Managing the Groundwater Governance Gap
You have probably heard that we are running out of groundwater. Headline after headline tells us that the United States is running dry. Wells in the arid southwest are going deeper, chasing after an ever-decreasing amount of water. Cracks in the Earth are the scars of our obsession with groundwater, over-pumped and over-relied upon for everything from drinking water to agriculture. The news is, all things considered, not particularly promising.
What can get lost in the doom and gloom is the role that government plays in regulating groundwater use. There is something of a groundwater governance gap. You might think that groundwater would be subject to federal regulation as an interstate resource—many aquifers underlie multiple states. It isn’t. Or at least no comprehensive federal legislation deals with groundwater. Instead, states and local governments are on their own.
To be fair, many states have taken serious legislative steps towards monitoring and regulating groundwater use. Arizona and California, for example, have both passed significant groundwater legislation. But peer a bit deeper, and it becomes clear that these laws—admirable though they may be—are wanting.
Arizona’s groundwater law, for instance, was passed in 1980 when the state had less than three million inhabitants. The law exempts whole rural areas of the state, areas that have seen a marked population increase as the state has topped seven million inhabitants.
So too in California, where a 2014 groundwater law has seemingly done little actually to regulate groundwater withdrawals. Water levels have continued to decline. In the past year alone, the state has reported 273 dry wells.
We need new approaches to protect and preserve the groundwater we have left. Some states are working to update and modernize their groundwater laws. Others are resorting to legal doctrines like the public trust doctrine to stem the tide. Some local governments have also taken steps to address groundwater withdrawals. All of these efforts are critical, and no action is too small. Whether through updated legislation, grassroots advocacy, or individual conservation efforts, we each have a role to play in safeguarding our groundwater for future generations.
