Drought and Kansas Water Rights - Part 2

Well, the decision has been made to offer drought relief to certain Kansas water right owners. Kansas Drought Policy - DWR  There are two options:  1) the Multi-year flex account (MFA - covered in part 1 of this issue (here)); or 2) a two-year term permit that basically lets the water right holder borrow against his or her next years water right for any over pumpage this year.

First of all, only water rights in agricultural drought disaster declaration areas are eligible.  These Counties are as of today are (in darkest rust color on map):

Barber, Barton, Butler, Clark, Comanche, Cowley, Edwards, Ellis, Finney, Ford, Gove, Graham, Grant, Gray, Greeley, Hamilton, Harper, Harvey, Haskell, Hodgeman, Kearny, Kingman, Lane, Lincoln, Logan, Meade, Morton, Ness, Norton, Phillips, Reno, Rice, Russell, Sedgwick, Scott, Seward, Sheridan, Sherman, Stafford, Stanton, Stevens, Sumner, Thomas, Trego, Wallace and Wichita Counties.

Moreover, this is a one-time offer.  Users will agree to reduce next years authorized quantity by the same amount this year's use is exceeded.  Applicants must file on or before December 31, 2011.  And water rights in established Intensive Groundwater Use Control Areas or that have any enforcement sanction against them for 2011 are not eligible.  If interested, use the link above to see all the program details and to access any filing forms needed for either option.

We have producers in all stages of drought damages.  If you have not been able to keep up with the water needs of the crop and its already burnt up or beyond responding to water, the term permit option is not in your best interest. The longer term MFA may be, but take a careful look at it before you jump in.  If the additional irrigation water will save your current crop, then by all means you should consider one of these offerings.  Filing fees will be based on the total, 2-year term permit, but these are not excessive.

If you do use either program, make sure you understand the new terms and limits of your water right and carefully plan on staying within these limits.  There'll likely be more on this topic later.

"Thoroughly and Thoughtfully"

These were the words the 11th Circuit Appeals Court used as they directed the Corps of Engineers to make a final determination on the water allocation from Lake Lanier - in one years time - to settle the tri-sate disagreement over Lake Lanier's uses.  This ruling was based on an appeal from Georgia on an earlier ruling by US District Court Judge Paul Magnuson that gave Georgia, Alabama and Florida until July 2012 to come to an agreement on how to share the water, or, Atlanta would only be able to withdraw the amount of water that it received in the mid-1970s.  The latest 11th Circuit ruling overturned Magnuson's 2009 ruling. 


Of course Georgia is pleased with the new decision while both Alabama and Florida are just plain, non-plussed.  It wasn't long before Alabama began calling for another appeal and  I'm certain Florida will weigh in very soon, too.


But my overall guess is the Corps will surprise everyone with their revised (thorough and thoughtful) operational plan next year.  I'm guessing Georgia will end up sharing more water with the other two states than they do now, and that all three states will still need to push water conservation, replacement supplies and efficient water use further than any of them have to date.  Just a hunch, mind you...

Unbroken

I just finished reading the Laura Hillenbrand book "Unbroken" - about Louie Zamperini.  Yes there is plenty of water in it, and a dire lack of water as well.

Louie was a running phenom in the 1930's having made the US Olympic team as a 19 year old in 1936.  He was slated by most of the track pundits as the most likely runner in the world to break the elusive 4 minute mile.  He didn't do all that well in his first Olympics, but well enough that his sights were firmly set on the 1940 games set for Tokyo, Japan.  But the war intervened and the 1940 games had been cancelled shortly after having been moved to Helsinki, Finland as soon as Japan withdrew its host status.  Louie enlisted in the Army Air Corps and became a bombardier on a bomber in the Pacific theater.

The book is his story of being captured by the Japanese and his extraordinary will and courage to survive and assist others in surviving.  Water plays key roles throughout the book, but that's all I'm going to say about that.  The book is meticulously researched and quite an amazing read, and if you're interested in World War II it's a double treat.  Enjoy.
 

The Water Plane..The Water Plane..!

A Russian company is now promoting the world's first jet water bomber purposely built for fighting wildfires.  In the last few years, the Beriev Be-200 Altair has helped fight forest fires in a number of countries including Greece, Italy, Portugal, Malaysia, Indonesia and Israel.

The flying fire-fighter suppresses fires by dropping water and/or chemical retardants. Eight water tanks are located under the cabin floor in the center fuselage section.  But the cool thing is that it can skim a lake and scoop up water, "on the fly" so to speak, skimming the source at 90% of takeoff speed.  Four retractable water scoops are used in this mode to scoop up a total of 12 tons of water in just 14 seconds.  I didn't see any reports of how many fish, boats or swimmers the system can handle, though.  However, if you're concerned about these dangers, the tanks can be alternatively filled from a hydrant or other water source on the ground. 

In it's multi-purpose configuration, the company reports that the "..water tanks can be removed quickly for carrying cargo or people.." - unless of course they're filled with water.  Anyway, with these tanks removed, 72 people can travel in pressurized and air conditioned comfort, or up to 30 stretchers with seven medical crew and go where needed.  I suppose if one of the water tanks was left in at least 25 stretchered patients could even take baths - again, no report to this effect - I'm just surmising.  But it's main purpose is fire fighting.  Water can be dropped in a single dump in right at one second, or, in up to eight consecutive drops.  The aircraft also carries six tanks for fire-retarding chemical agents.

The company so far has a total of 26 confirmed and optional sales, but they are thinking that growing threats of huge forest fires due to global warming will push their demand up well over 100 planes in the next 10 years.  They also are looking to the US whose fleet of fire-fighting planes tend to be old military air tankers that are aging quickly and will need to be replaced soon.   Heck, with corn markets as high as they are, I'm surprised some of the Californian ag folks aren't looking at these as high-tech irrigation systems.  They could even skim out of Lake Powell at night and the Nevadans might not ever catch on!  One thing's for pretty sure - Kansas is too far to make such water soirees economically viable!! 

Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/06/21/3716332/russian-water-bomber-on-display.html#ixzz1QE1KkKTM

Water Rights Conservation Program - Kansas

Kansas had a water rights conservation program (WRCP) that ended December 31, 2009 due to budget cutbacks.  It was a jointly conceived and developed program that allowed valid water right holders to set their water right (use) aside for a number of years and not become subject to abandonment for non-use.  And the best part, it was a free program for the water right owners.

When the budget crisis hit in 2008, the state agencies began jettisoning all non-core programs (not required by statute) and the WRCP was one of these.  It was developed and operated out of the goodness of the state agency's heart.  This program's demise was lamented by many because it was fairly well used - with almost 1,000 water rights enrolled - some of those having been idle for as many as 15-20 years.

With a lot of work and convincing, we were able to get the 2011 Legislature to statutorily embody this program, and require a $300.00 filing fee to cover all the state's administrative program costs.   I'm happy to announce that the program starts back up again July 1, 2011, and I've already had my first applicant asking to file - even though the application forms aren't even available yet.

There were a few other changes as well, like limiting the enrollment time to 2, 10-year enrollments with a maximum of 2 years between each enrollment.  All in all, the new program is better for all concerned and should run smoothly - completely fee funded.  I'll try and keep tabs on enrollment and cover this program again later.  It's a good thing when water rights in overappropriated areas can be set aside for conservation rather than be used for fear of being abandoned and forfeited.

Energy Beets?

I see now there is a push in North Dakota on growing energy beets for ethanol production rather than corn.  The pitch:  Energy beets:  help the soil in that they use less nitrogen than corn; are tolerant to saline soils; deep rooted so they mop up nutrients escaping from shallow rooted crops; require only 1.5 gal water to produce 1 gallon of ethanol compared to corn's 2.5 gallons; produces twice the ethanol per acre than corn; and irrigated yields are 41 tons per acre.

What the article I am reading never says is how much irrigation water it takes to grow a 41-ton per acre crop.  While I can appreciate the fact that the processing water is significantly less for beets than for corn, this has never been the real issue for me as a water manager.  What is the issue is the irrigation water requirement - which for corn, is significant.  I suspect it's considerably more significant for beets, but I've looked for about an hour now and nobody's fessin' up to how much water it does take. This likely means it's a boat-load! 

I guess one could argue that even if beets take twice as much irrigation water as corn, the studies report you only need one-half the acres of beets for the same amount of ethanol produced from corn.  This could be good, right?  At least no worse!  But in the business world I'd be very surprised if the ethanol production (economic returns) won't be maximized if the land and water are available.  Besides, these guys are talking about pretty significant new acreages of beet production.  My guess is that in North Dakota water conservation is not very prominent on the radar screens of those promoting ethanol production from beets.   And this is fine - if you've got the land and water.  But, if water conservation is important, or necessary, to you, looks like it'll have to happen some other way if you jump on the beet ethanol wagon.

What's With Kansas & It's Fish?

In the Late Cretaceous Period - about 87-75 million years ago - Kansas was under water.  Yes covered by a shallow sea of saltwater.  It's only been in the last 65 million years or so that the Rocky Mountain uplift elevated us above sea level.  This event also elevated all the sea bottom sediments (shales and chalks) that contained a wealth of marine fossils.  One of these was the unique Fish-within-a-fish fossil discovered by paleontologist George Sternberg in Gove County, Kansas in 1952.

The fossil is a nearly 14-foot Xiphactinus audax specimen that just happens to have a 6-foot Gillicus arcuatus in its stomach - also very nicely preserved.  See more from the Sternberg Museum of Natural History.  The Smoky Hill Chalk is the upper member of the Niobrara Chalk Formation, and has yielded many significant fossils - like the largest yet discovered Xiphactinus audax measuring in at 17 feet long.  It was discovered in 1996 by Mike Everhart.  

So, while Kansas doesn't have the world's wealth of water today, there was a time....