Utahn discounts date for signing water deal

A state water official is discounting a date on a draft groundwater agreement between Utah and Nevada that seemed to indicate the document would be signed Sept. 5, before adequate impact studies are completed.

The draft document, which was posted on the Internet on the Utah government Web site, concerns the proposal by Southern Nevada Water Authority, Las Vegas, to pump 25,000 acre-feet of underground water from Snake Valley and send it to Las Vegas. The authority also wants to pump 91,000 acre-feet from Spring Valley, which is entirely within Nevada.

Some Utah officials, ranchers and conservationists are concerned about the Snake Valley proposal because it would tap into an underground aquifer that runs along the border of both states. A concern often expressed is that the project could take water needed by Utah ranchers and the environment.

Under a law sponsored by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., called the Lincoln County Conservation, Recreation, and Development Act of 2004, Utah and Nevada are to enter into an agreement about the groundwater use before any Snake Valley water can be diverted from its basin.

Studies are going on to determine the effect of pumping water there.

Meanwhile, a boilerplate-type draft agreement posted on the Internet has places where specific figures would be filled in later concerning water use . It has provisions such as the need to monitor water use, including meters to show how much is used by anyone with water rights of 10 acre-feet or more per year.

At the bottom of the document are spaces for the signatures of Allen Biaggi, director of the Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, and Michael R. Styler, executive director of the Utah Department of Natural Resources.

Immediately above the signature lines is the supposed date of the signatures: "DONE at the City of Baker, Nevada, this fifth day of September, AD Two Thousand and Six."

That date, as far as some ranchers and environmentalists are concerned, is too soon. By then, extensive studies may not be completed on impacts of various levels of water withdrawals, they say.

But Boyd Clayton of the Utah Division of Water Resources says the Sept. 5 date isn't significant.

"No, it was the first draft" of the potential agreement, he said. Just as no actual figures are filled in for acre-feet to be used, the date does not represent the real time of the signing, he said.

Clayton added that he has no idea when an agreement will be signed.

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