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December 21, 2022
By Brandon
Loomis
Arizona Republic
Arizona
gets serious about piping water from Mexico in nonbinding desalination
resolution
Lake Powell: Glen Canyon emerges as water levels
fall, creating new worries.
Officials declared a water shortage for
Colorado River basin next year, limiting how much water can be used.
The Colorado River sediment delta near Hite, Utah, pictured on June
11, 2022. Mark Henle/The Republic
A state board tasked with vetting water supply augmentation proposals
for Arizona on Tuesday passed a
nonbinding resolution in support of a potentially
massive seawater desalination plant in Mexico’s Sea of Cortez.
A partnership led by Israeli desalination specialists IDE
Technologies pitched the multibillion-dollar plan to the Water
Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona’s board, saying it could
replace or complement declining Colorado River water that flows
through the Central Arizona Project’s canal. The plant would remove
salt from seawater and pump it north into the canal, where it would
flow through Maricopa, Pinal and Pima counties.
This is the first move toward evaluating a water project that state
lawmakers this year committed
more than $1 billion toward, heeding Gov. Doug Ducey’s call to
support desalination and other efforts. Some of the lawmakers who
supported it recoiled at what they called the rushed nature of this
resolution, having only been sprung on members last week. Ducey leaves
office in January.
Board member Andy Tobin, a former House speaker and Corporation
Commission member, said the greater risk was acting too slowly. He
noted that one development that has relied on Scottsdale’s water may
be cut off in January, in part because of the Colorado’s decline.
“We’ve got folks running out of water,” he said.
IDE representatives said they planned to submit the proposal this week
for federal environmental review, and hoped to show the state’s
support for that process. The project is substantial, potentially
moving enough water to supply all current Arizonans, while also
requiring a parallel power line for pumping. The eight-member board
unanimously approved the resolution after member Ted Cooke, the CAP’s
retiring general manager, amended it to make clear that the state was
only committing to “discuss” the plan, not negotiate it.
Recycling,
desalination, taller dams:As
the Colorado River shrinks, Arizona looks for more water
The proposal would also require Mexico's consent. The company said it
had discussed it with Sonora's governor, who is interested in securing
water from it for Hermosillo and Nogales. But the bulk of the water
would head to Arizona.
Proponents envision a seawater desalination plant near the resort town
of Puerto Peñasco, Sonora. Once reverse osmosis membranes separate the
salt, the freshwater would flow through a pipeline north, crossing
into the United States at Organ Pipe National Monument. From there the
pipeline would follow State Route 85 to Arizona’s population center in
Maricopa County. It would pass through Buckeye, which might receive
direct access to it there, and then on to two new reservoirs northwest
of the county’s White Tank Mountains Regional Park. It could then
enter the Central Arizona Project’s canal flowing toward Phoenix,
Pinal County and Tucson.
The consortium also envisions a smaller pipeline from the end of the
CAP canal south to Nogales, Mexico, where it would provide up to
10,000 acre-feet. Hermosillo, Sonora's capital, would take its own
share of water directly from the desalination plant. In all, Sonora
would take 40,000 acre-feet. Each acre-foot is about 326,000 gallons.
The initial plant would cost about $5.5 billion and supply 300,000
acre-feet, IDE representatives told the board. That would be enough to
supply a million or more Arizona households, but at a cost of more
than $2,500 per acre-foot. That would be a substantial price increase
over CAP deliveries currently in the hundreds of dollars. But, if
mixed with other sources, company officials say, it could raise
homeowners’ bills by just a few dollars a month.
If Arizona commits to the project, residents in areas ultimately
served by it would pay for the water on their bills. The state would
not pay for the plant’s construction, but would rather agree to pay
for what it produces.
The plant could later be scaled up to offer up to 1 million acre-feet,
which would represent more than a third of Arizona’s share of the
Colorado River. IDE would privately finance it, but would require a
commitment from Arizona to purchase the water for 100 years. A final
deal likely would require Arizona to pay even in times when it does
not need the plant's water, as has been the case with desalination
plants in California.
Environmentalists raised concerns about the project’s energy
requirements, the effects of brine returned to the sea, and crossing
unique and sensitive habitats, including at Organ Pipe.
“I wonder if we’re selling our environmental birthright for a mess of
water, so to speak, a big mess that we could be getting into,” Yuma
Audubon Society Conservation Chair Cary Meister told the board.
Others said there’s no time to waste in seeking new sources as the
Colorado River’s decline takes water out of the CAP canal and
threatens to empty it in future years. A contingent representing Pinal
County, whose farmers have so far borne the brunt of those losses,
urged support of the desalination plan. Pinal Partnership CEO Tony
Smith said the county’s farms generate more than $1 billion a year and
are at risk of running out of groundwater. At 1 million acre-feet, he
said, a desalination plant eventually could provide enough water for
all of the state’s homes, leaving other sources for farms.
Colorado River
drought:Can
the 100-year-old rules that divide Colorado River still work?
IDE officials said if environmental review, permitting and financing
move as hoped, the project could be producing some water by 2027.
Sen. Lisa Otondo, D-Yuma, said she felt deceived by the proposal’s
fast track before the board. She had supported the $1.4 billion
commitment that lawmakers granted Gov. Ducey for water augmentation
and conservation earlier this year. That bipartisan effort passed with
the assurances that the money would not “rubber stamp” any particular
project, she said.
“I’m sorry, but this reeks of backroom deals,” she said.
Some public speakers and board members at the meeting said they had
only heard of the proposal last week, and there should be no rush to
pass a resolution supporting it. Doing so for such a huge project
could send the signal that there will be no room for other proposals,
they said, at a time when the board has not even formulated its rules,
hired a director or announced a request for proposals.
“Approval of this resolution will scare away competing proposals,”
said Karl Flessa, a University of Arizona geoscientist and Colorado
River researcher who said he was speaking for himself and not the
university.
The Arizona Municipal Water Users Association asked the board to slow
down. Its Phoenix-area members include 3.7 million members who might
end up paying for the water but have unanswered questions about it,
Executive Director Warren Tenney said. “You should wonder why they
still have questions.”
Arizona has for years discussed the idea of a Sea of Cortez plant, and
in 2020 joined partners from Mexico, California and Nevada in an
initial feasibility study that also placed the price per acre-foot at
$2,000 or higher. That idea, though, would not include a pipeline
north into Arizona, but would hinge on an exchange of Colorado River
water with Mexico.
Some legislators cautioned about the potential cost to water
ratepayers if Arizona agrees to lock in a plant. House Minority Leader
Reginald Bolding said he saw no reason to rush, when the board could
take its time to review the resolution in coming months. “Why is the
need of urgency right now, today, this needs to happen?” he said.
But Mark Lewis, a retiring CAP board member, urged the board to act
now. The resolution does not commit state funds, only a commitment to
analyze and discuss. Whatever the state does to boost its water supply
will be costly, Lewis said.
“You need to have a sustainable, 100-year water supply for the state
of Arizona,” he said, “and it’s going to take a sustainable money
supply to do that.”
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