EDITORIAL: As lake declines, plan for pipeline

The news coming from Lake Mead was disconcerting, though not surprising: its water level continues to fall. As reported Friday by the Review-Journal’s Henry Brean, the lake declined to a record low of 1,081.82 feet above sea level late Wednesday night, a depth not seen since 1937, when Hoover Dam was completed and Colorado River water steadily rose behind it. Lake Mead will continue to shrink for several weeks.

The drought conditions underscore the urgency to complete a new intake, the so-called third straw, that will reach deeper into the lake to supply the Las Vegas Valley with water. There are two intakes right now, but should the lake’s level drop to 1,050 feet — projections show it could be drawing closer to that mark by 2016, at 1,064 feet — one of those intakes would no longer be functional. The Southern Nevada Water Authority expects the third intake to be finished by next summer, two years behind schedule and at a cost of $817 million.

But the sinking lake also highlights the need to move forward with a pipeline to east-central Nevada, should we need it. The Las Vegas Valley’s water supply is everything — if taps ever run dry, our economy will follow suit. Southern Nevadans are conserving like never before — we are far more conscious about our water use than we were 10 to 15 years ago — but that’s not enough insurance against potential reductions in the state’s share of Colorado River water, already the smallest of all basin states.

Plan B must be in place. The water authority has an obligation to take the pipeline project’s planning process as far as possible, to fully study and address the environmental consequences of pumping groundwater from rural areas north of Las Vegas, to meet all the judicial and regulatory scrutiny required. The agency must be ready to turn the first shovel of earth and purchase the first piece of pipe should the project pass muster and become absolutely, undeniably necessary.

Environmentalists and political opportunists are still demanding a halt to growth in the valley; these people on the fringe rip the region’s two new water parks and demand that homeowners fill in their swimming pools. Never mind that the water parks use recycled water and that covered swimming pools use far less water than the average lawn.

The truth is that, historically, droughts along the Colorado River are normal and can last decades. As such, the continuing decline of Lake Mead is a reminder to develop whatever additional water resources we can. Reducing the standard of living in this region is not a solution.

Make no mistake, no one wants to build the rural groundwater pipeline. Indeed, several lawsuits aim to prevent it, and the cost of the project would be massive — many billions of dollars, including service on construction debt. But make no mistake, the water authority must be prepared to forge ahead if river conditions continue to deteriorate.