Officials to draft drought plan for valley

Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2002 | 11:15 a.m.

A three-year dry spell on the Colorado River combined with a failure by Las Vegas Valley residents to conserve water has prompted local officials to consider drafting the first drought plan since the 1950s.

By January the Southern Nevada Water Authority will have a plan, which would become effective in 2004 if dry conditions persist, Kay Brothers, water authority resources director, said.

The plan has not been written yet, but could include higher water rates for many water users, Brothers said.

In the longer term, authority staff warned that rationing -- a practice common in other parts of the West -- might be needed.

Staff first want to see how much snow falls in the Rocky Mountains. The snow melt feeds into the Colorado River, the primary source of water in the Las Vegas Valley.

"When we've had three years like we've had -- the lowest flows in the river on record -- we're worried," Brothers said.

The authority's board will receive a report on Thursday outlining the area's water woes, Brothers said.

The authority and its sister agency, the Las Vegas Valley Water District, want to take steps to cut back on water waste and encourage conservation first.

The water district, which serves about 800,000 customers, already has a tiered rate structure in effect.

The authority cannot impose any rate changes; the Clark County Commission and other local governments have to approve such changes.

The big worry for local water officials is residents' failure to save water.

The goal this year was for residents to cut 20 percent of water use. But conservation dropped from a high of 16 percent last year to 13.5 percent this year, Brothers said.

At the rate residents are going, the water authority may not meet its goal of saving 25 percent by 2010.

"People have to learn to cut back," Brothers said. "We are all in this together."

Dale Devitt, a University of Nevada, Las Vegas, professor and director of the Center for Urban Water Conservation, gives the water agencies high marks for handling uncertain resources and long-range planning. But the population growth will strain even the best water plans, he said.

"It all gets back to the fact that we have growth that is just out of control," Devitt said. "If you leave it in the hand of the developers, they will push the population over 2 million.

"You can ask the community to conserve up to a certain point. ... But if that water is being turned over to developers so they can continue to build, people are going to react."

For the next year the water authority will be able to draw surplus water from the Colorado River. Each year the Interior Department reviews the river's supply and declares a surplus if there is enough water in storage at lakes Mead and Powell.

The yearly surplus has allowed Southern Nevada to use about 10 percent more than the state's base allocation of 300,000 acre-feet per year. One acre-foot is enough water for a family of four for one year.

By 2004, if the drought continues, Nevada would likely be able to draw only half of the surplus water.

Weather and water experts are hoping for a heavy snowpack in the Rocky Mountains, Brothers said.

Western officials are hoping for a repeat of the heavy winter snows of the mid-1980s.

"Oh, for a year like 1983-84," Brothers said.

In March water officials presented a plan to meet Southern Nevada's water needs for the next 50 years. The plan includes multibillion-dollar, long-term projects such as building water wells and pipelines from Central Nevada or desalinization plants on the Pacific Ocean.

The authority is flexible enough to adjust its short-term water supply under an extended drought, Brothers said.

The valley draws almost 90 percent of its annual water from the river through Lake Mead, Brothers said.

If the drought continues and the iver surplus dries up, the authority will tap into sources stored underground since 1989. Up to 250,000 acre-feet of river water went underground in the past 13 years, allowing the authority to tap into it like a savings account, Brothers said.

But unlike river water, once the stored water is used it is gone forever.

Last year the authority entered a "banking" agreement with Arizona, letting the thirsty Las Vegas Valley store unused river water from its annual share of the river in Arizona wells.

Sun reporter

Launce Rake contributed to this story.