Border Institute IV Binational Water Management

Planning

Consideration of Opportunities, Costs, Benefits, and Unintended Consequences:

Secure and Sustainable Water in the Border Region by 2020

Rick Van SchoikRio Rico, ArizonaMay 6-8, 2002

“Imagination is more important

than Knowledge.”

“I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and constitutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind...with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times.”

—Thomas Jefferson

Planetary

GeologicalGlobal

Influences

Region

Drought Cycles Tribes, State,

Federal & Int’l Institutions

Our Focus = the Global -Regional Interface(T

em

pora

l Sca

le)

(Spatial Scale)

Now

HereUS

Questions of Scale

This Watershed

This SpringLocal Mgmt.

From the Local and the Immediate...

...To the Regional and Cyclical...

Critical Trends

•Population growth

•Economic asymmetry

•Technological change

•Decentralization

•Deregulation

•Equity

•Resource depletion

•Global change

•Globalization

•Privatization

•Rise of NGOs

Sustainability?

Equity

Environment Economy

What is “Sustainability?”

Env

iron

men

tal D

eter

iora

tion

in P

oor

Are

as

Drastic econom

ic inequities

Low Quality of Life

Sustainability

Equity

Environment Economy

Sustainability

Qua

lity

of th

e C

omm

ons

Quality of G

rowth

Quality of Life

(Conservation / Preservation) (Business Entrepreneurship)

(Community Empowerment)

“Hard” Sciences

Life Sciences

Human Sciences

Management Science

What is “Sustainability Science?”

Sustainability Science

Integrating Willingness, Capacity, and Understanding

WillingnessWilling and

able but ignorant

Capacity

Understanding

Willing and wise but unable

Wise and able but unwilling

Decision-making for

sustainability

Influ

ence

Knowledge

Policy-making

Environmental “Reality”

Futures

Optimist Pessimist

Optimist OK Disaster

Pessimist Expensive hedging

OK

Worl

dvie

w

An Example

PHXLA

SD

TJ

Major Flows, Diversions, and Returns, Lower Colorado River System

Institutional MandatesChallenge Institution

Meandering river IBWC/CILA

Surface water alloc. IBWC/CILA

Environmental quality BECC/NADB/CEC

Groundwater ?

State-State ?

International Joint Commission

1909 Boundary Water Treaty

Project approval authority

Transboundary impact assessment

Water quality implementation

Air quality, toxics, etc.

U.S. Mexico•Potable

•Raw

•Brackish

•Tertiary

•Secondary

•Primary

•Sewage

•Seawater

•Potable

•Raw

•Brackish

•Tertiary

•Secondary

•Primary

•Sewage

•Seawater

Eco-systems services

Agriculture

Fire-fighting

Groundwater recharge

Power plant cooling

Water Quality Availabilities

TransborderIntervention

Potential Water Exchanges

U.S. MexicoTransborder Intervention

Wastewater Lagoon treatmt. Riparian rechge.

Infrastructure Wheeling Municipal

Wastewater Binat’l WWTP Wastewater

Floods Binat’l storage Excess srfc. flow

Municipal Fallow Agriculture

Transfer Binat’l aqueduct Transfer

“A diversity of connections is part of the package.”

—Commissioner Arturo Herrera Solís

Conceptualizing Binational Water Planning...

1) PlumbingSourcing

Transfers

Storage

Security

Use

Reuse

Treatment

Disposal

Quality

2) Necessary Considerations

Interdependencies, Energy,

Ecosystems

Database,Knowledge Sharing,

Monitoring, Indicators

3) Institutional FrameworkGovernance

Capacity

Equitable Access

Water for Poor

Finance

Municipal vs. IndustrialAgriculture vs. Environment

4) Equity

Brainstorming Binational Water Planning

Problems / Challenges

Objectives/ Proposed Solutions

Incentives/ Implementation/ Demonstrations

ExistingFramework

UnintendedConsequences