You can’t water your lawn when you want, but a new water-bottling operation is asking to pump millions of gallons for profit and probably will get an OK to do it.
The request is for more water than the controversial Niagara Bottling plant pumped when it first opened in Groveland. Are you surprised? You shouldn’t be.
Florida’s water-management districts can’t say no to anyone. Despite a sloppy application, chances are high that Spring Water Resources of Ocala — doesn’t the clever name sound like it’s a group doing good? — will be getting permission to pump 181 million gallons a year.
The company’s plan is to withdraw water from 10 acres just south of County Road 470 and east of U.S. Highway 301 in Sumter County. Some 144 tanker trucks a day would take the raw water to the Azure Bottling plant in Leesburg, owned by a Fruitland Park couple.
There, plans call for bottling the water and selling it to five retailers, including Niagara Bottling and Nestlé Water, according to a business plan filed with the Southwest Florida Water Management District.
The proposal is to drill a 10-inch well near Fern Spring, but don’t worry — the application swears that tests show the pumping won’t hurt the spring at all. Never mind that engineers at the water district have never even heard of the process the water company’s consultant used to determine the spring is safe.
In a Nov. 24 letter to Spring Water Resources manager Darryl C. Lanker, a senior district engineer asked the consultant to explain her methods and to disclose precisely how many feet the proposed well would be from the spring. Seems that she left that little tidbit out of the application.
The engineer also noted that the well was pinpointed in two different places on maps, that it is proposed for a flood plain without a plan to keep floodwaters from contaminating the well and that it appeared only one flow test was done — three years ago. The engineer pointed out that the applicant hadn’t suggested any way to mitigate the withdrawal from what’s known as the upper aquifer, where all the sweet water is buried, and he questioned the conclusion that two springs on the property would be unharmed.
Longtime environmentalist and Lake County Water Authority Chairwoman Peggy Cox snorted aloud at the very notion that a 10-inch well near a spring wouldn’t reduce spring flow before giving her personal opinion: “Good luck with that. The spring will probably not exist much longer.”
Niagara, Cox said, also started with upper-aquifer withdrawals and got permission in 2014 to double the amount it pumps to roughly 365 million gallons a year by agreeing to pump from more than 1,000 feet deep, where water must be treated before drinking it.
So, is this new request just a way for Niagara to avoid having to deal with the water in the deeper aquifer? Perhaps.
But the problem is bigger. It’s this: We like bottled water. People have gotten used to drinking it, and habit is a power motivator.
Bottled water is for drinking by humans, and that’s the very “best and highest use” of sweet aquifer water, according to the experts at the districts who issue the permits. The fact that Niagara water sells for $4 to $5 a case and a typical utility charges only $2 to $5 for 1,000 gallons doesn’t bother them in the least.
We also like to water our lawns, but the water districts aren’t shy about trying to change that particular bad habit by imposing restrictions and making water more expensive. Too bad they don’t have the courage to take on water bottlers, too.
Not many years from now, water experts at the districts will have to decide whether residents or for-profit companies rank higher when it comes to handing out the last of the cheap, easily accessible water in the upper aquifer.
The region has been consuming 800 million gallons a day from the aquifer, and hydrologists say pumping 850 million gallons is the point at which springs and wetlands will begin to degrade. Technically, utilities and other big users already have permits to pump the remaining 50 million, but they don’t need it right now and aren’t withdrawing it.
The trustees of the water districts must realize that the people paying their salaries have a valid point when they say the water should be theirs. The board of the Southwest district has an opportunity to forge a new path by turning down this request.
Lritchie@tribune.com. Lauren invites you to send her a friend request on Facebook at www.facebook.com/laurenonlake.