Larry Paulson: Despite what you hear, there’s plenty of water

Tuesday, Aug. 31, 1999 | 10:03 a.m.

Larry Paulson is a retired biologist and a member of the Lake Mead Water Quality Forum.

I see by the Sun's recent article, "Room will be made in Lake Mead for runoff," that the Colorado River system is at brim capacity again, as it has been for most of the past two decades. The Bureau of Reclamation is starting releases to make space for flood control.

Deliveries to Mexico are estimated at 2.1 million acre feet this year, or 600,000 acre feet above the 1.5 million acre feet Mexican Treaty requirement. That's after Arizona and Nevada take all they can use, and California takes its 4.4 million acre feet entitlement, plus another 700,000 acre feet of surplus. Runoff for the water year is estimated at 106 percent, slightly above normal. Imagine how much surplus there is in years of high runoff. It reached 14 million acre feet in 1984, enough to half-fill Lake Mead if it were empty!

Nevada doesn't use river surplus because we aren't using our 300,000 acre feet river entitlement after collecting return flow credits from discharges of treated sewage, contaminated ground water and storm water back to the lake. The sanitation districts are gearing up to spend $1.2 billion of 1/4 cent sales tax dollars to expand the three (yes, three!) sewage treatment plants to double waste water return flows to the lake.

The flood control district has earmarked another $1.3 billion of 1/4 cent sales tax dollars to dredge and line more flood channels to route even more untreated storm water back to the lake. Contaminated ground water is either being pumped or diverted into the Las Vegas Wash. More return flow credits, I guess.

Meanwhile, all this river surplus goes past our front door to Mexico. Surplus deliveries to Mexico have averaged more than 3 million acre feet since 1980. California has been taking 600,000-700,000 acre feet of surplus for years. Not us! Nevada will spend $1.2 billion for sewage treatment plant expansions to collect even more return flow credits, another $100 million to "bank" river water in Arizona, and yet another $25 million to gaming lobbyist Harvey Whittemore's limited liability company for 7,500 acre feet in Coyote Springs, 60 miles north of Las Vegas. Everyone wins but us taxpayers!

Many believe the surplus is too unpredictable and won't last forever. History tells us otherwise. There has never been a declared water shortage on the Colorado River. The upper Colorado River basin states are only using about 4 million acre feet of their annual 7.5 million acre feet entitlement. Ah, but they'll use it eventually, say the skeptics. When? They've never used their entitlements. There has always been a surplus in the upper basin. How do you think they managed to fill Lake Powell and all the other reservoirs up there to brim capacity? You got it, surplus water.

In years when there is little or no surplus, let's figure out a way to draw more from reservoir storage. Right now, Reclamation's got 56 million acre feet stored in the Colorado River reservoirs, 24 million acre feet of that in Lake Mead. That's enough water to meet basinwide demands for nearly five years without a drop of runoff! Surely, Reclamation will not continue delivering all this surplus to Mexico and tell Nevada we can't draw another foot, a mere 150,000 acre feet, off Lake Mead when we need it. They'd hardly know it was missing!

Wake up, Nevada! Let's reuse our waste water for irrigation here in the valley, trap and treat the storm water runoff and contaminated ground water return flows, and use the river's surplus to meet our potable water needs. It sure beats polluting Las Vegas Bay and our drinking water supply with return flows.