Set limits on river usage, to preserve limited resource

THE CATAWBA RIVER is designated the most endangered river system in the nation by an environmental watchdog group.

South Carolina is heading into another parching summer without any extra rainfall predicted and every single county still officially in a state of drought — in a dozen cases, severe drought.

Population growth both in South Carolina and in the North Carolina counties that get first dip into our rivers is increasing the demand by industry and individuals for cheap, readily accessible, clean water.

Our part of the world is changing, and we haven’t quite wrapped our minds around it yet. We’ve always taken water for granted — a free, unlimited resource, much like the air we breathe. But like other areas, the South is being forced to realize that water — at least water where we want it, when we want it, at the price we want — is a finite resource, that everyone who uses fresh, clean water reduces the amount available for others. And unless the scientists are all out of their minds, the pressure on this limited resource will only grow as droughts lengthen and deepen and populations swell. (Think Atlanta, summer of 2007.)

Attorney General Henry McMaster has responded to this new norm by taking North Carolina to court over its plan to divert some water away from the population centers of South Carolina.

The Legislature has not been so forward-thinking. With time running out in this session, it has reached an impasse on a plan to require permits and state oversight for new or expanding industries that want to draw large volumes of river water. (Current use would be grandfathered in.) This would bolster Mr. McMaster’s arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court, make it easier for our state to strike water-sharing agreements with other states and, most importantly, start us on the path of dividing up this limited resource in a fairer way.

The problem is that about the only time the Legislature does anything that pits two powerful groups against each other is when those groups reach a compromise, and in this case the two groups — environmentalists and industry — haven’t managed to do that.

Utilities and other industries that use huge quantities of water have a legitimate fear that limits could stymie growth. And we’re not convinced the public’s right to river flow adequate for kayaking should trump a power company’s right to generate additional electricity.

But environmentalists have the upper hand here: Without adequate water, life cannot exist; if people can’t get the water they need to survive, and survive comfortably, they’re liable to pack up and leave South Carolina. If aquatic life suffocates, if forests die off and wetlands dry up because rivers don’t flood as they’re supposed to, if sewer plants downstream can’t afford to treat the wastewater because plants upstream depleted the river flow too much, then it doesn’t matter how prosperous an individual business is.

The clock is ticking — on this legislative session, and on the era of abundant water. It might be unpleasant, but lawmakers need to act. There are lots of important details, but at its heart the impasse is over how much water companies must leave in the rivers. Given the consequences of setting those levels too low, and the reality of our Legislature, it’s far better to err on the side of too much water in the rivers than too little. You can always loosen the limits later if it turns out that they are too conservative. But with this Legislature, the opposite will not be so easy.