SACRAMENTO (CN) - California water districts properly considered the environmental impacts of the nation's largest farm-to-city water transfer agreement, a Superior Court judge ruled.
Sacramento Superior Court Judge Lloyd G. Connelly last week upheld the 2003 Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA), a collection of 12 agreements that settled disputes between California water agencies and several states about how to allocate shares of Colorado River water.
The Colorado River, which flows 1,450 miles from its source in the Rocky Mountains through seven states until it ends as a trickle in Mexico, is a vital source of water for farmers and city-dwellers.
The QSA agreement allows California to reduce its "historic overdependence" on Colorado River water to a 4.4 million acre-feet allotment, established 80 years ago by large-scale water transfers from agricultural areas to urban areas, according to a San Diego County Water Authority pamphlet about the QSA.
An acre-foot is enough water to cover 1 acre 1 foot deep: 271,330 gallons. The water industry estimates that one suburban family uses 1 acre-foot of water each year, though actual use, of course, varies.
One of the QSA's main features calls for Imperial Valley to transfer up to 200,000 acre-feet of water a year to San Diego for the next 75 years.
Imperial County and several co-plaintiffs sued the Imperial Irrigation District (IID) and three other water agencies that brokered the deal. The plaintiffs argued, among other things, that the Imperial Irrigation District had no authority to approve the QSA, and that the agreement's environmental studies were inadequate under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).
In response, the IID filed a validation proceeding that "focused on [determining] the validity of its actions in approving and executing the QSA agreements."
California's 3rd Court of Appeal upheld the agreement in December 2011, reversing a lower court's finding that the water transfers were unconstitutional, according to the Imperial Valley Press.
The appeals court remanded to Judge Connelly last year to determine if the Imperial Irrigation District had authority to approve the agreement, and whether the agreement's environmental studies complied with CEQA.
Connelly sided with the water agencies on June 4 and found that the QSA agreement's environmental review adequate.
In determining if agencies conducted proper environmental analysis under CEQA, the court must limit its scrutiny to whether the agencies supported their findings with substantial evidence in the record.
The plaintiffs claimed the environmental impact reports did not consider a reasonable range of project alternatives, as mandated by CEQA. Among other things, the plaintiffs claimed the agencies wrongfully rejected an alternative calling for the San Diego Water Conservation Authority to reduce its demand by conserving water, enabling the agencies to meet project goals without water transfers.
The water agencies disagreed, claiming that the all-conservation alternative was infeasible and would not supply San Diego with enough water to meet demand.
Connelly agreed with the water agencies and found that the all-conservation alternative clashed with the project's goals.