Surface Water Management: Planning for Feast or Famine

摘要

AS A RESOURCE CRITICAL to human survival, people often believe water to be a perpetually renewable resource. This belief, however, is confronting the harsh reality of limited water supplies and the need to develop and secure additional water supplies. The drafters of the first Texas Water Plan in 1961 likely never imagined planning for the magnitude of extreme drought and flood conditions that recently plagued Texas. From 2010 to 2015, almost the entire state was suffering from some stage of drought to the point that communities had to truck in their water supplies and requiring the Governor of Texas to declare an ongoing state of emergency due to such extreme drought conditions. Juxtaposed against that, in 2017, Hurricane Harvey dumped up to 60 inches of rain in some parts of Texas. Knowing events like these can and will occur in the future, water supply planners must address how to permit and manage surface water during such events. Whether feast or famine, surface water management must closely consider these extremes and evaluate opportunities to minimize endangerment of the public while optimizing the availability of surface water supplies.