Water, Water Everywhere
Part-2
Last week I finished my report on my investigation into the continued availability of California Aqueduct water to supply the proposed High Desert Power Project and the comparison between the assurances from the HDPP that all cooling water would come from the aqueduct and no native ground water would be used; and the real world of what their actual plan of operation was going to be. I gave some comparisons and finished with receiving testimony from the Staff of the California State Energy Commission who are evaluating the request for an operation permit from the HDPP...
My comparisons are
in italics and the bold sections are my calling your attention to important
passages. The complete report is 57 pages. I'll give an address where it can be
obtained at the end of this article.
Extract from Staff Testimony -- California State Energy Commission,
October 1999.
It
should be noted that the applicants (Flour Daniel 1998) revised annual water
demand figures in Tables 3.4-5 and 3.4-6 assumes maximum operation of 8,223
hours per year with the
resulting total of 3,597 acre-feet
for the "F" class configuration and 3,102 acre-feet for the
"G" class configuration (Groundwater supply).
The water supply for the proposed project
is to be a combination of surface and groundwater. As noted above, ground water
essentially supplies all water used within the Mojave River area.
**********
HDPP (Bookman-Edmonson 1998a) proposes that seven wells, constructed and
operated by the Victor Valley Water District be located starting approximately
three miles south of the of the power plant site. These wells will connect to a
VVWD 16-inch pipeline being built to provide to the SCIA. Six of the new wells
would serve as primary well and the seventh would serve as backup.
It is
estimated that each of the wells
could have a production rate of 550 gpm or approximately 4,000 acre-feet per
year. This would represent approximately a 4.6 percent increase in groundwater
pumping in the Alto Subarea compared to 1995/1996 water production by major
producers.
Supplying HDPP with 4,000 acre-feet of
water would also represent an increase of almost 25 percent over the district's
existing water demands. Furthermore, the proposed wellfield is located within
Pressure Zone 2, a VVWD planning area that has seen the greatest population
growth over the last ten years of any area within the VVWD boundary (So 1998).
In 1994 - 1995, water demand
within pressure zone 2 was 10,458 gpm while supply was only 7.207 gpm.
Furthermore, this is the area the district anticipates the largest growth over
the next 15 years.
There are a total of 33
production wells within the vicinity of the proposed HDPP wellfield.
Neighboring
production wells include one VVWD well located within a one mile radius of the
proposed wellfield while ten VVWD wells are within a two mile radius of the
wellfield. Two wells that were installed for the still under construction
Bureau of Prisons Facility on the SCIA are also within a two mile radius of the
proposed wellfield. These two wells have been abandoned due to water quality
concerns (Hill 1999). Eight additional VVWD wells are within a three mile
radius of the proposed wellfield as well as six City of Adelanto wells and six
George Airforce Base wells.
As
part of the base closure, these latter six wells are to be turned over to the
City of adelanto. In light of the high number of existing production wells
within a three mile radius of the proposed wellfield, the applicant (Bookman
Edmonston 1998b) and others (Geomatrix 1998; Fox 1998) conducted an analysis
that estimated the effects of operating the proposed HDPP wells.
Doesn't sound quite like the stuff you've
been reading in the papers, does it? As we get deeper into this, just remember,
it took only two letters of inquiry to get the information directly from the
energy department.
The
Geomatrix (1998) study did as well, but pointed out that this time estimate
does not reflect the full effect of groundwater pumping over the life of the
project. Outside the Mojave River Alluvial Aquifer, groundwater extraction
exceeds recharge resulting in lowered groundwater levels over time.
Without
additional on-site recharge, even intermittent pumping by the project would be
additive, leading to a long term drawdown of the aquifer, because of incomplete
groundwater level recoveries (Geomatrix 1998, Fox 1998, Martin 1998).
At the very least, HDPP will be pumping
groundwater one month each year while repairs are made to the California
Aqueduct. With no other interruptions in SWP deliveries, this still represents
two and half years of pumping over the assumed 30-year life of the project.
Additional pumping will be dictated by the availability of SWP water.
Geomatrix
(1998) concluded that the aquifer drawdown estimates are reasonably correct
given the assumptions and that alternative methods of calculating drawdown
returned similar results.
They can't recharge the Mojave River
Alluvial Aquifer because it's open at both ends and a one time recharge, just
like a heavy rain just flows downstream and out of our usage area.
To insure that the project receives SWP
water, the City of Victorville in October 1998 applied on the project's behalf
to the MWA for 4,000 acre-feet per year of water for the year 2002 (MWA 1998a).
The application requests approximately 298 acre-feet per month for all months
except June, July and August when the requested amount increases to
approximately 447 acre-feet.
Ordinance No. 9 of the MWA
stipulates that contracts for State Water Project water are for a single year.
Furthermore, as discussed above, SWP deliveries are not firm.
The ability of the SWP to
deliver water in a given year depends on rainfall, snowpack, runoff, water in
storage, pumping capacity in the Delta and regulatory constraints.
*********
The third run (Scenario C) is
based upon the assumption that 70,000 acre-feet per year of SWP would be
required by MWA to address the adjudication before the project could receive
SWP water. This 70,000 acre-foot figure
is again based upon the figure in the 1994 plan that shows 58,000 acre-feet of
replacement water being required by 2005 in addition to the 12,000 acre-feet
identified in the original run.
Based upon this simulation, HDPP would receive no SWP water (Fox 1998).
The time groundwater pumping would be required by the project was used by Fox
(1998) to estimate the well interference effects of the proposed project. The
unknown factor in these simulations is the actual amount of SWP water MWA will
require for addressing the overdraft.
This scenario is based upon the normal anticipated
growth rate, residential, commercial and industrial calculated in a 1994
plan...OOPS!
The availability of such water
in the future is not known.
In case of reduced SWP water
deliveries, Section 3.03 of MWA Ordinance No. 9 indicates that, "All
applications shall be evaluated and deliveries authorized based on the
following priority uses:
I) municipal, 2) industrial, 3) agricultural..." Ordinance No.
9 also states during SWP shortages, all
parties will be proportionately reduced. The ordinance does go on to allow MWA
to allocate the water, if there is no shortage in SWP supply, to ensure
domestic sanitation, sewage and fire fighting needs are met.
In light of the lack of a
water treatment facility, municipal demands for direct use of SWP water in the
near future are not likely. None-the-less , in the future, HDPP may be in competition
for SWP water with other users when deliveries are reduced. The MWA accepted
for processing the application for SWP water for the HDPP on November 10, 1998,
Section 3.05 of the Ordinance No. 9 states that SWP cannot be the sole source of water for the project and that a
reliable source of water must be obtained prior to approval of any application
to the MWA.
Both the VVWD (1998) and the City of Victorville (Roberts 1998)
indicated to the MWA that they will serve as an independent source of water for
the project when imported water is not available
*********
Staff is concerned about the
long-term availability of SWP water to the project, since future conditions may
change, there is no guarantee that this water will be allocated to the project.
Court decisions about the adjudication, or competition for SWP water may limit
the availability of this water. SWP water must be applied for each year.
Clearly, Ordinance No. 9 was adopted to provide water on a single year basis to
allow decision makers as much flexibility in allocating what may become a
scarce resource as possible.
This then becomes; however, a reliability
question, not one of environmental impacts. Given the nature of the competitive
market, one assumes that the liability of the project not operating due to no
water rests with the project owner and not with society.
Now we come to the serious part:
The State
Energy Staff is concerned about the long-term availability of SWP water to the
project, but I'm concerned about the fact that never in any press release were
we informed that,
"Both
the VVWD (1998) and the City of Victorville (Roberts 1998) indicated to the MWA
that they will serve as an independent source of water for the project when
imported water is not available."
We voted
out two MWA board members who tried to conserve our water supply and believed
everything we were told about the project. At least, now you have the
information straight from the licensing arm of our state government. Now you
know the truth.
******
To get the complete testimony of
the staff, write:
Richard K. Buell
California Energy Commission
1516 Ninth Street, MS 15
Sacramento, CA 95814-5512
(916) 653-1614