Water in National News

The state of Arizona recently announced that it would be limiting the construction of some future homes and businesses in order to manage the state’s water needs for the next 100 years.

New subdivisions in Arizona have required developers to compile a
100 year water plan for decades — professionally engineered plans that demonstrate how the new homes and businesses being constructed would have access to water in 100 year’s time — but now a certain selection of new developments won’t be permitted by the state to access groundwater even with a plan. And these projects won’t be permitted to break ground without that access to water. These extreme measures were done in reaction to the release of a new study that shows that Arizona is about 4% shy of meeting its projected 100 year water plan.

If these developments can access water from alternative sources,
they could be permitted to start construction. That’s why some in Arizona are considering a $5 billion project to pipe desalinated ocean water from the Gulf of Mexico to their state.