Water Transactions for Streamflow Restoration, Water Supply Reliability, and Rural Economic Vitality in the Western United States

Abstract

Across the western United States, environmental water transaction programs (EWTPs) restore environmental flows by acquiring water rights and incentivizing changes in water management. These programs have evolved over several decades, expanding from relatively simple two-party transactions to multiobjective deals that simultaneously benefit the environment and multiple water-using sectors. Such programs now represent an important water management tool and provide an impetus for collaboration among stakeholders; yet, most evaluations of their effectiveness focus exclusively on environmental outcomes, without adequate attention to impacts on other water users or local economies. To understand how these programs affect stakeholders, a systematic, multiobjective evaluation framework is needed. To meet this need, we developed a suite of environmental and socioeconomic indicators that can guide the design and track the implementation of water transaction portfolios, and we applied them to existing EWTPs in Oregon and Nevada. Application of the indicators quantifies impacts and helps practitioners design water transaction portfolios that avoid unintended consequences and generate mutually beneficial outcomes among environmental, agricultural, and municipal interests.(KEY TERMS: environmental flows; water scarcity economics; water markets; sustainability; water allocation; environmental indicators.)

Securing Environmental Flows Through System Reoperation and Management: Lessons From Case Studies of Implementation

“…Generally, water withdrawal limits protect existing streamflow from future development. In contrast, restoring depleted flows may require additional policies, such as Oregon's Conserved Water Statute, which explicitly re-allocates water saved through conservation measures to environmental flow (Aylward, 2008;Kendy et al, 2018).…”

Buy Me a River: Purchasing Water Rights to Restore River Flows in the Western USA

“…Previous studies have summarized the instream flow protection policies existing within each state (Charney ; Malloch ; Hanak and Stryjewski ; Western Governors’ Association ; Szeptycki et al ), and some studies have also provided summaries of water‐rights transfers for instream flow protection (Kendy et al ). Recently, Szeptycki et al () performed a state‐by‐state accounting of temporary and permanent transfers of water rights for environmental purposes and discussed the state policies that support such transfers.…”

“…Recently, Szeptycki et al () performed a state‐by‐state accounting of temporary and permanent transfers of water rights for environmental purposes and discussed the state policies that support such transfers. Kendy et al () assessed several river restoration programs in the Western U.S. in which concentrated investments in specific watersheds have successfully restored some semblance of historic flows. However, none of these previous studies has sought to document the details of a large number of individual environmental water transactions, particularly the water volume acquired, and the payment made in each transaction.…”

The diversity of water markets: Prospects and perils for the SDG agenda

“…Since the 1980s, water markets have become a feature of rural (mostly agricultural) water resource management frameworks in many jurisdictions, including Chile, south‐eastern Australia, the western United States, India, and Spain (Crase, Pagan, & Dollery, ; Garrick, Hernandez‐Mora, & O'Donnell, ; Rios Brehm & Quiroz, ). More recently, the potential of water markets has also been harnessed to restore freshwater ecosystem health, by enabling the transfer of well‐defined tradeable rights from irrigators to the environment (Kendy et al, ).…”