Squaw Valley Water Supply Assessment: More Questions Than Answers?

The Water Supply Assessment for the Village At Squaw Valley Specific Plan has been released by the Squaw Valley Public Services District. The document is intended to determine what amount of water will be needed to support the development that has been proposed by Squaw Valley and KSL. There’s been a lot of conjecture thrown about since we started covering the Village development story over the last year. During that time, there were a couple of different issues that had been raised by the Squaw Valley Public Services District:

• There was a limited ability of the aquifer within Olympic Valley to support new construction. At one point it was suggested that as few as 100 new homes could be built without an additional source of water.

• Olympic Valley needs a “backup source” of water, just in case something happened to the aquifer within Olympic Valley. Although other sources are under story, the most likely solution was the “8 Mile Pipe”, which proposed bringing water from Martis Valley.

It has caught the attention of many of UnofficialAlpine.com’s readers that maybe there was a connection between the need for the “8 Mile Pipe” and KSL’s proposal for roughly 1700 more units within Olympic Valley. The WSA has been highly anticipated, as it was expected to clarify the need for additional water within Olympic Valley. The study, conducted by a group of independent engineers, concludes that there is an adequate supply of water within the Olympic Valley aquifer to support the proposed development. Here’s a summary of the findings:

“The Olympic Valley Ground water Basin has sufficient supply to meet the needs of the Project, in addition to the existing and planned future uses in the Olympic Valley over the next 25 years in normal, single, and multiple dry years. The Basin is not currently in overdraft and is not projected to be overdrafted with the future demand. The Model projects the 2040 demand can be met with an adequate margin of safety even during single and multiple dry years. However, any additional demands above those projected for 2040 would need to be reevaluated using the specific demand schedule and proposed water supply system at the time that such development is proposed.” – Water Supply Assessment for the Village At Squaw Valley Specific Plan

That seems to be a fairly significant turn around from what we have heard in the past from SVPSD. It certainly calls into question the immediate need for the “8 Mile Pipe” project. The proposal to pipe water from Martis Valley to Olympic Valley along the Highway 89 corridor would be astoundingly expensive, in terms of pure financial costs, and in the disruption due to construction along the West River St and Highway 89 route.

Sierra Watch has also been keeping a close eye on the development of the Village At Squaw Valley. Sierra Watch released a statement this week questioning the validity of the WSA. Here’s a small part of the release:

“For years, officials have been telling us that the existing water supplies in Squaw Valley do not provide a secure and adequate source of water for existing customers, let alone new development. We either have water or we don’t, but we can’t have it both ways.” – Peter Van Zant, Field Director for Sierra Watch

Sierra Watch has engaged it’s own independent hydrologists to review the science behind the latest WSA in an attempt to understand the sudden availability of water. Here’s a copy of the statement release by Tom Mooers, Executive Director of Sierra Watch: Release Water Report for Squaw Development

The first public hearing on the WSA will be on Tuesday, June 24th at the regularly scheduled board meeting of the SVPSD. The public hearing is scheduled for 1:00 pm 12:00 pm at the SVPSD offices on the west end of the fire station on Squaw Valley Road. The complete WSA report is available here (it’s a very large download).