Groundwater study grounded

The Nevada Conservation League is disappointed with the lack of problems addressed in an extensive, longitudinal analysis of a groundwater diversion project conducted by the Bureau of Land Management. The project analyzed was a proposal to pump more than 30 billion gallons of water to Las Vegas from rural Nevada. The NCL claims that BLM did not take economics into consideration.

According to a statement released by NCL, “Federal contractors for the BLM failed to fully consider the rapidly growing cost of the project, which is now nearly $16 billion, according to the most recent figures revealed by SNWA [Southern Nevada Water Authority] staff members. A year ago, the SNWA in an analysis (required by state regulators) put the cost at just over $15 billion—four times the cost publicly released until then. … Conservationists, fiscal conservatives, rural ranchers and Native American communities are concerned with the multiple impacts that the project would have to both the economies and environment of the Great Basin of Nevada and Utah.”

Other opponents of the proposed pipeline include tribal communities from eastern Nevada who are also worried about the potential environmental impact, such as the Goshute tribe, which has set up a website to track the issue, www.goshutewater.org.