By Bob Christie | Capitol Media Services
Key Points:
- Arizona’s water supplies have dwindled due to cuts in Colorado River supplies
- Arizona’s Water Infrastructure Finance Authority may approve five imported water proposals this week
- EPCOR’s proposal relies on a controversial pumping project in California’s remote southeastern desert
The board overseeing the state agency charged with finding new water supplies for Arizona is poised to approve as many as five water importation proposals, one of which could reignite decades of interstate controversy.
A conservation group and an Indian tribe warned the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority committee screening the projects that EPCOR’s apparent proposal is fraught with risk and can’t deliver the stable water supply Arizona needs.
Details of the five projects — two involving desalination plants and the others relying on wastewater treatment, surface water and an unidentified third source — remain secret until the full board of the agency known as WIFA meets Wednesday.
