Arizona Water Resource Vol. 15 No. 5 (May-June 2007)

Abstract

As if Arizona did not have enough water-supply worries due to population growth and drought, the state is now contending with an application to transfer groundwater from Arizona to Nevada. Of the varied and perplexing issues the requested out-of-state transfer raises, one the most significant and far-reaching is whether Arizona law can protect state water resources from such transfers. This is the first time the state water export law has been put to the test; it very likely won’t be the last. The controversy is being played out in a remote, rugged and sparsely populated corner of Arizona, in the far northwest part of the state, an area where Arizona, Nevada and Utah lie in close proximity.