News Briefs

Gila River Makes Most Endangered River List

Arizona has role in New Mexico’s claim on Gila River water

The Gila River earned a dubious distinction recently when American Rivers included the river in this year’s annual list of the most endangered rivers in the country. This is the third Arizona River in five years to achieve that distinction, although the proposed water diversion plan that is said to threaten the Gila would occur in the upper stretch of the river in New Mexico. American Rivers says the project “could deplete a desert Oasis.”

Their water supply threatened, Arizona water users, located downriver from the proposed project, have an obvious interest in the issue. Environmentalists also are concerned.
From New Mexico into Arizona, the Gila River stretches 649 miles to its juncture with the Colorado River near Yuma. Along the way the Gila River undergoes great changes, its upper reaches a free-flowing river with cottonwood and sycamore and its flow in eastern Arizona sufficiently significant to be protected as the Gila Box Riparian National Conservation Area. The river then dries up as it journeys across Arizona, with little flow remaining below Coolidge Dam, southwest of Globe. The Gila has not reached the Colorado River in decades.

The American Rivers’ designation is in response to conditions in the uppermost reaches of the Gila, an area where the free-flowing river is unobstructed by dams or reservoirs, at least for the present. Plans have been in the works to build a dam to divert water from the Gila and its tributary, the San Francisco River, to enable the state to claim about 14,000 acre-feet of water. Planning continued until last year when Gov. Bill Richardson announced that no dam would be built on the Gila as long as he remained in office.

The threat remains that a subsequent administration might reverse the decision.
Understanding New Mexico’s claim to this share of the Gila River requires a look at the 1968 Colorado River Basin Project Act, the law authorizing the Central Arizona Project. Unbeknownst to many, the act also allocated 18,000 acre-feet of Colorado River water to New Mexico. Along with the allocation, a dam or suitable alternative was authorized in the upper reaches of the mainstem of the Gila.

New Mexico’s CAP advantages might be viewed as compensation for previous neglect. In 1964, four years before CAP was authorized, the U.S. Supreme Court adjudicated states’ use of water in the Colorado and Gila basins. The court allotted Arizona and California water based on future growth, without extending the same consideration to New Mexico, which was assigned the same amount it had been using as of 1957. The decision rankled New Mexico officials.
Payback came in 1968 when New Mexico’s congressional delegation maneuvered to hold up the proposed CAP project until gaining various concessions including an allocation of Colorado River water. The allocation could then be exchanged for an equal amount of Gila River water that would otherwise flow into Arizona.

The 2004 Arizona Water Settlement Act, passed to resolve various CAP matters critical to Arizona including Indian water right issues as well as Arizona’s federal CAP repayment obligation, also affirmed New Mexico’s right to take Gila and San Francisco waters. Funding also was provided to pay for future water projects. These developments prompted American Rivers’ concern for the health of the river.

Prescott Valley’s Auction Wins International Award
rescott Valley’s effluent water-rights auction, considered a groundbreaking, innovative strategy, achieved international recognition recently when London-based Global Water Intelligence presented Town Manager Larry Tarkowski its Water Deal with Distinction award. It is a second place honor.

Global Water Intelligence first recognized the Prescott Valley project when it published a story about the auction. In February, the publication notified Tarkowski that the town was nominated for an award and extended an invitation to him to present a paper at its April conference on Water, Finance and Sustainability 2008 at Whitehall Palace in London.

The other candidates in the running for the Water Deal of the Year award were Hyflux Water Trust IPO for its creation of a new water and wastewater investment model in China; Jumeirah Golf Estates for incorporating treated wastewater in large-scale real estate developments in Dubai; and the Greensands consortium for purchasing Southern Water in England.

The award-winning auction was conducted Oct. 29-30, 2007 and attracted local and national interests. Water Property Investors LLC, a New York water investment firm and a wholly owned subsidiary of Water Asset Management LLC submitted the winning bid of $24,650 per acre foot to acquire the water rights developed by the town through its wastewater treatment and recharge program. As the winning bidder, WPI purchased the 1,103 acre feet of water rights currently in the ground and available together with an option to purchase additional supplies as they become available, up to the 2,724 acre feet approved by the Arizona Department of Water Resources.

Water Property Investors LLC outbid a group of Prescott Valley developers for the water rights that must be put to beneficial use within the town.

Home Cooling Systems’ Water Use Figured
Once using an evaporative cooler or swamp cooler rather than an air conditioner was a point of pride, establishing that the user was environmentally conscious by committing to the more energy-efficient choice. Switching to air conditioning, an appliance that cools better but requires much more energy, would have been viewed as selling out.

That was then; now is now.
Swamp coolers have since fallen into disfavor due to their water use. An article in Southwest Climate Outlook, Sept. 2007 reports on the issue. The article refers to the work of T. Lewis Thompson of the University of Arizona’s Environmental Research Laboratory that found during summer conditions in Tucson (May - September) a swamp cooler working at 75 percent efficiency uses an average of 150 gallons of water per day. In comparison, air-conditioning units would appear to be models of water efficiency, not directly using any water in their cooling operations.

Their energy use, however, comes with a water cost, albeit an indirect water cost, that must figure into any comparison between swamp coolers and air conditioners. Generating energy requires water, an issue of increasing prominence. The article refers to work at the National Research Laboratory that found that hydropower, which supplies about 12 percent of Arizona’s electricity, consumes about 65 gallons of water per kilowatt-hour generated; coal-fired plants consume about half a gallon of water for each kilowatt-hour of electricity produced.

The ERL analysis considered coal plant water use in figuring the monthly water consumption of an air-conditioning system cooling a 2,000 square-foot home; it came to 425 gallons. This same analysis was used to determine that a swamp cooler would use about 4,620 gallons.

Applying the same calculations but using water consumption of hydropower found that air-conditioners use 55,250 gallons of water per month and swamp coolers 20,745 gallons.

Obviously homeowners wanting to determine the comparative water use of a swamp cooler and air conditioner would need to the know the source of energy in areas in which they live. For example, coal fired plants supply most of Tucson’s energy needs.

Town Seeks Legislation to Remedy Illegal Drilling
The town of Williams erred when it drilled a well to transfer water from one groundwater basin to another, a transfer that a 1993 Arizona state law does not allow. Officials say it was an honest mistake that fell through regulatory cracks when the Arizona Department of Water Resources approved the drilling.
The mistake was costly, with the town spending $13 million or more than $4,000 per person to drill the misplaced well. Drilling occurred between 1999 and 2003 before the town became aware of its mistake in August 2007.

Water pumped from the Williams’ well does not fall into the same category as water over dam which, according to folk wisdom, has an over-and-done quality about it. Pumping the water violated the law, and the city is looking to legislation to retroactively resolve the issue. The bill, which is making its way through the Legislature, would grandfather Williams’ use of water drilled from the well for an emergency. The bill’s sponsor Rep. Lucy Mason, R-Prescott, says the bill is intended as a good neighbor gesture, to provide relief to a community in a difficult situation.

Others don’t agree, arguing that seeking a legislative bailout after violating state water law sets a bad precedent. The issue has gained added prominence because of concern that the deep well may have penetrated the Redwall Limestone, a water source for streams in the Verde Valley.

Arizona Department of Water Resources Director Herb Guenther testified that many well locations are not clearly defined, and there is no way to verify that a production well is located in the groundwater basin to be pumped. Department strategies to remedy the situation include requiring well drillers to use a global positioning system to locate wells and attempting to digitize basin boundaries. ADWR supports the legislation, saying it is needed to correct a department error.

Taking the opposite view, the Sierra Club opposes the legislation because of its potential impact on water supplies and water law. The Sierra Club testified that, in effect, the bill’s passage would codify a mistake. It suggested a provision be included to allow the transfer only if it can be demonstrated that no harm would result to the Verde River.

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