New Santa Fe Water Supply Could be Most Energy-Intensive in the U.S.

To meet Santa Fe's growing thirst, the New Mexico Office of the State Engineer (which oversees water use in the state) is about to formally review a plan that would supply the region with what appears to be some of the most energy intensive water in the world.

I stumbled upon this story while reading Michael Aquadoc Campana's excellent blog WaterWired. His post was based on an article in the Santa Fe New Mexican that describes the new proposal as the following:

Backers of a private pipeline are moving ahead with plans to bring water from Fort Sumner to serve homes and businesses in Santa Fe and other communities in the Rio Grande Basin.

Water once used to irrigate alfalfa, wheat and other crops, would travel through 150 miles of pipeline, climbing nearly 150 miles and 4,000 feet in elevation to reach municipal water systems under the plan by Berrendo LLC.

Five Eastern New Mexico farmers have filed applications to transfer water rights for about 2 billion gallons of water a year from their farmlands to Santa Fe and other cities.

What struck me about this proposal is that there was absolutely no mention of the energy that would be required to lift this water 4,000 feet in elevation--higher than any other water supply that I know of. To put this lift in context, the State Water Project (SWP) in California lifts water 2,000 feet over the Tehachapi Mountains to convey water from northern to southern California. According to Energy Down the Drain, a report published in 2004 by the Pacific Institute and the NRDC, this is the highest lift of any water system in the world, requiring more than 9,000 kWh per million gallons and consuming an average of 5 billion kWh per year.

The proposal to bring Fort Sumner water to Santa Fe would result in double the elevation lift and energy requirements of SWP water (and implicitly take the cake for world's highest water lift). Unless some form of in-conduit hydropower recoups a portion of these pumping demands, we're looking at a conservative estimate of nearly 18,000 kWh/MG (assuming a relatively high pumping efficiency of 70% and no water lost to system leaks). If the proposed 2 billion gallons of water annually is actually delivered through this supply, new energy costs would be about 36 million kWh annually with associated CO2 emissions of about 32,400 metric tons (assuming electricity from NM grid at 1.99 lbsCO2/MG). While there are ways to reduce the energy demands and carbon emissions associated with this proposal, I hope that these pumping requirements raise some alarms.

When considering this new water supply, citizens of Santa Fe should wonder if they really need to develop one of, if not the, most energy intensive water supplies in the world. A first look at this proposal suggests that this water supply would be more energy intensive than ocean desalination, which has been criticized for its energy intensity of around 12,000 kWh per million gallons (See Pacific Institute's Desalination with a Grain of Salt). When placed in context of nationwide energy and carbon reduction goals, this project seems like it should only be considered after all other, less energy-intensive options (conservation, efficiency, reuse, low impact development) have been exhausted.