Potato Farm Sparks Concerns for Edisto River Water & Calls for Reform of SC Water Withdrawal Law
Note to readers: The following Dec 14, 2013 posting by Friends of the Edisto (FRED) presents the first in a series that addressed concerns regarding the Walther Farms registration with SC DHEC to withdraw water from the South Fork Edisto River in Aiken County. The concerns led to a law suit and eventually a settlement between FRED and Walther Farms on Jan 27, 2014, as described here (Walther Farms settlement). Our experience with how this farm was granted rights to remove water from the river revealed to us significant weakness in the state's surface water withdrawal law as discussed on this website.
Related information links: 1) FRED outline/points of concerns with SC Surface Water Law and 2) DNR comments on Surface Water Regs of 2011 and 3) Graph to explain how "safe yield" poses a threat to our rivers and 4) FRED response, Surface Water Law.
Dec 14, 2013 --
Friends of the Edisto members in the vicinity of Wagener and Salley have been monitoring the development of the Walther Farms operation on the South Fork of the Edisto River. Walther Farms, a national company headquartered in Michigan, has obtained state approval to withdraw a large amount of irrigation water from the South Fork in Aiken County and is seeking a second water withdrawal approval at a site downstream from the first.
Walther Farms has acquired about 3700 acres in the area along the river between Aiken Gopher Tortoise Preserve and Aiken State Park. The first water withdrawal, registered and approved by DHEC, could take as much as 805 million gallons per month which equates to 41 cubic feet per second (cfs) from the river. This flow represents the intake capacity of the pump system reported by Walther. (Images and video of track hoe operations on bank of South Fork Edisto show clearing and construction for water withdrawal infrastructure for farm's irrigation system.) Streamflow data for the South Fork Edisto indicate this potential withdrawal from Walther Farms could remove as much as two-thirds of the river flow in severe drought conditions. This may be the extreme condition, however, drought times are when irrigation water is needed, and during more common dry periods this farm could frequently take one-quarter or more of the available flow from the river. A second proposed Walther Farms withdrawal is under consideration by DHEC for half the amount of water as the first. This means another 20 cfs could be taken from the river to irrigate farm fields. If approved, total water withdrawals by Walther Farms could be about 60 cfs from the South Fork, which in a severe drought could be all the water there is in the river.
FRED is concerned for the health of the river and engaged in finding remedies to the state decisions that have allowed these large water withdrawal requests to be considered and approved with no public notice and opportunity for review and input by affected parties. See the FRED Facebook site for videos, news links, and ongoing commentary related to the Walther Farms development.
Other posts on this topic may be accessed at FRED website links: Archive 2013 and 2014.
