[Senate Hearing 109-55]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 109-55
WATER SYMPOSIUM
=======================================================================
SYMPOSIUM
before the
COMMITTEE ON
ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
ON
WATER ISSUES
__________
APRIL 5, 2005
Printed for the use of the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
_____
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COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES
PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico, Chairman
LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii
LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota
LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska RON WYDEN, Oregon
RICHARD M. BURR, North Carolina, TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota
MEL MARTINEZ, Florida MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana
JAMES M. TALENT, Missouri DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
CONRAD BURNS, Montana MARIA CANTWELL, Washington
GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia JON S. CORZINE, New Jersey
GORDON SMITH, Oregon KEN SALAZAR, Colorado
JIM BUNNING, Kentucky
Alex Flint, Staff Director
Judith K. Pensabene, Chief Counsel
Bob Simon, Democratic Staff Director
Sam Fowler, Democratic Chief Counsel
Kellie Donnelly, Counsel
Patty Beneke, Democratic Senior Counsel
Mike Connor, Democratic Counsel
C O N T E N T S
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STATEMENTS
Page
Atwater, Richard, WateReuse Association, Alexandria, VA.......... 44
Bell, Craig, Executive Director, Western States Water Council.... 62
Bingaman, Hon. Jeff, U.S. Senator from New Mexico................ 2
Birnbaum, Elizabeth, Vice President for Government Affairs,
American Rivers................................................ 16
Buller, Galen, Director, Sangre de Cristo Water Division, City of
Santa Fe, NM................................................... 53
D'Antonio, John, New Mexico State Engineer....................... 65
Davis, Tom W., Manager, Carlsbad Irrigation District............. 9
Domenici, Hon. Pete V., U.S. Senator from New Mexico............. 1
DuMars, Charles T., Esq., Professor Emeritus, University of New
Mexico School of Law, and Resource Planning Associates, P.C.,
Attorneys at Law............................................... 20
Echohawk, John, Executive Director, Native American Rights Fund.. 73
Galloway, Gerry, American Water Resources Association............ 26
George, Rick, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian
Reservation.................................................... 55
Graff, Thomas J., California Regional Director, Environmental
Defense........................................................ 85
Greetham, Stephen, the Nordhaus Law Firm, on behalf of the
Pueblos of Laguna, Santa Ana, Santo Domingo, and Taos.......... 69
Karlin, Richard J., Deputy Executive Director, Awwa Research
Foundation..................................................... 79
Kassen, Melinda, Director, Colorado Water Project, Trout
Unlimited...................................................... 12
Keppen, Dan, Executive Director, Family Farm Alliance............ 50
Kuharich, Rod, Director, Colorado Water Conservation Board,
Colorado Department of Natural Resources....................... 5
Mullican, William F., III, Texas Water Development Board......... 94
Sabol, Colin, Chief Marketing Officer, General Electric.......... 82
Salazar, Hon. Ken, U.S. Senator from Colorado.................... 32
Semanko, Norm, on behalf of the National Water Resources
Association.................................................... 40
Smith, Hon. Gordon, U.S. Senator from Oregon..................... 2
Thomas, Hon. Craig, U.S. Senator from Wyoming.................... 2
Tracy, John C., Director, Idaho Water Resources Research
Institute, and the Idaho Department of Water Resources......... 23
Tyrrell, Patrick T., Wyoming State Engineer, on behalf of the
Western States Water Council................................... 46
Underwood, Dennis, Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California..................................................... 3
Witherspoon, Jean, on behalf of the New Mexico Water Conservation
Alliance....................................................... 89
Wunsch, David, State Geologist of New Hampshire, on behalf of the
National Groundwater Association............................... 86
WATER SYMPOSIUM
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TUESDAY, APRIL 5, 2005
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
Washington, DC.
The symposium was convened at 2:25 p.m. in room SD-366,
Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Pete V. Domenici,
chairman, presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. PETE V. DOMENICI,
U.S. SENATOR FROM NEW MEXICO
The Chairman. Thank you all for coming. First of all, I
want to thank all the groups and individuals that submitted
proposals. Obviously, there is a genuine interest in issues
pertaining to water--water augmentation, water purification,
the delivery of water. We have received over 130 written ideas,
proposals, and suggestions.
I would like to thank the participants and all of those
here in the audience that are interested in this discussion.
The high level obviously reflects our shared concern for the
resource called water in our different regions and in the
country.
Federal water resources management and development efforts
in the 20th century have produced a complex web of governing
authorities, everything from Federal and State laws, compacts,
contractual obligations, often fragmented Federal agency rules.
Now at the beginning of the 21st century, the 109th Congress,
we are faced with an ever-increasing demand for water due to
such factors as drought, aging infrastructure, limited funding,
tribal needs, and various water rights claimed by individuals
and groups.
This afternoon we are going to discuss with our four panels
water supply and resource management coordination, the future
of the Bureau of Reclamation, Indian and Federal reserved water
rights, conservation and technology development. It is my hope
that today's discussion will lead to some items that can be
considered in legislation and initiatives, legislative
initiatives here in the Senate.
It is of interest that we move along in some kind of a
regular pace, so we will move on to the issues at hand.
Senator Bingaman, I am glad that you are attending today
and thank you for helping us with your suggestions and your
staff suggestions. Now I would be pleased to yield to you.
STATEMENT OF HON. JEFF BINGAMAN, U.S. SENATOR
FROM NEW MEXICO
Senator Bingaman. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman, and thanks for holding this conference on this very
important set of issues.
I do think that it is very timely. These are issues that
are of vital concern, of course, to people in our State. We
hear about them at all times. I sense a real disconnect between
the level of concern about these issues in New Mexico and much
of the West, I believe, and the level of concern that we have
here in Washington. I do not think that there is near enough
attention to these issues here.
I have been particularly concerned that when you look at
the budget that we have been presented with this year, whether
you are talking about EPA's funding, or Department of
Agriculture's funding, or Corps of Engineers funding, or U.S.
Geological Survey, or the Bureau of Reclamation, all of those
agencies are proposed for significant cuts in their water-
related work. I think that is very much a disconnect from what
I think ought to be the priority.
So I think this conference is a great chance for us to get
the issues out and hopefully get more attention to them, and I
look forward to working with you to see if there are
legislative efforts we can make to pursue some of the
suggestions we hear today.
Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
We have two other Senators. Senator Thomas or Senator
Smith, would you like to comment? You are welcome to.
STATEMENT OF HON. CRAIG THOMAS, U.S. SENATOR
FROM WYOMING
Senator Thomas. I think there are plenty of people here to
comment. Thank you. There are lots of folks here to comment. I
will wait.
The Chairman. He has got a real bass voice today.
Senator Smith.
STATEMENT OF HON. GORDON SMITH, U.S. SENATOR
FROM OREGON
Senator Smith. Mr. Chairman, I am here because this is the
current Federal water establishment. It is a picture of
dysfunction. In a time when the West is in drought, in a time
when we have obligations to Native tribes, we have got to
figure out a better system than just this kind of bureaucracy
to allocate this precious resource.
It was Thomas Jefferson--no, not Thomas Jefferson. It was
Benjamin Franklin who once wrote ``When the well is dry, we
know the worth of water.'' I think our well is dry and we have
got to find a better way to establish its allocation and its
worth.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator.
Now, we are going to proceed in some kind of orderly
fashion if I can figure it out here. On this side we have some
resource people, right? In the event we need you or somebody
raises a question, you will be available, but otherwise you are
not going to give us prepared statements; is that correct?
So we can all see who they are: the U.S. Corps of
Engineers, Fred Caver; Diane Regas from the Environmental
Protection Agency.
Can you help me with the next one?
Ms. Bach. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Maryanne Bach, Bureau of
Reclamation.
The Chairman. I cannot see that.
Mr. Carter: And Gary Carter, National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration.
The Chairman. Very good.
On this side we are going to start like this and go that
way. You know your instructions. We will start with you, Mr.
Underwood, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
STATEMENT OF DENNIS UNDERWOOD, METROPOLITAN WATER DISTRICT OF
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Mr. Underwood. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you,
Senators, for being here. I really appreciate the national
focus that is being placed on the need for coordination. All of
our resources, they are shared resources. That just implies
that you need coordination, not only--if you do coordination,
you also get added values.
I do not think I have ever been asked to stay only 2
minutes and I will try to do that.
If you are looking at coordination, a lot of that now gets
into integrated resources. The reason that you are seeing
integrated resources is it comes to the best approach to meet
various objectives. The objectives are in terms of water supply
to provide for water reliability. That includes having
flexibility in the plumbing to move water when it is available,
and also to have storage. The adequate storage is beginning to
play an even greater role if you look at the Colorado in the
last 5 years.
Water quality, diversity, the idea of desalting brackish
water. How do you bring new waters into the system? Saline
waters, other water supply options. Recycling, conservation can
all play a major role and are not necessarily concerned about
drought or shortages. They are hydrologic dependent.
You do need in coordination, it does need a partnership
between Federal, State, and local and regional agencies. You
need to go on the basis of beneficiary pay because you cannot
always rely on State and Federal funds, but there are a role
for Federal funds. By having integrated resources, it does
define the best approach and where those funds can be made most
useful.
I will give a few examples and I will close with a few
examples of how integrated resource planning can play a major
role. MWD has what we call an integrated resources plan. It
took 3 years to develop. It looks at a variety of water
supplies. You look at the CALFED, which is the Federal-State,
23 agencies involved. If you look at the Colorado River
management, that is an effort that has been basin States and
local entities, water users, and the Federal Government. Then
you look at multistate salinity coalition and more recently the
signing yesterday of the Lower Colorado Multi-Species
Conservation Program, where you are looking at a whole regimen
of a river, over 400 miles to provide for 27 species.
Those are examples of what we need to be doing, and it
helps to provide for more effective as opposed to individuals
trying to address these problems.
With that I will close.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Underwood follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dennis Underwood, Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California
1. water supply and resource management coordination
Is there a need for improved coordination of water supply
activities and water resources management at the local, state and/or
national levels, and if so, what form should this coordination take and
how should it function? What has been the experience with regional,
River basin and watershed-based planning efforts and conflict
resolution? What lessons can be learned from these and other models for
water supply coordination and water resources management? What role
should the federal government play in this area?
Several models exist that demonstrate coordination of water supply
activities and water resources management at the local, state and/or
national levels.
For example, Metropolitan's service area composes of 18 million
people in parts of six southern California counties who rely on
reliable, high quality water supplies for their quality of life and the
health of over $700 billion regional economy. The region's resource
strategy is based on the Southern California Integrated Water Resources
Plan, an example of how regional coordination can work. The IRP has
been tested and proven successful. The effectiveness of the IRP has
been proven in recent years by the severe drought in the Colorado River
watershed. Metropolitan's supply from the Colorado River Aqueduct has
been reduced by 40% in 2003 and 2004. The region continues to enjoy
reliable, high quality water supply because of the investments made
under the IRP.
First adopted in 1996 and updated in 2003, the IRP is both a
planning framework and the blueprint for resource program
implementation. It is formulated with input from water agencies
throughout southern California, environmental interests and the public,
with six objectives:
Reliability;
Affordability;
Water quality;
Diversity;
Flexibility; and
Recognition of environmental and institutional constraints.
The implementation of IRP relies on partnership of federal, state,
regional and local agencies and water suppliers, with diversification a
hallmark: the resource plan includes water conservation, water
recycling, groundwater production, brackish groundwater recovery,
ground and surface storage, supplies from the State Water Project and
Colorado River, agriculture to urban transfers, water supply options to
provide the needed year to year water supply assurances, drought and
surplus water management, and ocean desalination, which is the newest
addition to the resource portfolio. Operational flexibility and storage
are two necessary additional features to make supply diversity most
effective.
The benefits are myriad:
The IRP has allowed the region to handle uncertainties,
including climate change, inherent in any planning process. For
the water industry, some of these uncertainties are the level
of population and economy growth, which directly drive water
demands; water quality regulations and new chemicals found to
be unhealthful; endangered species affecting sources of
supplies; and periodic and new changes in climate and
hydrology.
The diversified water portfolio allows the region to
minimize uncertainties and risks associated with an individual
resource; provides flexibility in handling drought periods, and
adapts to changing regulatory and environmental conditions.
For example, the regions' diversified storage portfolio
allows Metropolitan to participate in the demand shift portion
of a CALFED Environmental Water Account to reduce imported
water demands from the State Water Project when endangered and
threatened species are moving through the Bay-Delta water
system.
The most significant state-federal collaboration on water issues is
the CALFED Bay-Delta Program, a collaborative effort among 23 state and
federal agencies to improve water supplies in California and the
ecosystem health of the San Francisco Bay-Sacramento-San Joaquin River
Delta watershed.
The primary objectives of the Program include:
Improve ecosystem quality of the Bay-Delta watershed;
Reduces water supply conflict and improve benefits to uses
of Bay-Delta water system;
Provide good water quality for all beneficial uses; and
Reduce risk to vulnerability of Delta functions.
The Program is coordinated through the California Bay-Delta
Authority (CBDA), which is a state organization with federal
participation. The CBDA obtains stakeholder input through a Public
Advisory Committee.
``The fundamental premise of the Program is that the agencies can
best meet their individual responsibilities by sharing information and
cooperating with each other. The CALFED Program or the CBDA exercises
no authority over the agencies. The program relies on the continuous
cooperation of each participating agency, exercising its own legal
authority.''
The Chairman. Thank you.
So we are going to proceed now with the State of Colorado
Department of Natural Resources, Rod Kuharich.
STATEMENT OF ROD KUHARICH, DIRECTOR, COLORADO WATER
CONSERVATION BOARD, COLORADO DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES
Mr. Kuharich. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.
Rod Kuharich. I am the director of the Colorado Water
Conservation Board, established in 1937, which plays a critical
role in the development of water policy for the State of
Colorado.
In 2003 the legislature directed us to do a basin by basin
study of the entire State. We looked at water demands, we
looked at water supply, and we looked at projects and processes
to meet those demands. We created basin roundtables, a bottom-
up approach which involved agriculturalists, municipals, water
providers, environmentalists, recreationists, and general
citizens to work through this process.
Three factors drove Colorado. One is it is the third
fastest growing State in the Nation. How we use and value water
in Colorado has been changing. There is a greater need for
municipal domestic water. There is a greater interest in the
use of water for environmental and recreational purposes, and
clearly the 2002 drought brought this to people's minds.
We have three goals: examine all aspects of Colorado water
use for the next 30 years, evaluate water supply and management
alternatives, and formulate strategies to build consensus and
alternatives to meet those water needs.
It was the most comprehensive look Colorado has ever taken
at its water supply picture. In 2030 Colorado is expected to
grow by 65 percent and we will be approximately 630,000 acre-
feet of water short of where we are today.
The providers have basically done a good job. The success
of their plans is somewhat uncertain because of legal,
political, regulatory issues and these have historically
hampered Colorado's water development. We will require in the
future multiple solutions--conservation, reuse, agricultural
transfers, and new storage.
Conservation and efficiencies will be a key tool. However,
they will not meet our future water needs. New water
development and transfers from agricultural use will all be
part of the mix.
There were three key findings that we came up with out of
this study. The first is the need for funding at the State and
Federal level. Federal funding to support water supply and
water resource projects through grants, loans, or related
mechanisms must continue with minimum strings attached.
Project permitting was identified as one of the primary
impediments to water supply projects and has the greatest
impact on the uncertainty associated with the identified
projects and processes. Federal permitting triggered by
authorizations, funding, rights of way, licenses, and
Endangered Species Act, or section 404 of the Clean Water Act
can entangle projects for years and cost millions of dollars.
Streamlining these permitting processes are important.
Finally, environmental and recreational interests, as well
as local government agencies, use these processes in order to
create opportunities to have their voices heard. These
regulatory processes are viewed as the only way that these
interest groups can have meaningful input to ensure that local
interests in environmental and recreational opportunities are
protected.
The development of alternative means to provide for
environmental and recreational enhancement that benefit the
general public without increasing the cost of water projects
are important to develop.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I will close and respond to
questions. I did prepare a statement and the staff has compact
disk copies of the entire report for the committee. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Kuharich follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rod Kuharich, Director, Colorado Water
Conservation Board, Colorado Department of Natural Resources
topic #1--water supply and resource management coordination
the state of colorado's role in water supply and resource management
Colorado has a great tradition of being a leader among the western
states in managing and administering its limited water resources and in
addressing and solving its water resources challenges and pursuing
management alternatives in innovative and effective ways. The Colorado
Water Conservation Board (CWCB) is part of the State of Colorado's
Department of Natural Resources (DNR), which administers programs
related to the state's water, forests, parks, wildlife, minerals, and
energy resources.
CWCB plays a critical role in establishing water policy in
Colorado. The CWCB Board formulates policy with respect to water
development programs. The Board assists in the administration of
interstate compacts on the Arkansas and Colorado Rivers; administers
flood plain programs, water project construction funds, and the Office
of Water Conservation and Drought Planning; and participates in
endangered species programs. It also acquires and manages all instream
flow rights for the state.
the statewide water supply initiative (swsi)
With the approval of the 2003 Colorado General Assembly, the CWCB,
commissioned the Statewide Water Supply Initiative (SWSI), an 18-month
study to explore, basin by basin, existing water supplies and existing
and projected demands through the year 2030, as well as a range of
potential options to meet that demand. SWSI is the most far-reaching
and comprehensive effort ever undertaken to understand Colorado's water
supplies as well as the state's existing and future water demands. As a
result of this study, we know more today about Colorado's current and
future water use than we have ever known before. This information will
help local communities and water providers as they work to plan,
manage, and efficiently use Colorado's surface and groundwater
resources. The SWSI report can be downloaded at http://
www.cwcb.state.co.us/SWSI/Table_of_Contents.htm
Ground Rules
In order to achieve broad support and acceptance by various water
interests and stakeholders, the SWSI process established ground rules.
Ground rules included:
Local authority and control: Providing water for municipal
and agricultural users is the purview of local water providers.
Consequently, it was important that SWSI not take the place of
local water planning.
Bottom-up, not top-down: Providers, stakeholders, and
communities across Colorado were asked to identify their unique
concerns, needs, and issues.
All solutions explored: All solutions, including
conservation, rehabilitation of existing water supply
facilities, enlargement, and/or more efficient use of existing
water supply facilities, as well as new water supply projects,
have been and must continue to be considered.
Adherence to Colorado's Doctrine of Prior Appropriation: The
baseline requirement for any water supply or water management
solution is that it must be accomplished within the statutory
framework of Colorado's existing water rights and water
administration system, incorporating Colorado's Doctrine of
Prior Appropriation.
Stakeholder and Public Involvement
In addition to the establishment of ground rules, a stakeholder and
public involvement process was implemented. This process was designed
to provide a mechanism and forum for the CWCB Board to solicit and
exchange information, and was essential to the success of the project.
Basin roundtables were established in each of the eight major river
basins in the state. The Basin Roundtables, with the support of and
input from the CWCB Board, defined the overall water management
objectives, established performance measures to meet these objectives,
and identified solutions for meeting future water needs. Information
exchange occurred at the following levels:
Basin Roundtables--where local interests met to exchange ideas,
review and present water supply and demand data, summarize planning
initiatives, and help guide the development of water supply and demand
objectives and strategies for achieving the objectives. This was a
consensus building process to address specific issues within each river
basin. A portion of each meeting was also devoted to obtaining
information and comment from the public.
Roundtable participants in each basin included representatives of:
Agricultural and ranching community
Business, development, and civic organizations
Environmental interests
Federal agencies (e.g., U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation)
Local Governments not directly providing water (municipal,
county, and regional)
Municipal water providers
Recreational interests
Water Conservancy/Conservation Districts
CWCB Board Member(s) for the basin
Technical support was provided by: the State Engineer's
Office, Division of Wildlife, State Parks, and select federal
agencies
General Public Outreach--intended to provide a forum specifically
for presenting information to and obtaining feedback from the general
public. The pubic was kept informed of the progress of the study, and
invited to provide public input and feedback, through a variety of
activities.
Major Findings of SWSI
SWSI explored major aspects of Colorado's water use and development
on both a statewide and an individual basin basis. Major findings are
based on technical analyses and feedback gathered through Basin
Roundtable input. Even though some of these findings are readily
apparent to some, it was important that they be affirmed as part of
building a foundation and common understanding. Other findings were
determined and/or clarified through the SWSI process. These findings
are summarized below.
1. Significant increases in Colorado's population--together with
agricultural water needs and an increased focus on recreational and
environmental uses--will intensify competition for water.
2. Projects and water management planning processes that local M&I
providers are implementing or planning to implement have the ability to
meet about 80 percent of Colorado's M&I water needs through 2030.
3. To the extent that these identified M&I projects and processes
are not successfully implemented, Colorado will see a significantly
greater reduction in irrigated agricultural lands as M&I water
providers seek additional permanent transfers of agricultural water
rights to provide for the demands that would otherwise have been met by
specific projects and processes.
4. Supplies are not necessarily where demands are; localized
shortages exist, especially in headwater areas, and compact
entitlements in some basins are not fully utilized.
5. Increased reliance on nonrenewable, nontributary groundwater for
permanent water supply brings serious reliability and sustainability
concerns in some areas, particularly along the Front Range.
6. In-basin solutions can help resolve the remaining 20 percent gap
between M&I supply and demand, but there will be tradeoffs and impacts
on other uses--especially agriculture and the environment.
7. Water conservation (beyond Level 1) will be relied upon as a
major tool for meeting future M&I demands, but conservation alone
cannot meet all of Colorado's future M&I needs. Significant water
conservation has already occurred in many areas.
8. Environmental and recreational uses of water are expected to
increase with population growth. These uses help support Colorado's
tourism industry, provide recreational and environmental benefits for
our citizens, and are an important industry in many parts of the state.
Without a mechanism to fund environmental and recreational enhancement
beyond the project mitigation measures required by law, conflicts among
M&I, agricultural, recreational, and environmental users could
intensify.
9. The ability of smaller, rural water providers and agricultural
water users to adequately address their existing and future water needs
is significantly affected by their financial capabilities.
10. While SWSI evaluated water needs and solutions through 2030,
very few M&I water providers have identified supplies beyond 2030.
Beyond 2030, growing demands may require more aggressive solutions.
Key Recommendations
Following from SWSI's major findings, and based primarily on
feedback obtained from the CWCB Board, Basin Roundtables, and public
input, the recommendations outlined below provide guidance on how
Colorado should proceed in addressing its future water needs.
Interested parties are encouraged to look at the Key Recommendations
section of the Executive Summary, which expands on these key
recommendations.
1. Ongoing Dialogue Among all Water Interests is Needed
2. Track and Support the Identified Projects and Processes
3. Develop a Program to Evaluate, Quantify, and Prioritize
Environmental and Recreational Water Enhancement Goals
4. Work Toward Consensus Recommendations on Funding Mechanisms for
Environmental and Recreational Enhancements
5. Create a Common Understanding of Future Water Supplies
6. Develop Implementation Plans Toward Meeting Future Needs
7. Assess Potential New State Roles in Implementing Solutions
8. Develop Requirements for Standardized Annual M&I Water Use Data
Reporting
The CWCB adopted two mission statements regarding meeting future
water needs. The first mission statement addresses supporting the
identified projects and processes that are designed to meet 80% of the
2030 municipal and industrial water needs:
Following the lead of local water suppliers, the state will
monitor long-term water needs, provide technical and financial
assistance to put the necessary plans, projects and programs in
place to meet those needs, and foster cooperation to avoid
being forced to make trade-offs that would otherwise harm
Colorado's environment, lifestyle, culture, and economy.
The second mission statement addresses the 20% municipal and
industrial gap and the agricultural shortages and the environmental and
recreational needs:
Foster cooperation among water suppliers and citizens in
every water basin to examine and implement options to fill the
gap between ongoing water planning and future water needs.
The CWCB and the State of Colorado General Assembly have recognized
the need for an ongoing dialogue among all interests and that the SWSI
is a dynamic process. The General Assembly is currently evaluating
continuing funding for the SWSI process as well as expanding the
dialogue to discuss inter-basin issues within the major river basins in
Colorado. The precise timing and method in which these recommendations
can be implemented is flexible, and more discussion of ideas and
suggestions will be discussed as the process moves forward.
potential federal role in water supply and resource management
The key findings and recommendations from SWSI identify critical
needs for funding at the state and federal level. The costs to
implement water supply and water resources projects continue to
escalate. In light of the significant investments that must often be
made to meet the needs of water users, numerous federal and state
agencies have developed programs for partnering with project sponsors.
Some agencies, such as the BOR, had their genesis in the immense need
to support water management solutions in working with local project
sponsors. Many of today's water resources programs include the ability
to provide funding to support water supply and water resources
projects, through grants, loans, or related mechanisms.
In addition to the potential federal roles identified above there
are two other areas where a federal role would be beneficial in meeting
future water needs:
Streamlining of Regulatory and Permitting Processes
Permitting was identified as one of the primary implementation
hurdles for water supply projects, and has the greatest impact on the
uncertainty associated with the Identified Projects and Processes. Many
water providers and agricultural users believe that one of the most
significant hurdles to reliable water delivery in Colorado is
environmental permitting. Federal permitting triggered by
authorizations, funding, rights-of-way, licenses, the Endangered
Species Act or Section 404 of the CWA can entangle projects for years
and cost millions in delays, consultants, and attorneys. Existing water
projects and water rights are also subject to permitting issues.
Alternative Funding for Environmental and Recreational Enhancements
Environmental and recreational interests and local governmental
agencies view the federal, state, and local permit process as vital to
protecting the environment, recreational opportunities, and the local
economy. These regulatory processes are viewed as the only way that
these interest groups can have meaningful input to ensure that the
local interests and the environment and recreational opportunities are
protected. The development of alternative means to provide for
environmental and recreational enhancements that benefit the general
public without increasing the costs to existing water users or
developers of water projects are needed.
The Chairman. When did you say that the study was ordered?
Mr. Kuharich. The General Assembly asked us to do this
study in 2003, right on the heels of the 2002 drought, Senator.
The Chairman. And you finished it? How long did it take?
Mr. Kuharich. 18 months. We finished it last November, with
the report to the General Assembly and to the Governor.
The Chairman. We are going to then move to our third
participant, Tom Davis. He is from the Carlsbad Irrigation
District in Carlsbad, New Mexico.
STATEMENT OF TOM W. DAVIS, MANAGER, CARLSBAD IRRIGATION
DISTRICT
Mr. Davis. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
I too submitted a detailed comprehensive paper to address
this topic. What I plan to do in this 2 minutes is just make
some general statements that apply probably throughout the
West. The detailed topics that I submitted deal specifically
with New Mexico and particularly the Pecos River Basin, with
which I am somewhat familiar.
But in general I think all of us throughout the West are
grappling some with the same problems. We need to keep in mind
two factors when wrestling with these problems: The Earth
contains the same amount of water today as it did when mankind
arrived; and only a small percentage of the Earth's water is
potable. So for thousands of years mankind has tried to deal
with these problems of getting water in a usable form at the
necessary location for use. In an attempt to do that, we build
dams to store surface water, we transport water from areas of
excess to areas where water is needed. We have learned to pump
underground supplies. We make saline water potable. We
conjunctively use surface and ground water. We are learning to
resupply depleted underground aquifers.
However, there are a number of inherent problems associated
with many of these practices. We must consistently try to
mitigate ways to deal with these inherent problems. But let me
suggest that we have enjoyed some good success, because never
before in the history of mankind have we had more of an
economical, dependable, safe supply of food and water than we
enjoy today in these United States. We are living healthier and
we are living longer.
In the Western States, agriculture has accounted for about
80 percent of the permitted use in the last century. Due to a
growing population and drought and certain Federal laws and
interstate river compacts, these items have fueled a demand to
change the permitted use from ag use to other uses. I believe
it would be--we would be foolish to sacrifice all of our
western ag water use and our western ag production by
transferring this use to municipal and environmental purposes.
But we must strive to reach some solution to these
problems. I believe that, at least in my experience, lengthy
and expensive court battles often result in court decisions
that are unworkable and create more problems than they solve. I
do not think courts are the best answer. It is my belief that
problem-solving is made possible by open, positive discussion,
having a thorough understanding of the problems, and setting
reasonable targets. Sound policymaking must be based on sound
science.
The solutions to our water supply problems will be found
through application of technology, sound economic principles,
sincere collaborative effort, must involve Federal and State
entities, national labs, university research centers, both
ground water and surface water managing entities, private
industry, local governments, recreational and environmental
interests. The rights of existing permitted senior water right
holders must be protected through this process.
Such efforts take time. Conferences----
The Chairman. Mr. Davis, your time is up.
Mr. Davis. Okay. Thank you.
The Chairman. Do you want to finish with a sentence?
Mr. Davis. I say conferences such as this are only the
beginning steps to dealing with our problems.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Davis follows:]
Prepared Statement of Tom W. Davis, Manager, Carlsbad Irrigation
District
topic 1--water supply and resource management coordination
This topic lends itself more toward the storage and management of
surface water supplies. However, in most river basins in the west there
is a hydrological connection between groundwater and surface water.
Federal entities rarely have involvement in administering ground water.
However, most surface water supplies are stored in federal dams. The
permitted right to use this stored water is administered by the states
and local or private entities respectively. This relationship results
in the need for coordination among local, state and federal entities.
Because most surface water supplies are stored and released from
federal facilities, that action becomes subject to the federal
Endangered Species Act (ESA). The ESA has had a very disruptive and
expensive impact on the traditional water operations in the past two
decades. However, in most instances those expensive operational
modifications, both in water and money, have resulted in very few
quantifiable positive results for targeted endangered species or their
habitat. Improved coordination among federal, state and local entities
has been one of the results of the impacts of the ESA.
Drought and increasing water demand by a growing population are two
factors that have and will continue to require improved coordination in
managing water supplies. In my opinion, state and local entities have
the primary responsibility of planning future water use and recognizing
and resolving conflicts. It is obvious federal interest must be
included in this endeavor.
In New Mexico the legislature has authorized the Interstate Stream
Commission to administer the drafting and implementation of regional
water plans. The state is divided into ten regional water planning
regions. In most instances, planning units are defined by a section of
major river watersheds or, in some regions, closed basins. The ISC has
developed a template that the plans must adhere to. The planning group
includes county and municipal entities, irrigation and conservancy
districts, industry representatives, such as mining, power generation,
commercial dairies, the Bureau of Reclamation and tribal interests. The
plan attempts to quantify the water supply and demand for a forty-year
water planning cycle. The plan investigates increasing water yield,
water conservation, implementing more effective conjunctive use of
ground and surface water supplies and many other practices that could
result in effectively using a limited water supply to meet a changing
and growing demand.
In the lower Pecos basin, we have taken regional water planning a
step farther. In July 2001 a task force was established under the
guidance of the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission. The task force
was comprised of the major water users in the lower Pecos River basin.
It included representatives of municipal and county governments, the
Carlsbad Irrigation District, Fort Sumner Irrigation District, the
Pecos Valley Artesian Conservancy District, the New Mexico Dairy
Association and the Bureau of Reclamation. The charge of this group was
to develop and implement a permanent solution for conflicts threatening
the stable water supply in the basin. These primary conflicts are the
adjudication of the rights of the Carlsbad Irrigation District, the
State of New Mexico's order by the U.S. Supreme Court to comply with
the Pecos River Compact to deliver the annual requirement of water to
the State of Texas and to meet the water needs of the listed threatened
Pecos Blunt Nose Shiner. The overriding threat is the water diversions
in New Mexico could be stopped in order to make up an under-delivery to
Texas by the enforcement of a Priority Call ordered by the Special
Master appointed by the U.S. Supreme Court. This task force effort
resulted in a Settlement Agreement signed by all parties and sanctioned
and funded by the New Mexico Legislature.
Implementation of this agreement protects the economy in the lower
Pecos Basin by avoiding a priority call that would shut down diversions
in New Mexico and also providing a more dependable water supply to the
Carlsbad Irrigation District, thus a more stable supply for the Pecos
River Compact deliveries. The hydrological underpinnings of this
agreement is based on a model developed by the ISC and private
contractors.
To my knowledge, this is the first settlement of this type
developed to solve a complex and contentious river basin problem
involving an inter-state compact, state adjudication and conjunctive
use of ground water and surface water.
I believe this approach will become the preferred method to
resolving such conflicts throughout the west rather than a lengthy and
expensive legal battle resulting in a court decision that might not be
functional.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Now we have Trout Unlimited, Melinda Kassen. Thank you for
coming, Melinda.
STATEMENT OF MELINDA KASSEN, DIRECTOR, COLORADO WATER PROJECT,
TROUT UNLIMITED
Ms. Kassen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members. I am the
director of Trout Unlimited's Colorado Water Project. We have
six State offices working to solve water scarcity problems
while also protecting trout and salmon in the West. With over
70 percent of native fishes endangered, threatened, or simply
not there any more, watershed level cooperative efforts focused
on increasing water supply for municipal and other uses must
also help restore rivers.
TU believes that the Federal Government has a unique role
to play in Western water management. Most water users focus on
securing their own water supplies. Because of our National
environmental protection laws, Federal land holdings, and the
network of Federal water infrastructure projects, this
government's presence in and financing for cooperative efforts
is necessary to protect our Nation's fisheries.
Re-operation of Federal facilities can restore or at least
conserve important Native and recreational fisheries. Allowing
the use of Federal facilities to facilitate temporary water
transfers as well as conjunctive use of ground and surface
water can expand the water available to new uses without
further environmental degradation.
Water 2025 grants should go to projects that increase
traditional users' efficiency but also conserve and restore
healthy rivers and fisheries.
Congress should also maintain the Fish and Wildlife
Service's Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program, which
provides critical funding for collaborative restoration
efforts. It was this program that TU was involved with on the
Blackfoot and it played a critical role in the restoration of
that fishery.
Maintaining Federal authorities to require water for in-
stream protections consistent with Federal land management
requirements is also important. The Federal Government should
support voluntary measures and State programs for accomplishing
these same goals, but without the backstop of Federal authority
voluntary measures are less likely to achieve results.
The Federal Government provides critical funding for data
collection, research, and technology development. We all need
the data from the Geologic Survey's National Stream Flow
Information Program, the gauges. Please not only restore
funding but increase funding for this program. And the Federal
Government can also play a role in terms of research. As I
said, two good examples I believe are bills that you are
involved in, S. 177, the Salt Cedar and Russian Olive Control
Demonstration Act, as well as S. 214, the United States-Mexico
Transboundary Aquifer Assessment Act.
Thank you and I would be happy to answer questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Kassen follows:]
Prepared Statement of Melinda Kassen, Director, Colorado Water Project,
Trout Unlimited
topic number 1--water supply and resource management coordination
Trout Unlimited's Western Water Project seeks to solve water
scarcity problems and enhance coordination among federal, state, and
local interests in six separate western states for the purpose of
protecting and restoring trout and salmon watersheds. Operating
independently in each state, and working at the watershed level, TU's
experience in productive collaboration in on the ground restoration,
provides insights on how to approach coordinated water resources
management. Overall, TU strongly believes that watershed level
restoration efforts that include federal, state and local players are a
very good model for coordination.
i. coordination among local, state and federal interests is imperative
Over-allocation is the root cause of water scarcity conflicts. In
other words, too much water has been promised to too many people.
Coordination among local, state, and federal interests is vital so that
all affected interests are engaged in finding solutions that best fit a
particular region or watershed. Existing federal laws provide an array
of different tools that can assist such coordination including re-
operating agreements and grants that support collaborative efforts.
A. Existing Federal Laws and Programs Provide an Array of Tools to
Assist Coordination
As a result of the vast network of Bureau of Reclamation
(``Reclamation'') and Corps of Engineers water infrastructure across
the West, the federal government has many opportunities to help
implement solutions to western water resource challenges.
Committee Members may be aware of some of the successes that
coordination efforts have already achieved on the endangered species
front. One in particular illustrates the potential for re-operating
federal projects in part to recover species. Under the auspices of the
Colorado River Endangered Fishes Recovery Program, which involves the
states, Reclamation, the Western Area Power Administration, the Fish
and Wildlife Service, and others, Reclamation is changing the pattern
of water releases from Flaming Gorge Reservoir on Wyoming's Green
River. Reclamation made some operational adjustments in the 1990s, but
more will occur following an in-process NEPA evaluation. The changes,
which reestablish a more natural flow pattern in the river below the
dam, have already had positive impacts on the downstream fishery.
Watershed level coordination, in and of itself, can often be the
impetus to solving water conflicts. On the Sun River, a tributary to
the upper Missouri River near Great Falls, Montana, two irrigation
districts, private ranchers, Reclamation, state agencies, Trout
Unlimited and others are working together to find ways to make
Reclamation reservoir operations and irrigation deliveries more
efficient in order to reduce water conflicts and put water back into
the dewatered Sun River.
We are aware that Reclamation is seeking solutions to water
conflicts through its Water 2025 program. While we support the
principles of this program, we strongly recommend Congress encourage
Reclamation to modify Water 2025 so that it can better realize its
potential to produce solutions to water scarcity while promoting
watershed health. First, the Water 2025 Challenge grant program's
eligible activities should be expanded to include design and
feasibility work, which for river restoration usually entails assessing
the flows needed for ecological health.
Second, while we agree that water banks, water markets and
temporary leasing arrangements, including fallowing, hold much promise
for accomplishing the goals of Water 2025, these tools can be much more
beneficial and effective if they are combined with broader strategies,
such as re-operation of infrastructure, reductions in physical losses
from the system, reductions in percolation losses to saline aquifers,
on-farm efficiency improvements, and conjunctive management of
groundwater and surface water. As such, TU recommends that Congress
persuade Reclamation to include projects that specifically have a flow
restoration component in its universe of projects that receive Water
2025 grants.
Third, while we agree that Water 2025 projects should be undertaken
with the full agreement and participation of the irrigation districts
serviced by Reclamation projects, we recommend that a broader array of
entities should be eligible for receive grants. Such modification will
ensure the most productive collaborations. In our experience, some of
the best ideas and the initiative to implement them sometimes originate
outside the districts themselves.
Finally, we recommend that Congress persuade Reclamation to modify
the Water 2025 grant program matching fund requirements. Matching funds
are most appropriate for capital improvements, that presumably return
ample benefits to the water district that provide such funds.
Ecological restoration projects, such as those that have a flow
restoration component, do not generate a revenue stream that would
facilitate a cost-sharing requirement. Therefore, we specifically
recommend that collaborative restoration projects be exempt from the
matching fund requirements.
Just as important, if Congress agrees to Reclamation's request to
increase Water 2025 funding by $13 million, it should not do so at the
expense of other crucial programs that fund collaborative efforts to
seek solutions to our water challenges as the FY 2006 budget appears to
do. For example, the budget cuts funding for water reuse projects by
$16 million and cuts funding for desalination and water purification by
$5 million. It also cuts funding for endangered species recovery
activities.
Recommendation: Congress should encourage Reclamation to modify
Reclamation's Water 2025 program to incorporate the changes outlined
above. In addition, if Congress agrees to increase funding for Water
2025, it should not do so at the expense of other critical programs
that provide federal resources for collaborative efforts.
B. The Federal Government's Duty to Protect Aquatic Resources Benefits
Both Local Economies and the Environment
As the largest land manager in the West, the federal government has
a responsibility that includes wise stewardship of its natural
resources, including the rivers flowing across federal lands. This
responsibility consistently appears in federal laws governing the
Forest and Park Services, as well as the Bureau of Land Management and
the Department of Defense. Other federal agencies, including
Reclamation and the Corps, also have the authority, and in some cases,
the duty to use their facilities to protect ecologic values and provide
recreational benefits.
Properly exercised, federal stewardship enhances both the natural
environment and local economies. For example, farmers near the Rio
Grande National Forest in Colorado supported the forest's efforts to
establish its federal reserved water right because such establishment
benefited the farmers' operations.
Yet, TU is aware that many federal agency attempts to protect
rivers have been controversial. This is true whether the tool the
federal agency has used involves re-operations of federal dams, the
designation of a wild and scenic river, imposition of bypass flows in
federal permits, acquisition of federal reserved water rights or the
denial of Clean Water Act permits for dams or diversions. Voluntary,
cooperative deals which conserve, protect or restore the targeted
resource can be an excellent alternative to the unilateral exercise of
federal authority, but only if they result in real river protection.
And the only way the federal government can negotiate meaningful deals
is if it demonstrates a willingness to use its legal authorities.
Consider the situation of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, a
National Park in Colorado, originally established as a monument to
protect not only the deep, narrow and dark canyon, but also the roar of
the river. In 2001, the Park Service filed to quantify its federal
reserved right based on a natural flow regime that would have included
yearly peak flows to scour out accumulated sediment and pollution. This
filing was based on a Park Service model that was the result of a
decade's worth of research and almost a century of data. Nonetheless,
facing opposition from the state and some water users, in 2003, the
Park Service signed an agreement with the state for a right to only a
minimum year-round base flow. A federal court subsequently determined
that it is likely that the Park Service violated its Organic Act and
NEPA in signing this agreement. Thus, the parties remain at an impasse,
and the river's flows continue to depend on the largesse of
Reclamation, which owns an upstream facility, rather than on the needs
of the National Park.
Recommendation: TU recommends that the Committee reject any attempt
to eliminate or weaken existing federal tools to protect rivers and
streams. Properly exercised, federal stewardship enhances both local
economies and the environment. In fact, as evidenced by the Blackfoot
River partnership detailed below, federal laws often provide the
incentive for people to work together. In addition, funding for federal
agencies to assess, scientifically, the flows needs of rivers on
federal lands will help to demonstrate the economic value of conserving
these resources.
ii. lessons learned from watershed-based planning and conflict
resolution: the blackfoot river
The Blackfoot River arises near the continental divide and runs
west for 132 miles to its confluence with the Clark Fork River near
Missoula, Montana. It was part of the route home for Lewis and Clark in
1805. For much of its modern history, it was known as a scenic river
with great fishing. But by the late 1980s, many local residents
expressed increasing concern that the fishing in the middle and lower
reaches of the Blackfoot had severely declined. After some
deliberation, people decided to form a local Trout Unlimited Chapter
that included ranchers and other landowners, as well as anglers.
When the State Fish and Game regional fisheries manager told the
newly formed Big Blackfoot Chapter that he had no population data, nor
the funding to acquire such data, the Chapter raised the necessary
funds in a manner of weeks and presented a check to Fish and Game. The
agency's findings largely vindicated the apprehensions of the public;
the fishery was not doing well.
One of the Chapter's first acts was to develop a cooperative
agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) through its
Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program to work on the restoration of
the Blackfoot fishery. Throughout the restoration of the Blackfoot,
both agency partners, the FWS and the state Fish and Game, have been
responsive, innovative and critical participants.
In 1990, the TU Chapter and its partners embarked upon their first
series of restoration projects. These projects focused on four areas-
instream habitat restoration, enhancing instream flows, addressing fish
passage barriers, and reducing the entrainment of fish into irrigation
ditches.
Upon successful completion of several projects, interest in the
restoration efforts grew, to the extent that, by 2001 (just ten years
from the start), fish screens had been installed on diversions in 12
streams, fish passage structures had been erected on 26 streams,
grazing management improvements were completed on 23 streams,
restoration of riparian vegetation had occurred on 27 streams, and
streamflow improvements were made on 12 streams. Moreover, in the face
of severe drought, a basin-wide drought-response plan was created and
first implemented in 2000.
The success of the Blackfoot River restoration rests heavily on a
few key ingredients. First and most importantly landowners and other
stakeholders support the projects because they have been part of the
process from the inception. Second, the restoration effort has been
fortunate in securing the necessary funding from a combination of
federal, state, and private sources. Third, the projects have focused
on key species that serve as indicator species. Fourth, government
agencies have not attempted to direct the process, but rather to assist
it as requested by other partners. The biggest lesson learned is that
the restoration efforts have been successful because the work is viewed
as building community and connection in the valley, rather than
diminishing it.
Recommendation: TU supports adequate funding for programs such as
the FWS' Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program because it provides
critical funding for collaborative restoration efforts such as those on
the Blackfoot River. However, such funding should be in addition to,
and not in lieu of, sufficient funding for endangered species programs
which would be cut by $3 million in the FY 2006 budget request. TU
encourages Congress not to view the situation as an ``either or''
proposition.
iii. the federal government's research and technology development
activities provide critical data that informs collaborative efforts
Another important role for the federal government in coordinating
water management is conducting and funding research and technology
development. The federal government already gathers and analyzes
important water resource data. The United States Geological Survey
(``USGS'') monitors stream flows through a network of gages, and the
Natural Resources Conservation Service also monitors and publishes
snowpack data from its SNOTEL sites. This information is essential to
the collaborative, watershed restoration work that TU is involved in.
For example, the innovative drought response plans in Montana's
Blackfoot, Big Hole, and Jefferson River basins all depend on the USGS
flow reporting and SNOTEL forecasting.
Recommendation: Although the FY 2006 budget request includes a
$300,000 increase for the USGS's National Streamflow Information
Program, which funds the gages, TU strongly recommends Congress
significantly increases funding for this program so that it can be
expanded. Such expansion will help all of us better understand the
resource we want to use and protect.
S. 177, the Salt Cedar and Russian Olive Control Demonstration Act,
is an important model for two reasons. First, it focuses on adaptive
science. In other words, it requires scientists to closely monitor how
the watershed is affected as various experimental tactics are tried to
address control of the invasive species. Second, the bill focuses not
just on removal of invasive species, but also restoration.
Enactment of S. 214, the United States-Mexico Transboundary Aquifer
Assessment Act, will provide exactly the type of information needed to
address the long term implications of using a nonrenewable resource,
namely, groundwater.
Recommendation: Congress should pass S. 177 and S. 214 and consider
using these bills as models for future legislation.
TU's experience with innovative, watershed restoration and
resolving conflict over water allocation issues across six western
states has informed our comments. From effective use of federal
authorities to protect water supply to a more expansive, inclusive
vision for Reclamation's Water 2025 program, the genesis of TU's
comments are on-the-ground stream restoration work. From TU's work in
the Blackfoot River valley to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, TU is
engaged in the daily work of watershed health. From this perspective,
watershed level coordination among local, state, and federal players
has the best potential to greatly enhance water resource management
and, ultimately, watershed health.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
American Rivers, Elizabeth Birnbaum.
STATEMENT OF ELIZABETH BIRNBAUM, VICE PRESIDENT FOR GOVERNMENT
AFFAIRS, AMERICAN RIVERS
Ms. Birnbaum. Good afternoon. My name is Liz Birnbaum and
I'm vice president for government affairs for American Rivers,
an organization dedicated to protecting and restoring healthy
rivers and the variety of life they sustain for the benefit of
people, fish, and wildlife. On behalf of our 45,000 members, I
want to thank Chairman Domenici and Senator Bingaman for
convening this important conference and for the opportunity to
participate.
Given the limited time, I will just touch on a few issues:
the need to develop cooperative strategies to address water
supply, the need to invest more and invest more wisely in
necessary infrastructure to maintain water quality and manage
storm water more effectively, and the need for careful analysis
of proposals for new water storage.
The papers submitted for this panel underscore the need for
cooperation and coordination. I note that three separate
submissions gave examples of how limits placed by environmental
regulation have led to the development of cooperative solutions
for water supply conflicts. Our river systems are reaching the
limits of ecosystem sustainability and environmental laws like
the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act are
beginning to place hard limits on how much water we can divert.
The instinctive response is to blame these laws and call
for their amendment or repeal. But the real answer is to come
together and work out coordinated solutions for ecosystems and
people, preferably before impasses arise.
At the same time that we need to work together to find
solutions, we must invest more in infrastructure to maintain
clean water supplies. Polluted and contaminated waters cannot
serve our water supply needs. To meet the national shortfall in
waste water treatment funding, we must increase investment, but
also find ways to spend more wisely on infrastructure that
works with natural processes. Treating storm water as a waste
stream diminishes both ground water supplies and base stream
flow, while finding ways to increase recharge reduces waste
water treatment costs as well as sustaining supplies.
Finally, on new water storage. While new storage may at
times be necessary, it should always be based on an accurate
analysis of needs and a complete survey of alternatives. Any
new storage should be subject to rigorous economic analysis,
including both societal benefits from the use of the new water
and ecological impacts of the project. And alternatives should
always include water conservation and reuse.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Birnbaum follows:]
Prepared Statement of Elizabeth Birnbaum, Vice President for
Government Affairs, American Rivers
response to question #1: ``water supply and resource management
coordination''
The United States is blessed with a vast and increasingly valuable
fresh water supply that provides an essential foundation of our
economic and ecological wealth, and provides for our high quality of
life and increased life expectancy. Water is necessary for direct human
use, but also for the species and ecosystems that sustain life.
Cooperative, watershed based planning can address the essential goals
of both adequate water supply and river health. Throughout the nation,
water is increasingly in demand and increasingly scarce. Federal,
state, and local cooperation with strong stakeholder involvement is the
key to solving what will be one of the greatest environmental
challenges of the 21st century.
A sustained and coordinated effort needs to develop at all levels
of government to:
1. Communicate and cooperate. Sustainable water management requires
inclusive cooperative agreements which, while difficult, are both
possible and necessary.
2. Invest more and invest more wisely. We need to transport and
store water more effectively, reduce actions that degrade water
quality, and make necessary long-term investments in water treatment to
support plentiful and clean water supplies.
Communicate and Cooperate
Maintaining river ecosystems and supporting human needs are both
served by a continual supply of healthy, clean water. In-stream flow
standards successfully maintained both river health and water supply in
many areas. Basic standards for keeping water in streams are good for
fish and wildlife, but also for recreation, drinking water, and other
economic purposes. The federal government has a variety of tools that
can be used to preserve in-stream flows, including the Clean Water Act,
federal reserved and non-reserved water rights, the Endangered Species
Act, federal dam operation, hydropower licensing under the Federal
Power Act, federal land management practices, and the Wild and Scenic
Rivers Act. States also have a variety of tools and many are taking an
active role by legislating in-stream flows, using permit programs to
enforce flow limitations, adding state-based permit requirements, using
Clean Water Act Sec. 401 certification and Sec. 303(d) listings as an
opportunity, granting or transferring in-stream water rights, mandating
conservation programs and setting conservation goals. In-stream flow
standards are critical not only to ensure the public has access to
sufficient clean water now and in the future, but also to ensure that
our rivers, wetlands and lakes retain sufficient water to sustain fish,
wildlife and all of the ecosystem services that healthy freshwater
systems contribute to our economy.
The Endangered Species Act has perhaps been the most controversial
of the federal government's water management tools, but in many cases
it has produced a positive and needed policy-making strategy for
rivers--collaboration among stakeholders, states, and the federal
family of agencies. The ESA has been extremely successful at preventing
species from going extinct and disappearing forever, but its regulatory
provisions should be used only as a last resort; at its best the ESA
brings affected interests together to find solutions for sustainable
river ecosystems. Increasingly, ESA-inspired efforts to convene river
basin interests around a table to discuss how to manage rivers and the
numerous biological and socio-economic values these rivers support
provides a model for how we should approach river management
nationwide, but we should begin before species near extinction.
American Rivers is active in some of the most prominent
collaborative efforts in the West, and these and other such efforts
across the country access the talents and passions of a unique blend of
agricultural interests, power producers, municipal water users,
recreation interests, biologists, conservation groups, community
leaders, and state and federal agency representatives. Though many of
these ongoing efforts are the offshoot of litigation or are otherwise
intertwined in ESA-related matters, their genesis is ultimately the
desire of residents along prominent rivers to share in decision-making,
help guide future water management, and more directly tie the economic
health of their communities to the resources their rivers provide.
Unilateral, command-and-control management of rivers, especially those
that cross multiple state boundaries, has proven to be a divisive
management paradigm that local interests are seeking to transform.
For example, since 1997 the states of Nebraska, Wyoming, and
Colorado, with their partner federal agencies and stakeholder
interests, have been negotiating future management of the Platte River.
This process was born out of conflicts over managing the Platte to
improve habitat along the river in central Nebraska to support four
ESA-listed species (whooping crane, interior least tern, piping plover,
and pallid sturgeon). Urban water use to the west and irrigation along
the river in Nebraska had reduced Platte River flows; the river lost
much of its historic shallow, braided nature and no longer provided the
habitat necessary to support key species. Maintaining the Platte even
for further human use was in peril, so the states and the Department of
the Interior have been meeting with key stakeholders to hammer out
details for sharing the Platte's vital water, protecting and restoring
important habitat for the listed species, and sharing responsibility
for decision-making on the river in the long term. Federal and state
funds are being pooled to meet land and water goals, and users from the
agriculture, power, municipal, and conservation sector all have seats
at the Governance Committee table and are intimately involved in
deciding the Platte's future. This form of management serves as a model
for other river basins to consider, as it allows those most affected by
important public policy decisions over limited water resources to share
in the decision-making process.
Similarly, the nation's longest river, the Missouri, has been
marked by some of the largest and most complicated water resource and
ESA litigation in the country over the last several years. Even though
much of that litigation is ongoing, American Rivers is working with the
Missouri River Coalition to restore a string of natural places, reform
dam operations to aid river wildlife and recreation, and revitalize
riverfronts. In 2002, the National Academies of Science published a
report on Missouri River management noting that current unilateral
management of the river by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was failing
to help the river meet the best interests of those in the basin. The
NAS team suggested that a new form of collaborative decision-making
process be developed among all the interests in the basin and given
authority by Congress to determine the river's future. Today,
conservation, agriculture, navigation, power, municipality, state, and
federal parties are beginning that very process and preparing to
develop a collaborative process to manage the Missouri's water and
ensure the river is meeting the modern economic and environmental needs
of the basin.
Interstate water compacts like those negotiated on the Platte and
Missouri are widely used in the West to allocate water among states,
but are also important in the eastern U.S. where limited interstate
water supplies are increasingly squeezed by growing cities like
Atlanta. The hydrologic and economic characteristics of river basins
vary greatly, so a large set of possible solutions are best solved
locally by stakeholders and states, with federal support of any
outcome. Interstate surface water compacts allow states to solve their
own interstate water problems with state solutions, avoiding
undesirable federal intervention and preemption. Cooperatively
developed interstate river compacts can be powerful, durable, and
adaptive tools to promote and ensure cooperative action among the
states. Federal mandates may dictate rigid requirements; interstate
water compacts give states to the opportunity to develop and invest in
collaborative and dynamic solutions for shared local problems.
We should also consider applying the lessons learned from surface
water compacts to groundwater management. Groundwater is by far the
largest potential source of fresh water, but withdrawals can be
destructive to both surface and groundwater supplies. In many cases
groundwater is critical to feeding rivers, but it is increasingly
relied upon by agricultural and municipal users. Much of this water is
not recharged quickly, and therefore escalating use is unsustainable
and presents a looming future crisis. One example of the need for broad
cooperation to manage groundwater is the Ogallala Aquifer, which sits
under 8 states and is by far America's largest single source of fresh
water. With few state restrictions or tracking of use, and growing
demands, the Ogallala water level is sinking at a troubling rate and a
cooperative solution is needed.
Invest More and Invest More Wisely
An essential feature of maintaining adequate water supply is
maintaining the quality of source waters. Last year, American Rivers
named the Colorado River the #1 Most Endangered River in America. This
designation was based not on the ongoing drought's threats to water
quantity in the river, but on a number of policy choices necessary to
protect water quality in this essential water supply for millions of
Americans in the Southwest. The water quality threats to this storied
Western river remind us that we must at every level of government
increase the investments necessary to sustain clean water supplies for
our communities.
Before any level of clean water investment can protect our water
supplies, we must address threats to water quality from the potential
failure to enforce the Clean Water Act on small or intermittent
intrastate streams, as suggested by a guidance document published by
EPA and the Corps of Engineers. These small and intermittent streams
are essential to both the quality and quantity of water supply, as
discussed in the joint American Rivers/Sierra Club report, ``Where
Rivers Are Born: the Scientific Imperative for Defending Small Streams
and Wetlands.'' As indicated on the attached map, in New Mexico fully
98% of stream miles are non-perennial--if these streams are not
protected from pollution or even eradication by fill, New Mexico cannot
protect its water resources. Enactment of the Clean Water Authority
Restoration Act would underscore the Clean Water Act's application to
all of the West's waters.
But we also cannot ensure supplies of clean water without a major
further investment our nation's in wastewater treatment. Since the
specter of burning rivers led to the creation of the Clean Water Act in
1972, decades of work and billions of dollars in federal, state, and
local funding on drinking water and wastewater treatment projects have
set the global standard for water quality. These investments benefit
our economy, public health, and the environment. Unfortunately, we are
now witnessing a major shortfall in support for these essential
projects. The combination of aging infrastructure, recent
underinvestment, relaxed standards and enforcement, population growth
and sprawl has brought us to the point where the water quality gains of
the past are being lost and water quality is now trending downward.
Former EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman warned that without a
major new commitment to upgrading America's wastewater infrastructure,
we would soon see water quality levels as low as the 1970s.
Where wastewater systems overflow, partially treated sewage is
released containing viruses and bacteria that cause serious and
potentially deadly diseases--cryptosporidium, hepatitis, dysentery, and
others. The young, old, and sick are at greatest risk. Between 23,000
and 75,000 sewage overflows occur nationwide every year, resulting in
the release of 3 billion to 10 billion gallons of untreated wastewater
directly into our rivers and streams, according to EPA estimates. In
many areas of the country, drinking water intakes can be found
downstream of sewer outfalls.
One example of sewage releases harming our drinking water supply
occurs on the Colorado River. Human waste from riverfront boomtowns in
California and Arizona contaminates the river below Hoover Dam.
Monitoring wells in the Lake Havasu area have recorded nitrate levels
four times higher than the limits set by the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) to protect public health. The communities relying on
septic systems that are polluting the lower Colorado River require new
infrastructure. In other areas, the need is replacement and retrofit,
as many systems are using antiquated pipes that are 50-100 years old.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency projects that $388 billion is
needed to be invested in our water infrastructure from 2000 to 2019 to
meet our clean water needs. Increasing population and urban sprawl
stretch our previous water infrastructure investments to their limits,
requiring miles of new pipe as well as treatment capacity.
The federal government should find assist state and local
governments with the future investments needed for: (1) fixing leaking
infrastructure to reduce water outflow from delivery pipes, and to
prevent stormwater leakage into wastewater pipes; (2) recharging
treated wastewater into local aquifers; (3) decentralizing wastewater
treatment; and (4) reusing and recycling gray water and wastewater. As
we consider future investments at every level of government, we should
encourage new construction to develop sewer systems that divide
rainwater and runoff, human waste, and industrial waste into separate
pipes and use different treatment systems. These practices reduce
overflows and prevent problems with toxic sludge. Cooperative funding
for cities and towns to improve infrastructure will prevent serious
threats to public health, the environment and the economy.
Sound investment must be accompanying by an adequate regulatory
system to support clean, safe water supplies. The Save Our Waters From
Sewage Act, H.R. 1126 was introduced in the House a few days ago. This
bill would ensure that EPA cannot reduce existing regulation of sewage
bypasses from wastewater treatment plants, and set up a system to
inform the public if such releases do occur.
Riverfront communities in Arizona and California recognize their
wastewater treatment problems and are raising capital on their own to
upgrade wastewater treatment capacities. They and other communities
across the nation could use some help, but in recent years federal
assistance to states for wastewater treatment facilities under the
Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund has been cut. The President's
budget this year proposes even further cuts, with a gradual phase out
of the program over the next few years.
The federal government must continue to support state and local
governments' investments in safe and clean water. We urge the
reauthorization and expansion of the both the Clean Water and Drinking
Water State Revolving Funds (SRF) which the federal government uses to
help local governments invest in needed wastewater and drinking water
treatment infrastructure. These funds should also be extended to
support innovative `soft path' technologies for stormwater and
wastewater management as well as more traditional projects, working
with natural processes to reduce infrastructure costs while maintaining
ecosystem services. We need not be limited by thinking of water
infrastructure as the creation of concrete monuments.
Federal projects should be guided by the same goal of working with
natural ecological processes. Stream buffers, infiltration swales,
disconnected impervious surfaces, and restored and constructed wetlands
can serve federal project purposes as well as local needs. The
investment in infrastructure that works with natural processes will
also ensure we continue to receive the other massive economic benefits
provided by these natural hydrologic systems: flood control, water
filtration and surface flow regulation. All levels of government should
work together to encourage more efficient and sustainable water use and
to harness enterprising creativity to improve best practices.
Conclusion
Federal, state, and local cooperation and coordination with strong
stakeholder involvement, investing more in water management and
investing more wisely, is the key to solving what will be one of the
greatest environmental challenges of the 21st century.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Senator Craig is going to proceed. We are going to take
Charles DuMars next.
Senator Craig [presiding]. All right. Mr. DuMars.
STATEMENT OF CHARLES T. DUMARS, ESQ., PROFESSOR EMERITUS,
UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO SCHOOL OF LAW, AND RESOURCE PLANNING
ASSOCIATES, P.C., ATTORNEYS AT LAW
Mr. DuMars. Thank you. Senators, thank you for inviting me
to come speak to you today. I represent numerous private water
users, over 100,000 acre-feet of water in different sectors, as
well as Intel Corporation and other entities that use water for
productive purposes.
My point is a simple one. Water is a mineral. It is like
oil and gas, but it is a mineral. We currently in our planning
and in our treatment of the water resource behave as though it
were not an essential part of production of food and production
of energy resources. We need to do better at that. We need to
focus in all our future analyses of water supply on the
question, is there going to be sufficient strategic water
reserve available for future generations so that we can
continue to produce food and develop the energy production we
have.
I was surprised to hear Senator Bingaman suggest there was
not a sufficient in his view in this topic. In my view there is
a tremendous security interest in ensuring there is adequate
water supply for energy production so we do not become
dependent on other nations for energy as well as food
production. Those are very, very vital parts of our future.
Unfortunately, the function of water has been viewed most
recently in the last 10 years as growing cities and protecting
the environment, neither of which is sufficient. We need to
work harder at developing plans for including those criteria,
the development of energy production and food production, into
our water models.
There is no place we can go today to get a complete
analysis of water and supply through the entire United States.
We need to encourage all States to develop comparable plans to
that that has occurred in Colorado and develop a national water
atlas and a website so that people can identify where those
are. We also need an optimization model for all decisions that
are made by agencies.
Finally, it is vital that institutions like the Corps of
Engineers and others that are reevaluating and reauthorizing
water resources do so in a way that acknowledges these needs.
[The prepared statement of Mr. DuMars follows:]
Prepared Statement of Charles T. DuMars, Esq., Professor Emeritus,
University of New Mexico School of Law, and Resource Planning
Associates, P.C., Attorneys at Law
topic 1. water supply and resource management coordination
As we have turned the corner into this new century, there is no
doubt that water supply issues rise to the top. This is true in part
because of absolute shortages that manifest themselves in areas where
shortages exist because of increasing populations. Dry areas often make
great places to live, but have insufficient water. Interestingly, the
water supply is fixed, known and is finite. The problem is caused not
because of a lack of sufficient water but of an excess of persons who
choose to live where water is scarce.
Yet, those who have moved to the arid southwest cry drought when
there is insufficient water to meet their newly created demands. The
drought becomes the enemy, not the lifestyle choices that placed these
populations where there is insufficient water supply.
The solutions are fairly straightforward--import water from another
location, find new sources of supply in the area, treat existing
heretofore not useful water such as brackish water and effluent, use
less through conservation, or take out of production current uses and
move that water to municipal uses.
Importation is an attractive sounding solution, but is fraught with
institutional difficulties. While this is indeed one United States, and
the Supreme Court has declared that embargoes on resources are not
constitutionally permissible, any attempts to deplete the water
resources of current users or future generations to benefit those in
another region or state are received with stiff resistance. Utilizing
effluent and brackish water are practical solutions, but often come at
costs that are higher than other alternatives such as conservation and
moving water from a so-called lower valued use, at least in economic
terms. While conservation is the politically correct solution and is
certainly required, the methods for actually eliminating consumption of
water quickly reach their limits, at least with respect to domestic
uses. This leaves movement of water from existing uses such as
agriculture to municipal and other uses.
One could proudly announce for example, that if one were to build a
new town that was composed exclusively of stock brokers, telephone
conference centers, computer information technology that moves
information from one place to another and real estate for sales of new
homes for those who move to the twenty first century community, very
little water would be required. And, if there are no lawns, no parks,
no other aesthetic uses of water the demand could be reduced
dramatically.
The problem, of course, is that such a community presupposes that
somewhere else, others are utilizing water for uses that produce wealth
through production of crops, chips, coal fired energy plants, nuclear
energy plants, aesthetic tourism, eco-tourism, movement of goods
through barges, and so on. It is not clear to me that in the long-term
societies can function and thrive on the transport of information and
wealth transfers without need for the use of water as a part of
production. The United States has exported the production of steel, the
processing of timber, is exporting coal to China in record amounts, has
exported the assembly of things to developing countries and is looking
forward to exporting the bulk of its food. We look to the importation
of other comparable minerals such as oil and gas to sustain our
transportation corridors. The question then becomes whether it
necessarily follows that we should value water solely as a mechanism
for sustaining our capital movement cities or whether there are
independent values in water. Simply put, whether the concept of the
public welfare value of water is capable of being captured through a
single lens that relates water as the inevitable support systems for
communities in arid climates or whether a broad section of uses for the
resource should be recognized and integrated into public policy
decisions, both in evaluating water markets and informing water
administrators.
Conflicting Values Included in the Concept ``Public Welfare''
Even though members of society are concerned about the ``public
welfare'', there is never unanimity as to its meaning. Visualizing
various values in water as located upon a continuum can help, perhaps,
to clarify this subject. At one end of the continuum would lie values
that are widely and strongly held. Water resources protected by law
might be placed here. Through the Endangered Species Act, for example,
Congress has preserved the water habitats of certain birds, fish, and
other kinds of wildlife. Similarly, as noted above, the federal
government has asserted water rights in national parks, Indian
reservations, and other areas it has set aside for special purposes.
At the other end of the continuum would lie values that are so
abstract or impractical they are unlikely ever to command a large
constituency. Here, then, might be placed the sentiments of people who
cherish the image of free running streams and, regardless of the
impact, insist that no stream be impeded in its flow to the sea.
Between these extremes are a number of other publicly held values in
water. Examples of these are set out below.
Environmental, Recreational, and Scenic Values
Almost all western states have recognized public benefit in
preserving water flow in some stretches of perennial steams and rivers.
Protection of a certain level of streamflow is justified on several
grounds. It maintains bacterial activity that cleanses the stream,
dilutes municipal and industrial discharge into the stream, carries
potentially clogging sediment downstream, ensures survival of fish and
other aquatic life, and sustains vegetation in the bed and on the banks
of the stream. This vegetation, in turn, serves as habitat for wildlife
and waterfowl and acts as a filter by trapping polluting substances
carried in return flow irrigation water and other runoff.
Other values in retaining water in streams and rivers are shown in
the popularity of sport fishing, swimming, boating, rafting, and other
purely recreational activities. In addition, there is clearly some
value held in the enjoyment of the scenic quality of rivers, and of
watersheds generally.
Economic Values
In addition to directly sustaining physical life, water has other
properties that, directly and indirectly, sustain economic life. It is
among the most fundamental of the ``means of production''. As a source
of buoyancy and momentum, channeled water can carry heavy objects from
place to place, and can carry away and dilute the effluent of factories
and businesses. Quantities of captured water, converted to steam or
hydroelectric power, can serve multiple energy needs and at great
distances from rivers and reservoirs.
In the end, the availability of water determines the feasibility of
nearly all commercial enterprises. Some of these--in the West most
notably large-scale irrigated agriculture, mining, and oil
exploration--require large amounts of water. Other businesses that do
not themselves use great quantities of water depend on businesses that
do. Manufacturers of farm implements, wholesalers and retailers of seed
and fertilizer, trucking companies, packagers, advertisers, grocers and
their customers all rely on the products of farming. Similar dependency
networks radiate from the logging camps, mines, quarries, and oilfields
of resource producing western states. Thus, water underpins not only
the tax base of towns built around highly water-consumptive industries,
but, ultimately, the tax bases of remote, less water-consumptive,
cities.
Historic and Cultural Values
For many people, water has significant cultural value apart from
its importance as an economic commodity. In New Mexico, this value is
evident in the traditions of historic communities. Among the many New
Mexicans descended from aboriginal Indians and 16th century Spanish
settlers there are some who make their living by subsistence farming
and livestock grazing in the tribal pueblos or rural villages built by
their ancestors. In these enclaves of nearly extinct cultures,
community values in water are manifest in physical structures--the hand
dug ditches through which water can flow to all parts of the villages--
and in social structures--the respected practices of using and
maintaining the ditches. Field crops are irrigated and stockponds
filled by water diverted from nearby sources and carried through this
network of ditches, or acequia.
Adherents to these traditional ways of life revere water as a
sacred substance, the lifeblood of society. Reverence for the life-
giving power of water extends to everything associated with water. The
seasonal changes and corresponding changes in rainfall and river flow
are observed by time-honored rituals, dances, and feasts. These events,
along with the handicrafts, music, and other creative works the events
inspire, are the basis of a substantial portion of New Mexico's tourist
trade, which is one of the state's primary industries.
Conservation Values
Where water is scarce, the tendency to prefer present over future
uses is strong, and the duty to ensure usable water resources to future
generations, while generally acknowledged in principle, often suffers
in practice. Still, partly because the disastrous effects of
improvident resource exploitation are now being felt world wide, value
in long-term management of water and other resources is today expressed
more earnestly than in the past.
The Chairman [presiding]. John, thank you very much.
Our next panelist is Idaho Department of Water Resources,
Idaho Water Resources Research Institute, John Tracy.
STATEMENT OF JOHN C. TRACY, DIRECTOR, IDAHO WATER RESOURCES
RESEARCH INSTITUTE, AND THE IDAHO DEPARTMENT OF WATER RESOURCES
Mr. Tracy. Thank you very much for inviting me to present
at this conference.
With the Idaho Department of Water Resources and Idaho
Water Resources Research Institute, we were looking at
coordination, not just an issue of physical infrastructure but
also intellectual infrastructure. Many of the proposals that
were selected for presentation in this session did discuss
elements of this intellectual infrastructure: the importance of
forums for discussion of information on water resources,
collaborative decisionmaking models, platforms for sharing
scientific information.
But one thing that I have seen lacking and I think needs to
be resolved in the future is the issue of who is setting the
research agenda for investigating new technologies and
approaches to solving our water resources problems. In the past
the agency that comes to the table with the funds has pretty
much set the objective and has entered into a monologue with
its partners. What needs to happen in the future is this needs
to turn into a dialog.
Having a monologue has resulted in a variety of situations
where approaches to solving water resources issues have been
limited to a particular agency's or entity's vision, mission,
and this has resulted in ineffective use of limited resources
to create new solutions to our water problems.
If any additional resources are made available to address
the water resources problems of this Nation, these resources
must come with a new commitment to collaborative
decisionmaking, especially at setting agendas of what
approaches we are going to look at for solving our water
resources problems.
This new structure must allow implementers of water policy,
which are typically States and irrigation districts and water
districts, to play a significant role in deciding what resource
dollars we are going to invest into what technologies we are
going to look at. This pretty much falls along the line of what
the AWRA, the National Institute of Water Resources, and the
University Council of Water Resources have proposed, and that
is developing regional-based consortia for directing research
and development activities for water resources. I would
strongly encourage any activities in the future to pursue this
path.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Tracy follows:]
Prepared Statement of John Tracy, Director, Idaho Water Resources
Research Institute, and the Idaho Department of Water Resources
purpose
This proposal was prepared in response to the upcoming conference
hosted by Senator Domenici and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee and addresses the Water Supply and Resource Management
Coordination topic.
background
As identified in many recent publications, the United States is
facing severe challenges in our ability to meet the growing demand for
water in sustaining hydropower generation, agricultural based
economies, urban center development and our natural environment (NRC
2004, DOI 2003). A number of these publications have also pointed to
key factors that have led to these current challenges, which include:
(1) A lack of investment in water research and technology
development (NRC 2004);
(2) Long-term climate variability and natural hazards (AWRA 2005);
(3) A decline in our nations water supply and delivery
infrastructure (AWRA 2005)
(4) Loss of potable water supplies due to contamination (Lawford et
al. 2003); and
(5) A lack of a coherent national water resources strategy (AWRA
2005).
There are a number of entities across the United States that range
in size from federal agencies down to individual persons that will have
a role in addressing our nation's water problems. In general, the
Department of Energy's network of Laboratories, and some University
Research Centers, have the capability to research and develop broad
scale technologies that can increase water supplies and water use
efficiencies. Every state has at least one, and in many cases multiple,
academic institutions that have the capacity to provide increased
knowledge on effective mechanisms to manage our nation's water
resource's supply, demand and infrastructure. Many of these
institutions, through their state extension services, also have the
capacity to disseminate this information and aid state agencies in the
training of technologists that can apply this knowledge to existing and
emerging water resource problems. In addition, all states currently
have agencies whose missions are defined as managing and regulating the
quality and quantity of their water resources. Finally, the
implementation of new technologies will continue to be the domain of
private water users, municipal utilities or cooperatively managed water
or irrigation districts.
The State of Idaho is currently engaged in collaborative efforts to
resolve conflicts between senior surface water and junior ground water
users. The potential effects if the issues are not resolved and water
rights for the junior users are curtailed would be a tremendous impact
on state and local economies. Early estimates ranged from $750 to $900
million dollars annually. An initial framework for a long term
agreement has been proposed which is designed to effectuate a net
change of 600,000 to 900,000 acre feet of water annually. This is a
significant amount of water that will require both demand reduction and
supply enhancement. Many of the principles included in the framework
include the development of water conservation and supply enhancement
technologies. Partnerships have already been developed related to
building ground water modeling tools to quantify alternative management
scenarios. Now additional assistance is needed to research and develop
technologies and tools required to increase supply, reduce demand and
to monitor the effects of management changes on the surface and ground
water resources.
Any solution to our nation's water resources challenges will have
to not only construct a mechanism to coordinate the flow of knowledge
and information through all of these entities, but also be able to
demonstrate the value of this knowledge once it moves beyond
theoretical study and into practical application.
proposal
To address the issue of Water Supply and Resource Management
Coordination, it is proposed that funding for the development of
Regional Water Resource Technology and Research Consortia be provided
as part of the proposed legislation. These consortia should be
developed on a watershed basis and should be an equal partnership
between DOE laboratories; academic institutions, state water resources
planning and management agencies, and cooperatively managed water
systems in the development of the region's research and technology
plans. In addition, these consortia should identify an area within
their region that can be used as a `test bed' for newly emerging water
resources research and technologies. Each region's `test bed' will
serve as an experimental proving ground for new research and
technologies that address the region's water supply, water use
efficiencies, and water supply and demand forecasting methodologies. In
addition, these test beds can serve as the technology transfer and
educational platform for disseminating knew knowledge and tools that
address each regions water resources issues.
It is further proposed that the Idaho Department of Water Resources
and the Idaho Water Resources Research Institute be the lead non-
federal partners in a consortium with Idaho National Laboratory (INL)
representing the Central Regional DOE area as defined in the Proposal
to Establish the Energy-Water Technology Program with the Department of
Energy (Multi-Laboratory Energy-Water Nexus Committee 2005). This
consortium would encompass the Snake River, Bear River and Spokane
River watersheds. Within this region, it is proposed that the Eastern
Snake River Plain become the experimental `test bed' for the region.
The Eastern Snake River Plain is an ideal test bed in that there has
already been a significant amount of water resources information
collected in the area to support the East Snake Plain Aquifer
adjudication process, it underlies the INL, significant conjunctive
administration of surface and ground water issues have arisen in the
East Snake Plain area are now emerging in other watersheds in the
region, and there are a number of projects and research that are
currently being proposed and undertaken to help resolve the issues.
These include:
1. Developing and predicting the impact of a weather modification
program to increase water supplies on the Upper Snake River;
2. Development of water supply technologies and management
strategies for the Idaho aquaculture industry.
3. Development and implementation of advanced evapo-transpiration
prediction technologies for the East Snake Plain area;
4. Development of methods to improve the forecasting of reservoir,
runoff and groundwater contributions to East Snake Plane Water Supply.
The consortium would immediately begin work on researching and
developing technologies to reduce water demand and enhance supply in
the Snake River and Eastern Snake River Plain Aquifer. As theses
technologies and techniques are developed, they will be applied to the
Spokane River/Rathdrum Aquifer and Bear River basins. Both of these
areas cross state boundaries and will require expanding the
collaboration of Washington and Utah state agencies and research
organizations.
benefits
The approach described above would provide a structure to ensure
that new and effective water resource information and technology would
not only address the most important regional issues, but also ensure
that this information would move efficiently from being a theoretical
idea, through development of applied technologies, to implementation
and evaluation of these technologies where they are most needed. This
approach would leverage the existing strengths of entities already
engaged in the research, development, planning, management, regulation
and use of water resources, and would thus ensure both a cost effective
strategy, and a collaborative engagement of these entities, in solving
the nation's water resources problems. The INL is well suited to
support this effort and has a long history of involvement in water
issues and water resource research capability. The current drought and
controversy regarding water allocation and management in Idaho provide
an important opportunity for collaborative research and technology
development. The results and capabilities developed by the consortium
can be used and expanded to other western states that are dealing with
similar issues.
The Chairman [presiding]. Thank you very much.
We have American Water Resources Association, Gerry
Galloway.
STATEMENT OF GERRY GALLOWAY, AMERICAN WATER RESOURCES
ASSOCIATION
Mr. Galloway. Thank you, Senator. It is a distinct pleasure
to be here, and I want to thank you at the start for being the
keynote speaker at our AWRA National Water Policy Dialogue. I
would like to very quickly talk about the results of this
dialog, which was held in Tucson last month and brought
together 250 water experts, focusing on those things to deal
with water coordination.
The dialog surfaced three issues of importance. First, the
Nation's water users need to be addressed in an integrated
manner, focusing not on a single project but on programs and on
watershed and on basin level issues. The successful holistic
efforts that are currently under way in evolving programs to
restore the Everglades, manage the California Bay Delta, and to
protect coastal Louisiana need to be replicated across the
country.
Second, there is great need to reconcile the myriad laws,
executive orders, congressional guidance that have created a
disjointed, ad hoc national water policy and to clearly define
our 21st century national goals. Many important laws were
passed early in the last century when national objectives,
physical conditions, and the roles of Federal and State
governments were far different than they are today. Many of
these laws are in conflict, placing Federal, State, tribal and
local agencies in tenuous and sometimes very adversarial
positions. Reexamination of these laws would eliminate some of
these contradictions and confusion and certainly lead to far
more effective water policies and policy implementation.
Third, given the fiscal realities facing the Nation today,
there is need to more effectively coordinate the actions of
Federal, State, tribal, and local governments, as well as with
nongovernmental organizations in dealing with water. Directions
for collaboration instead of competition among organizations
will provide better and more fiscally efficient use of the
scarce resources we are trying to husband and will assist in
overcoming gridlock on key water programs.
These are the challenges, but there are also opportunities,
opportunities for such things as a national water assessment as
some look at a national water commission.
I want to thank you for the opportunity. I have a longer
statement which I will submit to the staff.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Galloway follows:]
Prepared Statement of Gerald E. Galloway, American Water Resources
Association
proposal for: discussion topic 1. water supply and resource management
coordination
improved coordination of water resources management at the local, state
and/or national levels: results of the national resources water policy
dialogue
The Second National Water Resources Policy Dialogue (WPD II), held
in Tucson, AZ on 14-15 February 2005, provided a forum for participants
from all levels of government, as well as public and private
organizations to discuss critical water resources challenges facing the
Nation and the policy choices that need to be made to effectively deal
with these challenges. The second dialogue was a follow-up to the First
National Water Resources Policy Dialogue held in September, 2002 in
Washington, D.C. Like the first dialogue, WPD II was national in scope,
but because of its location, had a greater emphasis on western water
issues.
Convened by the American Water Resources Association (AWRA), the
dialogue was sponsored by nine federal agencies within the Departments
of Agriculture, Defense, Interior, and Commerce, and the Environmental
Protection Agency. In addition, 39 organizations representing a broad
spectrum of water resources interests co-sponsored the dialogue. The
dialogue was attended by over 230 persons representing a broad spectrum
of government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and academia.
Background: The Water Challenge
The growth and continued prosperity of our economy, the protection
and security of our public health, and enhancement of our quality of
life were made possible by past infrastructure investments that now
provide municipal, industrial and agricultural waters, navigable
waterways and ports, hydropower production, water-based recreation,
sustainment of our natural environment, and protection from floods and
hurricanes. The First National Water Resources Policy Dialogue held in
Washington, DC in 2002, reported that the Nation faced serious water
problems and conditions have not improved. Recent droughts have
resulted in annual losses of over $5 billion and drought mitigation
planning is moving slowly. Conflicts among States over water use and
allocation are growing. EPA rates our coastal ecological and water
quality conditions as fair to poor with no improvement over the last
two years. More than thirty years after the passage of the Clean Water
Act, beach closings abound. The States reported in 2000 that nearly 40
percent of out rivers and streams did not meet water quality standards
and since then, EPA, because of a lack of State funding for monitoring,
has questioned the reliability of even those assessments Floods losses
continue to grow and approach annual damages of $6 billion and an
average loss of 80 lives. The American Society of Civil Engineers
continues to give sub-standard grades to our aging water
infrastructure--ports, waterways, hydropower facilities, water and
waste water treatment plants--and our efforts to protect rare and
endangered species and restore ecosystem deficiencies seriously remain
under-funded. Water is our most precious natural resource.
Dialogue Outcomes: Four Key Water Resources Challenges and Two Cross-
Cutting Issues
The participants in WPD II identified four significant--and very
much interrelated--water resources challenges facing the nation, noting
the close link to similar challenges identified in the first water
policy dialogue. Additionally, two issues--financing water resources
improvements, and public education needs--run through all the
challenges. Each challenge and cross-cutting issue is summarized below.
The four challenges:
1. Promoting More Integrated Approaches. There is a need to address
the Nation's water issues in an integrated manner, dealing not with
single isolated projects but with programs and watershed-level
problems. The cooperative and holistic efforts evidenced in the
programs to restore the Everglades, deal with the California Bay Delta,
and protect Coastal Louisiana need to be replicated across the country.
Participants generally concluded that integrated management is the key
to effectively resolving water resources problems. Characteristics of
integrated water resources management include using systems approaches
and comprehensive GIS-based data to understand the connection between
natural and man-made systems; analyzing water resources problems on
basin or watershed scales; striving to achieve multiple goals and
purposes using water resources in a balanced manner; and using
collaboration across all levels of government and with all stakeholders
to find appropriate solutions. Participants noted there are many
obstacles to achieving integrated approaches. Those most frequently
discussed include the following:
The absence of a clear policy framework for making decisions
about water resources
The presence of multiple, often conflicting, agency mandates
and priorities
The lack of coordinating mechanisms and forums for dealing
with differences among agencies, and among stakeholders
The lack of adequate scientific data to permit basic
understanding of complex physical and biological issues, and to
facilitate good decisions
2. Harmonizing/Reconciling the Current Ad-Hoc National Water
Policy. There is a need to reconcile the myriad laws, executive orders,
and Congressional guidance that have created the current disjointed ad-
hoc national water policy and clearly define the 21st Century goals and
values that should be met. Many important laws were passed early in the
last century when objectives and physical conditions were far
different. Many of these documents conflict with each other, placing
executing federal departments in tenuous situations creating disharmony
among states and localities. Participants felt too many conflicting
goals and mandates are being pursued at the Federal level. Priorities
are too often pursued in isolation and create needless conflict and
gridlock. Participants called for clarification of roles and
responsibilities among federal agencies, for establishment of a clearer
vision for uses and priorities for the nation's water resources, and
for the development of coordinating mechanisms to harmonize and
reconcile policy differences before they lead to gridlock. Many
participants believe that a national commission is needed to undertake
the necessary recommendations for improving our current ad-hoc policy
situation.
3. Developing Collaborative Partnerships. The fiscal realities
facing the nation underline the need to more effectively coordinate the
actions of federal, state and local governments in dealing with water.
Collaboration instead of competition will provide more effective and
fiscally efficient use of scarce resources and assist in overcoming
decision gridlock on key water programs. The water resources decision-
making environment is extremely fragmented and complex. It is marked by
different laws and authorities to address different and sometimes
conflicting purposes (water supply vs. drinking water treatment vs.
endangered species vs. navigation, etc.), different levels of
government with overlapping responsibilities, and a wide array of
stakeholders with diverse values and view on water resources. In the
absence of integrating mechanisms and problem-solving forums when
conflict among agencies, governments, or stakeholders occur, litigation
becomes the way of resolving differences leading to delays, lost
resources, and limited ranges of options. Participants wanted to see
all levels of government working in collaboration to achieve
sustainable water resources solutions to critical issues. They noted
that incentives need to be put in place by government to encourage
greater cooperation among agencies. Dialogue participants strongly
supported more partnerships and collaboration to create productive
opportunities for resolving water resources issues:
Integrate water quality and water quantity management--they
aren't separate and shouldn't be treated independently;
Establish/invigorate forums to resolve differences in
federal agency policy and mission focuses and to deal with
multi jurisdictional coordination, interstate, and cross
jurisdictional water management issues;
Cut across boundaries at all levels--encourage federal/
state/local partnerships to address water resources
comprehensively and in an integrated manner.
Determine how best to assign the ``lead facilitator'' or
``lead integrator'' role in collaborative frameworks.
4. Information for Sound Decision Making. The nation is blessed
with access to a superb scientific capability and cutting-edge
information technologies. These capabilities need to be focused on
supporting water policy decision makers as they carry out their
challenging responsibilities. Participants at the dialogue concluded
that decisions on the uses of America's water resources must be based
on good science and complete information. Science and information need
to be available to all stakeholders and responsible authorities so that
decisions can be made in open, collaborative ways in a trusting
environment. Many participants believed that information on water use,
availability, water quality, and results being achieved in pollution
control, as well as projections on water demand and use need to be
better coordinated and integrated at all levels so that appropriate
information can be marshaled for integrated water management and
problem solving.
The two cross-cutting issues:
1. Financing Water Resources Improvements. Our nation's water
resources infrastructure--its ports, channels, flood control works,
irrigation systems, water works, distribution systems, and treatment
facilities--provides a foundation for our economic prosperity and
quality of life. Yet funding for these vital systems is not keeping
pace with the repair, replacement, and renovation requirements. There
is a need for innovative cost-recovery, pricing, and financing
mechanisms to address infrastructure funding needs. Participants in the
dialogue recognized that there are many competing national requirements
for public funds. Many felt frustration that the water resources
community has not done a good job of conveying the criticality of
issues and the risks associated with continued under-funding of the
nation's water infrastructure. Others pointed out that in the climate
of fiscal austerity there has of necessity been greater prioritization,
conservation, public-private partnerships, reliance on market forces,
and other innovations in cost recovery and funding mechanisms than
would probably have occurred if resources were plentiful. These
innovations have been helpful; however, most agreed that additional
funding for water infrastructure improvements must become a national
priority. Some called for a national assessment as a means to
comprehensively identify water resources needs and funding
requirements.
2. Educating the Public and Public Officials about Water Resources
Challenges. Much of the public at large and many public officials lack
an understanding of the water resources challenges facing the nation.
An education program must be conducted in parallel with efforts to
address the nation's water resources challenges. Participants
continually stressed the need to better educate/inform the public as
well as decision makers in local, state and federal governments about
the conflicts and limitations associated with water availability and
use. Topics in need of coverage include: the value of water, real cost
of water, environmental consequences of use, trade-offs associated with
different uses, importance of balancing needs and uses, availability of
supplies vs. demands, risks associated with an aging infrastructure,
importance of regional solutions to water use, long-term consequences
of unwise use, and impacts of political/jurisdictional decisions/
differences.
Calls for Action
Congress and the Administration were called upon to provide the
leadership for achieving the needed direction suggested by the key
challenges and cross-cutting issues. Repeatedly mentioned by
participants in this vein were the following actions:
Develop a national water vision: Working with all levels of
government and the private sector, lay out a framework for the
future for water resources; address competing goals and
objectives, and establish broad priorities for resource
expenditures.
Formulate policy principles for translating the vision into
action: Focus on shared responsibilities at all levels of
government, as well as the private sector for addressing our
water resources challenges in an integrated, holistic, and
cooperative fashion.
Insist that appropriate coordination and cooperation takes
place: Federal agencies must work together more
collaboratively, and with other levels of government about
water resources issues.
Main Conclusions
On balance, WPD II had a hopeful tone. Participants and panelists
all acknowledged that the nation is facing a wide array of daunting
water resources challenges--making adequate water available for
economic growth and other needs, allocating water to competing uses,
maintaining and improving water quality, rehabilitating an aging water
infrastructure, balancing economic needs for water with ecosystem
requirements, etc. However, the watchwords of the first national water
policy dialogue--integrating efforts, building partnerships, and
addressing problems in a comprehensive manner--were much in evidence as
participants described successful and innovative solutions to pressing
water problems. A key conclusion, from WPD II then is that the themes
and recommendations for responding to water challenges put forth in the
first dialogue are working and need continued support and nurturing.
The Second National Water Policy Dialogue was a significant event
that can help propel the United States forward to confront serious
water resources challenges. The first and second dialogues have made a
good beginning, but next steps are crucial to sustaining the progress
achieved. National groups like the AWRA can continue the dialogue, and
agencies can improve efficiencies and inter-agency cooperation and
collaboration, but improving, harmonizing and reconciling the troubling
and difficult policy issues we now have will require Congressional and
Administration action.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Now, we are on schedule. These witnesses are available if
anybody wants to ask them or if any of you do.
Let me yield to any Senator that might have a question. We
have additional panels, but you are surely welcome to ask.
Senator Smith.
Senator Smith. Mr. Underwood, what would it take for
desalinization to be cost effective in more coastal areas?
Mr. Underwood. There is two areas that you look at, I
think, in terms of desalting. One is energy and the other is
pretreatment that determines the cost on desalting. The other
aspect is, if you look at desalting just from saline water or
are you looking at it from brackish water or urban water? So
those alone--if you are looking at how to recycle more urban
water, it allows you to do it at a reduced cost. But it is
attaching the pretreatment, looking at the pretreatment and the
energy, making it more practical, make it more cost effective.
Like I said, it is applied not just to saline water bodies,
but we should look at other water bodies that we can
potentially include within the water supply, recover it into
the water supply.
Senator Smith. Is it proceeding? I mean, is this going on
or is this being studied?
Mr. Underwood. I think there is a lot of efforts. At
Metropolitan Water District we encourage--a lot of times we
will do things through incentives. We will pay so much money
per acre-foot to help buy down the cost. But that is not the
long run. You cannot just be buying down the cost.
You are making those investments so that the research will
make it more practical and more cost effective, and it is going
on.
Senator Smith. On another subject, is California taking a
comprehensive look at all the environmental impacts of all of
its water transfers?
Mr. Underwood. Say that again?
Senator Smith. Is California taking a comprehensive look at
the environmental impacts of all of its water transfers?
Mr. Underwood. If you look at where the water hubs are in
northern California, one is the Sacramento, the Bay Delta area,
and that is being addressed in terms of restoration. If you
look at the Colorado, like I mentioned earlier, the lower
Colorado, that is going under a multi-species program which was
just signed that looks at 27 species, provides for existing and
future operations, but most importantly it also provides for
the conservation of the species.
Senator Smith. Thank you.
Tom Davis, I agree with you on the need to maintain
agriculture in the West. Does the efficiency of water use vary
throughout the West and how much from State to State?
Mr. Davis. Efficiency in water use varies I think from
every irrigation district to irrigation district. One thing we
need to keep in mind with water efficiency or water
conservation, particularly in the use of surface water in areas
where conjunctive use of surface and ground water exists,
oftentimes conservation can be carried to the extreme to where
it might impair downstream surface diverters who might be
senior.
Senator Smith. In what way?
Mr. Davis. I will give you a good example that exists on
the Pecos River in New Mexico. The Pecos is largely supplied by
underground discharges from aquifers that are under pressure
and as the years went by and those aquifers were tapped for
irrigation, it was flood irrigation. A lot of return flow
occurred from that flood irrigation to the river and it
supplied the diversion for downstream senior diverters, which
once before the wells were drilled were supplied by the aquifer
discharges. Now they are supplied by the wells being the return
flows from the irrigation.
As more and more efficient irrigation is applied there,
such as the new LEPA systems, that is very good for areas like
the Ogallala Aquifer where you are mining an aquifer, but in
this case, where there is an intricate balance between the
aquifer and the surface flows, as you become more efficient in
applying your water from the underground wells there is less
return flow. So in effect, water conservation is impairing
downstream diverters' supplies.
So it is not a real clean--conservation is not a real
clean-cut situation. It has to be looked at in each individual
case to really understand what is workable and what is not.
But yes, all agriculture use should be applied as
efficiently as possible without impairing downstream diverters.
Senator Smith. So are they going back to flood irrigating
or are they----
Mr. Davis. We are waiting for the State engineer to sort
that out.
Senator Smith. Obviously, how they irrigate and how States
use it depends on the soil, the crops and everything they are
using. But your point is very well taken, that it is like
squeezing a balloon. You blow it up somewhere else, I suppose.
Can you identify for me any Federal programs or what
Federal programs are most effective at helping farmers use
waters efficiently?
Mr. Davis. I think for sure traditionally in the West the
Bureau of Reclamation has had the greatest involvement in
developing the projects and in being a source of knowledge for
districts to improve their use of water, to become more
efficient in measuring water and applying water to the land.
Obviously, a lot of irrigation districts have grown beyond that
because of demand. We realize that if we become more efficient
water can be used in other ways and can be used through drought
periods.
I think some of the farm programs have been very helpful in
the past. In the area that I am familiar with, most of the
benefits from those type programs have been reaped, have been
used. I am not sure that additional benefits are out there to
the extent they once were for individual farmers to make
improvements, such as laser leveling or concrete lining or
installing more efficient delivery systems. I think most of
that has been done.
But those projects in the past, the Great Plains Project
and the Equip Program, have been very helpful. I am not sure
there is a lot of good left in those.
Senator Smith. And they are done. I mean, they are already
accomplished.
Mr. Davis. Most of that work has been done, and would not
have been done without those programs.
Senator Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Bingaman.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you very much.
Mr. Galloway, you talked about the need to have a new look
at all of these complex water laws and the disagreements among
them. Back in the 1960's the Congress legislated into being a
thing called the Public Land Law Review Commission that had the
job of looking at all the public land-related laws and trying
to make sense out of them and then make recommendations. Would
you think it would make sense for us to have a Public Water Law
Review Commission that would do the same thing with regard to
the water laws? Do you have any thoughts on that?
Mr. Galloway. Yes, sir. That is certainly a minefield, as
water law is evolving. But it does point out the challenges
that you face today. In the dialog there was clear concern over
the variety of laws and the change of the laws that are taking
place to meet the new challenges, the issues that have just
been raised by Mr. Davis.
So there is a need for somebody to come together and bring
that together. If it could be done on a regional basis in some
cases, that might be very useful. Clearly, the need for a look
at how all of the national water laws fit together is something
that the dialog found to be very important.
The Chairman. Senator Bingaman, would you yield?
Senator Bingaman. Sure.
The Chairman. I think maybe we ought to ask all of you a
similar question to what Senator Bingaman asked of you. Could
you answer the question as to whether you think a national
resource commission, national water commission to examine the
water issues, should be established? I think the AWRA
recommended that?
Mr. Galloway. Yes, sir. Our letter to you and to the
President, the Speaker, recommended that there be a national
water commission to examine not only the water laws themselves
specifically on the use of water, but the entire issue of how
these laws fit together.
Senator Salazar. Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator.
STATEMENT OF HON. KEN SALAZAR, U.S. SENATOR
FROM COLORADO
Senator Salazar. Just as a footnote to the chairman's
question to all of you, here is what I would ask you to focus
on as well. I was on the National Water Commission along with
my good friend John Echohawk, who I see in the audience, back
in the 1990's. Frankly, I think that was a lot of time and a
lot of expense and in the end it amounted to nothing. So
sometimes when they see us getting together in these water
summits or water conferences, I think that we end up launching
off on doing studies and forums and ultimately do not get to
any kind of result.
So as you answer the chairman's and Senator Domenici's and
Senator Bingaman's question, I would like you to reflect, if we
do move forward with some kind of a national water commission
or forum, how do you make it effective so we do not repeat the
mistakes of the past?
The Chairman. Very good.
Senator Bingaman, you led off.
Mr. Galloway. I would just comment, Senator, it needs to be
very focused. It needs to be founded on good science. We have
not had a national water assessment in nearly 30 years. To get
some science behind some of the decisions that are being made,
and it cannot be all over the place. It has got to be focused,
and I think that is the worry, that it would go too far.
The Chairman. We will go around the table if you have a
comment. If you do not, you do not have to.
Mr. Tracy. No, I do have a comment on this. I think it is a
real good point, and I think to make it effective what we would
have to do is avoid the top-down philosophy. That is that the
national water commission I would not see as having a role of
leading anything, but rather facilitating, and all of these
would have to be done on a very regional basis and probably a
large watershed basis. So you would have one for the Snake, one
for the Columbia, one for the Colorado. And that they would
focus, as I think Mr. Davis had pointed out, in a very regional
fashion, where the expenditures of the study dollars, the
direction that the studies would take, would be in essence the
authority that would be held at a regional basis, which would
actually be a collaboration between Federal, State, irrigation
district, water district, that really had teeth in it.
Then I think you would find it effective, where the Federal
water commission would be nothing more than an organization to
help facilitate those studies.
Mr. DuMars. I concur with what John said, but I also concur
with what Senator Salazar said, that these national commissions
and big long reports can just gather dust. But it really would
be useful if we could focus energies on management of water on
the watershed or common aquifer basis, and within those
watershed regions have the States produce their part of the
plan. We have got the water resources research institutes at
the universities who could be coordinating the State engineers
to create the study.
But I think it is important that the product be clear from
the beginning, that it is not just an abstract discussion of
what is out there. Rather, it ought to be focused, what would
be some things that could be done to make things better. Those
things would include in my view an accurate analysis of all of
the demands for the water, and including in that demand
analysis, as I said in my earlier remarks, include demands that
are more than just current topical or popular demands, like
growing cities and keeping water in streams, but long-term
support of agriculture, long-term support of energy
development, so that you had a set of end uses that you would
define for the region and a set of processes, but the net
result would be a cohesive regional description of that
watershed and that basin which could then become part of a
water atlas that people could access on the web. I think that
would be very useful and the laws would naturally integrate in
there.
But I think most people--certainly I think I am aware of
most of the water laws in the Western United States, but that
does not make me an expert on the institutional problems that
you face at the regional level. So I concur with John as to its
content.
Ms. Birnbaum. I am actually torn over the answer to this
question, because, as our submission actually to this
conference indicated, there was a terrible split, kind of
represented by Senator Smith's chart, among the different
jurisdictions of committees, different agencies doing different
pieces of water policy, an artificial dichotomy between water
quality and water quantity, which really cannot be split.
It would be wonderful to have somebody come down and do a
real national review, but it is an enormous, incredibly complex
problem, and it instantly leads me to Senator Salazar's
question: How do you focus it and how do you make it effective?
I just do not know how you can define it in a way that will
actually produce an effective result.
If what you want is an assessment of demand and a fairly
accurate projection of demand, you can do that. That is a very
limited piece. But a very broad commission to try to look at
everything we are doing with water policy would be an enormous
challenge. Even the Western Water Policy Review Commission was
only a narrow piece of the puzzle and it came out with
recommendations that have yet to be acted on.
The Chairman. Go ahead.
We are not taking your time, Senator Bingaman.
Ms. Kassen. As a Coloradan, I agree with the good Senator
from Colorado that we do not need another national policy
commission to set Federal water law policy, in part because, as
all of you gentlemen know, the allocation of water is done at a
State level. So one of the reasons that the Western Water
Policy Review Commission, some of those recommendations have
not been enacted, is that it would be complicated and it would
get into areas where the States see that they have
jurisdiction.
That said, I do think that there is a role for the Federal
Government and maybe, Senator Salazar, if you think about
technology development and research and environmental values,
one of the things that the experience that we had in Colorado
with the SWSI showed is that local planning is pretty good, but
there are some gaps and we do not have enough information about
which environmental values absolutely need to be protected, how
much water is necessary to do that, how we get to where we need
to be.
From that standpoint, I do think that Federal resources
would help solve some of the gap problems, not just the gaps in
terms of ensuring that growing cities have what they need, but
also the gaps in terms of how do we satisfy the environmental
needs, how do we protect the remaining fisheries that are out
there.
Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Tom, you are next. Could we try to make them brief now?
Mr. Davis. I will try to be as brief as I can be.
I think Federal dollars are spent, better spent, other
places. I think a lot of this knowledge is there. We have
interstate river compacts on every river in the West, and
obviously the States have a role of allocating the water in the
States and within each State. I think the Federal funding
should look more at developing technology similar to what is
being there on the desal plant that is going in at Alamagordo,
New Mexico. I think those are the type projects that maybe the
Federal dollars should look toward, overall technology
increases that will help all of us.
The Chairman. Mr. Kuharich.
Mr. Kuharich. Mr. Chairman, the Statewide water supply
initiative identified three key findings and all three of them
had a Federal nexus. The first one had to deal with Federal
funding. Federal and State funding was going to be necessary in
order to meet some of the supply gaps that were going to
develop between now and 2030.
The second one was permitting. Permitting was identified as
one of the primary implementation hurdles to any water supply
project.
The third one was the issue of environmental and
recreational demands for water, which are growing in Colorado,
I think as with all Western States. There the problem is one of
cost. Once you mitigate the project, if there are any other
enhancements involved environmental or recreational uses have
no way of generating the revenues to pay for those
enhancements.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Mr. Underwood.
Mr. Underwood. I think there is a need to have a national
energy--national water strategy. They all go hand in hand, I
guess. Water strategy, primarily looking at how do you direct
the research, how do you direct the new technologies, is
precipitation management viable for the United States, is
vegetative management a viable tool.
So some of these, if you look at a national energy
strategy, you are advancing things, the tools that can be used
by individual States or in the river basins. Assessments or
looking at integrated planning, I do not know so much about
assessments, but I would look at the integrated planning, not
so much the assessment within an area but how do you--what is
the best approach that you should be using for river basins or
regions as a whole.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Senator Bingaman, if you want to follow-up.
Senator Bingaman. Let me just ask one other question, Mr.
Chairman. My impression is that when we talk about coordination
of water management and integration of water management, one
area that we all know exists, but I think has gotten way too
little attention, is this whole issue of the mining of
underground aquifers. You go State to State, each State has a
whole different set of rules either governing this or not
governing this.
For example, Texas has a whole different set of laws. They
have no limits on underground mining, mining of underground
aquifers. We have major limits in New Mexico. When you bring
the subject up and say, what are we doing about the depletion
of the Ogallala Aquifer, people say: This is a States' rights
issue. Well, at some point we are not going to have any water
on the New Mexico side because we have allowed Texas to pump it
all out. I do not know that it is going to be an adequate
explanation at that point to say that was a States' rights
issue.
I think the same thing on transboundary water or
transboundary aquifer assessment that we are trying to get done
on the U.S.-Mexico border. Some way or another we need to start
looking at the underground resource and recognizing that we are
not fighting about what is coming down the river near as much
as we are fighting about what is being pumped out of the
ground.
I do not know the extent to which any of those issues are
getting addressed. My sense is they are not getting addressed
very effectively. Chuck, maybe you have some thoughts on that.
Go ahead.
Mr. DuMars. I think they are not being addressed
effectively. They are being addressed on a State by State basis
with different degrees of interest depending on the State. But
as I said in my statement, there is an unavoidable analogy to
our oil reserves. When you mine ground water, it is gone, and I
think that there is no place that we have tried--I personally
have worked in the Juarez-El Paso area for years and worked on
draft compacts, international compacts for ground water mining
legislation or parallel legislation. It is now at a crisis
point in the frontera, in the border there, and it is now--in
the Ogallala and other places we are now faced with a choice,
are we going to save water for future generations or not?
When it becomes national in scope, I think there is a
national interest there in making, facilitating agreements that
reach consensus on how we treat these aquifers.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Well, I want to just make a point and if any of you want to
comment that would be fine. Then I will yield to any other
Senator.
I keep hearing use of the words, words like we need to
develop technology, the technology of producing good water from
saline, cleaner water from water that has pollutants in it. I
think that is one of the big things we could address. I am of
the opinion that the Federal Government could set up some
centers of technological excellence with reference to the
application of science and technology to various water
problems.
We are going to try that this year and we will try to
extract a little additional testimony from some of you on how
that might work. What we were thinking about was maybe four
centers in the United States built around a national laboratory
and a university, with private sector input, a certain amount
of dollars, managed in some way so that everybody was working
toward the same goals, maybe some duplication but to
disadvantage the idea of everybody doing the same thing, which
we tend to do in research.
Do any of you have a feeling about that kind of thing as an
idea? And then I will yield quickly to the other Senators.
Anybody?
Mr. Underwood.
Mr. Underwood. I think it is a good idea, because you
cannot do all of the research in one area. A lot of it, you may
even have--you are going to produce a solid or a sludge that
you are going to have and so you have the disposal of the
byproduct of even the improved water treatments. But water
treatment, if you look at cleanups, if you look at meeting the
Safe Drinking Water Act, you go through the recycling,
etcetera, all of those have a water treatment component, and
what we are trying to do is how do you reduce that cost to make
it more effective.
But when you do that, when you remove something, then you
have to dispose of it. So I think you need to do the adequate
not just on the treatment itself, but on the disposal.
The Chairman. John.
Mr. Tracy. Yes, I think that is a very good idea, and I
think the regionalization of the research centers is very
important because of the different physical circumstances that
exist in the different regions that are water-short, especially
in the Western United States, and having some type of
technological centers where you have a combination of the
State, the universities, Federal agencies, would really be a
good focus for directing the activities.
The Chairman. Yes?
Mr. Kuharich. Mr. Chairman, briefly, I think it is
important to separate out the water policy, which has
traditionally been a States' rights issue, from water research,
which I think can benefit everybody.
The Chairman. Okay. Any other Senators? Yes, Senator
Salazar?
Senator Salazar. I have just a quick question and that is--
before I do that, let me just say to Rod Kuharich and to
Melinda Kassen, welcome here to Washington from Colorado and
thank you for the good work that both of you do back there.
My question is to Dennis Underwood and to Rod. That is a
question about transfers of water from agriculture to municipal
uses. I think for all of us, especially in the West, what we
see happening in many of our States and our communities is that
you have agricultural communities that are devastated when you
have water moving to the economic uses that can afford to pay
the much higher dollar.
I know that MWD in southern California has been undergoing
some agreements with the agricultural community that has been
good for the cities and has been good for agriculture. Rod, I
think some similar things are under way in the State of
Colorado and I would like you to briefly just comment to the
panel on some of these sharing arrangements, because at the end
of the day, especially for those of us from the western part of
the country, we know that 90 to 95 percent of our water is
consumed by agriculture.
So one of the opportunities is how can we enhance our water
supply for municipal and other uses, but at the same time keep
from devastating rural communities that are dependent on water
supply for agriculture?
Mr. Kuharich. Thank you, Senator. That was not a plant. It
was a great question.
The Statewide water supply initiative addressed this head-
on. I think, to be blunt about it, if it is not new water it is
going to be ag water for development in Colorado. One of the
things we are facing which we identified is the need to develop
our unused compact allocations throughout the State, but also
to work with agricultural water in some sort of a cooperative
arrangement where we could get ag fallowing, where there could
be reliability to municipal providers as well as economic
security to the ag communities that remain viable through the
process.
I think you will find that Colorado will be moving toward
an idea like this probably as early as this summer, to try to
come up with projects and processes that are a win-win for
everybody in the State.
Mr. Underwood. We have had quite a bit of experience in ag
to urban transfers. What we try to do is really make it an
effective partnership. You are not changing water rights, you
are not changing land ownership, you are not losing prime
agricultural lands. You are doing it in a partnership.
Ag is facing, just like the water community, is facing a
lot of competition from the world down under. A lot of our
growers in California used to be able to control the markets
because of the wintertime, etcetera. But now the world down
under competes with that and so it is a harder life for them,
too.
So there is a way of putting together partnerships that
become effective without changing and losing prime agricultural
land. I will give you a few quick examples. Whether you are
doing on-farm improvements, are you doing system improvements,
are you doing long-term fallowing programs which allow for some
crop rotation, some lands that go out, that come back in and
are more productive than when they went out? You are looking at
some even where we have actually purchased some lands and then
leased them back to farming.
You also have 1-year water supply options. So there is a
variety of partnerships you can do with agriculture. Yes,
agriculture is one of the larger amounts of water that is
available, but you also need to sustain American agriculture.
So there are ways of doing both.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Any other Senators?
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I am sorry to all of you that I have missed the testimony
and I wish that I had had a chance to hear some of the
comments.
The question that I have relates to whether or not we are
at a point where we need to consider a national strategic water
reserve similar to what we have with our petroleum reserve.
When we recognize the vulnerability that we have as a Nation,
we think about things like oil. But think about what happens
when our water supply is threatened. Do we need to--are we at
that point where we have to have that discussion, that
conservation?
I do not even know who to throw this out to, but your
comments?
Mr. DuMars. Well, I talked a little bit about that in my
testimony. What I suggested was--I am Chuck DuMars from New
Mexico--was that the States at the State level--States are
beginning to evaluate their own reserves and make choices about
how much they are going to need for future generations and
looking at their mined aquifers and so on, and there has been
some testimony and discussion about the fact that I think it is
clear that the States are moving and that each State is moving
in that direction or needs to be encouraged to go in that
direction, in order to make sure we do have water reserves for
our energy production and for agricultural production.
I think that the States are evaluating that and looking at
that. We need to do that more. So I concur with your suggestion
that we need to evaluate the resources.
But what my testimony was was that I thought that the
States need to be encouraged to do that more and they are
beginning to look at that more, but over the next 10 years
there is going to be a crisis if we do not maintain water
supplies for our agricultural and energy production, at the
same time understanding what our environmental needs are and
trying to meet those needs.
Senator Murkowski. Well, certainly from a State like mine
in Alaska, where we have incredible water reserves, we are
sitting okay. We can take care of most of our needs. But in
some of the Western States where we know we have critical
shortages, it may not be so easy to look toward the future and
figure out how you are going to produce that reserve.
So I appreciate your State analysis. I am just wondering if
from a national perspective we need to think about that.
Senator Thomas [presiding]. Could we go forward now?
Senator Murkowski. She has got one comment.
Ms. Birnbaum. I just wanted to add one thing. Actually,
from New Mexico also, the State of New Mexico just passed a law
to create a strategic water reserve and the purpose of that
water reserve was to meet the State's needs both for compact
purposes with Texas and to maintain adequate in-stream flows
for endangered species.
One of the things that States are looking at in terms of
having a water reserve is making sure that they also have
enough water in rivers to maintain river ecosystems at the same
time that they meet all their uses. But New Mexico just passed
a bill on this.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Thomas. Thank you.
Thank you very much. I appreciate it and we are ready to
call our next panel. While they are being seated, let me say
this is called the ``Future Role of the Bureau of
Reclamation.'' The Bureau was established in 1902 to help
develop and settle the arid West through irrigation and
multiple use projects. Over 100 years later, the West is
largely settled, its population booming. Agriculture, urban,
and environmental needs now compete for a limited, sometimes
overallocated, water supply.
We have heard from our panelists that the Bureau is faced
with significant challenges, such as the impact of
environmental requirements on project operations, increasing
demands for non-agricultural uses such as M&I purpose and
ecosystem recreation uses, aging water infrastructure and new
security needs and funding for new projects.
The question for this panel: What should the Bureau's role
be in the 21st century? So as soon as we get settled here, we
will go forward.
Since my voice is not very good, would you give us your
name and whom you represent, please.
Mr. Semanko. Mr. Chairman, my name is Norm Semanko. I am
with the National Water Resources Association.
Senator Thomas. Thank you.
Mr. Atwater. My name is Richard Atwater and I am with the
WateReuse Association.
Mr. Tyrrell. Senator, my name is Pat Tyrrell, Wyoming State
Engineer, and I am here today invited by the Western States
Water Council.
Senator Thomas. Good. I recognize you.
Mr. Keppen. Senator, my name is Dan Keppen. I am the
executive director of the Family Farm Alliance. I am from
Klamath Falls, Oregon.
Mr. Buller. Mr. Chair, Senators, my name is Galen Buller
from the city of Santa Fe--I am sorry. Mr. Chairman, I am with
the city of Santa Fe, Water Division director.
Mr. George. Senators, I am Rick George and I am with the
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation in
Oregon.
Senator Thomas. The other side has gotten a little smaller,
I noticed.
Ms. Bach. This is pretty comfortable odds, I would say. I
am Maryanne Bach. I am the Director of Research and Development
for the Bureau of Reclamation.
Senator Thomas. Very well, and now the chairman has
returned.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Let us proceed. If you will start, Norm, and we appreciate
it very much.
STATEMENT OF NORM SEMANKO, ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL WATER
RESOURCES ASSOCIATION
Mr. Semanko. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, thank
you. It is my privilege to be here and thank you for providing
this leadership in looking at water issues from a national
level.
The National Water Resources Association strongly suggests
that our good partners for many years in the Bureau of
Reclamation have a strong and legitimate role well into the
foreseeable future. We have four primary suggestions in that
area.
No. 1, the first and highest priority in dollars and human
resources should be directed to the efficient and effective
operation of existing projects in such a manner as to honor
existing commitments and provide authorized benefits in a safe
and reliable manner. We think this is consistent with the
current Commissioner, John Keyes', direction to his staff and
we think that should be continued.
The basic operation and maintenance and safety of
impoundments is essential to ensure that the authorized
purposes and benefits of existing infrastructure continue in an
effective and efficient manner.
Second, Congress should clarify, reaffirm, Reclamation's
relationship to the States, the longstanding responsibility for
allocating water resources within their jurisdictions
consistent with interstate compacts and decrees, by affirming
again its longstanding policy, Congress's that is, of deferring
to the States with regard to allocation and administration of
water rights. This is reflected in section 8 of the current
Reclamation Act and again should be reaffirmed.
Third, with regard to aging infrastructure, there are many
projects that have met or exceeded their design life, having
been around for 100 years in many cases. They are in need of
modernization. Currently the Bureau does not have a program in
our view which enables water users to rehabilitate their
projects and pay off those costs over a reasonable period of
time. Such costs are currently considered operation and
maintenance costs and consequently must be paid back in the
year they occur. This is a problem that if not addressed will
result in severe consequences in the decade ahead.
Finally with regard to future development, few of us
envision a future infrastructure development program and
financing arrangement like the original reclamation program
which facilitated the development and economic growth of the
West, but it is time to recognize and address a new generation
of infrastructure development needs and financing realities for
the growing part of our country.
An essential element is a basin by basin needs assessment
of authorized but unfunded projects and projects in the
planning stages. This assessment cannot be developed without
the active involvement and leadership of western Governors,
water resource professionals, and State and local officials.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I have provided a copy of our
written comments to the staff. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Semanko follows:]
Prepared Statement of Norm Semanko, on Behalf of the National Water
Resources Association
role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century
Historical Perspective
The nation as a whole has come to take for granted the benefits
that flow from the omniscience and vision of the policy-makers who, at
the beginning of the 20th century created the federal/non-federal
partnership that settled the West--The Reclamation Program. Reclamation
projects authorized by Congress continue to provide numerous and
substantial benefits for the entire United States.
The Reclamation program was initially enacted with the passage of
the Reclamation Act on June 17, 1902. Essentially, the Reclamation Act
provided for the proceeds from the sale of public lands in 16 western
states to be deposited in a fund (the Reclamation fund) to be used for
the ``. . . construction and maintenance of irrigation works for the
storage, diversion, and development of waters for the reclamation of
arid and semi-arid lands in the said States and Territories . . .'' It
was one of several acts concerning the transfer and development of
public land in the Western United States. The Reclamation Act is bound
up with these other laws concerning the allocation, transfer, and use
of the nation's public lands. The exploration and settlement of the
west became a matter of great national interest in the latter half of
the nineteenth century.
As the Reclamation program changed throughout the early part of the
twentieth century, the combination of a simple message, clear vision,
and great leadership remained intact. In less than 40 years, the
Reclamation program evolved from single purpose irrigation projects,
funded by a revolving fund, with 10 year repayment periods, to complex
multi-purpose projects, funded by appropriations, with 40 year
repayment periods, and power revenues assisting in the repayment of
irrigation debt. Given these significant program changes, the program
message continued to be that of ``making the desert bloom,'' and the
basic purpose continued to be to promote regional economic development
by developing irrigated agriculture. The Reclamation program stayed on
this course until the late 1960s.
The Reclamation Program is vitally important to the West and the
Nation as a whole. Reclamation projects authorized by Congress provide
numerous and substantial benefits for the entire United States. Among
these benefits are: (1) flood prevention and protection totaling in the
tens of billions of dollars; (2) generation of substantial amounts of
hydroelectric energy using water as a renewable no-cost fuel source;
(3) delivery of irrigation water to hundreds of thousands of acres of
farmland in semiarid and arid regions that has increased and stabilized
agricultural production in those regions; (4) water-based outdoor
recreation facilities that provide recreation for millions of visitors
annually; (5) municipal and rural domestic water supplies for over 30
million people; (6) recharge of underground aquifers and water
supplies; (7) fish and wildlife habitat including new fisheries,
wildlife management areas, and hundreds of thousands of acres of
habitat and marshes throughout project distribution systems and
facilities; and (8) major surface water transportation.
mission obfuscation
Reclamation has never had a comprehensive Organic Act describing
its mission, much less recent revisions reflecting the evolving needs
of the west (unlike the National Park Service, the Bureau of Land
Management, and the Forest Service). Rather, its role and associated
authorities evolved through a series of individual project acts; many
Reclamation administrative acts concerning such matters as contracting,
financing, and general administration; the overlay of federal
environmental law; the waxing and waning of the federal commitment to
Indian programs; legal interpretation by Interior's legal staff, as
well as the courts, of the many, varied, and sometimes inconsistent
federal statutes associated with the Reclamation program; and the
direction provided by its own internal assessments and policy
directives. The absence of an organic act results in less clear
Congressional direction and contributes to the difficulty of providing
consistent program direction.
During the 1960s, three issues began to impact Reclamation's
``mission'' bringing focus to this lack of Congressional direction. The
first was a gradual reduction of strong Congressional leadership on
water issues. Members such as Senator Hayden and Congressmen Aspinall,
Johnson, Sisk, and Moss left office in the '60's and '70's. The
Reclamation program had fewer strong champions in the Congress and less
standing in the Department of the Interior. The second had been a
concern throughout the Reclamation era and involved questions of the
economic justification for further federally funded Reclamation project
development. The third issue concerned the environmental impacts
associated with Reclamation program activities
Reclamation's construction program was dropping off significantly,
and the planning program was moving away from traditional water
projects. Funding for the loan program was reduced and, ultimately,
virtually eliminated. Several projects were re-authorized (Garrison,
Central Arizona, Central Utah, Central Valley, Truckee Carson, etc.) to
reflect emerging fiscal, environmental, and/or Indian interest
resulting in a piecemeal widening of Reclamation responsibility. This
change in legislative direction by the Congress added credence to what
many in Reclamation viewed as a change in public interest associated
with the Reclamation program. Further, Reclamation's power marketing
and transmission program was transferred to the newly established
Department of Energy in the late 1970s.
From the 1930s to the 1970s, the power and construction programs
provided the funding stability required to run the Reclamation program
in the traditional manner. As these program functions were transferred
or significantly reduced, Reclamation managers found it more difficult
to support the historic organizational arrangements. Overhead costs
began to go up significantly. With a greater interest in cost recovery,
these cost fell, to a greater extent, on the largest remaining program:
operation and maintenance of exiting projects. Since O&M cost are
recovered from the water and power users in the year they are incurred,
this drove up costs to customers, creating another problem for
Reclamation and its user community.
Lacking clear Congressional direction on its mission in the form of
an organic act or some other form of overall policy guidance, and
recognizing all of these changes and the resulting effects on program
management, Reclamation's leadership went through a series of internal
assessments with resulting policy documents. These reviews and
documents include:
1987 Assessment
1988 Implementation Plan
1992 Strategic Plan
1994 Blueprint for Reform
1997 Bureau of Reclamation Strategic Plan, 1997-2002
In 1997, Reclamation published its five-year Strategic Plan
pursuant to the Government Performance and Results Acts of 1993. The
plan states three mission objectives:
1. Manage, develop, and protect water related resources.
2. Protect the environment.
3. Improve our business practices and increase productivity of our
employees
The objectives are supported by 18 strategies and five-year goals
associated with each strategy. (Interestingly enough, contract renewal,
which is a near-term vital interest to many Reclamation project water
users, is not even mentioned in the Strategic Plan.) The Strategic Plan
states broad objectives and numerous sub-objectives (strategies), and
includes ambitious five-year goals. The five-year plan includes
Reclamation's historic mission regarding facilities, operation,
maintenance, and dam safety. It incorporates environmental protection
as a fundamental mission of Reclamation. In many ways, it commits
Reclamation to being all things to all people, as it pursues its
mission and mission objectives.
The five-year Strategic Plan basically says that Reclamation will
continue its traditional activities, but with equal emphasis on
environmental protection and remediation. Recreation and Indian Trust
responsibilities are further emphasized as Reclamation objectives. The
problem is that there does not appear to be agreement in Congress or
among Reclamation project water users that 1) this is Reclamation's
future mission, or 2) this mission is being carried out at this time--
or can be carried out in the future-in an acceptable manner.
Given the significant additional responsibilities in the
environmental area imposed by the Congress, the renewed attention to
tribal obligation and the shifts in policy direction and institutional
change over the past 10 years, it is no wonder Reclamation is
struggling for a clear sustained direction. Reclamation can accommodate
adjustments to program direction from year to year and remain
effective. It has demonstrated this over the years. However, direct and
sudden reversals of program direction and organizational philosophy
have had a profoundly negative effect on the organization. A 20 percent
reduction in staffing and a loss of historical leadership and
institutional knowledge has also contributed to Reclamation's
instability.
role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century
Reclamation's ``mission'' has become so blurred over the past
twenty-five years that it is important for Congress to consider a
system of priorities for funding of the Reclamation's many programs. We
believe it is time for Congress to bring some clarity to the future of
the Reclamation program. There are several possible directions the
Reclamation program can move in the immediate future.
We strongly suggest that there is a legitimate role for Reclamation
into the foreseeable future. Reclamation manages over 350 high dams in
the west. Some agency needs to be administratively responsible for the
operation and maintenance of these facilities. Until--and unless--they
are transferred out of federal jurisdiction, this seems an important
and legitimate role for Reclamation.
Reclamation's history is entwined with the development of the West.
That development goes on today at an unprecedented rate, and is placing
significant pressure on a finite water supply. Ideally, Reclamation
should have sufficient resources to support the states by performing
the full range of functions that diverse western water interests are
demanding today. Regrettably, recent history has demonstrated that
fiscal and human resources are not unlimited. Therefore, the
Reclamation must focus its limited resources on priority projects and
programs. The following priorities are proposed:
The first and highest priority in dollars and human
resources should be directed to the efficient and effective
operation of existing projects in such a fashion as to honor
existing commitments and provide authorized benefits in a safe
and reliable manner.
The second priority should be the timely completion of
ongoing construction so authorized benefits can be realized
within a reasonable time frame. This includes pass through
funding associated with authorized construction projects
currently underway.
The third priority should be the funding or execution of new
activities or projects to provide expanded beneficial use from
existing facilities in response to increasing demands being
placed on western water resources.
The fourth priority should be funding and execution of
innovative new projects or activities.
The first priority is directed at protecting the existing federal
investment and honoring existing commitments by assuring the
uninterrupted and undiminished flow of authorized benefits from
existing projects. As long as the federal government insists on
retaining title to these project facilities, it must place their
operational integrity as the highest priority. This priority must be
fully funded or Reclamation risks unsafe structures and loss of project
benefits. Every effort must be made to identify means to fund this
priority, including off budget approaches. If Reclamation is unable to
fully fund this priority level, it should identify those facilities
with the least national interest and immediately initiate title
transfer to the local beneficiaries. To do otherwise is to create a
maintenance deficit that will never be overcome.
The second priority is to complete currently ongoing construction
activities in the shortest possible time frame. This serves two
interests. First, it will allow the public to realize the benefits
associated with the expenditure of taxpayer funds at the earliest
possible time. Second, it will minimize the cost of constructing the
project by reducing non-contract costs and the effects of inflation
associated with long construction periods. Any effort to discontinue
funding ongoing construction should be a result of an informed decision
by the Administration or the Congress and should not be a decision by
default.
The third priority is directed towards deriving the most public
benefit possible from exiting facilities. At the direction of Congress
and with the support of the states, additional project benefits can be
derived from existing facilities. The use of existing facilities to
meet new water needs is often the most cost effective and expedient.
These efforts should be supported by the existing project beneficiaries
and be consistent with the state water law.
The fourth priority includes new construction and other activities
not associated with existing projects or ongoing activities. There are
many good activities that may fall in this priority level and this is
not to say they should not be pursued. However, in these fiscally tight
times for Reclamation, these new activities should not be funded to the
detriment of the higher priority program activities. These new
activities may need to be funded from federal sources other than the
Reclamation program or from non-federal sources.
Along with prioritizing the Reclamation program, Reclamation must
continue to pursue efforts to reduce the cost of doing business.
Reclamation is making efforts to empower field offices and flatten the
organization, and should be encouraged to finish what has been started.
There remains room for significant improvement.
Reclamation must administer the projects under its jurisdiction to
achieve the benefits authorized and directed by the Congress. It is not
for Reclamation, but the Congress, to determine if there is a higher
purpose toward which the existing facilities should be used. Until--and
unless--the Congress authorizes these additional purposes, Reclamation
should dedicate its efforts to assure the effective and efficient
delivery of presently authorized benefits. As Congress considers
additional project purposes, current project beneficiaries must be
involved with and supportive of any legislation affecting their
interest in the project.
Lastly, as the Congress, the Administration, and the water
community deliberate the future of the Reclamation program, certain
actions need to be taken in conjunction with the program priorities
addressed above. They include the following:
Clarify Reclamation's relationship to the states' long-
standing responsibility for allocating water resources within
their jurisdictions, consistent with interstate compacts and
decrees. Reclamation should affirm its long-standing policy of
deferring to the states with regard to allocation of water
resources and administration of water rights.
Assure that Reclamation actions are consistent with its
authorities. Many, if not most, Reclamation projects have very
narrow project purposes, and cannot be expected to meet every
current interest in water without reconsideration by the
Congress.
Clarify the relationship and obligations to Reclamation
contractors, as opposed to other interest. Reclamation has
specific legal and policy obligations to Reclamation project
contractors. Reclamation has an obligation to consider the
concerns of others and address impacts of contracting. These
are not the same relationships and should not be treated as if
they are.
Develop incentive-based approaches to current water
allocation problems. Increasing demands are being placed on
Reclamation project water for wildlife, endangered species,
recreation, environmental remediation, etc. Rather than taking
this water from historic water users through regulation or
legislation, Reclamation should provide incentive based
approaches to resolution of water problems that ensure
provision of water for historic users, while responding to new
demands.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
We will proceed now with Mr. Atwater.
STATEMENT OF RICHARD ATWATER, WATEREUSE ASSOCIATION,
ALEXANDRIA, VA
Mr. Atwater. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee. Again, my name is Richard Atwater and I am
representing the WateReuse Association, and again I have a
written statement that I will submit for the record, but I will
be brief.
We likewise think the Bureau of Reclamation has a vital and
important role in the 21st century. Certainly, given that it is
103 years old and it has been around for over a century, it has
a strong, vital, historic role, and we would say that in the
future it needs to continue to provide strategically a
leadership role in those areas in the Western States where it
has really a very strong statutory authority, for example like
the Colorado River Basin. It needs to provide leadership in the
areas of innovative solutions, problem-solving, and importantly
I think, and I think the committee will be looking at that as I
heard the comments of the chairman, is the role in the
partnership of evaluating new technologies, new research and
development, and the application of that to solve our problems.
As others have already pointed out, we are not going to
create new water in the West except through the application of
new technologies where we reuse, recycle, and repurify waters
that historically were unusable.
So that clearly is what I think is a strategic role for the
Bureau. Short-term--and we can talk about the broader
perspective of how to approach that--the Bureau of Reclamation
now is partnering with the Department of Energy, Sandia Labs,
here at the WateReuse Research Foundation, and the American
Water Works Research Foundation to do a road map on
coordinating research. Certainly that is one example with your
new research centers, that we can expand upon that and using
that road map with these new centers of excellence would
certainly be an excellent approach to expanding that ongoing
effort.
Second, I would say that last fall through the omnibus
legislation Congress enacted the Council on Environmental
Quality to do a government-wide task force to look at the
existing programs and existing efforts in water recycling,
desalinization and such, to collaborate and coordinate.
Clearly, not only the Bureau of Reclamation, but EPA, the Army
Corps, the Department of Agriculture, and, frankly, in the
areas like desalinization probably the Navy does more work than
all the domestic agencies combined. That collaboration of
research I think would be clearly something that would be
useful and cost effective.
Then finally, let me just suggest that innovative
financing--certainly we have difficult budgets and historically
I think the targeted grants in the range of 10 to 25 percent,
for example, to Bureau of Reclamation with the highly
successful title XVI water recycling and desalinization
programs, that kind of program, where you are demonstrating and
developing new technologies to point out whether or not they
are economic, proven operational, the questions that members
asked about sea water desalinization. Well, the only way you
are going to learn from that is actually have operating one 5,
maybe 10 million gallon per day plants. And certainly
throughout the West, every major metropolitan area needs to
expand and stretch its supplies through water recycling and
reuse.
With that, again I will submit my comments for the record.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Atwater follows:]
Prepared Statement of Richard Atwater, WateReuse Association,
Alexandria, VA
2. role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century
The USBR was established in 1902 with a mission of ensuring
adequate water supplies for the developing West. Congress recognized
the need for multi-purpose water supply projects and authorized
municipal and industrial supply as a mission of the Bureau of
Reclamation in 1907. When the Bureau was established, the total
population in the 17 western states was approximately 11 million
people. In 2004, the population in the West totaled 97.2 million and is
growing rapidly. The mission of the Bureau in developing municipal and
industrial water supplies is even more critical today than it was 100
years ago.
The primary mechanism used by the Bureau to ensure adequate water
supplies in its first century of operation was to build dams for
storage of scarce water resources and the generation of hydroelectric
power with irrigation supplies. While the mission of the Bureau has not
fundamentally changed (although today the municipal and industrial
supply issue is much more critical than the historic emphasis on
irrigation supplies)--and need not change--in the 21st century, the
mechanisms of ensuring adequate supplies must be dramatically
different. The Bureau should play a leadership role in the development
of alternative water supplies (e.g., water reuse and desalination),
ensuring water use efficiency, and developing less costly and less
environmentally disruptive means of storage such as aquifer storage and
recovery (ASR) or groundwater conjunctive storage management (e.g.,
Orange County Water District's Groundwater Recovery Project). In many
cases this is true for several federally authorized projects: Southern
Nevada Water Project, Central Arizona Project, San Juan-Chama
(Albuquerque), and the Hoover Dam/MWD's Colorado River Aqueduct. The
Congress in 1986 recognized the need to augment the supplies of the
Colorado River to meet the future needs of the river basin, but in 1986
the emphasis was on large importation projects. Today, it is
appropriate for the Bureau to focus on water reuse, desalination, and
water use efficiency.
The Bureau should take a leadership role in cutting edge technology
to treat and reuse water. Title XVI is an example of a sound Federal
investment. Under this program, the Federal government provides no more
than 25% of the total capital costs while the local water agency
contributes 75% or more. Thus, the Federal government leverages
resource effectively, assists the local water agency with achieving an
enhanced credit rating, and assumes no long-term financial obligation
with operation and maintenance costs. The Title XVI program has
benefited many communities in the West by providing grant funds that
made these projects more affordable. The Federal cost share--although a
relatively small portion of the overall project cost--often makes the
difference in determining whether a project qualifies for financing.
Compare this to the historic Federal Bureau authorizations of the
Central Arizona Project, the Central Utah Project, and the Central
Valley Project which provided 100% upfront capital financing and long-
term subsidized repayment contracts (plus in some cases operating
subsidies for many years).
The USBR should collaborate with the CEQ Task Force (described in
the response to question #1) to address roles and responsibilities of
different Federal agencies in addressing western water problems in
collaboration with state and local governments.
The Chairman. You talked about an existing consortium. Tell
us, what was that again, the one that exists now?
Mr. Atwater. Yes. The Bureau of Reclamation, working with
Sandia Labs through the Department of Energy, with our
WateReuse Research Foundation and the American Water Works
Association Research Foundation over the last 2 or 3 years put
together a road map, a plan, if you will, on overall R&D. It is
a collaborative effort where our water users, the State of
California, the State of Florida for example, have contributed
substantial amounts of moneys to leverage the Federal
investment here in, in this case, like a four to one ratio with
outside funding.
Again, it is an integrated approach to looking at the
research and the application of technologies that will help
solve our water problems.
The Chairman. Let us proceed. We are going to take you now,
Patrick Tyrrell, Western States Water Council.
STATEMENT OF PATRICK T. TYRRELL, WYOMING STATE ENGINEER, ON
BEHALF OF THE WESTERN STATES WATER COUNCIL
Mr. Tyrrell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee. Good afternoon. Again, my name is Pat Tyrrell,
Wyoming State Engineer. However, today I have been asked to sit
and talk on behalf of the Western States Water Council and its
18 member States in discussing the future of the Bureau of
Reclamation.
The Bureau of Reclamation has an important and continuing
role in meeting present and future water supply needs in the
West. That role continues to evolve, from being a large builder
to a water and power purveyor and manager. I have three areas
where that role is most important, I believe. First of all,
rehabilitation, as Mr. Semanko mentioned, of existing projects,
necessary maintenance, and dam safety-related work must be a
top priority. Second, water conservation efforts will continue
to be essential. Third, the development of new supplies is
essential, using both storage and more innovative techniques,
such as water reuse, ground water recharge, desalinization, and
control of phreatophites, to name a few.
To fund this work, Congress could consider or should
consider increasing appropriations for the Bureau of
Reclamation projects and programs using the unobligated balance
in the Reclamation Fund. The actual unobligated balance at the
end of fiscal 2004 was over $3.8 billion and it is estimated to
grow to about $5.9 billion at the end of fiscal 2006. This fund
was created in 1902 and Congress intended these funds to be
used to meet the need for water development and management in
the West.
The Bureau's numbers for information today for
rehabilitation for aging infrastructure are about $645 million
for the foreseeable future and approximately $227 million over
the next 5 years for safety work. In fiscal 2004, $4 million
was directed toward Water 2025 initiative challenge grants,
while over 100 proposals were received, requesting more than
$25 million to help fund $98 million in needed western water
delivery system improvements. For fiscal 2005, the Bureau has
again received over 100 proposals, asking for in excess of $35
million for new projects with an estimated total cost of more
than $115 million.
Such programs and new legislative authorities need funding.
That again could be provided from the Reclamation Fund,
including these Water 2025 challenge grants, drought planning
and mitigation, small rural community needs, etcetera.
Finally, the Bureau and Western States must continue to
work in a partnership that meets the diverse needs of the
growing population. First, the Federal Government must continue
to respect State-granted property rights to water and the
rights of States to allocate and manage their water resources.
Second, the Bureau should adopt proactive non-regulatory
incentive-based approaches to managing water under its control
consistent with States' rights. Finally, Reclamation should
continue to pursue and fund work related to the existing
Bridging the Head Gate Partnership and drought planning and
preparedness activities.
On behalf of the Western States Water Council, I appreciate
the opportunity to join in this important discussion on the
future water needs of the West and the Nation.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Tyrrell follows:]
Prepared Statement of Patrick T. Tyrrell, Western States Water Council
proposal
Expand and fully fund Bureau of Reclamation programs to meet
identified needs.
preface
The Bureau of Reclamation operates hundreds of dams and reservoirs
in the West supplying water and power to millions of people, irrigating
millions of acres for food and fiber, providing flood control and
recreation, and maintaining instream flows for fish and wildlife
habitat, including anadromous and threatened and endangered aquatic
species. The value of federal Reclamation projects in assisting western
communities survive the continuing drought in the West, particularly
the Northwest, can not be overstated. Two of Reclamation's expressed
``mission goals'' are: (1) managing, developing and protecting water
and related resources to meet the needs of current and future
generations; and (2) operating and maintaining facilities safely,
reliably, and efficiently to protect the public investment.
Reclamation has stated, ``Our challenge is to balance and provide
for the new mix of resource needs in the West. . . . [P]roviding
recreational opportunities and protecting the environment have become
important to the public, while municipal and industrial development is
demanding more, high quality water. With Western population growth . .
. the future will be filled with greater demands on limited resources.
Balancing the needs in the West and providing water resources has
brought into focus our ability to manage existing water efficiently and
effectively, and to resolve conflicting needs through cooperation from
multiple stakeholders and customers.''\1\
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\1\ Draft 2000-2005 Strategic Plan, October 22, 1999.
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Reclamation's mission goals have been subdivided into a number of
long-term goals that include: (1) providing leadership in delivering
water and power; (2) increasing water use efficiency and availability;
(3) ensuring effective operations of facilities; and (4) operating,
maintaining and rehabilitating facilities to ensure reliability and
cost-effectiveness--to name a few. Its strategy for accomplishing these
goals lists several guiding principles that include: (a) the use of
broad based proactive conflict resolution methods; (b) continuing a
close working relationship with traditional water users, while forging
relationships with other users; and (c) promoting and using
partnerships to create sustainable solutions, leverage resources and
learn from others.
The Bureau of Reclamation and western state water managers,
represented by the Western States Water Council, have many common
interests. In a 1997 report for the Western Water Policy Review
Advisory Commission, the Council declared, ``In the arid West,
providing adequate water supplies to meet future demands continues to
be a priority.'' Making more water available for new and expanded uses
and increasing water use efficiency are critical, given the fast
growing population of the West, subsequent demands for water for
domestic and municipal uses, continuing agricultural water demands, and
increasing demands for water for environmental uses, particularly the
needs of endangered and threatened aquatic species. Reclamation has and
will continue to play an essential role in meeting western water
demands.
what should the future role of the bureau of reclamation be in the
west?
While the construction of large new federal dams and reservoirs is
unlikely for the foreseeable future, Reclamation faces an enormous
challenge related to its portfolio of aging dams and related
infrastructure. Dam safety must be a priority. Reclamation is also
actively pursuing programs to help irrigation districts and other water
users make the most efficient use of available supplies. The Council
supports this proactive, non-regulatory, incentive-based conceptual
approach to administering federal water conservation programs, and the
related ``Bridging-the-Headgate'' Partnership. We support the overall
objective of these activities, which is to work together as federal-
state-local partners for the sustained and efficient use of western
agricultural water supplies.
The Congress is considering reauthorizing and extending the Small
Reclamation Projects Act with more money for loans and grants for water
development. This is an important program which deserves congressional
support.
Interior's Water 2025 Initiative is an example of Reclamation's
efforts to address water resources challenges in the West before
conflicts reach a critical impasse, as in the Klamath River Basin.
Western states believe the scope of the program is insufficient to meet
the growing need. As Senator Domenici has declared, the appropriation
of $20 or $30 million a year in new money is woefully inadequate to
address our needs. However, the success in leveraging federal, state
and local resources through Water 2025's challenge grants is an example
of what can be accomplished if we are willing to work together. It
would appear that matching non-federal support could easily be found
for $100 million in federal money.
As discussed later in the statement on drought, the Council has a
long history of work in the area of drought planning and management. We
support Reclamation's efforts with respect to assistance for state and
local drought response and relief activities.
should the bureau undertake water supply augmentation activities?
The development and use of new water supplies to meet present and
future demands is a priority for western states. More storage is
essential. Reclamation has been and should continue to be a leader in
the development of a number of alternatives and technologies that
promise to help meet future water needs: (1) ground water recharge,
storage and recovery projects; (2) water reclamation and reuse
projects; (3) desalination; and (4) phreatophyte control, including
eradication of salt cedar. There may be other opportunities to increase
water storage and yields from wetlands/streambanks through better
management of state and federal lands and riparian zones. New
opportunities may exist for increasing the efficiency and yield of
existing federal, state and local water supply systems through project
modifications or re-operations. Further, new reservoirs and off-stream
storage projects should not be ruled out.
As explained in the Council statement on water supply, the Council
strongly supports federal legislation to provide technical and
financial assistance for small rural communities struggling to meet
their water supply needs. Legislation is needed to create a systematic,
integrated approach to investigating, authorizing and constructing
projects to meet rural western needs in close cooperation with State,
local and regional entities, as well as tribes. Existing authorities,
such as the Drinking Water State Revolving Loan Fund, are not
sufficient to meet the needs of small rural communities, which are
facing serious obstacles in securing the resources necessary to ensure
an adequate and reliable water supply for their future. New authority
and significant new funding is essential to better meet the needs.
what role should the bureau play with respect to
the west's (other) future needs?
Endangered species and western water management are and will
continue to be intertwined. Finding water for fish and farmers, as well
as growing municipal and industrial needs, within the parameters of
state water law and federal environmental law is a challenge that must
be successfully met. Reclamation and others are already deeply involved
in negotiating and implementing programs to purchase and lease water
for endangered species, provide incentives to restore and protect
habitat, build fish screens and fish ladders, etc. With respect to the
issue of dam removal, the engineering issues and legal and
socioeconomic issues, as well as functional alternatives to small and
large dams need to be carefully considered. Reclamation has experience
and expertise in these areas.
The needs of native American tribes and settlement of Indian water
rights claims is another priority concern for state and federal water
managers. As explained in a separate statement on the subject, the WSWC
has and will continue to support the successful negotiation and
implementation of settlements that provide certainty for all
stakeholders. The Bureau of Reclamations plays an important role in
achieving this goal.
The efficient, effective and safe operation of Reclamation
facilities is important. Moreover, state and local officials--in
cooperation with Reclamation and other federal water managers--together
need to look at water problems and opportunities to increase water
yields on a watershed or river basin basis. Participation by all
interested parties in grassroots watershed efforts holds the promise of
success in resolving many, but not all, western water problems--water
quality problems, as well as quantity problems.
Federal water project transfers to local ownership, as well as
operation, and the transfer of federal project and wheeling of
nonproject waters are also important areas for cooperative action
between Reclamation and state and local interests.
comments on funding mechanisms
The billion dollar question is how should Reclamation programs and
projects be funded? The President's FY06 budget request for the Water
and Related Resources account totals $802 million, down from $859
million appropriated last year. Further, the request anticipates that
off-setting receipts collected by the Western Area Power Administration
(WAPA) for operation and maintenance and other expenses allocated by
Reclamation to WAPA would reduce the final appropriation to some $771.6
million. According to program and financing figures and estimates, new
budgetary authority (gross) for obligation has dropped from $994
million in FY04, to $972 million in FY05 and is projected to be $919
million in FY06. Total gross outlays would be $940 million, compared to
an estimated $1.028 billion in FY05 and $953 million in FY04.
Meanwhile, the unobligated balance in the Reclamation Fund is
expected to grow from $3.877 billion at the end of FY04 to an estimated
$4.812 billion for FY05 and $5.905 billion in FY06. Created by the
Reclamation Act of 1902, the Reclamation Fund was envisioned as the
means to finance western water and power projects with revenues from
western resources. Its receipts are derived from water and power sales,
project repayments, certain receipts from public land sales, leases and
rentals in the 17 western states, as well as certain oil and mineral-
related royalties. It is a special fund within the U.S. Treasury that
is only available for expenditure pursuant to annual appropriation
acts. With growing receipts, in part due to high energy prices, and
declining federal expenditures for Reclamation purposes, the
unobligated figure gets larger and larger--while the money is actually
spent elsewhere for other purposes. While receipts in the past were
insufficient for the construction of major federal projects such as
Grand Coulee and Hoover Dams, which required the appropriation of
general Treasury funds, today it appears that the Reclamation Fund
could serve as a revolving account that would pay for Reclamation and
related water resources programs and needs in the West.
Examples of similar federal authorities include the Highway Trust
Fund, Land and Water Conservation Fund, Southern Nevada Land Management
Act and most recently the Arizona Water Rights Settlement Act.
Another alternative might be to create state revolving funds
(similar to the popular Clean Water and Safe Drinking Water SRFs) that
could be capitalized with dedicated Reclamation Fund receipts, in
excess of agency appropriations, to assist in financing state and local
water resource development and conservation projects and programs, or
water right acquisition and water trust programs. Such funds might also
be used to finance water conservation and water resources related
environmental restoration projects and programs (to protect instream
resources, endangered and threatened species, etc.).
On the other hand, some 25 years ago, Senator Domenici and the late
Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan proposed a [block grant] program to
assist states with their water development needs, which western states
thought merited consideration. Virtually every western state already
has some type of water resources related assistance programs in place
that would benefit. Further, it would keep the proceeds for development
of western resources in the West as the Congress envisioned in 1902.
Federal Reclamation funds might also be authorized to provide a
Water Insurance Trust to guarantee the repayment of state and local
water related bonds. The WSWC has in the past supported such an
insurance fund, as well as the use of tax-exempt bonds to finance water
resources needs. State and local agencies have always financed the
majority of their own water needs, but federal assistance has and will
continue to be important.
The federal government has in the past usually taken the lead on
large regional basin-wide and multi-state multi-purpose projects (with
particular national objectives). While the era of big dams may indeed
be over, a role for the federal government remains. Perhaps it is time
to focus federal financial resources intended to aid in western water
development to help state and local agencies meet the future challenges
of supplying adequate water of suitable quality in the face of growing
municipal and industrial demands and federal requirements to protect
public health and the environment.
Fully funding and expanding past and present Bureau of Reclamation
programs to meet identified needs, and/or authorizing the use of
Reclamation Fund money to capitalize a new federal SRF (or otherwise
assisting existing state and local programs), would go a long way
towards meeting the growing demands placed on western water resources.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Family Farm Alliance, Dan Keppen. Would you now proceed,
please.
STATEMENT OF DAN KEPPEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,
FAMILY FARM ALLIANCE
Mr. Keppen. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee,
thank you for this opportunity to speak today.
The Family Farm Alliance has represented family farms,
ranchers, and irrigation districts in 17 Western States for the
last 17 years. We are the Bureau of Reclamation's customers and
we are focused on one thing: to ensure the availability of
reliable, affordable, irrigation water supplies to western
agriculture.
What should the role of Reclamation be in the 21st century?
Its primary role should be to continue to fulfill its core
mission of delivering water and power in accordance with
contracts, water rights, and other requirements of State and
Federal law. Just as important, Reclamation should operate,
maintain, and modernize its infrastructure in the most cost
effective manner possible. All of Reclamation's other
activities are secondary.
Others on this panel have underscored their concerns about
the aging of Reclamation facilities. We share those concerns
because our communities rely on those facilities for their very
existence. We also are the ones who pay most of the costs in
maintaining and modernizing Reclamation projects. In general,
irrigators are obligated to pay 100 percent of the costs of
project operations and maintenance, which covers everything
from repainting guard shacks to replacing multi-million-dollar
flood gates, plus irrigators must pay those costs immediately,
not over time. That is why family farmers, ranchers, and
irrigation districts want to see Reclamation operated in the
most cost effective way possible.
An engineering committee of the National Academy of
Sciences is currently focusing on the question of what
cooperatives should remain with Reclamation and what work might
be performed by others. The alliance welcomes this review and
we are actually compiling experiences from around the West,
both good and bad, to develop specific recommendations for the
Academy. We have included five sample case studies as
attachments to our written and more detailed testimony that you
should have received yesterday.
In summary, urban growth and competition for water supplies
are driving western farmers off the land at a time when
American food production in general is following other
industries offshore in search of lower costs. Western irrigated
agriculture is a critical national resource and the role of
Reclamation in the 21st century should be to protect and
enhance that resource.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Keppen follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dan Keppen, Executive Director,
Family Farm Alliance
topic #2: role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century.
What should the future role of the Bureau of Reclamation be in the
West? Should the Bureau undertake water supply or supply augmentation
activities which are designed primarily for municipal and industrial
purposes, such as the Title XVI Program? Please also include comments
on potential financing mechanisms such as grants or loan guarantees.
What role should the Bureau play with respect to addressing: the West's
future water needs; drought and flood planning and response; water
infrastructure, including dam safety and site security; facility
operation and maintenance; rural water needs, including in Indian
country; hydroelectric power; recreation; watershed restoration; and
water use efficiency?
The Family Farm Alliance strongly supports the focus of the Bureau
of Reclamation (Reclamation) on fulfilling its core mission of
delivering water and power in accordance with applicable contracts,
water rights, interstate compacts, and other requirements of state and
federal law. Inherent in this definition of core mission is the need to
prioritize the expenditure of federal funds and other resources of the
Department of the Interior. Water 2025, so long as it continues to
recognize that transfers and the use of market mechanisms must be
voluntary and pursuant to state law, provides a strong foundation for
defining the role of the Bureau in meeting future water needs of the
West.
As is recognized by Secretary Norton's Water 2025 Initiative, it is
imperative that Reclamation provide for the operation, maintenance, and
modernization of existing water supply infrastructure. Many Reclamation
facilities are approaching the end of or are past the design life of
the facilities. In addition, many of these facilities also need to be
replaced with modern designs that provide for greater water management
efficiency. Sound business practices dictate that this existing
infrastructure, and the water supply provided by these facilities, be
protected and preserved prior to the dedication of scarce funds to the
development of new supplies. With respect to the specific question
regarding the role of the Title XVI Program, the Family Farm Alliance
observes that many of the existing and potential recipients of these
funds are entities that have the financial capacity to fully fund the
development of alternative water supplies. The Title XVI Program should
not be funded at the expense of taking care of existing infrastructure
and protecting important agricultural communities that do not have the
same financial capabilities.
The Family Farm Alliance supports the Water 2025 matching grant
program, and suggests that it be expanded to provide additional
opportunities for the investment in water conservation and efficiency
measures. However, because this program is unlikely to meet all of the
needs for funding the repair and modernization of existing facilities,
additional funding mechanisms must be developed. Alternatives include a
return to the Small Project Loan Program, or the development of
federally backed loan guarantees that will enable water users to access
alternative sources of capital in order to repair and modernize
existing infrastructure. With respect to financing projects, the
historical use of zero interest loans already authorized by Reclamation
law still has some merit; especially when it has been conclusively
shown that many projects have returned their construction costs to the
Treasury many times over from tax revenues directly related to the
project benefits. Even in areas of less intensive irrigation and
population, benefits from the various projects have more than returned
their cost, especially when all of the project benefits, including
those not originally authorized and assigned costs, are considered.
Another possibility would be to allow entities with annual
repayment obligations to shift those obligations to operation,
maintenance and replacement reserve accounts. Although this does have
an impact to the return to the Treasury, it could reduce the potential
need for future assistance for major rehabilitation. Also, it would
seem appropriate for Congress to allow for the capitalization of OM&R.
Many of the infrastructure problems on old Reclamation facilities could
have already been addressed if capitalization of OM&R had been
authorized.
A number of years ago the Family Farm Alliance took the lead in an
effort to provide for cost containment and accountability for work by
the Bureau of Reclamation that was either funded in advance by water
users or subject to repayment obligations. With the cooperation of the
Bureau of Reclamation in general, and Jack Garner in particular, great
progress was made in this regard. However, given that federal, state,
local, and private funds will be scarce, it is imperative that these
efforts continue.
Recent events on several fronts that are related to this issue have
been a source of concern to the Family Farm Alliance. First, the
unfortunate experience with the cost overrun on the Animas-La Plata
Project provided a warning signal that additional work was needed to
ensure that Reclamation continues to focus on cost containment and
accountability for projects funded through the Reclamation Program.
Second, a number of our members have dealt with situations where cost
estimates for work that would be done by the Bureau of Reclamation were
substantially over the cost of having the work done by the local
district itself or under contract with private consultants. There
appear to be at least two reasons for the divergence in the cost
estimates--excess staffing by Reclamation for work, with attendant
increases in costs, and the requirement of design standards that are
excessive or unjustifiable. Third, the Family Farm Alliance is deeply
concerned to hear that at least one district has been forced to use
Reclamation staff for design work and was not given the option of doing
the work itself or having it performed by qualified consultants. This
incident is of great concern because it is contrary to the practice
elsewhere in Reclamation, where contractors who are paying for the work
have had the option to have the work performed by Reclamation or by
qualified consultants.
In light of the fact that neither Reclamation nor water users can
afford to waste money through over-staffing or noncompetitive
practices, the Family Farm Alliance encourages the Committee to take a
very hard look at the policies and practices of Reclamation with regard
to the involvement of the Reclamation programs located at the Denver
Federal Center. The Family Farm Alliance also plans to provide input to
the ongoing review of these aspects of Reclamation by the National
Academy of Engineering, which appears to be focusing on the question of
what capabilities Reclamation should maintain within the agency and
what work or functions can and should be performed by others. However,
regardless of the outcome of this review, fundamental fairness requires
that when a water user is paying for work in advance or through
repayment mechanisms, that water user should have the option to have
the work executed in the manner that provides the most return for the
investment.
These concerns regarding cost containment and accountability do
not, in general, implicate the work done at the Regional and Area
Reclamation Offices. The Family Farm Alliance is proud of its
partnership with Reclamation, and believes that Reclamation has much to
be proud of in its service to water users and the public.
The Chairman. Thank you.
The city of Santa Fe, Galen Buller, nice to have you here.
You had a little water this year.
STATEMENT OF GALEN BULLER, DIRECTOR, SANGRE DE CRISTO WATER
DIVISION, CITY OF SANTA FE, NM
Mr. Buller. Mr. Chairman, we had a little snow for a
change. It has been nice.
The city of Santa Fe, New Mexico, has, like I think many
municipalities, woken up as a result of the 2002 drought. We
see the need for protecting and augmenting our sources of
supply. The city has been involved in a number of projects to
do just that: water management and protection, conjunctive
management between its surface and its ground water sources,
conservation measures which have brought per capita usage in
the city to among the lowest in all of the Southwest, and reuse
projects, infrastructure rehabilitation, and that kind of
thing.
But as the result of approaching those needs, we have also
identified a number of issues. We are involved in one of the
longest running adjudications in the country that involves
Native American water rights. We are involved with the silvery
minnow issues and other environmental community concerns. We
have the need for contract renewals with the Bureau of
Reclamation for our San Juan-Chama water. And we are involved
with the agricultural community as well.
All of these issues also provide opportunities for
partnerships and we have tried to pursue those. Those
partnerships also involve at the Federal level the Bureau of
Reclamation, who we have seen as a close partner through these
years and would like to continue that relationship.
But we do feel that it is time to revisit Reclamation's
mission for the 21st century. It fulfilled its 20th century
mission, we think, and there is a new mission that can be
filled. There are several statutory mission goals that I think
should explicitly be included.
The first would be new arrangements for water projects and
agreements that do not expire or terminate, to provide
municipalities with secure and continuous access to the water
supplies they depend on.
The second is to cooperate to develop water supplies and
sources of water through more efficient storage and
desalinization projects, protecting our existing sources of
supply through watershed restoration and protection and
maintenance of water conveyance efficiencies.
The third is to streamline market-based conversions of
water used for irrigation, for maintenance and industrial
purposes, and to meet environmental needs.
The fourth is to provide grants and loan guarantees to
assist municipals that are demonstrating a strong and capable
commitment to help themselves.
The fifth is to develop or provide water to settle Indian
water rights and Federal reserved water rights claims.
We believe that some of these are evolutionary, perhaps
some are revolutionary, but all are necessary.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Buller follows:]
Prepared Statement of Galen Buller, Director, Sangre de Cristo
Water Division, City of Santa Fe, NM
topic 2. role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century
The Bureau of Reclamation has largely fulfilled the mission that
Congress assigned to it over 100 years ago. Sustained rates of
population growth have literally become a way of life in New Mexico and
throughout the West, bringing significant challenges and unprecedented
pressures on our water resources for meeting municipal and industrial
needs. Now is the time for Congress to revisit Reclamation's mission
for the 21st century to undertake water supply and supply augmentation
activities in the West for the purpose of assisting municipal and
regional water providers to meet their water supply and drinking water
needs.
Congress should address several related topics in Reclamation's new
mission to squarely include municipal water supply development and to
help municipal providers obtain and maintain reliable sources of
supply. Our experience in water resources management in New Mexico
suggests that Reclamation's revised statutory mission should explicitly
include the following:
Implement new arrangements for Reclamation water projects
and agreements that do not expire or terminate, to provide
municipalities with secure and continuous access to the water
supplies that they depend on to meet their long-range needs.
Cooperate with states and municipalities to develop water
supplies, including new sources of water supply through more
efficient storage of water and desalination; protecting
existing sources of supply through watershed restoration; and
protection and maintenance of water conveyance efficiencies.
Streamline market-based conversions of water used for
irrigation for municipal and industrial purposes and to meet
environmental needs.
Provide grants and loan guarantees to assist municipalities
that are demonstrating a strong and capable commitment to help
themselves.
Develop or provide water to settle Indian water rights and
federal reserved water rights claims.
Each of these topics is discussed briefly below.
Municipalities, such as Santa Fe, depend on water service contracts
for significant portions of their water supply portfolio. In many
cases, these contracts have expiration dates and may have renewal
arrangements that are subject to Reclamation's discretion. As an
example, the City of Santa Fe and its regional partners are now
investing over $100 million in a new system to divert and treat the
City's allocation of Reclamation's San Juan-Chama Project water, even
though the City does not currently have a permanent or even long-term
agreement for use of that water. Given the importance of water supply
for the well being of the people and economies of the West, it would be
appropriate for Congress to limit Reclamation's discretion in renewals
of these types of contracts and to establish congressional policy
favoring replacement of water service contracts with permanent
arrangements that do not expire.
The water supplies of the West are generally fully developed,
except for the new usable water that more efficient water storage and
desalination can provide. Reclamation's 21st century mission should
squarely include both of these areas of endeavor. Similarly,
Reclamation's mission should also include watershed restoration and
protection and maintaining the efficiencies of water conveyance in
order to maintain the productivity of watersheds upon which
municipalities depend for their water supply, and protect water
supplies from losses suffered in conveyance. Aquifer storage and
recovery has great potential for storage of municipal water supplies in
a manner that eliminates evaporative losses, increases net supplies,
and increases drought reserves, yet its widespread use will be hindered
until further applied research is conducted. Reclamation should be
specifically authorized to assist municipalities with aquifer storage
and recovery and desalination projects that will reduce water losses,
facilitate the development of waters of lower raw water quality, and
increase drought reserves. Congress also should direct Reclamation to
avoid damage to municipal water supplies through maintaining the
efficiency of water conveyance. Santa Fe, for example, is directly hurt
if reduced water conveyance efficiencies on the Rio Grande contribute
to low water storage levels in Elephant Butte Reservoir, which in turn,
prohibit Santa Fe's storage of native water in its Santa Fe River
Canyon Reservoirs. If environmental restoration needs require
additional water losses in conveyance, Reclamation should be
responsible for offsetting those additional losses so as to keep
municipal water supplies intact.
Reclamation's use of a historic federal law (the 1920 Miscellaneous
Purposes Act) to convert irrigation water supplies to municipal and
industrial purposes should be discontinued. While the vast majority of
all the water development of water in the West was for irrigation
purposes in order to settle the West, municipal and industrial and
``urban'' growth now represents virtually all increases in water use.
But its vibrant municipalities and industries and economies need water.
Congress should provide for a mechanism that streamlines the process of
market conversions of water to these contemporaneous needs, while
providing fair compensation to the farmers through the market.
As demands on supplies increase, water supply development projects
become even more expensive--often measured in the hundreds of millions
of dollars even for communities of Santa Fe's size. Congress provided
very low cost development of water originally for the West. Congress
should provide new mechanisms to provide some grant funding and loan
guarantees for the expensive projects that municipalities need, such as
aquifer storage and recovery, desalination, and other technological and
infrastructure needs, to secure their water supply futures. Further,
each of Reclamation's existing funding programs should be reevaluated--
potentially through input from current and potential future local
project sponsors--to identify the strengths, weaknesses, and
applicability in meeting the evolving needs of communities throughout
the West.
Providing finality through realistic and fair settlements of tribal
and federal water rights claims is essential for the well being of
western municipalities, specifically including Santa Fe (as detailed
further in our submittal for Topic 3, Indian and Federal Reserved Water
Rights). Reclamation should be assigned an explicit role to help fairly
settle these matters and bring the uncertainty that surrounds them to
an end.
Together, we believe that these specific changes to Reclamation's
mission and responsibilities will allow Reclamation to fulfill a
critical role in meeting the evolving and growing water needs of the
American West.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rick George, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian
Reservation. We are pleased to have you, sir. Thank you.
STATEMENT OF RICK GEORGE, CONFEDERATED TRIBES OF THE UMATILLA
INDIAN RESERVATION
Mr. George. Thank you, sir. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman,
members of the committee. Senator Smith, hello from Oregon,
where it is finally raining and snowing.
Senators, today I would like to use as an example the
Umatilla Basin Project to illustrate what we think the Bureau
should be in the 21st century. We have chosen that example,
one, because it is in the home of the Umatilla Indian
Reservation and of Senator Smith, and also because it is a
success.
It is located on the Umatilla River in northeastern Oregon,
and we believe that the Umatilla Basin Project represents a
national model for the Bureau of Reclamation, and again one
that demonstrates success. Not to be presumptuous, but the
tribes believe that success should define the Bureau of
Reclamation in the 21st century.
The Umatilla Basin Project's success is demonstrated by its
accomplishments. The project restored a dry riverbed, drained
dry in fact by a previous Reclamation project, and it restored
it to a partially flowing Umatilla River once again. The
project thus enabled the tribes to recover salmon to the basin,
salmon that the tribes have a treaty right to, and today the
basin has gone from zero salmon for over 70 years to 30,000
adult salmon coming back to the basin--another demonstration of
success. Senator Smith can now fish for salmon in downtown
Pendleton.
The project protected and even enhanced irrigated
agriculture while restoring the Umatilla River and restoring
the fishery. Finally, the project set up the opportunity to
negotiate the settlement of the water rights, the Federal
reserved water rights for the Confederated Tribes of the
Umatilla Indian Reservation, and finally bring equity to the
water allocation in the Umatilla Basin.
Last, Senators, the Umatilla Basin Project under the Bureau
of Reclamation's leadership brought neighbors together, and
ultimately that is the end result of success. It is a people
factor, and in the Umatilla that people factor of success was
achieved.
We are now working on the final phase, phase three of the
Umatilla Basin Project. We hope to bring that back to this
committee for authorization just like phase one and two were
brought to this committee and shepherded through Congress by
Senator Mark O. Hatfield.
I thank you for your time today.
[The prepared statement of Mr. George follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rick George, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla
Indian Reservation
2. role of the bureau of reclamation in the 21st century
The Umatilla Basin Project (UBP) Act (100 P.L. 557; 102 Stat. 2782
Title II), passed by congress in 1988 under the visionary leadership of
Sen. Mark O. Hatfield, is the hallmark example of the need for, and the
potential of, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in planning, designing and
implementing projects to address water supply and water resource
management in the West.
In the UBP the Bureau of Reclamation (BOR) played the central
federal agency role in planning (EIS and feasibility report), designing
and constructing the water supply and distribution infrastructure. This
role was important not just because they had the expertise, but also
because they had the history. It was the BOR in the early 1900's (see
#1 Water Supply and Resource Management Coordination) that constructed
and subsequently operated the irrigation reclamation project that de-
watered the Umatilla River and that the UBP ultimately fixed.
In a nutshell, the infrastructure for the UBP took advantage of the
existing irrigation delivery system, and added new, large capacity
water pumps capable of pumping over 200 cubic feet per second (cfs) of
water. The new pumps were located near the mouth of the Umatilla River
where it empties into the Columbia River. With restoration of Umatilla
River streamflows as the project goal, the UBP pumps lift water from
the Columbia River and delivers it to the existing Umatilla River
irrigation distribution system. From a water management perspective,
for every bucket of water not diverted from the Umatilla River, a
bucket is pumped from the Columbia River to the Umatilla Basin
irrigation system. The end result is a partially restored Umatilla
River (about 50% of total spring-fall stream flow is now left in-
channel for fish) and partially recovered spring and fall chinook and
coho salmon populations. Summer steelhead, pacific lamprey and other
native fish stocks continue to be nurtured toward recovery and along
with the salmon runs require additional water and habitat restoration
(see #3 Indian and Federal Reserved Water Rights). Further, this unique
``water exchange'' between the Columbia and the Umatilla rivers,
regulated under Oregon water laws, results in no net loss to stream
flows in the Columbia River. This results from the bucket for bucket
exchange that leaves the same amount of water in the Umatilla River and
which ultimately empties back into the Columbia River.
The BOR played a diversity of roles in the negotiation, development
and implementation of the UBP. These roles can be divided into the
following categories:
1. Proponent--under the leadership of then-Regional Director John
Keys, the BOR worked closely with key stakeholders, CTUIR and three
irrigation districts, to help to find common ground.
2. Expert--the BOR was the irrigation infrastructure, reservoir
contracting, state water rights connection and project design and
construction expert.
3. Trust--a key component to allocating water in the 21st Century
is trust. The BOR in the 1980's and 1990's provided key senior
personnel to stay involved in basin-level negotiations between CTUIR
and irrigation districts and later with citizen groups and others
interested in the outcome. CTUIR believes that had it not been for the
active, personal involvement and presence of then-Regional Director
John Keys and his staff the UBP may not have been completed.
Twenty first Century roles for the BOR should continue to be:
1) Advocate for and assistance in settlement of federal reserved
water rights for Tribal governments.
2) Assistance in planning and constructing the infrastructure
necessary to serve the basic current and future water needs of Tribal
governments as part of satisfying reserved water rights by striving for
compatibility with existing water uses and rights.
3) Providing expertise in developing and implementing solutions to
water allocations, planning and management of water resources.
4) Providing direct assistance to Tribal governments in the forms
of in-kind personnel assistance (e.g. water resource engineering),
funding agreements to fund Tribal self governance work related to water
development and management, assisting Tribal governments to manage BOR
facilities that serve Tribal Governments, assisting Tribal governments
in marketing and managing trust water resources, providing technical
assistance to Tribal governments in quantifying and planning for the
later negotiation and settlement of Tribal water rights claims.
5) Watershed restoration and water acquisition for instream flow
restoration.
Most important for completion of a long-lasting Umatilla Basin
water solution is for the BOR to complete the shared vision of Sen.
Mark Hatfield, the CTUIR and the Umatilla Irrigation Districts--
Settlement of CTUIR reserved water rights and completion of Phase III
of the Umatilla Basin Project. Major legal and procedural
accomplishments are being made between CTUIR and the Westland
Irrigation District that are paving the way for BOR planning and design
of Phase III and for a negotiated settlement of the CTUIR water rights.
A request for authorization of construction of Phase III of the
Umatilla Basin Project and the infrastructure needed to serve CTUIR
consumptive water needs will be before the Energy and Natural Resources
Committee in the next couple of years.
Phase III of the Umatilla Basin Project will provide Columbia River
water for Westland Irrigation District, the last remaining and largest
irrigation district on the Umatilla River. Completion of Phase III will
provide enough water in combination with the existing Phases I and II,
and most importantly, water that is not obligated to competing uses,
for CTUIR on-Reservation consumptive uses and for instream flows to
protect the recovered salmon populations and to allow for recovery of
lamprey, steelhead and other important resources. Senator Mark Hatfield
challenged the Umatilla River Basin to achieve that goal--final and
complete water management and allocation settlement--20 years ago. That
goal is now within the vision of the CTUIR and basin irrigation
districts, the Honorable Governor of Oregon Theodore Kulongoski and we
look forward to working with the Committee to make it happen.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Bureau of Reclamation, could I ask you, Ms. Bach?
Ms. Bach. Yes, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. In last year's omnibus appropriations bill I
had some language put in there that the Council on
Environmental Quality (CEQ) undertake a review of existing
Federal water use--I think somebody alluded to it here--water
reuse, recycling, reclamation programs. Do you know what the
status of that effort is?
Ms. Bach. Mr. Chairman, I am familiar with the language
that was in the omnibus appropriations bill and sought to
verify the status of that and I do not have the status for you
at this time, but I would be happy to provide it for the
record.
The Chairman. I think it would be important that you do
that. We keep talking about it, but we ought to start with some
basis to know what we have got going.
Ms. Bach. Certainly, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. You will provide us that as soon as you can?
Ms. Bach. Yes, I will, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Bingaman, do you have any questions
of the panel?
Senator Bingaman. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me ask, Mr. Buller. You have a couple of statements in
your testimony here which caught my attention. You say:
``Reclamation's use of a historic Federal law, the 1920
Miscellaneous Purposes Act, to convert irrigation water
supplies to municipal and industrial purposes should be
discontinued.''
Then you also say, a couple of sentences later: ``Congress
should provide for a mechanism that streamlines the process of
market conversions of water to these contemporary needs''--I
think they are talking about municipal and industrial needs--
``while providing fair compensation to the farmers through the
market.
I am a little unclear as to what you see as the need for
Congress to get involved in this. As I understand, in our State
and in most States if you have got a willing seller of a water
right and you have got a willing buyer of a water right, then
the transfer occurs. Why does Congress need to be providing a
mechanism in this area? And why should we change this Federal
law to prohibit Reclamation from converting irrigation water
supplies to these purposes?
Mr. Buller. Senator, let me first say that I am not
advocating that the Federal Government step in and take over
where State water law has worked so well over the years. Let me
take those one at a time.
The Miscellaneous Purposes Act of 1920 has been the
mechanism that the Bureau of Reclamation has used to help
facilitate those kinds of transfers of Reclamation projects. It
has become, I think, cumbersome and it does not really lend
itself to creative thinking and creative methodology, or it
does not really create a mechanism for providing financing the
way that it perhaps could.
The suggestion there is that somehow we look at new
legislation that fosters creativity in the transfer of water
rights from agricultural to municipal and industrial where it
makes sense to do so.
As to the other question, why do we need the Federal
Government's participation in that, the Bureau of Reclamation
has had a long tradition of helping to facilitate the transfer.
It is not in lieu of State law; it is done pursuant to State
law. But that expertise in how transfers could occur from the
agricultural community to the municipal and industrial uses
that are the ones that we see the most need for, at least from
my perspective. That expertise might be there to help.
We have had several examples just in the city of Santa Fe,
and you may be aware of some of them, Senator, where we have
tried to bring agricultural rights to the city and, for various
political reasons and others, they have not worked out. That
might be fine that they did not work out. There might have been
all kinds of problems. But we could use the expertise in how
over the years the Bureau of Reclamation has helped to make
that happen.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you very much.
Senator Smith [presiding]. Thank you, Senator.
With the chairman's permission, I want to welcome
especially Anton Mentorn and Rick George from the Umatilla
Indian Reservation, and also Dan Keppen, the new executive
director of the Family Farm Alliance. They are both here from
Oregon and are very active in constructive ways to resolve the
disputes over water and provide a reliable source of water for
farmers, as well as to take better care of our natural
resource.
Rick George hit on something that I do not know whether
people in the audience necessarily fully understand just how
successful the Umatilla Project has been. Rick explained, I
think, that it is literally an exchange of water from the
Columbia River in order to leave water in the Umatilla River,
and this has enabled us to restore salmon runs while preserving
the livelihood of many farmers in this area.
It has been incredibly successful and I salute the tribe
and the farmers for this creative effort, and the Bureau of
Reclamation for being an integral part of making this happen.
Rick, you indicated that this could be a model for a
national model. Obviously, it is possible as a model in Oregon
because the Columbia River as a main stem of the water resource
has an awful lot more water than places like the Rio Grande or
even the Colorado River in a relative sense.
But I wonder, Maryanne, are there other areas in the West
where the Umatilla Project could be a model to solve these
environmental and farming disputes?
Ms. Bach. Senator, what I would say is that, given the
number of reservations that are in the West that are in
geographically colocated areas as Reclamation projects, that
there are undoubtedly opportunities for crossover of
understanding of what happened on this project and elsewhere
and how it could be applied.
Senator Smith. Well, let me use this forum to encourage the
Bureau to look to the Umatilla Project as a way to solve these
very real problems between the environment and the users that,
just like fish, they cannot live without water either.
Rick, you started your comments by noting that it is
raining in the Northwest. The last time I checked we were 40
percent below normal in the snowpack. What is it today with the
recent spring rains?
Mr. George. Well, the west side is starting to catch up. We
are above 50 percent now. But on the east side we are still
down below 50 percent.
Senator Smith. Dan, Dan Keppen, you noted that the Family
Farm Alliance is compiling case studies of how the Bureau of
Reclamation deals with local water agencies on construction and
other issues. Have you found some cases you can talk to us,
whether they are good or bad, that you can highlight?
Mr. Keppen. Well, I have summarized five of them in the
written testimony that I submitted to you. What we are doing
right now is putting together a larger report that we intend to
submit. It is kind of a subset of the National Academy of
Sciences. It is called the NAS Board on Infrastructure and the
Constructed Environment, and they are actually doing an
independent peer review of how Reclamation does business, in
particular looking at opportunities perhaps to outsource some
of the design and build work.
So we want to engage in that process in a constructive way.
There are some bad horror stories out there, but there are also
some very good stories. We are about halfway through putting
this effort together and I have got five of them laid out in
your testimony, two from California that we consider to be
success stories, three that outline some kind of consistent
themes that we are hearing.
Generally, the concerns are not with the area offices or
the regional offices. It is more with the technical services
center in Denver is where we are hearing the concerns. So I
would encourage the committee to track this Academy assessment
and perhaps that could form the basis for some policy
discussions later on.
Senator Smith. Several years ago the Appropriations
Committee required the Bureau to submit a report outlining
direct and indirect operations and maintenance costs for each
of the Federal reclamation projects. Do you know whether or not
Reclamation's overhead costs remain high or have they gone
down? What does the report tell us?
Mr. Keppen. Well, I have only been on board for a month, so
still catching up on all the multitude of reports we put
together. Norm has been pretty active with Family Farm
Alliance. He might want to engage on that.
I would just say specifically we are hearing some concerns
of higher costs in specifically the engineering and cultural
resource studies, 40 to 50 percent of constructed costs
sometimes, which is pretty high. I was an engineer when I
started out in the private sector and those costs generally
ought to be around 15 percent or so of the magnitude of the
costs that we are talking about.
Senator Smith. Is that accurate?
Mr. Semanko. Mr. Chairman, in my day to day role I serve as
executive director of the Idaho Water Users Association and
also serve on Dan's advisory committee. We have mixed bag
stories from Idaho and we are in the process of helping Dan
compile those stories, and I think we would be pleased to
provide those to the committee.
There is not a one size fits all answer. We are hearing
good stories and bad stories and it is kind of spotty.
Senator Smith. Also, Dan, the Family Farm Alliance has
discussed many times with me the need for more water storage in
the West. You are not talking about dams, but has the Alliance
identified ways to create water supplies that would be
available in lean years?
Mr. Keppen. Well, next week there is a House Resources
Committee hearing that has to do I think with storage of both
ground water and surface water. At that time the president of
our Alliance I think is scheduled to come out and testify, and
the Alliance will roll out a data base that we have been
working on for the last 2 years that will basically lay out a
summary of what folks at the ground level have seen on the
books for a long time, projects that have been there but have
not been developed.
We are not saying that this is necessarily a proposal or
anything like that. But basically what we are saying is, here
are some ideas and we want to use it as a basis for catalyzing
the discussion on the need to enhance supplies, and also to
develop other case studies that can specifically identify why
these things have not moved forward so we can come back with
some constructive suggestions.
Senator Smith. Thank you all for being here.
Mr. Keppen. Thank you.
Senator Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman [presiding]. Anybody else?
[No response.]
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Let me ask. When we were putting together a bill that we
will reintroduce with modifications, that I think was
bipartisan and the House was interested in also, which would
set up some centers of technology and innovation excellence, we
started off with a very fundamental question, which it was not
easy for us to answer. That was, where should you--what
department of the Federal Government should that be in?
Normally, you would think the Department of the Interior.
Then you would ask, are they experts in technology and science
and innovation in terms of water purification, water
enhancement, and the like? So I would like to ask, do you have
any ideas with reference to that? Not long answers, but where
does it belong? I concluded there was no logical place, so I
thought maybe it ought to be the Department of Energy since its
laboratories would be the basic researchers. But we did not
have unanimous feeling on that.
Anybody have an idea? We can start over there perhaps. Dan,
do you have any ideas?
Mr. Keppen. Senator Smith's office?
[Laughter.]
Mr. Keppen. I would say really the Department of the
Interior. A lot of the agencies within Interior I think are
well suited to deal with the issue. The areas of disconnect I
see: NOAA Fisheries needs to get pulled in there somehow. They
are in Commerce and sometimes they are out of the loop. But I
would think Interior would be the proper role if that is going
to happen.
The Chairman. Anybody else?
Mr. George. Mr. Chairman, I would agree. I think if we are
going to talk about water we need to go to the agencies that
would be the experts in water, and I think those agencies are
in the Interior.
The Chairman. Anybody else?
Mr. Tyrrell. Mr. Chairman, I tend to agree. You have some
of the best water scientists in the world in the USGS and the
Bureau of Reclamation. I would use them.
The Chairman. USGS?
Mr. Tyrrell. Yes.
Mr. Atwater. The only thing I would add to that
historically, for example, desalinization technology was
developed by the Bureau of Reclamation in the 1960's. But your
suggestion with the Department of Energy is a good one. What I
had suggested earlier in my testimony, certainly there is a lot
of good research at EPA, and clearly the Army Corps of
Engineers has research centers that are internationally
renowned.
So again, you have got to look at the collaboration and the
coordination between the different Federal agencies.
The Chairman. That is really what is the important part as
I saw it.
Thank you all very much. Nice to have you here. Thank you,
ma'am.
The third panel, please. There are only four people on
that: Mr. Bell, Mr. D'Antonio, somebody from the Nordhaus Law
Firm in Albuquerque, and Mr. Echohawk.
The Chairman. Mr. Bell, I am going to just call on you and
as I do I will tell them who you are: Mr. Craig Bell, Western
States Water Council.
Mr. Bell. Thank you very much.
The Chairman. Thank you.
May we have order, please.
STATEMENT OF CRAIG BELL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, WESTERN STATES
WATER COUNCIL
Mr. Bell. We appreciate very much the opportunity to be
here today.
The Council consists of representatives appointed by the
Governors of 18 Western States and so we have a great interest
in the subjects of this conference, no more so than the one
that I will be speaking to. The Council believes that there is
no more important obligation of the United States than that of
its trust obligation to Native Americans and particularly their
water claims, and the settlement thereof is not only important
to Native Americans, but also to the country as a whole.
We support, therefore, the settlement of these claims
throughout the country. In so doing, we work closely with the
Western Governors Association and I am authorized to say today
that the recommendations that are in the paper are also
endorsed by the Western Governors Association.
We wish to commend the Congress for their approval of these
settlements in the past. They have saved untold millions of
dollars in public and private moneys that would otherwise go to
prolonged and costly litigation.
A key component of that success has been the
administration's policy to establish negotiation teams, both to
achieve and implement settlements. Unfortunately, we believe
funding for those teams is currently inadequate and needs to be
supplemented. We would hope the Congress would do so and urge
them to do so, so that particularly Native Americans can
participate appropriately.
We also believe that the funding of water settlements
should be a mandatory obligation of the United States. That is,
that obligation is analogous to and no less serious than the
obligation of the United States to pay judgments that are
rendered against it, and we believe there is precedent for
doing so and we have provided legislative language to do so in
our written statement submitted to the committee. We believe
that would be an important progress, step of progress in terms
of achieving future settlements.
We believe that the settlement of Federal non-Indian
reserved rights is also important. It has much to commend it.
One of the ways in which these settlements can be achieved is
within the context of State adjudications, and these are also
costly. One of the things that complicates that is the fact
that in 1992 the Supreme Court ruled that the Federal
Government is exempt from paying filing fees associated with
those general adjudications. This creates a hardship for other
users, who have to subsidize those adjudications, including
States.
We would hope that Congress would remedy that by reversing
the effects of that holding, simply requiring the Federal
Government to pay filing fees to the same extent as other
private water users. We believe that would be substantially
helpful in funding these adjudications.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bell follows:]
Prepared Statement of Craig Bell, Executive Director,
Western States Water Council
proposals
1. Provide adequate funding for Interior negotiating teams for both
achieving and implementing settlements in order to facilitate increased
tribal participation and significantly advance the goal of achieving
water rights settlements.
2. Enact legislation to establish a funding mechanism to ensure
that any land or water settlement, once authorized by the Congress and
approved by the President, will be funded without a corresponding
offset to some other tribe or essential Interior Department program.
3. Enact legislation to require that the federal government pay
filing fees for its claims in state general adjudications to the same
extent as private water users.
what effort should be made by the federal government to encourage the
adjudication or settlement of indian water right claims?
The Western State Water Council has for years actively supported
the negotiated settlement of the water claims of Native Americans. The
Council believes that the settlement of Native American water claims is
one of the most important aspects of the United States' trust
obligation to Native Americans and is of vital importance to the
country as a whole. The Council adopted a policy advocating the
settlement of water claims in 1986 and has maintained this policy
consistently since that date.
The Congress is to be commended for its support of negotiated
Indian water right settlements. Over the past 25 years, more than
nineteen settlements of Indian land and water rights have been reached
in the western states and approved by the Congress. These settlements
have helped save untold millions of dollars of public and private
monies through avoidance of prolonged and costly litigation. A key
component of this success has been the Administration's efforts to
establish and maintain negotiation teams for both achieving and
implementing settlements. Unfortunately, the level of funding for these
negotiation teams is currently inadequate to meet the needs. Moreover,
a significant cut in funding is being proposed for the FY06 federal
budget. Consistent with the trust responsibility of the United States
to the tribes, we urge Congress to provide the necessary funding to
facilitate increased tribal participation which could significantly
advance our mutual goal of achieving water rights settlements.
In addition, an appropriate funding mechanism must be found for
water settlements, or the Administration's settlement policy may become
a nullity.
The current practice is to treat the funding of water settlements
as discretionary, with the result that a settlement can only be funded
with a corresponding reduction in some other discretionary component of
the Interior Department's budget. The practical effect of this
budgetary policy is to significantly hinder the funding of water
settlements. It is very difficult for the Administration, the States or
the Tribes to negotiate settlements knowing that they will only be
funded at the expense of some other Tribe or essential Interior
Department program.
Funding of water settlements should be a mandatory obligation of
the United States government. The obligation is analogous to, and no
less serious than the obligation of the United States to pay judgments
which are rendered against it. We urge that steps be taken to change
current policy to ensure that any water settlement, once authorized by
the Congress and approved by the President, will be funded. If such a
change is not made, all of these claims will be relegated to
litigation, an outcome which ought not to be acceptable to the
Administration, the Congress, the Tribes or the States.
The following is draft legislative language which, if enacted,
would make mandatory the funding of any water settlement authorized by
Congress and approved by the President. It would appropriately treat
the funding of the settlement of Indian water right claims as a
judgment against the United States. It is proposed as language to amend
an Interior appropriations act or a supplemental appropriations act:
``Such sums as may be necessary, not to exceed $250,000,000 in any
fiscal year, shall hereafter be available for payment of amounts
authorized in Indian land and water claims settlement Acts, subject to
the same protections and limitations as funds appropriated in
satisfaction of a judgment of the Indian Claims Commission or the
United States Claims Court in favor of any Indian tribe, band, group,
pueblo, or Indian community.''
Historically, judgments upholding Indian claims rendered by the
Court of Claims or the Indian Claims Commission have been treated and
paid as were other judgments by the Court of Claims, and have not been
included as part of Interior's budget. As recently as 1992, the Indian
Claims Commission ruled that compensation should be paid to the tribe
which it would have received related to lands taken for construction of
the Grand Coulee Dam. The compensation was paid from the ``judgment
fund.''
We acknowledge that there may be other approaches to achieving the
desired result than the above language. In 1996, Congress established a
trust fund to rectify the failure to perform restoration work that was
supposed to have ameliorated the negative effects to the Crow Creek
Sioux Tribe from the Pick-Sloan Project. The trust was funded by
placing into an account at the Department of Treasury 25% of receipts
from the power revenues generated by the Pick-Sloan Missouri River
Basin Program every fiscal year until the total of $27.5 million is
achieved. Interest on the corpus of the trust is to provide for the
construction, operation and maintenance of a water system on the
reservation. We look forward to exploring various approaches in
resolving this vital issue.
should a similar effort be made to quantify other federal reserved
rights?
A policy favoring settlement of non-Indian reserved right claims is
also important, although these claims are not associated with the
federal government's trust responsibility for Indian tribes. Such
settlements offer advantages which include: (1) the ability to be
flexible and to tailor solutions to the unique circumstances of each
situation; (2) the ability to promote conservation and sound water
management practices; and (3) the ability to establish the basis for
cooperative partnerships. While funding for the settlement of these
claims is also vital, the dynamics are somewhat different and one
important aspect arises chiefly in the context of state general stream
adjudications discussed below.
are adjudications an appropriate means to quantify those rights?
States in the West have developed comprehensive judicial and
administrative proceedings (general stream adjudications) to quantify
and document relative water rights within basins, including the rights
to waters claimed by the United States under either state or federal
law. These adjudications are typically complicated, expensive civil
court and/or administrative actions that involve hundreds or even tens
of thousands of claimants. Such adjudications give certainty to water
rights, provide the basis for water right administration, reduce
conflict over water allocation and water usage, and incidentally
facilitate important market transactions for water rights in the West.
Congress recognized the benefits of state general adjudication systems
and by adoption of the McCarran Amendment (43 U.S.C. Sec. 666),
required the federal government to submit to state court jurisdiction
for the adjudication of its water right claims.
Although water right claims by federal agencies are often the
largest and/or most complex claims in state general adjudications, the
United States Supreme Court, in the case of United States v. Idaho, 508
U.S. 1 (1992), determined that the McCarran Amendment does not require
the United States to pay filing fees, which pay for a portion of the
costs associated with conducting adjudications. This holding means that
the cost of adjudicating some of the most difficult claims in a state
general adjudication has shifted entirely to private water users and
state taxpayers. This drain on the resources of states and lack of
federal government financial support significantly inhibit the ability
of both state and federal agencies to protect private and public
property interests.
This is nowhere more evident than in the Klamath Basin where
approximately 400 of the 700 claims being adjudicated are federal
claims. The complexity of these federal claims, coupled with a series
of lawsuits filed in federal court by federal agencies, has
significantly delayed the state adjudication. Further, because they are
not subject to fees and costs like other water users in the
adjudication, federal agencies have filed questionable claims that may
have been otherwise tempered. In Idaho, for example, the Forest Service
initially filed 3,700 last minute claims in the Snake River Basin
adjudication just prior to the initial court action on the adjudication
fee issue. After the Forest Service used these last minute claims to
quantify the fiscal impact of paying fees and after the State of Idaho
incurred considerable expense investigating these claims, the Forest
Service withdrew all but 61 of the claims, and the state adjudication
court has since dismissed all but 9 of the claims.
With this background, the western states have attempted to address
this problem in the Congress. Bills have been introduced in Congress
that would require all federal agencies filing water right claims in
state adjudications to pay fees and costs to the same extent as a
private party to the same proceeding. New Mexico proposed alternative
legislation to provide federal funding support to each of the states
pursuing general stream adjudications, based on a formula assessing the
relative need for such support. These proposals have not advanced
within Congress. We urge you to address this inequity. Payment of
filing fees by federal agencies was in fact a common practice prior to
the unfortunate U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the Forest Service claims
in Idaho.
In addition, while not within this Committee's jurisdiction, it
should also be noted that varying Tribal water quality standards (as
well as the lack thereof) and checkerboarded reservations, raise
serious state concerns over administration--on and off the
reservations--which have yet to be resolved. In order to prevent voids
in regulation, state water quality standards should be effective on
Indian lands until replacement standards have been adopted by tribal
governments which are treated as states, or promulgated by EPA.
Congress should provide direction that will aid in cooperative
resolution of water quality issues. All efforts should be made to
develop consistent tribal/state water quality standards at adjoining
jurisdictional boundaries.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
We are very pleased to have the State Engineer from the
State of New Mexico, John D'Antonio. You do not have the
easiest job in the world. It is a hard trip up here, but I
imagine it is a little reprieve from what you go through every
day out there in the State. But we think you are doing a great
job, and thank you for coming and sharing your views with us.
STATEMENT OF JOHN D'ANTONIO, NEW MEXICO
STATE ENGINEER
Mr. D'Antonio. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee.
Again, three issues that I want to stress up front: funding
Indian water rights without a corresponding reduction in
Department of the Interior funding is very important;
fulfilling the U.S. trust responsibilities to tribes and avoid
liability issues is a big benefit. I know the benefit is the
sense of community and harmony within the basin among all water
users because of certainty of water rights, and that includes
economic benefits.
The completion of water rights adjudication is a priority
for New Mexico. New Mexico supports settlement of Indian water
right claims and Federal reserved water right claims. The
cooperation from the Federal Government is essential to bring
closure to New Mexico's settlement negotiations. The direct
benefits of completing the adjudication of Indian water rights
and Federal reserved rights include the removal of a barrier to
economic development for both Indians and non-Indians and also
savings to all parties on the high costs of protracted
litigation.
The need in New Mexico is acute. We have 22 tribes,
nations, and pueblos within the State. Only one, the Jicarilla
Apaches, have been fully adjudicated. The remaining claims,
they have senior water rights, they have a priority on a large
quantity that, if recognized and fully exercised, could
displace significant numbers of non-Indian users that have
State-based water rights.
New Mexico's legislature is now considering legislation to
establish an Indian water rights settlement fund. That is in
order to comply with the State's portion of funding
obligations, and I believe that bill was signed in New Mexico
today. It was scheduled to be signed today. New Mexico,
however, will not succeed unless there is a corollary effort by
the Federal Government as far as funding goes.
Federal action and inaction has contributed to uncertainty
on settlements. There are shifts in Federal policy through
implication that may reserve water without an actual
appropriation. Lately we have had limited participation by DOJ
and DOI in recent negotiations on the Aamodt and the Abeyta
adjudications, and it makes sessions non-substantive. The
Federal Government is unwilling to contribute to more than a
fraction of the total proposed settlement cost and that is
recently with the Aamodt case, and that causes extreme
dissatisfaction to the negotiation process and again causes
problems there.
It would not be helpful or advisable for Congress to
attempt quantification of Indian and Federal reserved rights
outside the existing general stream adjudication process.
New Mexico is proud of its accomplishment in negotiating a
settlement agreement with the Navajo Nation, which was
completed in December 2004. While the settlement provides for
water rights and associated water development projects in New
Mexico for the Navajo Nation, the Navajo Nation releases claims
to water that would displace existing non-Navajo water users in
the San Juan Basin. This cost is about $800 million in 2005
dollars to the Federal Government. State, and local
contributions total upwards of $160 million.
In closing, again the three points I would like to stress:
the funding of Indian water rights settlements without
corresponding reduction in DOI funding is essential; benefits
include fulfilling the U.S. trust responsibilities to tribes
and avoiding liability issues; and also, the sense of community
and harmony within the basin among all the users because of
certainty of water rights is essential.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. D'Antonio follows:]
Prepared Statement of John D'Antonio, New Mexico State Engineer
topic 3: indian and federal reserved water rights
The determination and quantification of Indian and federal reserved
water rights is a matter of critical importance to all citizens, Indian
and non-Indian alike, of the western states. This is an area where
Congressional action can achieve direct and substantial benefits.
Completion of water rights adjudications is a priority for New
Mexico. Toward that end, New Mexico supports settlement of Indian water
rights claims and federal reserved water rights claims. New Mexico has
recently completed the negotiation with the Navajo Nation of a
settlement of the Nation's claims for water rights in the San Juan
River Basin in New Mexico, and is in the process of negotiating other
Indian water rights settlements. Based on experience, New Mexico
understands the difficulties of negotiating a settlement that must take
into account competing demands for a finite resource. New Mexico also
understands the need to balance the uncertainties of litigation against
the challenges of meeting the needs of opposing interests. Cooperation
from the federal government is essential to bringing closure to New
Mexico's ongoing settlement negotiations and to resolving the many
outstanding Indian and federal reserved water rights claims that exist
in our state.
1. determination of indian water rights claims and
federal reserved water rights claims
A. The direct benefits of completing the adjudication of Indian
water rights claims and federal reserved water rights claims are
significant. They include the removal of a barrier to economic
development for both Indians and non-Indians, and the savings to all
parties of the high costs of protracted litigation. These benefits
would accrue to the nation as a whole.
B. In New Mexico, the need for the adjudication of Indian and
federal water rights claims is acute. The lands of 22 Indian Tribes,
Nations, and Pueblos lie within the borders of New Mexico. Of these,
only the water rights of the Jicarilla Apaches have been fully
adjudicated. The remaining Indian claims are typically to water rights
of such senior priority and large quantity that, if recognized and
fully exercised, they could displace significant numbers of non-Indian
water rights developed under state law. In one instance, the claims of
the Navajo Nation are potentially so large that they could exceed New
Mexico's apportionment under the Upper Colorado River Basin Compact.
Based on an understanding of the importance of Indian water rights
settlements, the New Mexico legislature is now considering legislation
to establish an Indian Water Rights Settlement Fund. This fund would
provide a mechanism for the state to comply with its funding
obligations under potential Indian water rights settlements. This
legislation recognizes the need for New Mexico to plan ahead to make
the Indian water rights settlements successful, but New Mexico's
efforts will not succeed without a corollary effort on the part of the
federal government. Notwithstanding the current federal budget
difficulties, the federal government needs to prioritize settlement and
funding relating to Indian water rights.
C. Federal action and inaction have contributed significantly to
the considerable uncertainty surrounding Indian and federal water
rights claims. This uncertainty accentuates the present urgent need for
those claims to be adjudicated.
In New Mexico, it is easy to see how actions and inaction of the
federal government have contributed to the present uncertainty over the
water rights claims of Pueblo Indians. It is well known, for example,
that the early U.S. Supreme Court case of U.S. v. Joseph, 94 U.S. 614
(1876) (in which the Pueblo Indians were determined not to be
``Indians'' for purpose of the Non-Intercourse Act, with the
consequence that they could own and alienate their lands, which they
did), followed by the Court's 1913 decision in U.S. v. Sandoval, 231
U.S. 28 (which reversed Joseph, finding that the Pueblos were, and
always had been, subject to and benefited by the Non-Intercourse Act),
threw into doubt the validity of some forty years of real estate
transactions involving lands within Pueblo grants. In addition, the
attempts by Congress to address the problem, by the Pueblo Lands Act of
1924 and the 1933 Act, were wholly inadequate.
The federal government also has contributed to the uncertainty
surrounding the water rights claims of Indian Nations and Tribes other
than the Pueblos, and of the federal government. Federal actions or
policies that have contributed to this include the creation and
dissolution of Indian reservations, periodic recurrence of radical
shifts in federal Indian policy, and other federal actions which may
``impliedly'' reserve water without an actual appropriation.
D. It is therefore appropriate for the United States to provide
substantial support to promote the completion of adjudication of Indian
and federal reserved water rights claims, by both settlement and
litigation.
E. Congress helps enormously, of course, by legislative approval
and funding of successful Indian water rights settlements, and this
expectation of United States support is usually critical to achieving a
settlement.
New Mexico is proud of its accomplishments in negotiating a
Settlement Agreement with the Navajo Nation. The Settlement was
completed in December 2004 after years of negotiations and resolves the
claims of the Navajo Nation to the use of waters of the San Juan River
Basin in New Mexico in a manner that would inure to the benefit of the
Navajo Nation and the State of New Mexico. The negotiating parties made
great efforts to provide information to the public and third parties
regarding the Settlement and to take comments into account in
finalizing the Agreement.
The Settlement provides water rights and associated water
development projects for the benefit of the Navajo Nation in exchange
for a release of claims to water that potentially might otherwise
displace existing non-Navajo water uses in the San Juan River Basin in
New Mexico. Along with the Settlement Agreement, the parties have
negotiated: 1) a proposed court decree for entry in the San Juan River
Adjudication setting forth the rights of the Navajo Nation to use and
administer waters of the San Juan River Basin in New Mexico; 2) a
proposed Settlement Act for Congress to authorize the Bureau of
Reclamation to construct and operate the Navajo-Gallup Water Supply
Project, to fund the Bureau of Reclamation to complete and rehabilitate
Navajo water projects in the San Juan River Basin in New Mexico, and to
approve the Settlement Agreement and other authorizations to secure to
the Navajo Nation a water supply to meet the needs of the Nation and
its members; and 3) a Settlement Contract to provide for deliveries to
the Navajo Nation under Bureau of Reclamation water projects, namely
the Navajo Indian Irrigation Project, the Navajo-Gallup Water Supply
Project, and the Animas-La Plata Project. Continued cooperation from
the federal government will be critical to ensure the benefits of this
settlement can be achieved.
In addition, under the Settlement, the federal government is
responsible for providing approximately $620 million of the funding
necessary to implement the settlement. The state is responsible for
funding an additional $35 million and local parties and the Jicarilla
Apache Nation are responsible for yet another $131 million. This level
of funding represents a reduction from the amounts originally proposed,
and New Mexico expects that the federal government will cooperate in
enabling the Settlement to progress.
F. Unfortunately, participation by the Departments of Justice and
Interior in recent negotiations to resolve Indian water rights claims
in New Mexico has been perfunctory and non-substantive.
In addition to the Navajo settlement, New Mexico is in the process
of negotiating settlements in the Aamodt adjudication, in the Nambe-
Pojoaque-Tesuque area, and the Abeyta adjudication, in Taos, both of
which are long-standing water rights adjudication suits. In the Aamodt
case, which has the distinction of being the oldest active case in
federal court, settlement negotiations have been proceeding for over
four years, and while the federal government participated in the
negotiations through the Justice Department, recent public
pronouncements that the federal government is unwilling to contribute
more than a fraction of the total proposed settlement costs have caused
extreme disruption to the negotiation process. It is unreasonable for
the federal government to attend settlement discussions without
meaningful participation, and to withhold substantive comments until a
settlement is finalized and legislation is introduced before Congress.
New Mexico is encouraged by the recent appointment of Jennifer Gimbel
within the Department of the Interior to oversee Indian water rights
settlements, and looks forward to working closely with her within the
next few years to finalize the settlements under negotiation and obtain
the necessary congressional support. New Mexico is also supportive of
the comments made on this issue by the New Mexico delegation during the
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing on the Fiscal
Year 2006 Interior Department budget.
G. In most of the west, and certainly in New Mexico, it is crucial
that all Indian and federal water right claims be adjudicated. The
surface waters of New Mexico's streams were fully appropriated years
ago, and the competing demands on the state's available water supplies
do not allow the luxury of putting off quantification questions. The
adjudication of reserved water right claims asserted by the federal
government should be made a priority along with the adjudication of
Indian water rights claims.
Recommendations
1. Congress should make clear that the timely adjudication of
Indian water rights and federal reserved water rights is an important
priority of the United States deserving of special attention from the
Departments of Justice and Interior.
2. Congress should support the timely adjudication of Indian and
federal reserved water rights at all levels of the process, by any
available means, including:
providing sufficient funding for, and the specific direction
to use, federal technical expertise and assets (through the
USBOR, USGS, etc.) to aid settlement negotiations; and
requiring, as a condition of funding, annual reporting on
the progress of achieving Congress' goal of timely adjudication
of Indian and federal reserved water rights.
3. Congress should fund settlements of Indian water rights claims
without requiring corresponding reductions in Department of Interior
programs.
2. role of water rights adjudications
A. General stream adjudications, legislatively prescribed and
undertaken by the states, are the indispensable tool for the
determination of all competing water rights claims in a stream system.
The needs and the history of each state are different, and the general
stream adjudication process has taken different forms in different
states, from quasi-administrative to strictly judicial, but all should
be supported as no other viable alternative exists for the
determination of federal and Indian water rights claims alongside
competing water rights claims developed under state law. In New Mexico,
where unappropriated water on its major rivers ceased to exist long
ago, no other mechanism exists to determine the water rights of all
parties. The adjudication of water rights is a process that must
succeed for the benefit of all. The more timely this process is
completed, the better.
B. It would not be helpful or advisable for Congress to attempt
quantification of Indian and federal reserved water rights outside the
existing general stream adjudication process. While that process has
sometimes suffered from delays and lack of needed resources, it is the
only process which can legitimately determine all water rights claims
in a basin in a fair and principled manner, and it is the process which
Congress has explicitly approved with the passage of the McCarran
Amendment.
Recommendations
1. Congress should support the water rights adjudication process
generally, including by:
providing sufficient funding for the federal judiciary's
special needs in water rights adjudications, such as Special
Masters, and specialized clerk and support staff; and
providing funding for the continuance of adjudication and
administration efforts by the states, many of which are
struggling to cope with the burdens of adjudicating and
administering water rights.
2. Attempts to quantify Indian water rights and federal reserved
water rights outside the existing general stream adjudication process
should be avoided.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Now we have down here a Nordhaus Law Firm member. That is
you, Steve?
Mr. Greetham. ``GREET-ham.''
The Chairman. ``GREETH-im''?
Mr. Greetham. Yes. The pig welcomer, ``Greet Ham.''
The Chairman. ``Greet-ham,'' okay.
STATEMENT OF STEPHEN GREETHAM, THE NORDHAUS LAW FIRM, ON BEHALF
OF THE PUEBLOS OF LAGUNA, SANTA ANA, SANTO DOMINGO, AND TAOS
Mr. Greetham. Thank you very much, Senators, Mr. Chairman.
I am here on behalf of the Pueblos of Laguna, Santa Ana,
Santo Domingo, and Taos today. My firm also represents the
Jicarilla Apache Nation, which has been referred to. They have
already completed a successful settlement of their water
rights.
The questions that the committee has asked fundamentally
turn on whether an adjudication is the appropriate way to
proceed. An adjudication is essentially the only tool we have,
and by that I mean a court decree declaring one's property
rights in water. The real issue gets to whether sole reliance
on litigation or a negotiated approach is the appropriate way
to go, and I think New Mexico gives us some sad examples of
exclusive reliance on litigation.
Aamodt and Abeyta, two of the oldest Federal cases in the
country, are 35, 39 years old respectively, dealing with five
tribal claims in addition to the affected non-Indian
communities. The Rio San Jose Basin is a State court
adjudication that was filed in 1982 and not a single water
right has yet been adjudicated in that action. This is simply a
pace that is not keeping up with the increasing demands that
are being placed on water supplies throughout the West.
I have to say that the discussion so far talking about
making increased supplies available will still not address the
allocation of those supplies as among the different communities
and individuals within any system.
Contrasting the litigation track record, the negotiation
track record in New Mexico gives a lot of reason for hope. The
Jicarillas completed their settlement on one basin in 1998,
another in 1999, and since the completion of the decree, the
negotiated decree on their rights, they have entered into the
water market as an economic player, which has benefited both
the non-Indian users in providing senior sources of supply for
municipal growth and economic development on the part of the
Jicarillas.
Aamodt and Abeyta are both pushing through. Those are two
large settlements in northern New Mexico and they are both
preparing to come back to D.C. for the second phase of the
negotiation process.
What role can Congress play, has been touched on. It was
interesting that all of our comments touched on the same
issues: money. The negotiation process is expensive and time-
consuming. The technical expertise, the legal requirements,
require extensive resources. Taos Pueblo over the past year and
a half has been in an intensive negotiation effort. They met
120 times in face to face negotiation sessions last year and
they are hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, both to
their in-house staff and to their technical consultants.
Because of the Federal trust responsibility and because of
the sprawling public interests in resolving the quantification
of senior tribal water rights, the Federal Government--the
easiest thing the Federal Government can do is to provide the
resources to complete these efforts. On top of that, right now
we operate in accordance with the 1990 settlement guidelines
that the Department of the Interior promulgated after the first
President Bush enacted the Indian Tribes Settlement Act.
Congress should step in and declare the priority as well. To
the extent Federal legislation is to be pursued to deal with
Indian water rights issues, Congress should set the tone as far
as declaring the priority in Federal policy to resolve these
quantifications and a preference for true intergovernmental
negotiated resolutions of the claims.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Greetham follows:]
Prepared Statement of Stephen Greetham, The Nordhaus Law Firm,
on Behalf of the Pueblos of Laguna, Santa Ana, Santo Domingo, and Taos
the united states must dedicate increased resources to the resolution
of tribal water rights claims and declare that effort to be a federal
policy priority
These comments--which are submitted by the Nordhaus Law Firm on
behalf of the Pueblos of Laguna, Santa Ana, Santo Domingo, and Taos--
address two portions of the Committee's third question: (1) what effort
should be made by the federal government to encourage adjudication or
settlement of Indian water rights claims?; and (2) are adjudications an
appropriate means to quantify those rights?
1. Tribal Water Rights Claims Must Be Resolved
Resolution of outstanding tribal water rights claims is a critical
priority throughout the West, both for the affected tribes and the
states in which they are located. There is no dispute that Indian
tribes possess the most senior water rights in the West. See, e.g., New
Mexico v. Aamodt, 537 F.2d 1102 (10th Cir. 1976); New Mexico, ex rel.,
State Engineer v. Aamodt, et al., 618 F. Supp. 993 (D.N.M. 1985).
Without a lawful quantification of those rights, however, efforts to
manage water use in this arid region are profoundly hampered, and that
has induced the State of New Mexico to declare the resolution of tribal
water rights claims to be a critical state priority. See generally New
Mexico State Water Plan at 11, 64-65 (Dec. 23, 2003) (available at
http://www.seo.state.nm.us/water-info/NMWaterPlanning/
2003StateWaterPlan. pdf); cf. id. at Sec. E. Furthermore, regardless of
planning and management difficulties, the absence of finality with
respect to the scope and extent of tribal water rights unfairly
undermines tribal efforts to develop those resources and to pursue
desperately needed collective economic benefits, and the longer it
takes to obtain finality, in fact, the more pressure there is on scarce
water supplies that could otherwise satisfy tribal rights. The bottom
line is that until outstanding claims are resolved, both the Indian and
non-Indian communities throughout the West will be burdened by
unnecessary conflict and uncertainty. See generally Western Water
Policy Review Comm'n, Water in the West: Challenge for the Next Century
(June 1998).
2. Exclusive Reliance on Litigation Efforts Is Inefficient
The Committee has asked whether adjudication is ``an appropriate
means'' for the quantification of water rights, and the general answer
has to be ``yes.'' Under relevant state law, see generally NMSA 1978,
Sec. 72-4-15 (1907), and the McCarran Amendment, 43 U.S.C. Sec. 666,
the quantification of any right to water located within New Mexico,
including tribal rights, must be decided by a court; indeed, absent an
appropriate court order, the protection of those property interests may
be compromised. See, e.g., United States v. Bluewater-Toltec Irr.
Dist., 580 F. Supp. 1434 (D.N.M. 1984), aff'd, 806 F.2d 986 (10th Cir.
1986). However, the fact that adjudication may be considered
``appropriate'' does not end the discussion.
For example, the adjudication of water rights by exclusive reliance
on litigation has, by no means, proven efficient. For example, the
Aamodt and Abeyta adjudications, which the state filed in federal court
more than 35 years ago, have so far failed to produce a quantification
of the water rights separately held by the Pueblos of Nambe, Pojoaque,
San Ildefenso, Taos, or Tesuque. Similarly, although litigation was
initiated more than 20 years ago to adjudicate all rights to the waters
of the Rio San Jose, the state court in the Kerr-McGee adjudication has
so far not entered a single interim order determining any non-Indian
water right, nor did it order an expedited inter se subproceeding on
the rights of the Pueblos of Acoma and Laguna until 2002. Procedural
issues in that subproceeding continue to consume the parties' and the
court's energies. In Abousleman, which will adjudicate the rights of
the Pueblos of Jemez, Santa Ana, and Zia, the federal court ruled only
last summer on cross-motions for summary judgment that were filed in
[1989]. It is troubling that all of these actions relate to the
adjudication of water rights on tributaries to the Rio Grande; at this
time, there is no publicly known plan to commence a general
adjudication of rights to the waters of the Rio Grande main stem, an
action that could affect almost all of the federally recognized Indian
tribes in New Mexico. One can only imagine how long such a
comprehensive court action would take to complete.
Adapting to these legal realities and consistent with the Interior
Department's 1990 guidelines, 55 Fed. Reg. 9223 (Mar. 12, 1990), tribes
have not relied exclusively on litigation. For example, the Jicarilla
Apache Nation successfully concluded negotiations on a final settlement
of its rights in the San Juan and Rio Chama basins in 1998 and 1999.
The eight Pueblos that are party to the Aamodt, Abeyta, and Abousleman
adjudications have likewise pursued a negotiated resolution of their
claims, and at present, the Aamodt and Abeyta Pueblos are nearing
closure on the local phase of those efforts. The Pueblos of Acoma and
Laguna, on the other hand, have been unable to obtain sufficient
attention from the United States for more than the most preliminary of
discussions with the current federal negotiation team assigned to the
Kerr-McGee adjudication. Largely due to a scarcity of resources, those
negotiation efforts have proceeded slowly, when they have proceeded at
all.
The inefficiencies of relevant state law adjudication processes or
the federal administrative negotiation guidelines do not necessarily
constrain options for how to proceed with the quantification of tribal
water rights. As the courts have stated, Congress has not abandoned
tribal water rights to state law control or otherwise compromised the
controlling authority of federal law with respect to those rights. See,
e.g., Arizona v. San Carlos Apache Tribe, 463 U.S. 800 (1976); Aamodt,
537 F.2d 1102. Accordingly, as discussed in the next section, Congress
can-and should-act to improve the quantification process by declaring a
federal priority for the resolution of tribal water rights, authorizing
increased funding for the litigation and negotiation processes, and
requiring the formal promulgation of clearer and more substantive
guidance for intergovernmental water rights negotiations. Such an act
would be appropriate given Congress' plenary authority over Indian
affairs and, particularly, in light of the United States' trust
responsibility with respect to the protection of tribal water rights.
3. Congress Should Declare the Resolution of Tribal Water Rights a
Critical Federal Priority and Require the Dedication of
Adequate Financial and Human Resources for the Fair
Quantification of Tribal Water Rights
Fifteen years ago, the United States declared its preference for
the negotiated resolution of tribal water rights. See 55 Fed. Reg.
9223. Congress and the Administration must back that preference with a
commitment of the funding and human resources necessary to bring these
critical and complex efforts to fruition. The simple truth is that
these efforts are expensive, especially for tribal governments that are
too often hamstrung by insufficient financial resources. In the Abeyta
negotiations, for example, Taos Pueblo's negotiation team, which
includes paid tribal staff members as well as legal and technical
consultants, has had to attend almost 120 negotiation sessions during
2004. In January 2005, alone, the Pueblo team met in Abeyta negotiation
sessions 21 out of 31 days. This recent pace, which was urged by the
federal court and which was critical to the dramatic progress that the
parties made last year, has required a tremendous dedication of
resources. However, due to insufficient federal funding, the Pueblo was
forced to allocate funds to the settlement effort at the expense of
other essential Pueblo programs, and substantial work performed in this
effort remains unpaid due to a lack of funds.
Throughout the West, tribes have had no alternative but to commit
scarce tribal funds on the quantification of their water rights, and
the United States has not matched that tribal commitment, either in
terms of funding or human resources. Recently, there has been much
public attention paid to the Justice and Interior Departments' refusal
to offer more than $11 million for the Aamodt settlement, a figure that
pales in comparison to the settlement's estimated cost of more than
$200 million. Furthermore, the Justice Department has tasked only one
Denver-based attorney to represent fifteen of the Indian tribes in New
Mexico that are currently engaged in litigation and/or negotiation over
their water rights. No matter the skill of this able and committed
attorney, his task is daunting. These brief examples represent the
insufficiency of the federal commitment to the timely and fair
resolution of tribal water rights claims.
Finally, while financial and human resources are desperately needed
for the successful and fair quantification of tribal water rights,
Congress should also provide guidance and greater clarity as to how
those resources could be most effectively and efficiently deployed.
Through appropriate legislation, for example, it could:
declare that the resolution of outstanding tribal water
rights claims is a federal priority;
declare that the policy of the United States is to seek
resolution of tribal water rights claims through
intergovernmental (federal-tribal-state) negotiation;
require that the Interior and Justice Departments develop
and implement plans for the completion of litigation or
negotiation of those claims;
require that the Interior Department actively commence its
representation of the United States in any tribal water rights
negotiation at the earliest possible stage;
establish a fund outside of the Interior Department annual
budget and appropriate to it sufficient money to cover annual
federal and tribal costs arising from ongoing quantification
efforts; and
similar to what the New Mexico Legislature is presently
considering, establish a tribal water rights settlement fund
and appropriate to it sufficient money to cover the costs of
implementing future settlements.
To provide greater clarity to the negotiation process, such
legislation should also direct the Interior Department to promulgate
regulations that:
establish how timely intergovernmental negotiations for the
quantification of tribal water rights should be commenced and
conducted;
standardize the ``shape of the table'' to preserve and
facilitate the intergovernmental (federal-tribal-state) nature
of these efforts;
establish a uniform threshold scope for these efforts to
encourage an appropriate and realistic focus; and
establish standardized procedures for developing timely
administrative policy on specific issues as they arise in
negotiations.
The Pueblos do not propose a radical overhaul of the present
negotiations process; nonetheless, the current administrative
guidelines for the negotiated settlement of tribal water rights are too
vague to provide adequately uniform direction or to facilitate timely
progress. And perhaps more importantly, administrative guidelines do
not carry the full weight of the United States' endorsement or
authority, and such gravity would be appropriate in matters as critical
as those affecting tribal trust resources.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Mr. John--would you tell me how to say your last name?
Mr. Echohawk. ``Echo Hawk.''
The Chairman. Echohawk. We look forward to hearing from
you.
STATEMENT OF JOHN ECHOHAWK, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIVE AMERICAN
RIGHTS FUND
Mr. Echohawk. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I am the executive director of the Native American Rights
Fund and we have been involved in Indian water rights
litigation and settlements for 35 years. We are currently
representing three tribes in that regard.
I am also here on behalf of the National Congress of
American Indians and the tribal representatives of the joint
Federal tribal Indian water funding task force. As you know,
Indian water rights is one of the most important issues to the
tribes out there. You know that tribes are sovereign
governments and each tribe reserves to itself the right to
decide how to resolve its Indian water rights claims, whether
that be through litigation or negotiation or through some other
avenue.
I think we are in agreement, those tribes involved in these
negotiations, that what we need to focus on and what we would
recommend to the committee is a focus on creating a funding
mechanism to do that. Under the current system, funding of
Indian water rights settlements is discretionary. So that means
when we are negotiating these settlements we have to find money
in the Interior budget somehow, and that is not very easy and
that is a stumbling block that we face in terms of trying to
reach settlements in these cases.
What we would propose is that funding of these Indian water
rights settlements be made mandatory. You may recall, Mr.
Chairman, in the 107th Congress we worked with you to put
together such a mechanism, providing for relief from the Budget
Act so that appropriations for these settlements would not be
scored against the budgets of the appropriators under the
Budget Act.
Since we do not have the Budget Act, I think it would
behoove us all to try to find another, similar kind of funding
mechanism that would accomplish the same thing. Some kind of
annual automatic appropriation up to $250 million as we
proposed in our proposal is I think a mechanism that we could
look at, in effect a judgment fund for Indian land and water
claim settlements, the $250 million figure based upon where we
were at historically back in the 1970's when the settlement of
these claims really got going. We think that is the way that we
should go and that is what we would recommend to the committee.
Finally, I would also point to the issue that Steve was
focusing on and that is the need for funds for these tribes to
be able to come to the negotiating table. So many of them do
not have the resources to do that. Again, the funding to the
Bureau of Indian Affairs for this purpose is very, very
limited. Whatever funds come that way end up supporting
litigation and the tribes who are ready to enter into
negotiations are really left without the resources to do so.
This of course also holds up this whole process of settling
these claims.
I would urge the committee to focus on those two areas, and
again I appreciate the invitation to be here.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Echohawk follows:]
Prepared Statement of John E. Echohawk, Executive Director, Native
American Rights Fund; Jacqueline Johnson, Executive Director, National
Congress of American Indians; and Bruce Sunchild, Co-Chair, Joint
Federal-Tribal Indian Water Funding Task Force
topic #3: indian and federal reserved water rights
proposals
a. Enact legislation to establish a funding mechanism to ensure
that any Indian land or water settlement, once authorized by the
Congress and approved by the President, will be funded without a
corresponding offset to other tribal programs or essential Interior
Department programs.
b. Provide increased funding for Interior Department tribal
programs that support tribal participation in settlement negotiations
in order to facilitate increased tribal participation in negotiations
and significantly advance the goal of achieving water rights
settlements.
discussion
What effort should be made by the federal government to encourage
the adjudication or settlement of Indian water rights claims?
The Native American Rights Fund, the National Congress of American
Indians and the Indian Representatives on the Joint Federal-Tribal
Indian Water Funding Task Force believe that the resolution of Indian
water claims is one of the most important aspects of the United States'
trust obligation to Native Americans and is of vital importance to the
country as a whole. As sovereign governments, each tribe decides for
itself how its water rights claims will be resolved and the federal
government should honor that decision. We support those tribes who have
decided to resolve their water rights claims through negotiated
settlements, and those who are either pursuing litigation or have
decided to wait to address their water rights issues.
We commend the Congress and the Administration for recognizing that
settlement of Indian water rights claims is an obligation of the United
States government and for encouraging the settlement of those claims.
However, an appropriate funding mechanism must be found for Indian
water rights settlements or the settlement policy will become a
nullity.
The current practice is to treat the funding of Indian water
settlements as discretionary, with the result that a settlement can
only be funded with a corresponding reduction in some other
discretionary component of the Interior Department's budget. The
practical effect of this budgetary policy is to significantly hinder
the negotiation and funding of new settlements. It is very difficult
for the federal government, the tribes, the states and private parties
to negotiate settlements knowing that they will only be funded at the
expense of other tribes or essential Interior Department programs.
We would note that Congress has given serious consideration to
proposals to take Indian water settlements off-budget. In the 107th
Congress, Chairman Domenici introduced S. 1186, that provided a
budgetary mechanism to ensure that funds will be available to satisfy
the Federal Government's responsibilities with respect to negotiated
settlements of disputes related to Indian water rights claims and
Indian land claims. S. 1186 is important legislation that deserves
additional consideration by the Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Funding of Indian water rights settlements should be a mandatory
obligation of the United States government. The obligation is analogous
to, and no less serious than, the obligation of the United States to
pay judgments which are rendered against it. We urge that steps be
taken to change the current policy to ensure that any Indian water
rights settlement, once authorized by the Congress and approved by the
President, will be funded. If such a change is not made, all Indian
water rights claims will have to be litigated or languish, an outcome
which ought not to be acceptable to the federal government, the tribes,
the states and private parties.
The following is draft legislative language which, if enacted,
would make mandatory the funding of any Indian water rights settlement
authorized by Congress and approved by the President. It would
appropriately treat the funding of the settlement of Indian water
rights claims as a judgment against the United States. It is proposed
as language to amend an Interior appropriations act or a supplemental
appropriations act:
``Such sums as may be necessary, not to exceed $250,000,000
in any fiscal year, shall hereafter be available for payment of
amounts authorized in Indian land and water claims settlements
Acts, subject to the same protections and limitations as funds
appropriated in satisfaction of a judgement of the Indian
Claims Commission or the United States Claims Court in favor of
any Indian tribe, band, group, pueblo, or Indian community.''
Historically, judgments upholding Indian claims rendered by the
Court of Claims or the Indian Claims Commission have been treated and
paid as were other judgments by the Court of Claims, and have not been
included as part of Interior's budget. We acknowledge that there may be
other approaches to achieving the desired result and suggest that such
funding mechanisms might be considered in joint oversight hearings with
the Senate Indian Affairs Committee.
We also urge increased funding for the Interior Department to
facilitate tribal participation in Indian water rights settlement
negotiations. Without tribal participation in negotiations, settlements
can never be reached. Too often the lack of funding slows the
negotiation process or prevents tribes from negotiating at all. The
limited Interior Department funding that does exist is prioritized for
litigation and negotiations suffer. We urge Congress to provide
increased funding that will facilitate increased tribal participation
in water settlement negotiations and significantly advance the goal of
achieving water rights settlements.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, all four of you.
Senator Bingaman, did you have anything you would like to
ask?
Senator Bingaman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me ask our State Engineer, John D'Antonio. You have
some fairly strong statements here in your testimony, which I
appreciate. You say: ``Unfortunately, participation by the
Departments of Justice and Interior in recent negotiations to
resolve Indian water rights claims in New Mexico has been
perfunctory and non-substantive.''
Then a little later you say: ``It is unreasonable for the
Federal Government to attend settlement discussions without
meaningful participation and to withhold substantive comments
until a settlement is finalized and legislation is introduced
before Congress.'' Then you go on to talk about how you are
encouraged that Jennifer Gimbel has been appointed to oversee
this set of issues.
One point that Senator Salazar made when we had a budget
hearing on the Department of the Interior budget earlier this
year was that we have got a systemic problem in the Department
of the Interior, in that every time you put somebody in this
kind of a key position, responsible for working on these
negotiations, if they prove capable they are promoted to
another job, and therefore the position is vacant again.
The current Solicitor, Sue Ellen Wooldridge, was in this
job and then she was--it was determined that she was capable,
so they promoted her to a different position. She is now the
Solicitor. That was the comment Senator Salazar made, as I
understand it or as I recall it.
Do you think that is a fair comment? Do you think there is
something else that we could be trying to do here at the
Federal level to get a consistent level of expert involvement
by the Department of the Interior on these important issues?
Mr. D'Antonio. Mr. Chairman, Senator Bingaman, our
frustration in New Mexico--and again, we are actively involved
in three water rights settlements, the Aamodt which has been--
it is the longest Federal lawsuit that is out there. And then
we have the Abeyta adjudication also, which is in the Taos
area.
What we have seen is, the most frustrating part is
negotiating for 3 or 4 years thinking that there is a level of
involvement, especially on the funding side, from the Federal
Government, and going through a set of plans, which again in
most cases in order for us to settle Indian water rights we
have to give something up in order that the tribes or pueblos
give up a future right to water. So it evolves into the Federal
Government funding water projects essentially in the case of
the Aamodt settlement. Obviously, a regional water system is
essential. It was above $200 million.
When parties are negotiating for longer than 4 years, but
substantively for the last 4 years, and then all parties
thinking there is going to be a nexus of $200 million there and
the Federal Government comes in and says: we think perhaps
there may be only $11 million to do it. It really throws a
wrench into what progress has been made.
I understand budget issues. I understand that the budget is
a big concern for everybody. But I also understand that the
certainty of those water rights settlements is going to enable
us to move forward in every aspect of the State in terms of
certainty for economic growth and our ability to allow us to
market water amongst different parties.
I am not sure I am answering your question fully here. I
know Jennifer Gimbel is somebody that we have a lot of
confidence in. We have worked with her closely, her being from
Colorado, on other issues in other areas, and we think engaging
her in some of the Indian water rights settlements discussions
is only going to help.
Senator Bingaman. Thank you.
The Chairman. Senator.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
We do not have any Indian water rights issues in my State,
so I am listening very attentively to the concerns and the
problems that you have raised. I had to lean over to my
colleague the chairman here and say: I cannot believe that they
have been trying to work through these settlements and this
litigation for 25, 35 years, and it is still hanging out there.
You have all cited the need for some funding at this end to
kind of provide for the push. But other than the I guess it was
$250 million annually that I understand was in Chairman
Domenici's legislation that he had introduced in the 107th,
there has not really been any discussion of what would be
sufficient, what would be adequate.
If you can tell me what you think would be adequate, tell
me how we push it over the edge so that you do not have these
settlements continuing for yet another 25 years? Just because
you have the funding there does not necessarily mean that there
is the impetus to resolve.
Mr. Echohawk. I think the experience we have had in these
Indian water rights cases is that in most instances the
parties, once they come together, are going to be able to
figure out a resolution on the ground, how they can all live
together, how to make this thing work, because we are dealing
with a situation where tribes generally have the senior rights
and water rights holders under State law had rights that most
of the time are junior to the tribes. The question is how to
put those two together.
We have the U.S. Government in the middle, having a role as
trustee. They have not protected the tribal water rights, but
at the same time they have encouraged the States to go ahead
and develop water under State law. So the Federal Government
plays a major role here and they need to be able to step up to
the plate and fund their fair share of a settlement.
They have not been able to do that in each and every case,
and that is the basic problem that we have. That is why this
funding mechanism that I proposed is the best way, because that
is usually the reason the government cites for not being able
to support a settlement, is the lack of funding.
Senator Murkowski. Maybe I am confused. There is the
funding for the settlement, but I thought you were also looking
for assistance just to cover--it says ``annual Federal and
tribal costs arising from ongoing quantification efforts and
sufficient to cover the costs of implementing the future
settlement.'' So you have got two fronts that you are looking
at from a funding perspective, is that correct?
Mr. Echohawk. Steve, you want to?
Mr. Greetham. Yes, that is true, as far as the two funding
components, now working on and then implementing whatever we
agree to.
I just want to make sure two things are clear. One, those
long time lines. Folks have not been negotiating for 25 years.
For example, in the Abeyta there have been negotiation efforts,
but a lot of the efforts require extensive hydrologic and
technical assessments to figure out how the watershed works. So
you figure out what the available supply is. There is a lot of
time-consuming technical work.
Since August 2003 we have been working with a mediator and
we have been meeting on a very aggressive schedule. When you
contrast the time between sitting down to talk in a negotiating
context versus going to the courthouse to sue, the time to
complete is much quicker through the negotiation process.
Also you mentioned, how can we be sure that there is going
to be the impetus for folks to finish. The impetus exists. For
example, on the Rio San Jose, on which you have the Pueblos of
Akima and Laguna, the two pueblos back in the early 1980's took
an action to Federal court to protect their water sources,
their water supplies--they are down at the bottom of the
system--as against junior diverters upstream. The Federal court
kicked them out and said: I am sorry, you cannot protect
anything until you have a court decree saying precisely what
your water right is.
So until there is a formal court decree quantifying, the
tribes, their ability to protect their property interests and
their sovereign interests in their water resources are
compromised.
The finality serves a tremendous value. John D'Antonio
supervised or oversaw the formulation of the New Mexico State
water plan back in 2002. In that document, which was the result
of extensive public comment processes and intensive town hall-
type discussions, folks really highlighted on the problem of
not even being able to plan as far as the use of water
resources without having final quantifications of their rights.
So it is not just a question of if we pay more money then
folks will get the interest to finish. Folks are interested in
doing it now. Two gentlemen are here from Taos Pueblo, Nelson
Cordova and Gil Suazo. For the past 14 years they have
essentially dedicated their lives to seeing the quantification
of the tribe's water rights to closure, and they do it often
without any payment or compensation from their tribe.
But the commitment is there. The resources and the
expertise need to be made available to complete the process.
Senator Murkowski. I appreciate you clarifying the length
of time that you have been involved in the negotiations.
Mr. Bell. Senator, just one aspect of your question. I
think the fact that this mechanism would make it mandatory
means that the tribe would no longer be faced with the prospect
of losing money for some important other Indian program if
their settlement is funded. That has been something they have
faced and it is a real disincentive for tribes to participate.
This would solve that.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
I do not believe we are saying, and we surely are not
advocating, that the Federal Government say, we are going to
cut Indian programs for the amount of money we had to settle a
claims case for. We may be cutting Indian programs for some
other reason that we may not like, but I do not think that is
the case.
I do think it is real that the Department is beginning to
say, where do we get the money. I myself think it is a mistake
for the Federal Government not to participate all the way up
and down, because it seems to me if the end product is
something that the Federal Government says is unreasonable,
they should have been players all along talking about its
unreasonableness, rather than wait until the end.
The two that we have spoken of, Navajo and the long-term
Aamodt case, are rather interesting in that the biggest portion
of the settlement in each case is the construction of large
public works facilities. So that one ends up saying the water
right must be worth, who knows, X, and then you look out there
and say, let us build two water lines. Now, what do they cost?
And they are not necessarily related, but the water lines may
cost $800 million. So the answer is the solution, the
settlement, is build the water lines, in exchange for which the
water rights are settled.
You know, the Government could get involved in that much
earlier and say, we do not think that is the way it should be
settled. So I do not think they help the case to not get in it
and argue--and I say that with you here; I have talked to the
Secretary personally about it. Frankly, we have got to find
money to settle the cases, and we will find it somewhere. They
are looking for a stream of resources. That is how we settled
the Arizona one. They found a stream of resources. It did come
out of the budget, however, so there is no argument. It was
sent over from another place that it was going, but it was
coming out of the general fund in the final analysis.
So we have to do that. It is a hard job, but we will have
to do it.
Let us see. Did you have one last comment, Mr. Attorney,
Steven?
Mr. Greetham. Just in following up on Senator Bingaman's
comment earlier about in essence a modified Peter principle at
work, that once folks demonstrate proficiency they get promoted
out of their job of working on Indian water rights.
Unfortunately, I think that is a sad example of the lack of
institutional priority being brought to bear on the resolution
of these claims.
It is not just the money, although that is obviously the
critical material component. But there needs to be a
reinforcement of the institutional critical priority on seeing
these efforts to closure.
The Chairman. Well, two ways to look at it. Senator
Salazar's approach may be looked on as something that he is
against promoting people. So that I do not know where we are
going. Those people want to get promoted. They do not want to
be where they were.
On the other hand, I would make one last observation. It
has to do with payment of fees. The case was made we have got
to pay for the Indian costs for the Indian litigation. I think
you made the case. You ought to know, as a Senator we get a lot
of complaints about the poor people that get sued too by the
Indian claims, and they want us to pay their fees, too. They
are poor, they do not have any money, and all of a sudden they
get served with a subpoena and get in a lawsuit.
They come up here one time, they asked Senator Bingaman and
I to pay fees up and down the river for the people that were in
the lawsuit. We did that once. It is a tough situation, but I
wanted to say it is not all always only the Indian way, the
Indian problem. It is another problem too for the non-Indian
who has to pay. They were innocent, too. Not in a legal sense,
but they did not know what was going on for 50 years, 100
years.
With that, we will go on to the next panel. Thank you very
much.
Okay, the last panel. We have six of you: the Awwa Research
Foundation, General Electric, the Environmental Defense--I
guess it is Environmental Defense Fund--Tom Graff; Groundwater
Association; the city of Albuquerque; and the Texas Water
Development Board.
Can we get started? Are you ready, Awwa Research, Richard
Karlin?
STATEMENT OF RICHARD J. KARLIN, DEPUTY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AWWA
RESEARCH FOUNDATION
Mr. Karlin. I am. My name is Richard Karlin. I am the
deputy executive director of Awwa Research Foundation. I want
to thank the Senators for inviting us to participate in this
conference.
By means of introduction, I would like to describe what we
are so that people put into perspective what we are talking
about. Awwa Research Foundation, commonly known as AwwaRF, is
nonprofit international, member-supported organization that
supports research to enable water utilities, public health
officials, and other professionals to provide reasonably safe
and cost effective water for citizens.
We get our resources from 900 voluntary contributions from
water utilities around the world, mostly in North America,
Congress, Federal and State agencies, and from other research
organizations. We have a long history of partnering. We have
partnered with 30 organizations from eight countries, including
several governments, and have been able to parlay $52 million
we have received from Congress into a $360 million program
since 1986.
With that in mind, we do believe that there is a Federal
role in conservation technology and knowledge management
regarding water resources. We think that the Federal Government
should consider public-private partnerships as a cost effective
approach for developing long-term solutions to the challenges
facing the drinking water community. Provision should be made
in any future programs, in our belief, that would require or
encourage public-private partnering as a portion of the
program.
We believe nonprofit research organizations have several
distinct advantages over purely Federal programs. No. 1, we can
leverage Federal funding. As we indicated before, we have about
a seven to one record on our leveraging. We believe that we
have access to a lower overhead management process. We can
access a national and international network of water
researchers in a variety of ways. Last, we have active
involvement by the actual end user to get real research needs
and therefore real research results that can be used as opposed
to studied.
In summary, public-private partnering we believe is a win-
win opportunity for the Federal Government, water utilities,
and the public because it not only leverages funding, but it
provides for coordination that can help eliminate some of the
duplication that sometimes happens in research.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Karlin follows:]
Prepared Statement of Richard J. Karlin, Deputy Executive Director,
Awwa Research Foundation
4. conservation and technological developments
introduction
Established in 1966, the Awwa Research Foundation (AwwaRF) is a
member-supported, international, nonprofit organization that sponsors
research to enable water utilities, public health agencies, and other
professionals to provide safe and affordable drinking water to
consumers. Resources to fund research come from voluntary contributions
from nearly 900 public water utilities, Congress, federal and
international agencies, and other research organizations.
Since 1983, Congress has provided support to the AwwaRF, helping it
become the centralized coordinator of studies that focus on the
challenges faced by U.S. water suppliers. This congressional support
has come in the form of earmarks in the VA-HUD Independent Agencies
appropriations; 18 separate earmarks have provided $52 million in seed
funding. Research lays the groundwork for cost-effective solutions to
such issues as new technologies to control emerging water contaminants,
aging infrastructure, finding new sources of water, conservation
strategies, and keeping water supplies secure. 1Many of these same
issues are described in the conference topic ``Conservation and
Technological Developments.''
As the leading organization for drinking-water studies, AwwaRF has
partnered with 30 organizations worldwide in it research activities.
Partners include federal and state agencies, research organizations
from eight countries, foreign environmental and health agencies, and
international drinking water organizations. Through these partnerships,
the Foundation is able to leverage resources, maximize research
efforts, and develop and disseminate broad-based knowledge to the
drinking water community. By leveraging the $52 million provided by
Congress, AwwaRF has funded a total research effort of over $360
million on topics such as arsenic removal, disinfection byproducts,
Cryptosporidium control, security, infrastructure renewal and
replacement, perchlorate, and new technologies to address emerging
contaminants in drinking water.
Research supported by AwwaRF and its partners has resulted in
development and validation of new treatment technologies that are
effective, reliable, and affordable for removing drinking water
contaminants of concern.
Examples of the positive impact of AwwaRF research are:
AwwaRF's pioneering research showed that ultraviolet
treatment was effective against Cryptosporidium so that the EPA
could recommend it as a treatment when developing regulations
for surface and groundwater regulations.
Since the 1990s, many water utilities are now installing
membrane treatment processes as a result of the AwwaRF's
research that demonstrated that membranes are cost-effective
and reliable in meeting increasingly stringent regulations for
both large and small water utilities.
In anticipation of lowering of the arsenic action level and
the emergence of perchlorate as a drinking water contaminant,
AwwaRF leveraged federal funds to perform multiple pilot-and
full-scale studies that will enable water utilities to
confidently select appropriate treatment technologies.
AwwaRF research has impacted other areas important to water
utilities and consumers including energy conservation
practices, water conservation practices, cost-effective
desalination processes, aquifer storage and recovery of treated
drinking water, and automated metering to promote conservation.
proposal
This proposal responds to the Senate Energy & National Resources
Committee's request for comment as to the role of federal government in
addressing the challenge of meeting the nation's ever-increasing demand
for water.
AwwaRF is submitting a proposal on the topic ``Conservation and
Technology Developments.'' This topic addresses the development of new
water technologies and operational strategies that can be used by the
drinking water community to meet future water challenges, a primary
focus of AwwaRF. The other topics focus on national policy issues.
The U.S. water supply community, particularly in the arid
Southwestern states, is increasingly challenged by limited water
supply. In many areas this challenge is being amplified by persistent
drought and significant population growth. Water utilities are being
compelled to manage resources more cooperatively on a regional level,
pursue conservation measures and rate-based incentives, and leverage
appropriate technology advancements to develop alternative water
supplies (e.g., desalination and reuse). These measures place
significant financial burden on water suppliers and, in turn, their
customers, the U.S. public. The federal government can help to ease
this burden through public education regarding the realities of limited
water supply, the cost and value of water, the public's role in water
resource management, and through continued sponsorship of research and
development on key water supply issues and technologies.
With three decades of experience in successfully leveraging public
and private resources to fund research that benefits the public, the
AwwaRF supports the critical role of the federal government in helping
to identify drinking water challenges facing the nation's public water
systems, and providing resources to address these challenges. The
AwwaRF believes that the most effective approach to solving these
challenges is through cooperative efforts between federal agencies and
the private sector. This approach helps ensure that the world-body of
knowledge and national expertise are brought together to develop and
implement reach strategies.
Therefore, AwwaRF proposes the Senate Energy & Natural Resources
Committee consider public-private partnerships as a cost-effective
approach for developing efficient long-term solutions to the many
challenges facing the drinking water community. The following
information provides the basis for this proposal.
partnership approach
Provisions should be made in future legislation to encourage and/or
require the participation of nonprofit organizations, such as the
AwwaRF. Nonprofit research organizations offer distinct advantages over
a purely federal program.
First and most importantly, nonprofit organizations can and will
provide matching funding for research of interest to the water
community. This leverage can be significant--documented six to one
funding leverage for AwwaRF earmarks--and can be in many forms
including a cash match, management fee contribution, and contractor
contributions.
Secondly, funding from the federal government can take advantage of
the extremely low overhead rate provided by most nonprofit
organizations. For example, the AwwaRF has a general administrative
cost factor of 11 percent, which means that the great majority of
funding is spent on research.
In general, nonprofit research programs have excellent research
management systems and processes in place. The AwwaRF operates one of
the most efficient and internationally competitive processes available
in the global water community. This process ensures that research
issues are examined from different perspectives and that the most
competent researchers for a specific issue are utilized.
Industry-sponsored research programs, like AwwaRF, are closely
connected to the user of the technology--water suppliers themselves--
thus ensuring the rapid dissemination and implementation of research
developments. AwwaRF research is peer-reviewed, and the results are
used by researchers, federal agencies, and the drinking water
community.
Moreover, AwwaRF members, primarily public water utilities, help
determine appropriate research topics necessary to address their actual
needs. The identification of ``real-world'' needs is the essential
ingredient in producing research results that can be applied by water
suppliers.
Lastly, existing research organizations have a large network of
researchers, both national and international, who have worked
extensively on water issues. This network allows immediate access to
the best talent in the world without creating the need to create a new
institution and/or import of expertise. Results can produce better and
faster without the lag-time inherent in creating a separate
organization. Additionally, the international research community has
the opportunity to provide technical and funding leverage to issues of
common concern. Since many of the issues transcend national boundaries,
a nonprofit organization with extensive international reach provides a
mechanism for cooperation on a global basis.
In summary, public and private partnering is a ``win-win'' for the
federal government, water suppliers, and the public through leveraging
of limited resources to develop the best knowledge to produce high
quality, affordable, and consistently safe drinking water.
The Chairman. It sounds like you were speaking in the past
tense as to the Federal Government's participation. Is that
because they used to, or they still do?
Mr. Karlin. They still do. I am sorry if that was not
clear. We are still active in several partnerships with the
Federal Government through U.S. EPA, through Department of
Energy, and through the Bureau of Reclamation.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
How do you say your last name, sir?
Mr. Sabol. ``KOLL-in SAY-ble.''
The Chairman. ``SAY-ble.''
STATEMENT OF COLIN SABOL, CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER, GENERAL
ELECTRIC
Mr. Sabol. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the
committee, for inviting me here today. I appreciate it.
GE Water and Process Technologies is a leading global
provider of water treatment systems and services. Water is the
lifeblood of industry and our products and services conserve a
billion gallons of water annually for our industrial customers.
Our treatment systems create safe, affordable water for
millions of people living in water-scarce regions around the
world. We create and commercialize innovative technologies
through the GE Global Research Center, where we have 2,500
technologists, and we spend $3 billion on research and
development annually.
To ensure an adequate, safe supply of affordable water, a
strategy that incorporates conservation and the development of
new water resources is critical. Membrane-based treatment
solutions are the key to creating these new water sources, such
as brackish water aquifers, sea water, and even waste water.
Membrane technology is proven effective, but remains a costly
alternative to surface water treatment. Broader application of
these technologies to create meaningful new water sources
requires investment to reduce the energy consumption associated
with the operation of these membrane systems.
GE and other companies have created great strides in
reducing the cost of desalinating sea water using membranes,
from over $20 per thousand gallons in 1980 to now less than $4
per thousand gallons today. We believe that a broad research
and development program focused on membrane advancements and
energy efficiency could lead to a 30 percent reduction in
operating cost and a 25 percent reduction in capital cost of
these systems. This would encourage industry and potable water
providers to reduce their reliance on surface water sources by
fulfilling their demand with new water sources.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Sabol follows:]
Prepared Statement of Colin Sabol, Chief Marketing Officer,
General Electric
development of enabling technologies for enhancing water availability
in the united states
National Need
Worldwide water needs have been increasing rapidly due to
population and industrial growth. In the past, water was seen as mainly
a Middle-East or African issue, however, with the rapid growth in North
America this view point is changing. In contrast to many areas of the
world, the United States has enjoyed abundant supply of freshwater at a
relatively low cost to the end user. Over the next few decades,
however, factors such as population growth, increased industrial usage,
and pollution of existing supplies may place a strain on the nations
capability to supply the necessary quantities of safe freshwater. A
case in point is the recent and projected growth in southeastern and
southwestern regions of the country where safe freshwater shortages
occur routinely during drought years. These regions may also face daily
shortages in the not so distant future. The potential inability to meet
the growing needs for freshwater will adversely impact public health
and various economic sectors of the United States. To ensure adequate
supply of safe freshwater at a reasonable cost, a combination of water
conservation, reuse and recycling, as well as development of new water
resources is critical. Since conventional water resources are limited,
the development of new water resources will most likely come from
existing impaired resources such as brackish water and seawater, in
addition to water generated during energy production (oil, natural gas
or coal bed methane production). It is imperative the U.S. government
recognize this growing need and act quickly to fund research and
development of enabling technologies in areas such as industrial water
reuse, generation of potable water from non-potable sources using
desalination powered by renewable energy, and low-cost seawater
desalination. In all of these areas it is clear that various membrane
technologies can play a significant role in helping the U.S. to protect
and increase one of its most valuable resources.
Desalination holds the potential for addressing the shortage of
safe freshwater in the United States by processing vast inland brackish
water supplies and coastal seawater. While desalination has the
potential to address existing and future water needs, it has been
plagued by high cost, making it non-competitive with natural resources
used today. Of the available desalination techniques, reverse osmosis
(RO), multi-stage flash, multi-effect distillation, and vapor
compression, RO consistently has the highest demonstrated energy
efficiency, typically 3-8 kWh/m3. Even at this higher efficiency,
energy cost still accounts for roughly 45% of the cost of water in RO
based systems. For many projected water starved regions of the country
and remote, inland areas where grid connectivity is limited, the retail
cost of energy ranges from $0.08-$0.12/kWh. While the cost of energy
generation has dropped, for remote areas, the cost associated with
transmission and distribution makes up a large percentage of the retail
energy cost. Hence, alternative solutions are required for the
production of safe freshwater.
Two prevailing concepts for reducing energy cost associated with RO
are to 1) reduce overall operating costs ($ per 1000 gallons of water
produced) of desalination systems and 2) couple RO with renewable
energy sources, such as wind and photovoltaics. Research and
development focused on high recovery, low energy desalination systems
would include efforts on high efficiency energy recovery devices and
pumps, vertically nested signature system designs, enhanced
pretreatments (antiscalants and filters), and finally low energy, high
rejection membranes. The table below shows the dramatic improvement
made in the industry to increase the permeability of RO membranes,
which results in a decrease in the required power consumption of
desalination systems. Membrane permeability, denoted by A-value,
correlates directly to the operating pressure required for
desalination. Cellulose acetate membranes require around 28 bar of
driving pressure to achieve common flux targets, the most common
polyamide membranes operate at only 15bar. In the past ten years there
has been significant development of RO membrane technology that has
lead to the commercialization of membranes with about twice the
permeability. GE has presently working to develop RO membranes with
even greater permeability, with a target driving pressure around 4bar.
Combining the improvements in RO membranes with energy recovery devices
and pretreatments could lead to an overall reduction in operating cost
per 1000 gallons of at 30%, and a reduction of capital and land cost of
25%.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Permeability (A- Driving Pressure
Membrane value)* (bars)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cellulose Acetate............... 35................ 28
1993 state-of-the-art polyamide 10................ 22
RO.
1997 state-of-the-art polyamide 17................ 15
RO.
2002 state-of-the-art polyamide 22................ 11
RO.
New GE polyamide RO............. 30-50............. 2.8-4.8
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* A-value has units of 10^5 cm/(sec*atm)
Table: Industry improvement in RO membrane permeability
Desalination via a hybrid approach, where renewable energy sources
(RES) such as wind energy or photovoltaic are coupled with RO
desalination, is another attractive alternative to conventional RO
systems. It is apparent from investigating the cost structure of a
traditional desalination system that energy, capital, and operation and
maintenance cost are major factors. The advantages of a combined RES-RO
system would address these factors. Coupling the energy generation
directly to RO systems through the use of renewable energy sources the
energy cost associated with transmission and distribution is avoided.
In addition the RES resources throughout the nation correlates to
potential impaired water resources that can be used for the development
of new, safe freshwater, as shown below. Specifically, the plain states
have abundant saline aquifers, which if cultivated, can yield
freshwater for the agricultural economy. In the plains states, both
wind and photovoltaic sources are prevalent and can be used for
desalination. In the southwest, specifically New Mexico, Texas, and
Colorado, significant growth in population is projected. These areas
not only face the challenge of meeting the ever-increasing water
demand, but also the restrictions of water rights on the use of
available freshwater sources. The development of novel membrane
materials and modules, energy recovery devices, and operating
strategies in a flexible, modular RO configuration coupled with
renewable energy sources offers an excellent opportunity to provide
cost-effective freshwater.
Potential Program Scope
GE Global Research in conjunction with its Infrastructure and Wind
Energy business units will collaborate in the development of flexible,
modular RO configurations. The key objectives of the program are:
Design and fabricate advanced membrane materials
Establish optimal efficiency through fluid dynamic modeling
of module designs
Develop system level energy integration to design flexible,
modular RO configurations
This program allows for the complete system development of cost-
effective desalination strategies that can be commercialized to meet
the growing freshwater needs in the U.S. GE Infrastructure has state of
the art membrane research and fabrication capabilities in its Osmonics
facility located in Minnetonka, MN. Osmonics employs approximately 700
people in areas including membrane research and development, design of
modules and filters, and complete membrane systems fabrication. They
have recently completed the construction of a 50,000 sq. ft. building
to house a new $7 million state of the art membrane coater for
desalination.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Tom Graff.
STATEMENT OF THOMAS J. GRAFF, CALIFORNIA REGIONAL DIRECTOR,
ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE
Mr. Graff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am Tom Graff,
California regional director of Environmental Defense. The
proposal that we submitted to the committee was jointly
drafted, really principally drafted, by my Texas-based
colleague, Mary Kelly.
One can look at Western water policy in the United States
as a glass being in effect half empty or half full. There are
real problems. That is the half empty part. There is very
substantial population growth. The most substantial population
growth overall in the United States is occurring in the driest
States of our country, and absent focused conservation efforts
that will mean added stresses on our water supplies.
We already have very significant environmental stresses and
inequities. Declines of salmon and other iconic species,
endangered species losses, starved rivers and parks have been
impacted by dams and reservoirs and water operations, and
climate change appears to be a looming challenge that we are
going to have to face as well.
We of course have uneven water supplies. Droughts are a
fact of life in the West. Just in the last dozen years,
California, the Mountain States, New Mexico, and now the
Northwest have faced significant droughts. I would say we have
only slowly reforming institutions and laws to cope with all
these very real problems.
But we also have--there is also an optimistic view, a glass
half full point of view. Our institutions and public processes
have been adapting. To take a California perspective, I go back
to the omnibus bill that Senators Bradley and Garn were so
intimately involved with in 1992 that led to the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act of 1992 that was such an innovation in
California, that led in turn to the CALFED program that Senator
Feinstein had a big hand in prompting and nurturing along.
The Colorado River States have gotten together on surplus
criteria. We will see if they can do the same on shortage
criteria. That of course was prompted and passed in part by the
California 4.4 plan, which I actually did not think could
happen, and then a quantification settlement agreement among
southern California entities, both urban and agricultural,
which has been another innovation.
Of course, none of these innovations are perfect. They are
all works in progress, but they have prompted positive change.
The other and last major point I would like to make is
bringing economics to bear on water policy is a healthy thing.
Having beneficiaries pay the costs of the water that is stored
and delivered to them is useful to prompt innovation. It is
useful to prompt technological innovation, which is of course
another topic of this panel. Urban water pricing reform can do
the same. It will prompt conservation. It will prompt
innovation.
Last, voluntary transfers, which have also been discussed
at some length already today, are another way for a limited
water supply to be widely shared and usefully deployed.
I would just, last, end by saying that one should account
in these voluntary transfers for social and community and
worker and environmental impacts. I think there was a question
earlier about where is that happening in a way that is
constructive and innovative. I would have people look at the
local entity that has been created by the San Diego-IID
transfer in southern California. There is a group of us that
got together, a group of United Farm Workers, California Rural
Legal Assistance Foundation, Latino Issues Forum, Environmental
Defense, and others, who have been advocating for community and
worker impact assessment and relief in connection with those
transfers.
Remarkably, the farm workers and the farm bureau down there
are actually working together now in the context of this local
entity. So I think voluntary transfers can be made to work, but
one needs to take account of all the different impacts.
Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Let us see. David Wunsch, National Groundwater Association.
STATEMENT OF DAVID WUNSCH, STATE GEOLOGIST OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, ON
BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL GROUNDWATER ASSOCIATION
Mr. Wunsch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee. My name is David Wunsch. I am the State geologist of
New Hampshire, but I am representing the National Groundwater
Association this afternoon. Our association has over 16,000
members and our association is predicated on the safe use and
wise development of our groundwater resources.
We are a unique association that is comprised of three
different divisions, one being contractors, one manufacturers,
and the scientific and engineering division which I represent.
So diversity is truly one of our strengths.
Recently we polled our membership as well as other State
regulatory agencies that deal with water and State geological
surveys about the knowledge of groundwater and the state of the
science throughout the country, and our answers of course
conform to some of the questions you asked for this committee.
Some of our results are both consistent and alarming. For
example, only 2 of 28 States reported that they have sufficient
knowledge of the potential yields of their aquifers. In a
follow-up survey, 41 of 43 States indicated they expected
localized groundwater shortages within the next 20 years.
There was also reported a wide disparity in the quality of
groundwater monitoring programs and networks from State to
State. These issues are not isolated to the arid Southwest. My
native State of New Hampshire is also suffering water
shortages, even with our humid climate, along the seacoast
region of the State.
Our membership consistently stated that the most useful and
efficient action for the Federal Government--that the Federal
Government could take, would be to increase funding for
cooperative groundwater programs and data collection. A good
example of a successful Federal-State partnership is the
National Cooperative Geologic Mapping Program, which I know
members of the committee are acquainted with. In this program
the States leverage Federal funds and direct research to areas
of their States in most need and share the data with the
Federal Government, which creates national data bases.
This same model could be utilized for programs such as
aquifer mapping, which it was reported by our group needs more
work, as well as enhancing State groundwater monitoring
networks and trying to create parity among the States. One
strength of this program is that it is statutorily established
to define the work, it produces timely deliverables, and it
keeps overhead costs under control.
Another Federal initiative that has been echoed by others
today is that there is a need for a national clearinghouse of
both groundwater information and data, including real-time
data, such as groundwater levels, that could aid in drought
management, which hits different parts of the country at
different times.
Other research priorities cited by our membership include
research on water use and conservation, aquifer storage and
recovery and artificial recharge, alternative treatment
systems, including using brackish water supplies, development
of models and standards that bring data together, and
translating this information in a usable form for policymakers.
Studies on emerging contaminants and technologies to
address these pollutants are also needed by the regulatory
community. Of course, education for the public nationwide so
they will understand the urgent need for responsible water use.
I do not have written comments to submit for the record,
but I will offer that National Groundwater has position papers
and the results of our survey available for the committee.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wunsch follows:]
Prepared Statement of David Wunsch, State Geologist of New Hampshire,
on Behalf of the National Groundwater Association
question 5: knowledge of water resources
Given the fundamental role that water plays in dictating the
quality of life and economic opportunities in our communities, do we
have the level of scientific understanding needed to assess accurately
the sustainability of the surface and groundwater resources upon which
we depend? Do we have an adequate scientific understanding to address
potential water use conflicts? What initiatives should be undertaken to
improve our scientific understanding in these areas?
While states are gathering the necessary data to inform decision-
making, no state has met its data collection goals. In fact, only two
of 28 states responding to an NGWA survey are very confident they know
the potential yield from all of the state's major aquifers. We lack the
fundamental data necessary to adequately understand the nation's ground
water resources and make informed decisions regarding its use and
management (NGWA 2003a; 2003b).
The federal government is currently playing and must continue to
play a vital role as well. Although actual ground water management
decision making is most effective when taking into account site-
specific considerations, federal funding of cooperative water quality
and quantity data collection and aquifer mapping leverages the
expertise and resources of the federal government with partners around
the country.
NGWA members identified increased federal funding for cooperative
ground water quantity and quality data collection and aquifer mapping
as the most useful actions the federal government could take.
Additionally, NGWA identified increased research related to ground
water availability and the development of a national clearinghouse for
ground water quality and quantity information as a top priority
requiring federal government leadership. The most important types of
water data to expand identified by NGWA members include: accurate water
use, water quality for all aquifers, ground water level monitoring
networks, on-line aquifer data and ground water recharge rates. Within
each area, examples of possible specific activities are provided for
consideration and further discussion.
data gaps
Establish a collaborative framework among federal, state,
local and non-governmental entities to address data gaps on
ground water resources. Collecting ground water data is costly,
given its location and variability. While specific data gaps
and priorities may vary around the country, collaboration will
help maximize everyone's data-gathering efforts.
Increase federal funding for cooperative ground water
quantity data collection. Ground water professionals identified
the need for additional federal funding for cooperative ground
water quantity data collection as the most useful federal
action. The data would be used to fill information gaps and
will assist states in developing and implementing overall
ground water management goals. The federal government should
develop a cooperative program with the states and other
interested parties so goals meet not only the national but also
state and local needs as well. First steps include assessing
available data and identifying the appropriate role of federal
agencies. A potential model to follow is the National
Cooperative Geologic Mapping Program, which includes a federal,
state and educational component.
Provide federal support for aquifer mapping. Funding for
geologic mapping is provided to state geological surveys
through the USGS STATEMAP program, the state component of the
National Cooperative Geologic Mapping Program. The STATEMAP
program utilizes state staff knowledgeable in the local geology
that maintains the data upon which much of the mapping is
based. The states, not the federal government, also select the
areas of the state that are in most need of mapping data. The
program provides a comprehensive understanding of the geology
at/near land surface, in which ground water is commonly a major
consideration. Limitations of the program are that it requires
1:1 matching of state funds; the mapping is required to be
completed within one year; derivative maps such as fracture
trends are not considered for funding; and maps do not
necessarily focus on delineating subsurface aquifers.
Another federal-state cooperative program involves the USGS
and the state surveys from Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and
Ohio. This partnership, known as the Central Great Lakes
Geologic Mapping Coalition, is conducting three-dimensional
geologic mapping mainly at 1:24,000--scale, specifically
targeting the delineation of glacial aquifers. Limited funding
has allowed only pilot study areas to be mapped during the last
three years. However, the states and USGS have contributed
considerable federal and state funds toward the effort. If
additional funds are not forthcoming, it will take about 170
years to complete this mapping in high-priority areas of the
four states. Although under funded, the Coalition serves as an
excellent example of how a federal-state partnership can
address the specific needs of a region that is united by common
ground water issues
Establish a national clearinghouse to identify sources of
ground water data and links to those sources. These data should
be disseminated widely to the public--or at least to authorized
public and private water professionals--using several formats.
These formats should include maps and reports showing
interpreted data as well as Internet-based access to archived
data and real time data collection. These data should be
available from links on already existing National Spatial Data
Infrastructure (NSDI) sites to make the information easier to
find and assure that the proper documentation of these data is
maintained.
research priority areas
The following research areas have been identified by our ground
water professionals as top priorities in the area of developing long-
term ground water sustainability plans:
Research on water reuse and conservation
Research on alternative treatment systems
Research on development of brackish ground water supplies
Development of models and data standards that can bring
together scientific data and inform local policy decision
makers.
Research on aquifer storage and recovery or artificial
recharge.
Research on emerging contaminants and the development of
remediation technologies that can be used to address new and
current pollutants.
education and collaboration among federal, state, and
local decision makers
It is important for collaborative efforts among federal, state,
local, and non-governmental entities and water professionals to educate
decision makers, professionals, and the general public on topics
including:
What ground water data are being collected and what data are
needed.
How to utilize ground water data to make sound decisions.
What current research projects and technologies are being
developed, and how to incorporate these developments into
ground water management decision making.
What long-term effects does water supply infrastructure
design have on the sustainability of the natural ground water
system, and how do we design systems that take those impacts
into consideration.
What constitutes effective ground water conservation
measures and how to incorporate these initiatives on a state
and local level.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
The city of Albuquerque. We are glad to have you, Jean
Witherspoon.
STATEMENT OF JEAN WITHERSPOON, ON BEHALF OF THE NEW MEXICO
WATER CONSERVATION ALLIANCE
Ms. Witherspoon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senators.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak. I am speaking on
behalf of the New Mexico Water Conservation Alliance, although
I am a city of Albuquerque employee.
I am here to urge that conservation continue to be seen as
a significant component of the strategy, the long-term water
resource strategies in this country. Conservation is critical
to the future of our being able to meet demand with a
diminishing supply. Conservation has proven to be successful in
many cities in the West, with reduction rates in per capita
usage of 30 percent or more. This provides additional water to
meet growth demands, to meet environmental demands, to meet
endangered species demands, and that is water that you could
not have bought anywhere else. So it is an amazing source of
additional water supply.
Another beauty of conservation is that it can be most
effective in addressing new development, which many perceive as
a lot of the problem. So conservation is getting directly at
that source of additional demand.
The Federal Government has been key to conservation being
successful in this country, initially with the bold step to
adopt the new plumbing fixture standards in 1992. There are a
number of additional ways that the Federal Government supports
conservation, including the Bureau of Reclamation Water
Conservation Field Services Program, which gives grants to both
small and large projects that are related to conservation. FEMA
is involved in water conservation. Many of the Federal
facilities go through performance contracting that includes
water.
The Energy Star program, which the Federal Government
supports, has been incredibly helpful in getting energy
efficient and water efficient appliances on the market and in
people's homes.
I would urge you in closing to continue this involvement,
to make water conservation--to integrate it into even more
programs where conservation is a requirement of water and waste
water project funding, to include it in FNMA provisions for
mortgages, and the many ways in which water efficiency can be
integrated into existing programs and legislation.
Thank you again for the opportunity.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Witherspoon follows:]
Prepared Statement of Jean Witherspoon, on Behalf of the New Mexico
Water Conservation Alliance
conservation and technological developments--executive summary
Water conservation is critical to the future of this country. As
population grows over time, demand increases, and supplies remain
essentially the same, conservation must play a significant role in
helping water providers meet demand. Water conservation is the easiest,
quickest, and least expensive way to extend supplies dramatically.
Urban areas have led the way in demonstrating that conservation can
achieve dramatic results. In the West, major urban areas like Seattle,
Washington, El Paso, Texas, Denver, Colorado, and Albuquerque, New
Mexico have achieved reduction rates of 30% or more--extending adequate
supply many decades into the future. These programs and others have
proven that conservation can be successful, can significantly reduce
usage, and will benefit both suppliers and users with little or no
change in their quality of life.
Technological advances in plumbing fixtures, appliances, irrigation
equipment, and landscaping techniques have led the way in this effort.
Replacing older equipment and appliances can immediately reduce user's
water use dramatically. Focusing on management of water use, which
requires education and understanding, is equally important. A xeriscape
can use as much or more water than turf if it is not managed properly.
Low flow plumbing appliances, if installed properly, can save one-third
of a customer's usage almost ``overnight.'' But these fixtures and
appliances must be properly maintained to continue to operate
effectively.
Many improvements in water delivery and use have not received the
attention needed. Water systems typically have water losses or non-
revenue producing water of 7% to 40% of production. Smaller systems, in
particular, may not have the resources to install even basic tools like
meters in order to determine how much water is being lost between the
source and the customer. Water pressure, though specified in the
nationally-adopted Uniform Plumbing Code, is often ignored. Meters,
which are essential to understanding usage, are often not replaced when
malfunctioning or broken.
The federal government, through the Bureau of Reclamation, the
Environmental Protection Agency, and other agencies, has supported
conservation through grants and promotion of advanced technology. These
programs have suffered more recently, however, as some emphasis has
shifted back to large supply and ``hard'' solutions. Competition for
limited funds will become even more intense as the nation is forced to
address its aging water and sewer infrastructure and the need for
replacement. Federal support of water conservation, including ``soft''
components like education, must continue in order to maintain the
success that has been achieved to-date and to more fully realize the
benefits yet to be achieved through conservation.
conservation and technological developments
Introduction
The nature of water conservation in the United States has changed
dramatically over the last decade. In the 1970's and '80's,
conservation was used largely as a tool to carry utilities over periods
of drought or infrastructure inadequacies. Conservation was utilized as
a short term solution to a short term problem. In the last decade, it
has become increasingly clear that conservation must be a component of
many, if not most, long term water resource strategies for communities
and states. In the West and in some areas east of the Mississippi,
supply cannot meet the existing and/or growing demand if usage levels
remain at the high per capita rates common in the '70's and '80's.
Without reduction of usage and further development of new technology
that increases supply at reasonable cost, many areas of this country
cannot meet future demand. And as most areas become more conscious of
this situation, the willingness to share and/or allow limited
commitment of currently unused supply decreases.
This presentation will focus on urban or community water use and
conservation. While urban or domestic use is a small percentage of
overall use in most western states, urban areas have led the way in
demonstrating that conservation can achieve dramatic results. Many
major urban areas, including Seattle, El Paso, Denver, and Albuquerque
have achieved 30% or better reductions in per capita use. This has
occurred concurrent with natural drought that has dramatically
decreased precipitation for many of the last ten years. Areas
historically dependent on ground water are now preparing to use surface
water while, overall, use of ground water has increased as
precipitation becomes less dependable. And, as flows in rivers
decrease, demands for water for environmental purposes, e.g.,
endangered species and riparian habitat, increase.
Lower precipitation levels are expected to become the norm in
portions of the Southwest. Rivers such as the Colorado and Rio Grande,
which were appropriated in the early, historically very wet twentieth
century may very well not supply as much water as has already been
appropriated, further increasing supply shortfalls. Population growth,
while it has slowed in many portions of the Sun Belt, is still
occurring at 3% to 10%, a trend which is not likely to change,
particularly given the expected higher growth rates of Hispanic
Americans (through both natural increase and immigration). Water
conservation is vital to the future economic and environmental health
of the country.
Technology and the Federal Role
Technological advances affect water conservation in many ways. At
the household level, the development of well-functioning, low water use
toilets, showerheads, and other plumbing fixtures has provided the
easiest, quickest, and least expensive ``fix'' to reduce water usage.
For less than $200, any household can reduce its indoor per capita
water use by one-third by simply replacing higher use fixtures. With
minimal maintenance, these inexpensive fixtures will continue to keep
usage down indefinitely. However, people must be educated to watch for
and repair leaks, replace flappers with correct models, and manage
their water use habits to reduce even further. Plumbing models which
will further reduce the waste taken for granted with every flush are
under development. Research is not adequate, however, to understand the
limits of conventional sewage collection systems, i.e., whether sewer
flows become inadequate if toilet flush volumes go too low.
The federal government, through adoption of plumbing fixture
standards in 1992, led the country into the needed, new conservation-
oriented mentality. Passing these laws at the federal level avoided
much of the confusion and backlash that would have occurred if each
state had to adopt its own laws. This same leadership is needed
relative to new products which circumvent the intent of these laws,
such as gang showers (multiple low flow shower heads used
simultaneously in one stall) and continuous bleed-off evaporative
coolers. Egregious water waste should not be acceptable just because a
homeowner can afford expensive fixtures and high water bills.
The federally-supported Energy Star program has been very
successful in promoting the development, sale, and use of high water
efficiency appliances. While the primary focus has been on energy, most
low energy use appliances also use less water. At some point in the
future, manufacture of high water use appliances should be prohibited,
just as federal law now prohibits manufacture of high water use
plumbing fixtures. Effort is now underway to develop a program for
water use labeling requirements. This effort will help educate and
inform the public in making wise water use purchasing decisions, in
ways not possible now. Federally-supported financing programs, such as
Fannie Mae mortgages, could also be utilized to increase the market
penetration of high efficiency appliances and hot water on demand
systems in new construction.
In the dry West, landscaping can consume 30% to 50% of total urban
use. This usage creates the high seasonal peak which drives and then
underutilizes water system capacity. And, unlike indoor usage which can
be treated and reused, this outdoor water use generally evaporates. Led
by the landscaping community in Denver, xeriscaping (low water use
landscaping) techniques and plants have been developed and
individualized for the climate conditions in different parts of the
West. The endless possibilities of this low use alternative to turf are
being explored and promoted. And irrigation technology has changed
dramatically as newer landscapes require less water and customers
demand higher efficiency systems. Sprinkler system efficiency,
particularly for large turf areas that are professionally managed and
maintained, has gone from 50% to 70%+. Drip irrigation hardware
continues to become both more sophisticated and easier for do-it-
yourselfers to understand.
Additional research, promotion, and education is necessary before
the potential reductions in landscaping use are approached even in the
urban setting, however. The Bureau of Reclamation's Conservation Field
Services Program, among other federal programs, has helped to fund
local research and education projects. More recently, in some regions,
these funds have been substantially reduced and restricted to exclude
education efforts. At the customer level, research and development can
provide products and information, but proper management and maintenance
of the products depends on education and public information. Excluding
this important component is diluting the effectiveness of more
efficient products and plants. Uneducated homeowners are also more
likely to overuse pesticides and herbicides, often leading to
additional water use as well as contamination of storm and ground
water.
For the remaining non-residential urban water uses, research and
development into lower use equipment, education to ensure efficient
water management and maintenance, and financial assistance for major
improvements is even more important. Commercial, industrial, and
institutional users often ignore water costs and efficiencies while
focusing on high cost, energy usage. Longer-term paybacks are often
less acceptable, even if the changes will benefit the company, and
saving water is often not within the accepted corporate mandate.
Hospitals, for instance, often run high use wash equipment twenty-four
hours a day even if that flow is not needed much of the day. Water
bills are often paid by financial people who have no direct connection
to either management or operational staff. And management may not
communicate a commitment to efficient water use to staff, diffusing the
ability of the organization to minimize usage.
The federal government, through FEMA, educates facility managers
about water conservation, as well as working more directly on some
federal facilities to reduce usage. Performance contracting for federal
facilities to reduce usage of energy is common, but is often not
feasible for water because water costs are so low. And funds to
implement water conservation improvements are often not available for
federal facilities, similar to non-federal facilities. Since 9/11,
security issues and the financial demands to meet these concerns have
reduced the federal resources focused on water conservation in many
areas. While the need to counteract terrorism is unquestionable, the
need to ensure that federal facilities and the communities in which
they are located will be able to meet future water demand is also
critical. Excessive turf landscaping, leaking and inadequate
infrastructure, and no metering of individual water uses are examples
of inefficient use of water under federal control which need attention
in many areas. In Albuquerque, development of innovative approaches to
individual building water reuse was severely reduced or lost as a
result of the focus on security issues.
At the water provider or system level, many potential methods to
reduce conservation have been inadequately addressed. Unaccounted-for-
water (UAW) or non-revenue water ranges from 7% to 50%, tending to the
higher end for small utilities, which typically have volunteer boards,
minimal staff, and very low water rates. While these losses cannot be
eliminated, UAW rates of 7% to 12% are entirely feasible. The new
standards for calculating these losses, while maybe improving
understanding in the long term, have confused the issue and made data
from different systems incomparable. Federal assistance in funding
efforts to audit UAW, reduce loss from leaks, replace malfunctioning
meters, and meter unmetered uses would help address this area.
Federal water and wastewater funding should be available for these
improvements, as well as rehab and replacement of older or worn lines.
The need for rehab and replacement will become greater as the majority
of the nation's water and sewer systems reach forty plus years; but
other system needs, including UAW, cannot be ignored. Even self-
supporting UAW efforts, like testing, maintenance, and replacement of
large meters, are often cut first when budgets get tight. And more low
volume uses, like drip irrigation and continuous bleed-off evaporative
coolers, may not be registered by meters, increasing the non-revenue
water. Pressure issues have been addressed by a few utilities, but too
many systems are not meeting the national Uniform Plumbing Code
requirement for 80 psi. Pressure reduction valves are often not
installed where needed, even though much of the conservation-related
equipment, particularly drip irrigation, needs to operate on lower
pressure.
The Environmental Protection Agency assists utilities through Clean
Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act funds. Provision of these funds
should be linked to development, adoption, and effective implementation
of a water conservation plan, including measures aimed at customers,
and education. The amount charged for water, i.e., rates, is a crucial
component of these plans since low and/or decreasing block rates
falsify the value of water, provide inadequate resources for utility
improvements and conservation incentives, and may lead to utility
failure.
The EPA itself could also launch a more aggressive education
campaign related to conservation, both by promoting conservation issues
and solutions itself and through making materials available to
communities and utilities. This federal role was more evident in the
'80's when the need for ``permanent'' conservation was just beginning
to be recognized. EPA grants should also be available for state
conservation efforts, where issues and target population are much more
diverse, the logical link between revenue and program doesn't exist,
and the conservation effort may not be ``owned'' and/or financed by one
agency.
``Larger'' ways to extend supply such as reuse and desalination are
necessary, also. While reuse is not a solution in some cases, since it
may reduce river flows, reusing gray or treated water for irrigation
and other purposes help preserve potable water for drinking water
purposes. In an urban setting, large scale reuse is most practical and
safe while, in a rural setting, individual reuse is most practical. The
Bureau of Reclamation has helped fund and will hopefully continue to
help fund many large scale reuse efforts. The Bureau is also helping to
fund some desalination projects. In inland areas, these may involve
recovery of brine water which was formerly considered nonpotable. In
the coastal areas, if costs can be brought down over time, desalination
may provide a source for drinking water supply that would allow inland
states to use more of the country's surface water supply. Additional
research and expanding technology to bring the costs of treating ocean
water down are needed.
Conclusion
Water conservation can have a dramatic impact. In Seattle,
Washington, which most people are surprised to find even needs
conservation, water use has been cut dramatically over the last twenty-
five years. Over that period, the motivation for conserving has varied
from avoiding the cost of new facilities to ensuring that water remains
in the rivers for salmon, and the reductions have been significant. The
city expects that, by finding additional ways to reduce usage, they
will be able to keep production level for another ten to twenty years.
To-date, Seattle has saved over 267 billion gallons of water or about
820,500 acre feet.
El Paso, Texas has reduced usage from 230 in 1978 to 140 gallons
per capita per day in 2004. Water utility officials estimate they've
saved $300 million in infrastructure costs through this reduction in
usage.
Albuquerque, New Mexico's sole source of water supply to-date has
been ground water. Usage has been reduced from 250 to 177 gallons per
capita per day. The program, which was adopted only ten years ago, has
already saved over 54 billion gallons of water (167,250 acre feet) the
equivalent of a year and a half's production. Despite a population
growth rate around 3%, production is at mid-'80's levels; per capita
usage is at an amazing late-'50's level (see Chart*). Albuquerque
recently adopted a 40% goal which should continue to reduce production
through 2010. Albuquerque also intends to begin using surface water by
2007, providing a ``window'' of significantly reduced ground water
pumping to allow the aquifer water levels to partially recharge.
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* The chart has been retained in committee files.
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Denver, Colorado initiated a conservation program around twenty
years ago. The effort, which focused primarily on voluntary and
education measures, was forced to change dramatically in 2001 due to
the extreme drought. With the addition of mandatory measures, higher
cost measures like rebates, and drought rates, usage dropped
dramatically (see Chart).
Each of these cities and their conservation efforts is unique.
Annual rainfall ranges from 9 inches in Albuquerque to 37 inches in
Seattle. Initial usage rates ranged from 253 gallons per capita per day
in Denver to 154 in Seattle. One city uses exclusively ground water to-
date while three use a varying mix of ground and surface supply
sources. What unites these cities is a community-supported commitment
to reduce usage significantly through conservation programs supported
almost entirely through utility revenues. Logically, as water becomes
more limited, rates rise, though three of these cities' commodity rates
do not exceed $3.50 per 1,000 gallons, a bargain compared to other
potable liquids and compared to most other urban areas. While further
reductions and price increases may be required, these cities have been
able to greatly extend the water supply currently available to them for
decades. (Please note--results from 2004 may be unusually low due to
the wet fall and winter.)
The federal government has played a part in the success of each of
these conservation programs, through adoption of the federal plumbing
standards, Energy Star promotions, Bureau of Reclamation grants,
federal facility use reductions, and other programs. Support for
communities and utilities that do not have the level of resources
available to these cities of half of million or more population is
needed even more. Conservation is, in fact, the easiest, quickest, and
least expensive way to extend water supply. Reduction of per capita
usage must be a component of this country's water resource strategy.
Federal assistance, whether through funding or other methods, is
essential to helping make this happen.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Texas Water Development Board, William Mullican.
STATEMENT OF WILLIAM F. MULLICAN, III, TEXAS WATER DEVELOPMENT
BOARD
Mr. Mullican. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee. On behalf of the State of Texas, we want to thank
you for your energy and interest in this very critical issue to
the State of Texas. On behalf of the State, we will commit to
working with you and your committee as you work for solutions
to this very, very important issue.
Sir Arthur Doyle, wearing his Sherlock Holmes hat, once
said: ``It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has
data.'' While I suspect that Sir Doyle was reflecting on trying
to solve a crime mystery when he developed that concept, I
think that there is a direct corollary between this and our
issues with water. That is, for us to try to resolve our water
issues without having a good foundation of good data and then
the good tools to analyze that data, it would be a capital
mistake for all of us.
In the State of Texas, in 1997 we were suffering through
severe drought and as a result of that the State put in place a
bottom-up, public participation-based, regional water planning
process that now is being utilized pretty much coast to coast
as people work to address their water supply needs. When we
first put that regional water planning process in place, the
first thing that all of the public participants, the local
entities, regional entities, that were participating in this
process recognized was that we did not have good enough data on
which to be making those policy decisions that were going to be
impacting the State of Texas for the next 50 years.
As a result of that, we have worked on aggressively
developing both groundwater availability models and surface
water availability models for all the major and minor aquifers
and the river basins in the State of Texas. However, there
continues to remain a need, a critical need, for additional
data and tools to help us understand our water resources.
Three recommendations I bring to you today that relate to
data, water data, and issues that we would like you to take
into consideration. First and foremost, at this time we have
got to stop the erosion of Federal funding for the stream
gauging program in the Nation. This is both going to create
short-term problems and long-term problems. Without this
information there is a variety of areas, both flooding and
drought, development of projects, water supply projects, the
whole water gamut is negatively impacted if we are not out
there collecting good long-term record, scientifically based
water data.
The second recommendation--and Mr. Chairman, I think this
would go to one of your questions. That is, a recommendation
related to not only the identification and the assignment of a
clearinghouse for water resources research, but also an entity
that would be charged with roadmapping or developing the course
of action for how that research should be conducted. Nothing is
more frustrating, as one who is responsible for conducting a
significant amount of water research in the State of Texas, as
the realization of exactly how much duplication of effort is
ongoing with respect to water research.
So if we could put in place a process where not only is all
the research that is developed readily available to the water
community, but also to assign at least one entity to be charged
with the recognition of all the Federal agencies that are being
involved in water-related research and State agencies and other
organizations, so that that process could be laid out and be
done in the most efficient and effective manner. I think that
would be a good thing.
I think this relates also to, for example, the USGS has
some wonderful groundwater scientists and surface water
engineers that they can bring their strengths to. But also, the
Department of Energy has some wonderful scientists that have
been involved and will continue to be involved. If we could
through a clearinghouse process--perhaps we could put in place
where we would be able to take advantage of all those wonderful
assets as we work together to try to ensure the future water
supply needs of the Nation.
Finally, in my written remarks that were submitted there
are a number of specific topics of research that we would like
to focus on, including we just do not have the science or the
tools, for example, to understand surfacewater-groundwater
interaction at a level that is demanded today by the
policymakers, at least in the State of Texas and in other
areas, like for example the quantification of recharge.
Those are areas that there just needs to be a tremendous
amount of additional effort put into.
Thank you, sir.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Mullican follows:]
Prepared Statement of William F. Mullican, III, Texas Water
Development Board
question 5. knowledge of water resources
``It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.''
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Our knowledge of water resources is the foundation upon which we
build our solutions to water needs. If this foundation is faulty and
inadequate, our solutions are doomed to collapse, costing taxpayers
billions of dollars and, in times of drought, adversely affecting
millions of lives. Unfortunately, our knowledge of our water resources,
our foundation, is not as strong as it needs to be, especially as our
water demands grow relative to a fixed resource. Federal support for
collecting and interpreting basic water resource information has been
cut and continues to shrink. This is unfortunate because the data we
need to make important policy and financial decisions concerning our
water resources is shrinking at a time when problems with meeting our
water demands are growing.
During the drought of the 1990s, Texas instituted regional water
planning, a process infused with local guidance of water planning in
sixteen regions across the state. This process required a significantly
more refined understanding of water resources in Texas, including the
development of water availability models (WAMs) for water rights
permitting of the major rivers and numerical groundwater availability
models (GAMs) of the major and minor aquifers. As water becomes scarcer
and scarcer and as people look closer and closer at water issues, the
need grows for more water data and more thorough analysis of that water
data.
do we have the level of scientific understanding needed to accurately
assess the sustainability of groundwater and surface water resources?
We do not have the scientific understanding to assess the
sustainability of our water resources at the level currently required
by our policymakers and citizens. For groundwater, we need a better
understanding of the outcrop processes that affect recharge, the
primary parameter for estimating sustainability. These processes
include evapotranspiration and surface water and groundwater
interaction. Many of our aquifers have no field-measured estimates of
recharge. Our aquifers in the western part of the state are often
lacking basic hydrologic information related to hydraulic properties,
flow paths, and quality.
do we have an adequate scientific understanding to address potential
water use conflicts?
We need more scientific studies to address potential interstate and
international water conflicts. Streamgaging is less than adequate (less
than 70 percent of needed gages are reporting data), and groundwater
information is less than adequate (many aquifers with little
information). Many water issues requiring more data are interstate and
international in scope. Texas shares surface and groundwater resources
with four states and Mexico. We have had surface water conflicts with
New Mexico and Mexico (Rio Grande, Rio Concho, and Pecos River) and
concerns about water conflicts with Oklahoma (potential export of
surface and groundwater from reservations in Oklahoma to Texas and a
potential reservoir in the Panhandle that would have affected
Oklahoma). Other states face border issues as well. As demand for water
grows, new issues and conflicts will appear. Good science is needed to
understand the facts behind the issues so that fair and defensible
solutions can be reached. More federal support in transboundary studies
would help create a common database for resolving transboundary water
issues.
what federal initiatives should be undertaken to improve our scientific
understanding in these areas?
Federal agencies have a long history of working with Texas to lay a
strong foundation for water policy and financial decisions. After Texas
joined the United States in 1845, the U.S. military dug wells on the
High Plains in search of artesian water in one of the first
hydrogeologic studies in North America. The U.S. Geological Survey
(USGS) arrived in the 1880s to begin seminal work to characterize the
surface and groundwater resources of the central part of the state.
Over the years, the U.S. Geological Survey worked closely with various
state and local agencies to characterize water resources in the rest of
the state and implement and maintain water monitoring networks.
Many local water-related activities are inherently federal in
nature. Historical streamflow data are needed to accurately estimate
the water supply yield and spillway requirements of a proposed
reservoir; this data may derive from neighboring states. Two of Texas'
largest reservoirs are located on state boundaries; two other major
reservoirs are located on the border with Mexico.
Streamflow monitoring
In 1998, at the request of Congress, the USGS prepared a report
entitled ``A New Evaluation of the USGS Streamgaging Network'' stating
that the network's ability to meet long-standing federal goals was
being compromised because of the loss of streamgages, particularly
those with long periods of record, and the declining ability of the
USGS to continue monitoring flow at high priority locations when local
funding is discontinued.
In 1999, the USGS went to Congress to create the National
Streamflow Information Program (NSIP) program. The vision of the
program was to provide 100 percent funding for a base streamgage
network and complement the continuous monitoring data with intense data
collection during floods and droughts. There are 4,424 identified NSIP
sites across the nation, and less than 70 percent are currently active
and reporting data. This lack of basic data compromises our ability to
conduct water resources research and assessments.
Assistance in meeting federal requirements
The permitting and construction of a dam and impoundment of a
reservoir or any project that crosses a water course requires
compliance with the Clean Water Act (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) and
the Endangered Species Act (U.S. Fish and Wildlife). The supporting
studies require the compilation and analysis of large amounts of data,
the burden of which is generally placed on the local sponsor. More
federal support in collecting the data and guiding the studies would
benefit both the local sponsor and the federal interests, by ensuring
that minimum standards of quality assurance on the data are met and
that the ensuing studies are standardized and widely accepted.
Surface-water/groundwater interaction
The interaction between surface water and groundwater is important
for understanding both resources. Groundwater discharge to rivers and
streams amount to substantial amounts of water, especially in the drier
parts of the state. For groundwater, understanding how much groundwater
flows into rivers (what flows out of the aquifer is equal to recharge)
and out of rivers into the aquifer (direct recharge) helps better
understand how to manage groundwater resources and the effects of
pumping on water resources. More federal support in characterizing
these interactions on a basin-aquifer scale would be useful for
developing better models and protecting natural resources.
Climate change
There remain significant uncertainties regarding the magnitude and
impact of future climate change. What is known is that global
temperatures are on the rise, as are sea levels. Most climate models
also predict hotter summers and more evaporation for the United States
in years to come; many predict increased hurricane activity and
frequency of extreme weather events. Whatever our future climate looks
like, it doesn't seem sensible to address the issue of climate change
at the local level. Some kind of coordinated federal effort is needed
to fully investigate the likely impacts of climate change and the
recommend measures that need to be taken in order to minimize these
impacts.
Research clearinghouse
Many different federal agencies conduct work associated with water.
There should be one user-friendly Webpage that users can visit to find
reports and data from all of the federal agencies related to water. The
information could be site specific (for example, to a particular state)
or of wider applications across a large area. This research
clearinghouse would ensure that money invested by the federal
government in research projects is available and being used by
stakeholders.
summary
We do not have the scientific understanding to assess the
sustainability of our water resources at the level currently required
by our policymakers and citizens. We need more scientific studies to
address potential interstate and international water conflicts. The
federal government can assist in these issues by:
expanding streamflow monitoring;
assisting states in meeting Clean Water Act and Endangered
Species Act requirements;
researching the interaction between surface water and
groundwater;
assessing the effects of climate change on the nation's
water resources; and
developing a research clearinghouse.
Together, local, state, and federal governments can build a strong
foundation of basic data and scientific solutions to for our water
needs.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Our administration witnesses, we want to thank all of you
for coming. Did you hear anything that prompts you to say
something to us, which you just heard, any of you? Mr. Baldwin,
Mr. Hirsh, Ms. Bach?
[No response.]
The Chairman. Do you have anything further?
Senator Bingaman. Mr. Chairman, if I could just ask a
question. The Texas Water Development Board, I know you folks
have endorsed the bill that we reported out of the Senate for a
transboundary aquifer assessment along the U.S.-Mexico border.
I believe that your board has gone on record in favor of that
legislation.
In the last Congress I also had a bill that tried to get
the Geological Survey authority and additional resources to
pursue underground aquifer monitoring in the Ogallala. Is that
something that you would also support?
Mr. Mullican. The majority of my professional career was
spent as a groundwater hydrologist, including a significant
amount spent on the Ogallala Aquifer. There are many things
that remain to be done on the Ogallala Aquifer and one of the
things that we would like to work with you on on that
particular piece of legislation is perhaps expanding what that
legislation would allow, to go beyond the more basic aspects of
that, because the Ogallala has had a lot of the basic
hydrologic information collected, but looking at, for example,
how can we enhance recharge to the Ogallala Aquifer, that is
going to be--if we are talking about sustainability of a
resource, we have got to look at mechanisms that would allow us
to enhance recharge to the Ogallala.
When we worked with your staff on that, that was one of the
major elements that we really wanted to emphasize with you, was
that that would be something that we would very strongly
support.
Senator Bingaman. We will try to get back with you on that
and see if we can get your support. Thank you.
The Chairman. Anything further?
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I guess I looked at some of the comments from several of
you and thought you should have been at the first part of the
panel, because so much of what we have talked about today goes
back to: Where is the water? Hop much water do we have? Once
again, an incredible resource in this country, and we do not
have a real accurate assessment of it. We have not mapped it,
we have not surveyed it.
I am sitting in a situation in my State, I am trying to
define what the watershed capability is for a large project. We
do not have any stream monitoring systems. We have got 12 up
there now and we need another 100 to actually make a dent in
what we are doing up there. But we have not mapped our
resource. Whether it is oil or whether it is gas or whatever
the resource is, until we know what we have and where we have
it, it is tough to say, well, we have got to conserve this much
and we have got to be doing this much over there.
So I would just urge at the agency level, at the Department
level: Let us identify what it is that we have. I am pleased to
hear that within the National Groundwater Association you are
working to push the monitoring that we need to do, to push the
assessment.
We will work with you, but it seems like we have got the
cart before the horse here on a lot of this. Until we know what
we are dealing with, it is tough to make good solid policy
decisions.
The Chairman. I want to thank all of you very much. I think
the panel gave us some very good things to think about.
On GE, I just wanted to ask. You described this enormous
research capacity and then you suggested that the Federal
Government ought to do the research. Was I hearing you right or
were you saying on desalinization improvement that you have
reached the point where you needed some other science applied?
Mr. Sabol. You heard me right. I think, while there is a
great deal of money that GE puts toward research and
development, the pace of change and the pace of what we need to
develop can always be accelerated with additional funding. We
think that putting additional funding toward desalinization
membrane technologies can only get us ready for when we really
know what our problem is and we will be prepared to deal with
it.
The Chairman. Could I just ask you? Maybe you are not the
right one, but I am rather upbeat about the possibility that
desalinization will become economic in all respects, both the
closed circle, get rid of the end product, and cost. Do your
experts share the same thing?
Mr. Sabol. I am not sure that desalinization will ever be
as cost effective as dealing with surface water, so treating a
lake or a river, it is hard to imagine it will ever be that
cost effective. But brackish water treatment can certainly
become close to what it costs to treat surface water, and I
think desalinization can be reduced to a point where it becomes
a much more attractive alternative.
Senator Bingaman. I should have said ``brackish.'' I think
that we have ignored the inland brackish water in the United
States. There is a lot of it in our State. That is what we are
looking at, not the ocean water. And brackish is easier to
clean up, some kinds of brackish water.
Mr. Sabol. Absolutely.
The Chairman. Thank you all very much. We stand adjourned.
Thank you very much.
[Whereupon, at 5 o'clock p.m., the symposium was
adjourned.]