KGS OFR 2003-55B: Assessment of Irrigation and Municipal Water Conservation Plans, State of Kansas.

by Brownie Wilson, Kansas Geological Survey.

This open file report is one of five assessment reports under KGS OFR 2003-55 conducted by the Kansas Geological Survey for the Kansas Water Office and the State Water Plan. This report series serves in part as the contract completion of KWO Contract No. 03-121 entitled, "Assessment: Water Management and Water Conservation." This contract was supported by the State Water Plan Fund.

By 2015, conservation plans will be required for water rights meeting the priority criteria under K.S.A. 82a-733 and it has been determined that such a plan would result in significant water management improvements.

INTRODUCTION

In the FY 2004 Kansas Water Plan (KWP), the Kansas Water Authority approved objectives for the year 2015. The objectives were developed to define targets to quantify achievements as part of the implementation of the KWP. The above objective is included in the Water Conservation and Water Management Sections of the FY 2004 Kansas Water Plan.

The Kansas Water Office (KWO) used KWP funds to contract with the Kansas Geological Survey to complete and finalize this assessment as part of the contract "Assessment: Water Management and Water Conservation", KWO contract no. 03-121.

The Chief Engineer of the State of Kansas may require a permit to appropriate water or the owner of a water right to adopt and implement conservation plans and practices if it is determined that such actions would assure public benefit and the public interest. In accordance to K.S.A 82a-733, water users that share a common source of supply that could be insufficient during times of drought, whose use is significantly higher than their peers in the same geographic area, or who apply for state administered grant, loan, or cost-share moneys for water-related projects are to be given priority for water conservation requirements.

All conservation plans must be consistent with guidelines for conservation plans and practices developed and maintained by the Kansas Water Office pursuant to subsection (c) of K.S.A 74-2608. The KWO prepared the initial Municipal Water Conservation Plan Guidelines in 1986 (revised in 1990) and the initial Irrigation Water Conservation Plan Guidelines in 1986 (revised in 1993). The Kansas Water Authority approved both conservation plan guidelines. The Kansas Water Office is also charged by K.S.A. 82a-733 to provide or arrange to provide technical assistance for water users required to adopt and implement water conservation plans and requirements.

This assessment report quantifies where water conservation plans are required and who made the requirement. This report will focus solely on conservation plans required under the guidelines of K.S.A. 82a-733 for water rights with authorized municipal and irrigation uses of water. Several Groundwater Management District in Kansas have water conservation plan activities that have been required through their respective local management plans in conjunction with duties of the Chief Engineer. For example, Northwest Kansas GMD #4 has over 800 conservation plans in place that were developed under federal guidelines of the Natural Resources Conservation Service. These plans are not considered to be within the specifications of subsection (c) of K.S.A 74-2608 and as such are not accounted for in this assessment. However, at the time of this assessment, there are on-going discussions at the state level of revising the conservation guidelines to incorporate these types of conservation activities.

ASSESSMENT DATA SETS

The Kansas Department of Agriculture, Division of Water Resources (KDA-DWR) currently maintains data on conservation plan requirements and the status of those plans in the Water Right Information System (WRIS) database. Conservation plans are tied to a water right and its use made of water (water rights can be authorized for multiple uses of water), which allows the conservation plan to account for all points of diversion and places of use associated with the water right. The conservation plan tables from WRIS were used as the sole source of information to identify which water rights had any irrigation conservation plan requirements and which entity made the requirements.

For irrigation conservation plans, individual water rights often have multiple actions ranging from different entities requiring the plan to possible time extensions on plan development to modifications of the existing plans. For example, a water right may voluntarily submit a conservation plan, which becomes approved only to be required by the KDA-DWR to modify that plan because of change in the point of diversion or place of use. To facilitate this many-to-one relationship, several data procedures and assumptions were used to structure the conservation data into a one to one relationship.

If an individual irrigation water right was required by more than one entity (i.e. KDA-DWR and Volunteer) then the KDA-DWR was identified as being the agency requiring the plan. If an irrigation water right had an approved plan in place but was required to modify that plan which in turn had not yet been approved, the water right was still coded as having an approved conservation in place. If an irrigation water right was required to have a conservation plan but was not coded as being approved, the plan was assumed to be pending approval. Finally, all dismissed and waived irrigation conservation plan requirements were coded as being dismissed from their requirements.

Although the WRIS also contain information on municipal conservation plans, the KWO maintains a more detailed and specific database on which public water suppliers have conservation plan requirements and the status of those plans. The KWO can and does require conservation plans for public water suppliers especially when an entity is involved in one of the State's water supply programs, such as the Water Marketing Program or the Water Assurance Program.

The KWO municipal conservation database is also more encompassing in nature since the KWO also administers conservation plans for public water suppliers who do not have dedicated water rights of their own. These public water suppliers purchase water from other sources, generally other public water suppliers, or through state-sponsored programs. As such, without water rights, they are not accounted for in the KDA-DWR conservation database. The KWO's municipal water conservation database contains information on 590 individual public water suppliers including two located in Missouri that have working affiliations with Kansas municipal entities.

ASSESSMENT RESULTS

Irrigation Conservation Plans

As of June 2, 2003, there are 1,316 active water rights in the state required to have irrigation conservation plans under K.S.A 82a-733 (Table 1). Of these, over 90 percent (1,192) were required at least by the KDA-DWR. Ninety-two plans (almost 7 percent) were solely voluntarily submitted by water-right holders. The entities requiring the remaining 32 conservation plans could not be established from the KDA-DWR conservation database and were coded as "Unknown". Of the 1,316 required conservation plans, the KDA-DWR has approved 1,245 or just over 94 percent. Sixteen water rights had their conservation plan requirements waived or dismissed while 55 plans are still pending approval.

On a regional basis, most of the conservation plan activity is in basins where irrigation development is more prevalent, specifically the western Kansas and south-central basins. The Cimarron and both the Upper and Lower Arkansas basins had the greatest number of plan requirements and approvals. In eastern Kansas, where irrigation development is less, there are fewer irrigation water conservation plan activities.

Figure 1 displays those points of water diversion where active irrigation water rights (as of June 2, 2003) had some type of conservation plan activity (i.e. plan requirement, approval or dismissal). Most of the plan requirements in the Upper Arkansas Basin are found along the Walnut Creek where the Walnut Creek IGUCA required conservations plans on all irrigation water-rights in the area. A high density of water rights with conservation activities are located in Stevens County within the Cimarron Basin of southwest Kansas.

Municipal Conservation Plans

Of the 539 public water suppliers that have an approved conservation plan in place, 476 or approximately 80 percent were approved under 1990 guidelines. The remaining 63 were approved under the 1986 guidelines. The KWO approved 317 of the plans with the remaining 222 being approved by the KDA-DWR. As of the time of this assessment, 49 municipal conservation plans were still in development or pending final approval (Table 2). As should be expected, the KWO planning basins with the higher population concentrations also have greater level of municipal conservation plan activity (Figure 2) with the Kansas - Lower Republican Basin having the highest number. The Upper Republican and Cimarron Basins have the lowest number of municipal water conservation plans.

Currently, fifteen reasons can trigger municipal conservation plans (Table 3). Many of these reasons are directed by state statute, such as water marketing, state revolving loan fund, multipurpose small lake program, or involvement with a water assurance district. In some voluntary cases, such as the water marketing voluntary and multipurpose small lake voluntary, the public water supplier may not be directly involved in those particular programs. However, they are required to have a conservation plan because they purchase water or are affiliated with another public water supplier who is. Out of the 590 required water conservation plans, 168 were required by KDA-DWR as part of general water right administration with 100 being required under participation with the State Revolving Loan Fund (Table 4). Voluntary is the next most prevalent reason with 74 public water suppliers submitting water conservation plans.

CONCLUSION

Currently in Kansas, 1,316 active irrigation water rights have been required to submit a conservation plan under the guidelines set by K.S.A. 82a-733. Of these, the Kansas Department of Agriculture-Division of water Resources has required 1192, with 92 voluntarily being submitted. The requiring agency for 32 irrigation water rights that are listed to have required conservation plans could not be identified. The KDA-DWR has approved over 90 percent of all the required plans. Most of these water rights required to have conservation plans are located in western Kansas, particularly southwest Kansas and the Walnut Creek Intensive Groundwater Use Control Area, where irrigation development is greater or special management plans are in place.

For municipal conservation plans, of the 539 public water suppliers that have an approved plan in place, 80 percent were approved under the 1990 conservation guidelines with the remaining under the older 1986 guidelines. The Kansas Water Office approved 317 of the plans with the KDA-DWR approving the remainder. As us the case with irrigation, the KWO planning basins containing a higher concentration of public water suppliers have the greater number of conservation plans in place. The KDA-DWR has required the most municipal conservation plans with requirements from the State Revolving Loan Fund and voluntary submissions, respectively, being the most prevalent reason.

Return to KGS OFR 2003-55.