Tuesday, Sep 27 2011 3:45PM
Rural Nevadans may lose water to groundwater project.
Rural residents of Nevada may lose substantial amounts of water if the Southern Nevada Water Authority's (SNWA) plan to supply Las Vegas with water from a pipeline extending to the northern part of the state is approved, Nevada News Bureau reports.
According to Pat Mulroy, general manager of SNWA, because the Colorado River is being overused by Las Vegas and surrounding communities, a shortage could force her department to take groundwater from the northern part of the state to southern Nevada.
However, taking water from northern Nevada could leave many rural residents with limited access to the resource.
"Granting the Southern Nevada Water Authority’s applications for the groundwater in these four valleys would create impermissible conflicts with other existing water rights both in the subject valleys themselves and in hydrologically connected valleys that will inevitably be impacted if these applications are granted and the pumping is allowed to go forward," said Simeon Herskovits of the Great Basin Water Network.
According to the paper, the recent drought and resulting hydrological effects have affected Native American tribes of southern Nevada.