Here’s why Cadiz company says it’s taking ‘a little pause’ from its desert water project

A pumping station designed to help Cadiz project researchers understand how quickly water seeps into the earth, migrate to the subterranean lakes. The Cadiz project hopes to pump water that would otherwise evaporate from their unique Mojave Desert site and make it available for municipal use and agriculture. Picture made at the Cadiz project site in the Mojave Desert on Monday, June 1, 2015.

By JIM STEINBERG
San Bernardino Sun

LOS ANGELES--Fresh from gaining the long-sought federal approval for its massive desert water project, Scott Slater, Cadiz president and CEO, said it’s time for the project to “slow down” a bit.

“We are going to take a little pause…and double our effort to allow people to understand this project,” Slater said. “We believe people should support an innovative project like ours.

The Cadiz project involves pumping billions of gallons of water annually from an underground aquifer in a remote part of the Mojave Desert in San Bernardino County. The water would be piped to parts of Orange County and other locations, which could include San Bernardino County. Cadiz water could serve as many as 400,000 people.

This year, with the Trump administration running the Interior Department and Bureau of Land Management, the Cadiz project gained momentum.

The Obama administration had not supported the desert water project.

One environmentalist who has studied and followed the project for years, said pausing at this point strikes an odd note.

“They have waited years for this clearance, and now, after getting the blessing from the BLM, they take a pause?” said David Lamfrom, California Desert and National Wildlife Programs director with the National Parks Conservation Association.

Lamfrom said he believes the pause is really because the California Lands Commission has recently surfaced as a possible stumbling block to the project.

Cadiz downplays that notion.

“We want to be having conversations with stakeholders and decision makers,” Slater said of the company’s focus for the remaining weeks of the year.

Last month the Lands Commission wrote Cadiz, saying the company needs to fill out an application for a lease permit on a 200-foot-wide by 1-mile long slice of the project’s proposed 43-mile pipeline.

However, Cadiz management does not consider the state’s request to be a significant impediment. Whether the proposed use of railroad right-of-way falls within the state’s permit, issued in June 1910, is something for “an impartial judge” to decide, not the state land commission, the company contends.

Cadiz and Slater, are riding a crest, at least on the federal level. Much has changed in the past two years.

Legal turn-around

In October 2015 the Cadiz project was dealt a major setback when the Obama Administration’s Bureau of Land Management rejected the company’s use of an 1875 railway right-of-way to build a critical pipeline.

In statements, Cadiz has said that the BLM’s October 2015 evaluation “not only impeded the Cadiz Water Project but also set a troubling precedent for thousands of miles of existing uses of railroad rights-of-way in the West.”

Things began to change in September. The project got a huge boost when the Interior Department’s Office of the Solicitor issued an opinion which appeared to allow construction of a 43-mile pipeline from Fenner Valley — about 40 miles northeast of Twentynine Palms — to the Colorado River Aqueduct, where it could deliver water to potential customers.

Nevertheless, the opinion didn’t provide a clear green light.

The definitive victory came in October, when Michael D. Nedd, BLM acting director, cemented the government’s about-face in a letter to Slater.

The letter said the BLM’s October 2015 interpretation of the law no longer represents the agency’s viewpoint and has been rescinded. It also said the scope of the proposed activity does not require BLM authorization.

Groups opposed to the project were outraged.

“This just confirms what the administration has been signaling (since Donald Trump was sworn in as president). They will bend heaven and earth to try to move the Cadiz project forward,” Lamfrom said.

Slater has a different viewpoint:

The action of October 2015 was a “bogus act by the BLM” that took “two years for them to get right.”

Support for the project originated, not from the Trump administration, but a broadly based group of business and political leaders who advocated for what they believe is a good project, Slater said.

Labor groups, including North America’s Building Trades Unions, wrote Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, supporting the project, Slater said.

After receiving the BLM’s favorable ruling, Cadiz said it would turn its attention to final engineering design, contract arrangements with participating agencies and a conveyance agreement with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

Although the engineering plans are proceeding, Cadiz is not immediately applying to the Metropolitan water district for use of pipelines to transport its Mojave Desert water to customers. That will happen early next year, said Courtney Degener, a Cadiz spokeswoman.

Misconceptions

Slater said a major misconception he wants to address stems from an allegation that Sen. Dianne Feinstein made in late September. Feinstein, D-Calif., said allowing Cadiz water into the Metropolitan Water District’s system “could endanger the health of not only Cadiz’s customers but all 19 million Californians who rely on that water.”

Feinstein, who has long opposed the Cadiz project, contends the desert water is polluted with arsenic and Chromium-6.

Although Slater did not mention Feinstein by name, he said no company in California or the United States would be allowed to put water into a drinking water supply pipeline that does not meet state and federal standards.

Shortly after Feinstein questioned the safety of using the desert water, Cadiz issued a statement calling Feinstein’s remarks “irresponsible and not true.”

A state agency tasked with protecting California’s water supply seemed to back up the Cadiz company.

“Any water system that wants to bring on a new source of water must have the new source permitted, which would include sampling the new source for water quality before it was put into use,” said Andrew DiLuccia, spokesman for the State Water Resources Control Board.

Ongoing battle

For a time, the project faced a threat by a Feinstein-backed bill in the state Legislature that would have prohibited the Cadiz water transfer unless the state Lands Commission, in consultation with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, finds the project “will not adversely affect the natural or cultural resources, including groundwater resources or habitat, of those federal and state lands.”

But in early September, AB 1000, the bill to block Cadiz, was itself blocked in the state Senate Appropriations Committee.

A short time later, however, the state Lands Commission, asserted that it owned a 200-foot wide by one-mile long parcel along the path Cadiz plans to use for its 43-mile pipeline.

The Lands Commission’s chairman is Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who along with Gov. Jerry Brown, supported AB1000.

The Lands Commission sent Cadiz an application for it to complete. After Cadiz submits its application, commission staff members will analyze land ownership and the level of environmental documentation to be required before a decision is made, the state agency said in a letter to Cadiz.

The company is questioning the request.

Cadiz will comply with any “lawful condition” imposed by the Lands Commission but does not intend to fill out an application before there can be a discussion about what this state agency is seeking from Cadiz, Slater said.

Bill would curb massive Cadiz desert water project

Cadiz Inc. plans to pump the Mojave Desert aquifer and transport that water to Southern California communities. (Jay Calderon/The Desert Sun)

By DAVID DANELSKI
The Press-Enterprise

The battle over plans by a Los Angeles company to sell water pumped from aquifers underneath Mojave Desert conservation areas heated up again this week when state legislation was amended to require a new round of state reviews.

The legislation’s new language, by Assemblywoman Laura Friedman, D-Glendale, would stop major pumping until state land and wildlife officials determined that groundwater extractions would not harm wildlife or cultural resources.

The legislation is in response to the Cadiz desert water project that has been prioritized by the Trump administration.

Cadiz officials called the legislation a flawed attempt to further delay the project.

Cadiz wants to pump groundwater from wells on land its owns in the Cadiz Valley that is surrounded by the Mojave Trails National Monument. These wells would draw water from connected aquifers below the Cadiz, Bristol and Fenner valleys that supply springs within the monuments as well as the Mojave National Preserve.

The water would be piped more than 40 miles across federal lands along a railroad right of way to the Colorado River Aqueduct. It would then be ferried to water customers in suburban Southern California.

The project has been staunchly opposed by environmental groups and other desert advocates, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who sponsored the California Desert Protection Act of 1994 that created the Mojave National Preserve and protected 69 wilderness areas between the Mexican border and the town of Bishop.

If it passes the Legislature and is signed by Gov. Jerry Brown, the new state law also would be called the California Desert Protection Act.

Contacted by cell phone, Friedman, a first-year legislator, said her aim is to conserve the water below the desert conservation areas that wildlife depends upon.

“This is the water that supports the desert’s ecosystem, and it is vitally important,” she said.

The law would prohibit taking groundwater from a large swath of the Mojave unless the State Lands Commission, working with the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, finds that pumping “will not adversely affect the natural or cultural resources of those federal and state lands,” the bill says.

Friedman said the Cadiz project could go forward under the law if the new state reviews find it does no harm.

The Cadiz company issued a statement Thursday, July 6, that contends the legislation is designed “to further delay the Cadiz Water Project” by using a “gut and amend” legislative process, which is “universally condemned.” (The original bill, AB 1000, pertained to water meter standards.)

The company’s statement said the project was previously reviewed under state environmental disclosure laws and “found to have no adverse impacts on the environment.” Those reviews were done about 17 years ago.

The Cadiz project would “create a safe, sustainable water supply for 400,000 people,” as well as about “$1 billion economic activity and close to 6,000 jobs,” the company statement added.

The Santa Margarita Water District in southern Orange County plans to buy between 5,000 to 10,000 acre-feet a year, said district spokesman Jim Leach. In all, the project would pump as much as 50,000 acre-feet a year, depending on how the water tables are affected by the extraction, he said.

“We are really disappointed,” Leach said. “We see this legislation as a roadblock to delay the project.”

But Feinstein and other critics maintain the Cadiz project is unsustainable.

In May, the senator released a letter from the U.S. Geological Survey that said a 2000 analysis by the agency found that the Cadiz, Bristol and Fenner basins naturally recharged water at rates of 2,000 to 10,000 acre-feet a year — just a fraction the rate water would be pumped out of these basins.

The Trump administration has made moves favorable to the project. In April, it rescinded a 2014 policy directive that was used to find in 2015 that Cadiz needed to obtain a federal right of way permit and thus had to complete comprehensive environmental studies before it could build a water pipeline in the railroad right of way.

The Trump transition team also put Cadiz on a list of priority projects.

“If the federal government is not going to do these environmental reviews, the state has a responsibility to do them,” Friedman said.

Federal gift of land to schools went awry

Jill Tucker
San Francisco Chronicle

There was a time when California's schools were financially set for life - holding the rights to any profit and proceeds from 5.5 million acres, or 6 percent of the entire state.

The land was given in trust by Congress when California joined the union to support the education of children, then and forever more. Other states received similar "sacred, irrevocable" trusts for their schools.

In California, a state blessed with bountiful agricultural potential, veins of gold, power-producing rivers, a coastline full of commercial possibility and so much more, the school trust acreage should have produced riches beyond every teacher's wildest dreams.

It didn't.

As was the case in many states, most of the land was quickly sold off, mismanaged, used as chess pieces in backroom deals or neglected, according to Utah researchers who recently released the first analysis of school trust lands in more than 100 years.

"As you can imagine, there was probably a lot of good-old-boy stuff going on," said Margaret Bird, a school land trust specialist at the Utah State Office of Education. "It's money that belonged to someone else, namely schoolchildren, and it was just stolen."

There were 134 million total acres granted nationwide to support public education by 1959, with about a third currently remaining in the hands of state agencies to benefit schools.

Of the original California school trust land, less than 500,000 acres remain, generating about $6 million in royalties and revenue each year, with all proceeds deposited into the state teachers' pension fund.

Pot of cash raided

In addition, about $60 million was set aside from the trust's profit to be used for further investment. But that small pot of cash was raided to nearly nothing by Gov. Jerry Brown to help balance the budget.

The state must pay back $59 million to the trust by 2016.

Nearly two dozen states have nothing left of their school land trust.

"While we point sometimes at California - and to be honest there is, on the part of some people, snickering - California at least has some lands left," said Richard West, executive director of the Center for the School of the Future at Utah State University, author of the report.

Profits in other states

Other states, however, have a lot to show for the land.

Arizona, for example, still has all of the mineral and/or surface rights over its original 928,000 acres as well as $440 million in the bank. New Mexico has most of its initial 8.7 million acres and $10.7 billion in its fund.

As in other states, the land sold off in California was gone even before the start of the 20th century.

"In the old days, they sold off everything anybody wanted," said Jim Porter, public land management specialist in the California State Lands Commission.

A lot of what's left in California is in the desert.

Still, the Utah report questioned the ongoing management of the land and funds across the country, noting that some states, for example, don't make market rate on some leases or royalties.

In California, the school trust is overseen by the State Lands Commission, which comprises the lieutenant governor, state controller and finance director. West argues that education officials should be part of the conversation about how to use the trust.

Across the country, much of the revenue from state trust lands come from mineral, oil and gas rights; timber production; agriculture; and commercial or residential leasing.

Geothermal leases

In California, the vast majority of revenue is generated from geothermal leases at the Geysers along the border of Sonoma and Lake counties. A bit of oil, gold and other minerals also generate some revenue.

In a weird historical twist, California is still owed about 51,000 acres from the federal government for the land trust because some of the initial parcels designated for education support were already occupied. The federal program allowed for that, guaranteeing replacement land to make up for property already in use, but California has yet to receive that land.

The State Lands Commission is working with other states to pursue legislation that would push federal officials to fulfill their pledge to California and any other states owed acreage.

In the meantime, Porter said, the commission wants to expand solar and wind efforts, which could produce significantly more revenue for the school land trust.

But given current law, the money wouldn't make it into classrooms.

Teacher pensions

While other states use the land trust proceeds for libraries, technology, schools and other programs, California deposits all revenue into the teacher pension fund, as directed by the Legislature in the mid-1980s.

Why support the pension fund rather than schools directly?

"My guess is political muscle," Porter said, noting the pension fund needed financial help from the state. "You've got to get the money from somewhere."

The Utah researchers questioned California's use of the money and whether it met the intent of the Continental Congress when they established the school land trust.

"A retired teacher does not help the school at all," Bird said. "If I lived in California I'd be out right now looking for an attorney ... because somebody needs to speak up for the children."

Owens Lake as solar power plant?

The DWP seeks to build a 660-acre pilot project on the dry lake bed -- and avoid doing an environmental impact report.

A solar array could mitigate dust at Owens Lake. Currently to help fight dust, the DWP regularly floods the dry lake bed, which attracts birds -- and bird-watchers, as above. (Brian Vander Brug / Los Angeles Times / April 18, 2009)

By Phil Willon
Los Angeles Times

Nearly a century after Los Angeles drained Owens Lake by diverting its water to the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the city now hopes to generate solar energy on the dusty salt flats it left behind.

The Department of Water and Power's board of commissioners Tuesday unanimously approved a renewable energy pilot project that would cover 616 acres of lake bed with solar arrays -- a possible precursor to a mammoth solar farm that could cover thousands of acres.

City utility officials hope that, along with generating power for L.A., the solar panels would reduce the fierce dust storms that rise from the dry lake bed. To comply with federal clean air standards, the DWP must control the dust that has plagued the Owens Valley for decades. Its efforts are part of a $500-million dust mitigation plan.

The solar project still must win approval from the California State Lands Commission, and that may be a difficult task. The commission's executive officer Tuesday said he had serious concerns about the size of the "demonstration" project and the DWP's plans to seek an exemption from a state environmental impact review.

Well aware of the nasty residue left by L.A.'s water grab in the early 1900s, city officials have taken special care to sell the idea to Owens Valley residents. So much water was pumped away from the valley that, afterward, many farmers and ranchers couldn't scratch out a living.

Interim DWP General Manager S. David Freeman traveled to Inyo County before Thanksgiving to meet with local government officials, environmental groups, ranchers and other residents in an effort to sell the solar proposal.

"It's really interesting and exciting, to say the least," said Inyo County Administrative Officer Kevin Carunchio. "Generally, the county has been looking at the potential for renewable energy projects to generate economic activity and fill the county coffers, since mining has been regulated out of business."

To help win over environmentalists, Freeman promised that the DWP would continue its program to flood portions of the lake bed with water to help control dust; the project currently uses enough water to supply 60,000 families. That shallow, ankle-deep flooding has created critical habitat for tens of thousands of migrating waterfowl and shorebirds.

"In general we support that idea. This small test project is in an area of the lake that has some of the least value for wildlife. It's a good area to put a project, to see if you can make it work and fix the dust," said Mike Prather of the Eastern Sierra Audubon Society.

DWP Commissioner Jonathan Parfrey, who serves as director of the Green L.A. Institute, said Tuesday he was "really enthusiastic" about the proposal but counseled DWP executives to keep Owens Valley residents well informed.

"We need to maintain good relations with the environmentalists in the eastern Sierra in order to provide them really strong assurances of the limited scope of this particular project, and an ongoing . . . conversation with them about any expanded projects," he said.

Michael Webster, the DWP's assistant manager of system development and procurement, told the board of commissioners that the agency has tested solar arrays in wind tunnels and determined that the structures, if properly aligned, can work as effective dust control measures.

The pilot solar project would generate an estimated 50 megawatts by 2012, or about 0.5% of L.A.'s energy needs. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has vowed to halt the use of coal-burning power plants by 2020 and -- that same year -- generate at least 40% of its energy from renewable resources.

The DWP estimates that the solar pilot project also could save 2,460 acre-feet of water a year -- worth $1.7 million -- because the solar arrays could be used to control dust in that portion of Owens Lake instead of flooding.

Because the State Lands Commission has oversight of the 100-square-mile Owens Lake, the DWP must convince the agency to lease the 616 acres for the pilot solar farm -- and, later, to grant leases for any expansion.

Paul Thayer, the state commission's executive officer, said the agency is willing to discuss "some sort of balance of habitat restoration and solar generation on the lake bed."

But he cautioned that a 616-acre solar farm would be among the largest in California, and DWP's efforts to avoid an environmental review could pose a major obstacle. "We think the project is much too ambitious now, particularly for that kind of environmental review," Thayer said, adding that a smaller project might be more acceptable.

Thayer said DWP officials estimate that Owens Lake has the potential to be developed into a large-scale solar farm: "They envision up into the gigawatt range . . . thousands of acres."