By Ian James
Even as groundwater levels have rapidly declined in farming regions from California’s Central Valley to the High Plains, the federal government has mostly taken a hands-off approach to the chronic depletion of the nation’s aquifers. But in a new report for the White House, scientists say the country is facing serious and unprecedented groundwater challenges that call for the federal government to play a larger role.
Members of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology said the country needs better data to provide a comprehensive picture of how much groundwater there is and how fast it is being depleted. The scientists called for a national effort to advance strategies for safeguarding aquifers, including establishing a federal program that would provide incentives to encourage states and communities to manage underground water supplies sustainably.
“The current rate of groundwater pumping exceeds that of natural recharge,” the council said in the report. “Much of the water in the major aquifers in the U.S. is fossil water, recharged over 10,000 years ago, and will not be replaced naturally in centuries and millennia. In the western U.S. groundwater resources are being depleted at alarming rates, mostly from agricultural withdrawal.”
The scientific advisory council outlined several recommendations, including creating an interagency working group focused on groundwater; increasing investment in research, data collection and modeling; establishing regional “hubs” to coordinate management efforts; and starting a program that would provide grants to “incentivize groundwater conservation and management based on sound science.”
The seminal report is “a beacon for the future of groundwater management,” said Jay Famiglietti, a water scientist and global futures professor at Arizona State University. “Its recommendations are comprehensive and forward looking, and if implemented over time, can be a game-changer for groundwater sustainability in the United States.”
The council suggested providing grants to incentivize “planning, recharge, and sustainable management,” but didn’t provide details. Famiglietti said the government could help by providing incentives for farmers to switch to more efficient irrigation methods, or to grow less water-intensive crops.
Researchers have found that when California farmers are charged more for electricity to run their pumps, they pump less water. These findings show that a tax or fee on water use could help achieve necessary reductions in pumping, said Matt Woerman, a co-author of the research and assistant professor of agricultural and resource economics at Colorado State University
“There are tons of different ways that you could try to get farmers to extract less water, everything from just putting limits on how much water they’re allowed to use, charging them fees to use this valuable resource, some kind of a subsidy program to use more efficient irrigation infrastructure,” Woerman said.