Is Las Vegas out of water options?

LAS VEGAS — Las Vegas has run out of options for water and will see growth pinched off in seven to 10 years unless plans are approved to pump groundwater 200 miles south from rural White Pine County, a water agency official said.

The assessment by Pat Mulroy, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, is the strongest warning to date about a looming water shortage.

In recent years, drought in the West and a failure to find other water sources have left the agency with just one option, Mulroy said: The water must come from groundwater in White Pine and other rural parts of the state.

White Pine rancher Dean Baker and county Commissioner Gary Perea said they don't believe the water authority's analysis of the amount of water underground in their county nor the predicted effect the groundwater plan will have on their ranches, farms and the environment.

They said they do not trust the agency's promises to stop pumping if the environment is hurt.

"It's not about politics or money or whatever. It's about water," Baker said.

Mulroy acknowledged that her sharp warning was, in part, due to her anxiety about how the state will rule on the plan. The state's top water official, State Engineer Tracy Taylor, has scheduled hearings in September before deciding whether to approve the agency's proposal to pump the water more than 200 miles.

Mulroy said the economic effect of a denial would be immediate. Even before the agency could appeal the decision in court, lenders who bankroll construction and business expansion in Las Vegas would begin turning down loans, she said.

"There's a whole market collapse that would happen," Mulroy said. "The whole economic confidence of southern Nevada would start eroding."

The argument ups the ante in a fight over the Southern Nevada Water Authority's plan to pipe 200,000 acre-feet of water a year from rural Nevada to Las Vegas.

Mulroy and her staff have argued consistently that the agency must find new sources of water to complement the 300,000 acre-feet drawn annually from the Colorado River, which supplies 90 percent of the local demand. An acre-foot of water can supply up to two homes per year.

Six years ago, Mulroy said river water surpluses could supply the growing needs of the region for decades. But drought coupled with growing demand from other states has effectively killed expectations for surplus water.