term consequences of their decisions.

Local governments allow unchecked growth because it increases tax revenue, but these same governments do not sufficiently plan for the resources such unchecked growth will require. Nor do individual citizens consider frequently enough their consumption of our scarce resources, absent a crisis situation such as that experienced in the ACF basin in the last few years.

The problems faced in the ACF basin will continue to be repeated throughout this country, as the population grows and more undeveloped land is developed. Only by cooperating, planning, and conserving can we avoid the situations that gave rise to this litigation. [emboldening mine]

Regarding the above passage, Gleick said, "The lawyers will ignore it." That may be true, but let's not forget that a bunch of other people will ignore it as well. Let's not lay our water mess solely at the feet of the legal profession.

Maybe I should be promoting Judge Paul A. Magnuson for the USA's Water Czar.

I'm anxious to see if Georgia can get Congressional approval and get Hot 'Lanta out of hot water (or rather, no water).

Methinks it's time for Gov. Sonny Perdue to start prayin' again.

"Oh father, we acknowledge our wastefulness. But we're doing better. And I thought it was time to acknowledge that to the creator, the provider of water and land, and to tell him that we will do better." -- Gov. George Ervin 'Sonny' Perdue III (R-GA)

Tennessee Revises Water Laws

Since Atlanta and Georgia are is doing their best 'Las Vegas imitation' vis-a-vis Southeast water, neighboring states might do well to ensure that their own 'water houses' are in order. Remember Georgia's effort to move its border so it could access Tennessee River water?

Looks like Tennessee has taken that advice to heart. Gov. Phil Bredesen (D) has signed into law a bill that revises Tennessee's water laws. It takes effect immediately.

But not everyone thinks it is a great idea. From U.S. Water News Online:

Sponsors say the new law is necessary to clarify what are “waters of the state.”

Opponents, however, say some provisions of the measure weaken the state's oversight by shifting the decision making from the public to the private sector.

For instance, the law allows a company or individual to hire a professional to determine how a watercourse should be classified and allow that person's finding to be conclusive.

Read it for yourself:

Download SB0632

Hey, I'm classified as a 'qualified hydrologic professional' by the law. Awesome.

"The solution to our water problems is more rain." -- attributed to Mark Twain

More On Mississippi vs. Memphis: First Transboundary Aquifer Case Before U.S. Supreme Court?

I posted on this case a few days ago, but Gabriel Eckstein of the International Water Law Project  at Texas Tech University has more on this case from a legal perspective.

You can also follow the case on the SCOTUS blog, as suggested by dlb in his comment on my original post.

Back to Gabriel - check out his post.

I like his last paragraph:

Ground water resources, for too many years, have been treated as the neglected stepchild of water law. This is especially true in a transboundary context but also in the domestic laws of many nations, including the US. The adage “out of sight, out of mind” comes to mind. The US Supreme Court has a great opportunity here to develop US jurisprudence and provide guidance for this nascent legal area. It also has a wonderful occasion to influence the evolution of international law in this area.

Neglected stepchild? Amen!

"Before enlightenment, Chop wood
Carry water.
After enlightenment, Chop wood
Carry water. " --Zen Saying

Memphis Sand Aquifer Pumping: U.S. Supreme Court Could Decide Mississippi vs. Memphis

Non-sequitur alert: since I am now in Panama, why not update a story about which I posted in early 2008? 

On 2 February 2008 and 5 February 2008 I posted about the court case involving the State of Mississippi, the City of Memphis and Memphis Light, Gas, and Water (MLGW). Mississippi accused the MLGW of stealing water from beneath Mississippi by pumping from the Memphis Sand aquifer, which underlies both states and Arkansas.

From my 2 February 2008 post (where there is more information, including graphics):

In a nutshell, the case boils down to Mississippi claiming that Memphis Light, Gas and Water (MLGW), the municipally-owned utility for the Memphis area (Shelby County), is deriving about 30% of the water it pumps from the Memphis Sand aquifer (aka the Sparta aquifer) from beneath Mississippi. This amounts to about 60 mgd (million gallons per day) coming from beneath the Mississipians' land. Total MLGW pumpage from the aquifer is about 160-200 mgd. The Memphis Sand's water is reputedly some of the best ground water in the USA, and the aquifer supplies drinking water to over 1.1 million residents of Shelby County.

This is no nickel-and-dime lawsuit; the damages sought by Mississippi amount to $1 billion, and if the Memphis utility loses, it would be forced to reduce its pumping and obtain some of its water from the Mississippi River, which would entail the construction of an expensive water treatment plant.

Most of the "harm" to Mississippi occurs in DeSoto County, a rapidly-growing suburb of Memphis. Well water levels there have been dropping -- that's what happens when you pump water from an aquifer, folks, until you increase recharge or decrease discharge to offset the pumping rate.  Mississippi contends that some of the declines are due to Memphis' pumping and constitute "harm". Memphis claims that its use is "reasonable" and not reducing the water availability in Mississippi.

The Supreme Court may decide this case. Here is Tom Charlier's 5 June 2009  Memphis Commerical-Appeal article and the first few paragraphs:

It'll be up to the U.S. Supreme Court to settle the billion-dollar question of whether Memphis has been stealing Mississippi's water.

In a decision hailed by the city, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans on Friday affirmed a lower court's dismissal of Mississippi's 2005 lawsuit against Memphis and its municipal utility over the use of water from a aquifer beneath several states.

The case must be refiled with the Supreme Court, which has exclusive jurisdiction in disputes between states, the court said. Tennessee is an "indispensable party" to the suit, the judges said, even though it wasn't named as a defendant.

Here is a copy of the court's decision:

Download 08-60152-CV0

Here is more from Charlier's article:

Affirming a February 2008 decision by U.S. Dist. Judge Glen H. Davidson, the appellate court said that because the aquifer is an interstate resource, the water must be formally divvied up before one state can sue another for "invading its share."

Although it lies hundreds of feet underground, the aquifer, for legal purposes, is "indistinguishable from a lake bordered by multiple states or from a river bordering several states depending on it for water," the court said.

"The aquifer must be allocated like other interstate water resources in which different states have competing sovereign interests."

Mississippi has indicated that it will pursue the case in the USA's highest court. The appellate court's ruling did not judge the merits of the case, only that Tennessee is an 'indispensable party" to the case.

I am intrigued with this case because it involves transboundary groundwater and it's relatively novel to see Eastern USA political jurisdictions involved in a good old-fashioned Western USA-style fight over water quantity (much like the Georgia-Alabama-Florida kerfuffle over the ACF Basin).

Stay tuned.

Note that the U.S. Supreme Court has not yet decided to take this case (thanks to Noah Hall at the Great Lakes Law blog).

As I said earlier, it ain't over till it's over, or:

"The opera isn't over till the fat lady sings." -- Unknown

GE Sucks PCBs From the Hudson River

  Who would have imagined that GE, the 'We bring good things to life" folks, would begin to clean up the Hudson River of the PCBs for which it is responsible? I'm sure many thought they would never see this day.

Andrew Revkin writes about the first dredge scoop a few days ago in the New York Times. The first few paragraphs of his story:

Twenty-five years after the federal government declared a long stretch of the Hudson River to be a contaminated Superfund site, the cleanup of its chief remaining source of pollution began here Friday with a single scoop of mud extracted by a computer-guided dredge.

Twelve dredges are to work round the clock, six days a week, into October, removing sediment laced with the chemicals known as PCBs. Mile-long freight trains running every several days will carry the dried mud to a hazardous-waste landfill in Texas.

The Superfund site is 197 miles long.

Here is an editorial from the Times.

It is interesting - the GE WWW site says, "We believe health is everything. GE is making a new commitment to health." I'm not sure they are referring to the PCB cleanup, but to the health-care industry and GE's push into that arena.

Too bad GE didn't think of this commitment long ago.  

“Today, the healing of the Hudson begins.” -- George Pavlou, Acting EPA Regional Administrator (quoted in the article)

Steve Gough's 'Riparian Rap' Blog

The other day I posted about Steve Gough and his moveable bed models. I also wanted to mention Steve's blog, Riparian Rap. 

He even had a nice write-up on my visit to LRRD. I especially enjoyed this:

I've followed his blog WaterWired for a while. It's very fresh, and today's post on his arrival in the Midwest ended with this quote from Cheap Trick's Robin Zander: "We're from Rockford, Illinois, but we've always thought international." I'd enjoyed the blog, and by its hip tone assumed a young author, and so was a little surprised to see a man who is, let's say, well past his thirties, walk into our lab this afternoon!

Awesome, Steve - thanks. Actually, I'm double the number you mention. Believe me, I had not seen this until after I wrote about the models!

And here's Robin Zander - he's put on a few years, too.

Sorry I couldn't think of a band from southern Illinois...

"Cheap Trick are a total fun band...you know all the songs, you're going to sing along." -- Phil Collen

Little River Research & Design's Moveable Bed River Process Simulators

When I visited Southern Illinois University in Carbondale a few weeks ago I had an opportunity to visit Little River Research & Design, owner Steve Gough, and his assistant, geoscientist Cara Bergschneider. Steve's firm provides consulting services in river ecosystem restoration, river geomorphology, biotechnical engineering, and urban stream management.

So I visited a consulting firm? Does that merit a blog post? 

In this case, yes.

And no, I'm not on the LRRD payroll.

What Steve and Cara wanted to show me were LRRD's remarkable moveable bed river process simulators, specifically the Em2 model, which is about 0.9 m (3 feet) by 2.1 m (7 feet). There is also a larger model, the Em4, which is 3.7 m x 1.5 m (12 feet x 5 feet) with 5 square meters (about 53 square feet) of surface area. 

These models were designed by Steve, built onsite by LRRD, and are for sale. Here are short movies on the Em2 and Em4.

These pictures are of Cara, Mae Davenport of SIU, and me with the Em2.

In the 'old days' I remember fiddling around with stream tables - linear plastic tubs in which you'd put some sand, run some water down the middle, and see what happened. They were useful but messy and primitive compared to the LRRD moveable bed models.

Perhaps the most innovative aspect of these models is the use custom-made, color-coded thermoplastic particles as 'sediment' in lieu of actual earth materials. LRRD currently uses four different grain sizes. They are about half the density of quartz sand and result in better hydraulic scaling.

You can see the different colors in the pictures. They really make it easy to visualize the processes and the resultant geomorphic/sedimentologic changes. 

Steve and Cara have used the Em2 and Em4 extensively to illlustrate the effects of gravel pits, among other processes. The effects are dramatic and can be seen virtually immediately.

These models are being used by educational institutions, government agencies, and others. You can imagine how great they'd be for educational purposes. 

You can read and see more, including videos, at the LRRD site. Again, here are links to short movies on the Em2 and Em4.

Think I'll return as a fluvial geomorphologist.

Steve also has a blog, Riparian Rap.

"Like swift water, an active mind never stagnates." -- Unknown

WaterWired's Southern Illinois University Presentations

Had a great visit to Southern Illinois University-Carbondale on 16 April 2009. Amazing, friendly, engaged people who treated me like royalty.

Colleagues Mae Davenport and Karl Williard, of SIUC's Department of Forestry, were wonderful hosts. Thanks!

And no attacks by the killer deer in Thompson Woods!

Here are my presentations.

Prof. Karl Williard's Advanced Watershed Hydrology class seminar, Hydrophilanthropy 101: Small-Scale Water Supply Projects in Central America:

Download Campana Adv_Hyd_Class_SIUC_16April2009

My Center for Ecology seminar, World Fresh Water Resources and the 4C's: Climate, Conflict, Cooperation, and Compassion:

Download Campana_SIUC_16April2009

Enjoy!

"What we are trying to do may just be a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop." -- Mother Teresa 

WaterWired Visits The Heartland

WaterWired is off again on another trip. First stop: Carbondale on the Illinois prairie and home to Southern Illinois University-Carbondale (SIUC).

I didn't realize that this region has 21 wineries! And BBQ is big!

Colleagues Mae Davenport and Karl Williard, of SIUC's Department of Forestry invited me to speak and visit with them and their colleagues. I am speaking in the Center for Ecology's Seminar Series, Water in a Changing World. I will also speak in Karl"s Advanced Watershed Hydrology class.

It's nice to visit a new place and university. I am unfamiliar with this part of the world. I finally got out of the Lambert-St. Louis International Airport after changing planes there a few times. I was almost immediately greeted by a familiar piece of nostalgia - a White Castle fast food hamburger restaurant, home of the (in)famous 'Slider' (or 'Slyder') burger. Yeah, they slide right down. 

I leave here tomorrow, and will head to Tucson for the Ground Water Summit and the Third Ephemeral Reunion of the U of AZ Hydrology and Water Resources graduates. It'll be fun to see a bunch of friends and colleagues.

Time to break out the Ben-Gay!

"We're from Rockford, Illinois, but we've always thought international." -- Robin Zander (Cheap Trick)

Tough Sledding for Poland Spring in Maine

Todd Jarvis, Mr. Bottled Water himself, sent me this item.

The Portland Press Herald's Noel K. Gallagher reports that challenges are piling up for bottled water purveyor Poland Spring, a subsidiary of Nestlé Waters North America. Check this out from the story: 

After 146 years of doing business in Maine, Poland Spring is fighting battles on three fronts these days -- over test wells in Shapleigh, a proposed tax that would cost the company $7 million a year, and a state Supreme Court case over a pumping station in Fryeburg.

"Where have we done harm or where have we caused issues that have caused people to take drastic steps like this?" asked Mark Dubois, natural resource director for Poland Spring, a subsidiary of Nestle Waters North America.

Poland Spring is the third-leading brand of bottled water in the country, behind Aquafina (Pepsi) and Dasani (Coke), and employs about 800 Maine residents.

Gallagher further reports that 14 bills concerning ground water have been introduced in the Maine legislature, including measures to declare Maine's ground water a public trust (like its surface water), and repeal the "absolute dominion" law, whereby a landowner can pump as much ground water as s/he desires.

There are also a number of municipal regulations on the table.

Could be a long winter for the folks at Poland Spring.

"Bottled water has certainly animated the conversation in the last several years." -- Andrew Fisk, director of Land and Water Quality, Maine Department of Environmental Prtotection 

Mulroy to Obama: Tap Mississippi Floodwaters, Create Jobs, Water the West

Ray Walker sent me this link to Henry Brean's article in the 12 January 2009 Las Vegas Review-Journal. 

The first part of the story will whet your appetite:

If the federal government wants a surefire way to create jobs and stimulate the economy, Pat Mulroy has a suggestion to make: Why not study and build the largest water diversion project in American history?

The general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority said now may be the time to take a serious look at a decades-old idea of capturing floodwater from the Mississippi River and using it to recharge the massive groundwater aquifer beneath the Central Plains.

In terms of jobs and investment, the project would dwarf the Hoover and Glen Canyon Dams, and some believe it could secure the future water supply for a vast swath of the Midwest and West, including Nevada and six other states that share the Colorado River.

Mulroy plans to float her suggestion in Washington, DC, today, during a panel discussion at the Brookings Institution on shoring up the nation's infrastructure.

This will be the 10th in a series of events organized by Brookings to make policy recommendations and advice to President-elect Barack Obama and his transition team.

Today's forum will result in a "memo to the president" on why and how to invest in infrastructure as part of an economic stimulus package and beyond.

"It's the best opportunity to come along," Mulroy said. "We've ignored our infrastructure for decades."

She is the only panelist from the West, and the only representative from a water agency.

I thought I said she should be appointed Commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. Seems like she's already started the job!

Perhaps she read Dead Pool or my posts on that book.

Is Pat thinking about the unthinkable? Check this out from Brean's story:

Short of dismantling the sprawling cities and massive economies that now dot the arid West, Mulroy said the only way to save the Colorado is to find more water to fill it.

Many predict climate change will only make things worse.

"We can't conserve our way out of a massive Colorado River drought. We can't desalt our way out of a massive Colorado River drought," Mulroy said. "If the West is growing drier and the Midwest is growing wetter, I see that as an opportunity."

You can download the MP3 of the event here.

 

Marc Reisner mentioned a project like this in Cadillac Desert  (see the chapter "Things Fall Apart"): pump Mississippi River water up to the High Plains to recharge the Ogallala (High Plains) aquifer and supply some Texas cities along the way. I recall hearing of this as a graduate student at the University of Arizona in the early 1970s. Since the Mississippi is a 'Corps of Engineers' river, they would have to be involved.

 

When this idea was discussed in the 1960s and 1970s, nuclear power was proposed as the power source to pump the water uphill - over 3000 feet, and around 4000 feet if you took the water out below New Orleans.  But - wait a minute! Now we can make the project 'green' by using T. Boone Pickens' wind energy! He's looking for a buyer.

 

What goes around, comes around. Can NAWAPA and NARA be far behind?

 

"The more things change, the more they remain the same."  ("Plus ça change, plus c' est la même chose.") -- Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr

Improving Mississippi River Water Quality is Focus of New Report

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Department of Agriculture should jointly establish a Nutrient Control Implementation Initiative (NCII) to learn more about the effectiveness of actions meant to improve water quality throughout the Mississippi River basin and into the northern Gulf of Mexico, says a new report from the National Research Council.

The report also advises how to move forward on the larger process of allocating nutrient loading caps -- which entails delegating responsibilities for reducing nutrient pollutants such as nitrogen and phosphorus -- across the basin. In addition, the two agencies should jointly establish a Mississippi River Basin Water Quality Center to administer the NCII and to conduct related water-quality monitoring and research. You can read this report free online or order a copy.

Here is the press release:

WASHINGTON --The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Department of Agriculture should jointly establish a Nutrient Control Implementation Initiative (NCII) to learn more about the effectiveness of actions meant to improve water quality throughout the Mississippi River basinand into the northern Gulf of Mexico, says a new report from the National Research Council.  The report also advises how to move forward on the larger process of allocating nutrient loading caps -- which entails delegating responsibilities for reducing nutrient pollutants such as nitrogen and phosphorus -- across the basin.  In addition, the two agencies should jointly establish a Mississippi River Basin Water Quality Centerto administer the NCII and to conduct related water-quality monitoring and research.

"A Nutrient Control Implementation Initiative would represent an important step toward EPA developing water-quality criteria and states setting water-quality standards," said David Moreau, chair of the committee that wrote the report and professor in the Departments of City and Regional Planning and Environmental Sciences and Engineering at the University of North California-Chapel Hill. "However, efforts to reduce nutrients in the northern Gulf of Mexico will face significant management, economic, and public policy challenges, as well as a time lag --- a decade at minimum -- between reducing pollutants across the river basin and identifying water-quality improvements downstream in the Gulf."

The Gulf of Mexico's oxygen-depleted "dead zone" derives from excess nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus from fertilizers and other sources, flowing into the gulf from the Mississippi and Atchafalaya Rivers.  Numerous federal and state regulatory agencies and water-quality standards govern conditions across the 31-state river basin.  To better meet nutrient and sediment reduction objectives in the Clean Water Act -- and in turn help improve water quality in the Mississippi River basin and into the northern Gulf of Mexico -- EPA asked the Research Council for advice on how to initiate nutrient pollutant control programs, identify alternatives for allocating reductions of nutrient discharges into bodies of water, and document the effectiveness of these strategies.  

The committee recommended that EPA and USDA create the NCII to implement a network of pollution-control pilot projects to evaluate local and downstream water-quality improvements, and to compare results and enhance the outcomes of best management practices.  The NCII should start with approximately 40 projects, which would be targeted to priority watersheds with high levels of nutrient pollutants.  The NCII would represent a systematic approach to better understanding and managing nutrient inputs across the basin, and provide opportunities to strengthen interagency, interstate, and state and local coordination and cooperation.  The committee noted that the collective reduction of discharged pollutants from the NCII projects would have little effect on the gulf's dead zone because the projects would cover only a small portion of the sources in the river basin.  Therefore, other nutrient control actions and programs across the river basin should not pause or slow their progress to wait for NCII project development and implementation.

To gather additional data regarding the relative nutrient contributions of "point sources" -- such as water treatment plants and industries that have permits to release nutrients -- EPA should require major point sources to monitor the nutrient concentrations of their discharges as a condition of their permits.  Although the estimated current flux of nitrogen and phosphorus being delivered to the Gulf of Mexico from these point sources is roughly 10 percent of the total, the relative importance and actual percentages are still debated.  Requiring monitoring and reporting as conditions for discharge permits could substantially reduce uncertainties in the estimates of point source nutrient discharges, the committee said.

The report also recommends how EPA, USDA, and Mississippi River basin states should allocate nutrient loading caps for the river basin, including selecting an interim goal for the amount of nutrients that can enter the basin; identifying priority watersheds for nutrient control actions; adopting an allocation formula for distributing interim reductions; allowing credit for past progress; and encouraging the use of market-based approaches to allow jurisdictional flexibility.  In moving forward on this front, all parties should look to the experience gained in setting nutrient loading caps in the  Chesapeake Bay watershed, as it provides an example of how these processes have been developed in a large, multistate watershed with some similar water quality challenges.  Information gained from the NCII would also be an important part of the process for determining loading reduction caps.

In addition, the committee proposed that EPA and USDA establish and jointly administer a Mississippi River Basin Water Quality Center to implement the NCII and conduct related monitoring and research activities.  The center should manage a basinwide water-quality monitoring, assessment, and nutrient-control program and be located in the upper basin, where most nutrients enter the river system.  Participation from other organizations that play important roles in water-quality monitoring -- such as the U.S. Geological Survey, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and state natural resources and water-quality agencies -- would be vital.  Some of the center's responsibilities should include coordinating NCII projects; conducting basinwide water-quality and land-use monitoring and relevant analysis and research; developing a land use and cover database for the basin; identifying additional watersheds for future NCII projects; providing advice on water-quality variables and statistical approaches; and producing periodic reports on basinwide water-quality assessments and project implementations.  

Lastly, the committee stressed that the new water quality center, EPA, USGS, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and basin states should strengthen their commitment to systematic water-quality monitoring for the northern  Gulf of Mexico in order to complement data gathered upstream and document the effectiveness of upstream nutrient-control actions. 

The National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of  Medicine, and National Research Council make up the National Academies.  They are independent, nonprofit institutions that provide science, technology, and health policy advice under an 1863 congressional charter.  Committee members, who serve pro bono as volunteers, are chosen by the Academies for each study based on their expertise and experience and must satisfy the Academies' conflict-of-interest standards.  The resulting consensus reports undergo external peer review before completion. 

"The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise." -- Mark Twain

Water-Energy Nexus Conference: 17-19 November, West Virginia

This notice just hit my mailbox. It's being convened by my Mid-Atlantic water institute colleagues. Looks good. The fuse is short - 10 November registration deadline.

 

When it rains, it pours. Certainly true here in Corvallis!

 

The Water-Energy Nexus: A Necessary Synergy for the 21st Century -- November 17-19, 2008 -- National Conservation Training Center of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Shepherdstown, West Virginia. 

The Mid-Atlantic water institutes are sponsoring this regional conference to highlight management issues associated with the increasing demand for water and energy.  Session and Panel Topics include:

• Water-Energy Issues in the Mid-Atlantic Region
• Marcellus Shale Drilling & Implications on Water
• Coal Mining Impacts on Water
• Hydroelectric Production
• Water Needs for Biofuel
• Green Building
• Low Impact Development
• And much more

More information, including online registration, is available on the conference website: http://wvwri.nrcce.wvu.edu/conferences/2008/WRRI/.  Information about lodging is available on the site as well.  Registration deadline: November 10, 2008.

For additional information,
Call: Terry Polce, Conference Coordinator at (304) 293-2867 x5450;
E-mail: mailto:2008waterconferenceinfo@mail.wvu.edu ; or
See the Web site: http://wvwri.nrcce.wvu.edu/conferences/2008/WRRI.

Sponsored by the Mid-Atlantic Regional Water Resources Research Institutes (WRRI's) of West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, and New York

Green Mountain Ground Water and Bottled Water Redux

Last spring I posted an item about Vermont declaring its ground water to be a public trust, and requiring anyone who pumps more than 57,600 gallons per day to obtain a permit. The law does not take effect until 2010.

Enter Daniel  Antonovich, a businessman who wants to bottle 250,000 gallons per day from the town of East Montpelier's signature spring, which sits on his land. But last March the town of East Montpelier instituted a three-year moratorium on bottling water.

So it appears that all the ground water issues in the Green Mountain State have not disappeared. Felicity Barringer wrote about Vermont's ground water in the 20 August 2008 edition of the New York Times.

While some residents of East Montpelier worry that their wells may suffer if Mr. Antonovich’s firm, the Montpelier Springs Water Company, opens for business, Mr. Antonovich said that he had had the aquifer mapped and that there was more than enough water for all.

Mr. Antonovich, a furrier in the New York area who has been vacationing in Vermont for half a century, said he did not plan to contest the three-year moratorium.

But what about the new law?

The new law notwithstanding, there are still few restrictions on using groundwater, but the new system is designed to help map it, measure it and apportion it. It puts home and farm uses of water at the front of the line in case of shortages and makes large-scale withdrawals, like those envisioned by Mr. Antonovich, who owns the land where the spring emerges, subject to new permits and monitoring.

Barringer continues:

With the growing recognition that groundwater is not limitless, more states and localities are looking for ways to protect it. Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan and New Hampshire are at the forefront of this trend, and Vermont is now making its move.

“It’s no longer an under-the-radar issue,” said Jon Groveman, the general counsel of the Vermont Natural Resources Council. “There is now a sense that groundwater is finite and needs to be protected.”

It is interesting to see the Eastern USA take more of an interest in ground water, often the stepchild of water resources management, especially in wet regions with seemingly ample surface water.

Surface water in streams, lakes and rivers, has been legally managed for hundreds of years. But groundwater, until recent years, was often treated as something separate, hydrologically and legally. Both distinctions are now breaking down.

An interesting observation:

“Public policy makers are wrestling with legal systems designed in an era of abundance,” said Andy Buchsbaum, director of the Great Lakes office of the National Wildlife Federation. “They were not designed to address shortages.”

Buchsbaum continues, bringing the USA West into focus:

Mr. Buchsbaum said he believed that the Vermont law could produce fairer and more comprehensive results when done before a crisis, or “we’ll be trying to change our water laws in the context that the West is now.”

“There is no water and they’re trying to apportion droplets,” he said of the West. “They’re in the terrible position of trying to judge between needs that are all critical with not enough resources.”

“We have the chance to get ahead of it,” Mr. Buchsbaum said.

Let's hope Vermont gets it right.

There is a great analogy in the article: Vermont State Geologist Laurence R. Becker compares mapping flow in Vermont's fractured-rock aquifers akin to tracing a Jackson Pollock painting. Amen!

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." -- Bertrand Russell

'Beating' the Southeast USA Drought: Them That Has, Gets

Colleague Sam Chan sent me this story by Alyssa Abkowitz from the 31 July 2008 Wall Street Journal. The photos and the graph are from the article.

The story describes how some people in the Southeast USA are "beating" the watering restrictions imposed by places like Atlanta and Raleigh. How? By drilling wells, which they use for landscape watering and swimming pools. Since many of these wells are quite deep - some up to 600 feet or so - they're not cheap, so most of these people are well-heeled.

Metro Atlanta's water restrictions from midnight to 10 AM do not apply to well owners who pump fewer than 100,000 gallons per day. What? 100,000 gallons per day? That is over 110 acre-feet per year! 

The residential pumpers see nothing wrong with what they are doing. Why should they feel guilty? They are not taking water from some beleaguered municipal water supply, such as Lake Lanier that supplies the Atlanta metro water system. That is surface water, and these rich folks are pumping ground water. Never the twain shall meet, right?

That's not necessarily true. The water they pump ultimately would flow to some surface water body, perhaps in the Chattahoochee River basin (for those pumping in the Atlanta area), or perhaps some other stream system far away from Atlanta. But the truth is that these folks are in fact using someone else's water. By pumping ground water, they are likely reducing the discharge somewhere else.  

"We're not draining Lake Lanier here," said one resident of the upscale Buckhead section of Atlanta. Well, good for you.

For illustrative purposes, here is a simplistic schematic of what happens when a well pumps from an aquifer (from USGS Circular 1186). When the well is turned on (Figure B), it intercepts water that would ultimately flow to a stream. Under certain conditions, the well can even derive some of its discharge from the stream (Figure C).

 

Sure, one well is not going to seriously impact someone else's water. But what about 100, 1,000, or 5,000 wells?

I used to get this claptrap all the time when I lived in the Albuquerque area. "I'm not part of the problem, because I have my own well." Well, yeah, but 10,000 other people have "their own wells" and are sucking from the same aquifer that you and the City of Albuquerque both use. Your straws may be smaller and shallower, but it's the same source.

I'd say to people: "You want to know who's responsible for the area's water shortage? Look in the mirror."

I would make the same case in Atlanta that I made in New Mexico: you're sucking water from the same source, it's just that the connection is less obvious.

Here are comments from Jim Kennedy, Georgia's state geologist.

Despite the I-own-what's-under-my-house laws, too much pumping can lower the amount of groundwater if there are a lot of wells in one area that yield a significant amount of water, says Jim Kennedy, Georgia's state geologist. In Atlanta, Dr. Kennedy says most of the wells don't yield more than a modest 15 gallons a minute -- making them self-limiting. However in extreme cases, over-pumping can lead to land subsidence.

"If people develop a lot of wells in an area, we could get into a situation where pumping water out of fractured rock could deplete or dry up a creek," Dr. Kennedy says. "But we're not at that point yet."

Perhaps Kennedy's agency could help enlighten locals about the source of their well water. Some outreach would be helpful.

Kennedy's right about the generally low-yielding wells in the Atlanta area, which sits atop "hard" rocks, such as igneous and metamorphic rocks that generally don't produce high well yields unless you tap into a big fracture that is connected to a surface water body. These fractured-rock aquifers don't have a lot of storage, so when you pump them, they are more likely to draw water from a stream or lake.

It's Garrett Hardin's "tragedy of the commons": the problem with a "common pool resource". I think higher water rates are in order (David Zetland would be proud of me).

So are these folks violating the law? Nope. Are they doing the right thing? Only if you consider selfishness a virtue.

"Character is doing what's right, even if no one is looking." -- Unknown

Florida Purchases Sugar Land to Help Restore Everglades

Nope, that's not Sugar Land, TX, but land used to grow sugar cane for sugar production in Florida.

Florida is spending $1.75B to purchase about 292 square miles of U.S. Sugar Corporation's holdings in the Everglades (see map, courtesy of the Washington Post). Those holdings equal the land area of the entire city of New York - all five boroughs.

Read about it in the New York Times.

U.S. Sugar Corporation is the USA's largest sugar cane grower. Here is the complete media kit from U.S. Sugar, which contains the statement of President and CEO Robert H. Buker, Jr., the details, Q&A, etc:

Download us_sugar_media_kit.pdf

The South Florida Water Management District, a quasi-governmental entity of the State of Florida, will assume control of the land, which will not occur for 6 years.  

It's not quite a done deal yet, however. More work needs to be done over the next few months.

The importance of the land acquistion cannot be underestimated. The purchased land will add about 1 million acre-feet of storage, and taking land out of agricultural production will reduce the phosphorus and nitrogen loads to the system. The former was a particular issue. Some of the "natural plumbing" will be restored.

The negotiations were a well-kept secret, and the announcement surprised a number of people.

Let's hope the Everglades are on the road to better health. 

“Most agencies want to spend the money making things happen and not spend the money finding out if they work." – Dr. William Dietrich, UC-Berkeley geomorphologist

A 'Mirage' in Oregon: Cynthia Barnett Visits Oregon State University

Cynthia Barnett, award-winning author of Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the Eastern  U.S., just left us at Oregon State University (OSU) after entertaining us for about 90 minutes with tales of water woes in Florida and elsewhere in the eastern USA.

We had a good crowd for a late Friday afternoon, and she also sold and signed some copies of her excellent book, which is now available in paperback, so you have no excuse for not reading it.

A brief aside: she commented on the dearth of home "For Sale" signs here as compared to Florida.

This is the third time I've heard Cynthia speak, all in the last six months. I told her that she is in my Robert Glennon class, meaning that I never tire of listening to her. Her style is more relaxed, as though she's having a cordial conversation with her audience. Very effective.

She again spoke of the merits of conservation, and how conservation is often given short shrift by politicians and water managers for a simple reason: no one makes much money from conservation projects. No big infrastructure, no grand engineering schemes, etc. She alluded to the fact that in Florida, state alternative water-supply grant money cannot be used for conservation projects.

To be sure, conservation can have its drawbacks. Customers get annoyed when their rates go up because conservation may drive utilities' revenues down. And those who save water are concerned that the water saved may just go for more development. Wastewater engineers worry about sluggish flow in sewer systems or lack of sufficient dilution.  But conservation should occupy a more prominent place in the water-supply toolbox.

She told the story of Orme, TN, the tiny (145 people) town on the TN-AL border 40 miles west of Chattanooga that ran out of water in 2007. The town temporarily survived by sending a tanker truck across the border to an Alabama town three days a week for water from the town's fire hydrant. The 20,000 gallons of water replenished the Orme's storage tank and allowed residents to use water from 6-9 PM each evening. Cynthia said that the story was big news and journalists descended upon the place, got the story, then headed home.

But they never came back to get the rest of the story. Here's what happened after the journalists left:

• volunteer plumbers and plumbing supply firms blitzed the town and fitted each home with water-saving devices free of charge;
• the town saved 140 gallons per household daily; and
• the water availability went from 3 to 12 hours per day solely because of conservation 

All in all, time very well spent with a person who has a great message.

And she brought some Florida sunshine with her.

"We use drinking water to grow our lawns, then spend the summer cutting it down using fossil fuels." -- Cynthia Barnett, Corvallis, OR, 2 May 2008

DC Report 3: Rep. David Price; Western States Water Council; FY2009 Budget

Yesterday morning at our NIWR meeting we heard from Rep. David Price (D-NC), a PhD political scientist and former Duke University professor who represents the Raleigh-Durham area.

Price contrasted the "old" water issues the East and Southeast formerly confronted: water pollution, flood control, and hydroelectric power generation. But things have changed, because now, the Southeast is experiencing serious water supplu problems. The Atlanta situation is well-known; I have even blogged about it. Memphis and Mississipi are squabbling over the city's pumping of ground water - 60 million gallons per day (mgd) - from beneath its southern neighbor. North Carolina is fighting the city of Virginia Beach's (VA) attempt to import 60 mgd from the Roanoke River via an 85-mile pipeline. And South Carolina is upset over North Carolina's diversions from the Catawba River.   

Price's own district has serious problem: Raleigh's supply is down to 119 days and Durham's is down to 243 days. In fact, 55% of North Carolina's population is under some kind of water conservation mandate.

If you are interested in learning more about the Southeast's water woes, check out Robert Osborne's excellent Watercrunch blog. He even recently "identified" an I-85 drought, that seems to be follow Interstate 85. Robert, you may have uncovered something of hydroclimatic significance!

What a change - sounds like good old fashioned Western wars!

Price noted that the Southeast, like the West, is growing rapidly. His own state faces high growth but has a limited water supply - no large rivers. Ground water is available in the state's coastal plain. He speculated about sustainable growth under such conditions, and called for sound water research to:

• improve infrastructure;
• identify efficient conservation measures;
• resolve interstate and intrastate conflicts; and
• forecast accurately.

*****************

Last night we heard from Tony Willardson, Deputy Director of the Western States Water Council (WSWC), which is part of the Western Governors' Association (WGA). Tony mentioned that the WGA visualizes six water or water-related issues:

• growth;
• data;
• infrastructure;
• climate change;
• Indian water rights; and
• endangered species

*****************

Several people told us that this will be a contentious year for the budget process, with the Democrats perhaps trying to hold out for a Democratic president who won't veto their budget. President Bush will not want to appear to be "caving in" to Congress during his final year. The word is that the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security will get their money, supplemental funding will be appropriated for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but everything else might have to wait until the 111th Congress.

Could be a wild ride this year.

"The difference between an economist and a political scientist is that the economist believes people are rational." -- Unknown, courtesy of Tony Willardson

Georgia-Tennessee Border War for Water Access

The 20 February 2008 NBC Nightly News had a feature on the Georgia-Tennessee "border war" for access to the Tennessee River. Here is the video clip (you will have to watch a 30-second commerical).

Colleague Aaron Wolf sent me this story from the 17 February 2008 issue of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The accompanying picture is from the story.

The article reports that some Tennesseans are sympathetic to Georgia's argument and its drought-stricken plight. Here's one:

"It's not necessarily our water," said Kate McBryar. "I don't see why Georgia can't use our water if they are having a drought. Why not help our countrymen?"

I suspect most of her fellow Tennesseans might not be so generous towards Georgia, and Atlanta, the "Las Vegas" of Southeastern water.

"I was pretty much just having fun. I didn't expect anything to come from it." surveyor Bart Crattie, commenting on the 1818 surveying error he pointed out.

Solution to Georgia's Water Woes: Annex Part of Tennessee

You've know doubt read by now that Georgia has lost its dispute with Alabama and Florida about water withdrawals from Lake Sidney Lanier (see these New York Times and Environment News Service articles). A federal appellate-court panel ruled that the state can not withdraw as much water as it wanted to from the reservoir. So Atlanta must look elsewhere for more drinking water, or better conserve what they have.

The picture of Buford Dam on Lake Sidney Lanier is from the Environment News Service article, courtesy of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

It is unclear whether Georgia will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Looks like the "lovey-dovey" relationship among Alabama, Florida, and Georgia (see my earlier post) may be on hold for a while.

From the NYT story:

Though the fast-growing Atlanta area relies on the reservoir, the other states have argued that Georgia has done little water planning over the decades and has not tied growth and development to water resources.

On Wednesday, Gov. Sonny Perdue is scheduled to sign into law Georgia’s first comprehensive water management plan, which was hastily approved by both houses of the General Assembly last month in the opening days of the 2008 legislative session. Environmental groups have already criticized the plan as ineffectual in the face of a record drought, which could threaten the drinking water for four million people.

What? Not tied growth and development to water resources? Are those folks daft?

But these Easterners are proving themselves adept at water wars. Want more water? Just annex part of another state!

Here's a story by Ben Smith from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

A couple of state lawmakers want to annex a piece of Tennessee to get more water for Georgia.

State Sen. David Shafer (R-Duluth) and state Rep. Harry Geisinger (R-Roswell) on Wednesday introduced companion resolutions to stake a claim on a one-mile stretch of disputed land that they say rightfully belongs to Georgia.

If Georgia were to take that land, the state's new border would stretch beyond the south bank of the Tennessee River, one of the largest tributaries in the Southeast.

Georgia was shortchanged of the land because of a "flawed survey conducted in 1818 and never accepted by the state of Georgia," Shafer said.

"A misplaced survey marker is just that and nothing more," he said. "A state boundary can only be changed by the legislatures of the states, with the consent of Congress. It cannot be changed by a mathematician with a faulty compass or a skittish surveying party afraid of the Indians."

Nobody need be alarmed that such resolutions might be a prelude to a second, much smaller, War Between the States.

They merely call for the creation of two panels to investigate Georgia's possible legal claims to land on the other side of the Tennessee and North Carolina borders.

See what Tennessee thinks of all this - read the article in the Chattanooga Times Free Press. Chattanooga is on the Tennessee River, just across the border from Georgia. One Tennessee lawmaker, House Majority Leader Gary Odom (D-Nashville) quipped "I think we need to have our militia down there."

Note added 15 February 2008: Here is an article from the 15 February 2008 edition of the Christian Science Monitor. The accompanying map is from the article.

"What's the best thing to come out of Alabama? Interstate 85. What's the second-best thing? Interstate 20. " -- Georgia joke

Mississippi vs. Memphis: Case Dismissed, But It Ain't Over Till It's Over

A Federal District Court Judge dismissed the $1B lawsuit filed by Mississippi against Memphis Light, Gas and Water (MLGW) over MLGW's pumping of ground water from beneath Mississippi (see my earlier post about this issue).

Judge Glen H. Davidson ruled that his court does not have jurisdiction, since the case involves two states, and such disputes must be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.  Although Tennessee is not a defendant, the judge ruled that the state must be brought into the case as a "necessary and indispensable" party, making it a dispute between two states.

The court dismissed the case without prejudice. Mississippi can now appeal the case or file with the Supreme Court. Attorneys for the state said they will appeal to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and, if unsuccessful there, file before the Supreme Court.

Tom Charlier of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal gives the full story.

But stay tuned, because the fat lady hasn't sung yet.

"The opera isn't over till the fat lady sings." -- Dick Motta, former NBA coach

Pumping from the Memphis Sand Aquifer: Is Memphis Kicking Sand in Mississippi's Face?

So what business do I have posting on the Memphis Sand aquifer and the lawsuit between Mississippi and Memphis it has spawned? None, really, except that I was quoted in an article by Tom Charlier about the impending trial in Oxford, MS, in last Sunday's edition of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal. And I just finished a 30-minute phone interview with reporter Stephen Koranda from Mississippi Public Broadcasting (MPB).

I am reminded of an adage we used back in the 1970s:

Definition of an expert: someone who comes from more than 500 miles away and has colored transparencies.

In this case, I did not even have colored transparencies.

I am not an expert on this aquifer; I was contacted to opine because I know something about transboundary aquifers. And one reason for seeking out-of-area experts is that local ones may be called upon to testify and don't want to make comments to the media.

In a nutshell, the case boils down to Mississippi claiming that Memphis Light, Gas and Water (MLGW), the municipally-owned utility for the Memphis area (Shelby County), is deriving about 30% of the water it pumps from the Memphis Sand aquifer (aka the Sparta aquifer) from beneath Mississippi. This amounts to about 60 mgd (million gallons per day) coming from beneath the Mississipians' land. Total MLGW pumpage from the aquifer is about 160-200 mgd. The Memphis Sand's water is reputedly some of the best ground water in the USA, and the aquifer supplies drinking water to over 1.1 million residents of Shelby County.

This is no nickel-and-dime lawsuit; the damages sought by Mississippi amount to $1 billion, and if the Memphis utility loses, it would be forced to reduce its pumping and obtain some of its water from the Mississippi River, which would entail the construction of an expensive water treatment plant.

Most of the "harm" to Mississippi occurs in DeSoto County, a rapidly-growing suburb of Memphis. Well water levels there have been dropping -- that's what happens when you pump water from an aquifer, folks, until you increase recharge or decrease discharge to offset the pumping rate.  Mississippi contends that some of the declines are due to Memphis' pumping and constitute "harm". Memphis claims that its use is "reasonable" and not reducing the water availability in Mississippi.

Here are some additional background articles (thanks to Ricky Clifton):

1. Business TN (February 2007); and
2. U.S. Water News (March 2005)

The Memphis Sand underlies about 10,000 square miles of AR, TN, MS and KY; some reports state that parts of it extend into IL, MO, and northern LA. It occurs within a geologic-physiographic feature known as the Mississippi Embayment, a northward extension of the Mississippi River Delta's fluvial sediments from southern Louisiana to the Mississippi's confluence with the Ohio River at Cairo (that's "Cay-ro"), IL (see relief diagram). It is a topographic low, filled with sediments.

The cross-section from Mississippi State University's Department of Geosciences shows the Memphis Sand, which is up to 700 feet thick beneath Memphis and estimated to contain up to 1 trillion gallons of high-quality water. Note that the vertical exaggeration of the cross section is huge; the dip angles of the individual strata are under 1 degree.

 

Here is what the University of Tennessee's Energy, Environment and Resources Center (EERC) said about the case in a report several years ago (from the Business TN article):

*The appellate court in Tennessee has rejected the absolute dominion rule, which allows a surface owner to pump any amount of water from an aquifer regardless of the damage it does to the rights of other landowners overlying the same aquifer. The court concluded that overlying landowners are restricted to a reasonable exercise of their mutual rights in the common source.

* Under common law, water pumped from an aquifer can only be used on land overlying the aquifer that is owned by the pumper. This is a situation where the common law has not yet caught up with the contemporary reality of large scale pumping for use [and sale] off-site.

*If MLGW has been pumping water from the aquifer so as to diminish the flow and pressure to others wells for a period sufficient to allow the company to acquire rights to the water through prescription (probably 20 years), then the company may have acquired rights to this water.

*Under Tennessee law, incomplete as the record is, if the volume that MLGW is pumping is unreasonably high, much more than their share of the water from the aquifer, their actions are illegal if another overlying user complains.

*Because the Memphis Sand aquifer underlies land in several states, it is entirely possible that this dispute could also lead to a suit for apportionment of the waters of the aquifer … Such a suit would likely originate in the U.S. Supreme Court as an equitable apportionment suit. The Supreme Court has never apportioned the water in an underground aquifer ... the outcome might be unfavorable to MLGW and Memphis water users because there is another source, the Mississippi River.

This a fascinating case; it is more akin to what we'd expect out here in the West. My water-lawyer friends also agree this is a very interesting case, what with a state suing a city utility in another state for supplying water to its residents. It may result in the states agreeing to the allocation of the aquifer's water. That's what should be happening now.

The trial begins 4 February 2008. Stay tuned.

                                       Happy World Wetlands Day!

Update, 4 February 2008: Well, that was quick - the judge dismissed the case, saying that the Supreme Court has jurisdiction (thanks again to Ricky Clifton). See my post.

"Nobody ever forgets where he buried the hatchet." -- Frank Hubbard

Stream Restoration Efforts: Ooops...

Two geologists at Franklin and Marshall College are  suggesting that the models upon which stream restoration efforts have been based may be flawed because they were deverloped by studying "non-natural" streams, many of which are in the Mid-Atlantic states.

Here is the New York Times' 18 January 2008 article by Cornelia Deans.

Dr. Robert Walter and Dr. Dorothy J. Merritts, in a recent Science paper, say the streams studied by their geological predecessors were not “natural archetypes” but rather the artifacts of 18th- and 19th-century dam building and deforestation.

The article continues:

The researchers examined historical records and maps, geochemical data, aerial photographs and other imagery from river systems in Pennsylvania and Maryland. They discovered that beginning in the 1700s, European settlers built tens of thousands of dams, with perhaps almost 18,000 or more in Pennsylvania alone.

In a telephone interview, Dr. Merritts described a typical scenario. Settlers build a dam across a valley to power a grist mill, and a pond forms behind the dam, inundating the original valley wetland. Meanwhile, the settlers clear hillsides for farming, sending vast quantities of eroded silt washing into the pond.

Years go by. The valley bottom fills with sediment trapped behind the dam. By 1900 or so the dam is long out of use and eventually fails. Water begins to flow freely through the valley again. But now, instead of reverting to branching channels moving over and through extensive valley wetlands, the stream cuts a sharp path through accumulated sediment. This is the kind of stream that earlier researchers thought was natural.

“This early work was excellent,” Dr. Merritts said, “but it was done unknowingly in breached millponds.”

She said she and Dr. Walter believed their work had important implications for stream restoration. For one thing, she said, evidence so far suggests that removing the overlay of sediment may encourage streams to return to a truly natural state. But also, she added, restoration “requires much more consideration of what we are trying to restore, and what might actually be a sustainable approach.”

NPR also has an excellent story by John Nielsen on Walter's and Merritts' work. 

The two smaller pictures - of a dam and Merritts - are from the NPR story. The larger one of Walter is from his F&M home page.

Here is an excerpt from that story:

David Montgomery, a geologist at the University of Washington (UW), says the paper is also a cautionary tale for everyone involved in river restoration projects.

For example, says Montgomery, "if you are trying to restore rivers in a way that will benefit fish and other organisms — if you're not just trying to make them look pretty — the best model for that is the system in which they evolved and thrived."

Basically, if you want to put Humpty Dumpty back together again, you need to know exactly what he looked like in the first place.

Merritts and Walter say it's likely that the landscape underneath a lot of winding rivers was dominated by broad wetlands full of tangled water channels. Walter says those broad wetlands are now all but nonexistent in the East. Whether they will be restored on a large scale is an open question, he says.

Ain't science wonderful!

"Never assume anything but a 4% loan" --Unknown

An Orphan River: The Mississippi's Water Quality

The National Research Council (NRC) has just issued a report, Mississippi River Water Quality and the Clean Water Act: Progress, Challenges, and Opportunities. You can click here to read the report for free online or purchase a copy. You can download a copy of the press release below.

Download water_quality_in_mississippi_river.htm

The following article, 'Orphan River', by Sara Frueh, is from the National Academies InFocus magazine, Volume 7, No. 3 (Fall 2007).

No river has played a more central role in American literature and history than the Mississippi, the river that carried Huckleberry Finn's raft and serves as the symbolic dividing line between east and west. And the Mississippi's economic and ecological importance continues to be enormous. Tens of millions of people in 10 states depend on it for drinking water and recreation, and hundreds of millions of tons of grain and other goods are shipped along the waterway every year. The rivers of about 40 percent of the continental United States drain into the Mississippi, which is also home to the longest river wildlife and fish refuge in the lower 48 states.

Despite its significance, however, the Mississippi is an "orphan" in terms of efforts to monitor its water quality and reduce pollution, says a new report from the National Research Council that evaluates efforts to implement the Clean Water Act (CWA) on the Mississippi. Currently there is no single system to monitor pollution levels along the river's entire length, the report observes. And though states on the Mississippi have assumed most authority for implementing the Act, the resources they dedicate to monitoring the river vary widely, as do their standards for water quality.

This lack of coordination has made it difficult to address pollution problems in the river, some of which are significant, the report says. Although the Clean Water Act has successfully reduced direct discharges of pollution from industry and wastewater treatment plants, less-direct forms of contamination -- for example, nutrients and sediments that enter the river and its tributaries through runoff -- are still a problem in the Mississippi. High levels of nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorous from fertilizers used on farm fields, are polluting the river itself and contributing to an oxygen-deficient "dead zone" in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Sediments are a more complex challenge; in the upper Mississippi they often are too plentiful and considered a pollutant, while in the lower river, sediments are too scarce -- a shortfall that is contributing to losses of coastal wetlands in southern Louisiana.

Addressing these and other water-quality problems will require the U.S. Environmental Protection  Agency (EPA) to take a stronger leadership role in implementing the Clean Water Act along the Mississippi and in the northern Gulf of Mexico, the report says. For example, EPA should take the lead in establishing a single program to monitor water quality in the entire Mississippi. In addition, the agency should develop water-quality standards that protect the river and Gulf from excessive nutrient pollution. And EPA should develop what is known as a federal Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for these nutrient pollutants; this is a limit set on the total amount of a pollutant that the river and northern Gulf can accept and still meet water-quality standards. The agency has successfully led a multistate effort to better manage nutrient pollution in the Chesapeake Bay, the report notes, and it should draw upon that experience when stepping up its efforts along the Mississippi.

States should take steps to improve their teamwork as well, the report says. In particular, states along the lower Mississippi should strive to create a cooperative organization similar to one already in place for states along the upper river. And the report calls on the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to aggressively apply its conservation programs in order to reduce polluted runoff from agriculture. EPA should work with USDA to ensure that these programs are targeted to areas where runoff of nutrients and sediments is most severe.
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"He who dies with the most toys is, nonetheless, dead." -- Unknown