AUSTIN – The Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) released a paper on water development in Texas. The paper, “The Case for a Texas Water Market,” examines state regulations that have inhibited needed water development and illustrates the value of water markets as an effective driver of increasing water supply and water conservation.
The paper was co-authored by Kathleen Hartnett White, Distinguished Senior Fellow-in-Residence and Director of the Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment at TPPF; Megan Ingram, policy analyst at the Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment at TPPF, and Carlos Rubinstein and Herman R. Settemeyer, both of RSAH2O, LLC, an environmental consulting firm with strong emphasis on water issues.
“Landmark water legislation enacted in 1997, still known as Senate Bill 1, envisioned Texas would develop a water supply that could meet increasing demand predominantly through voluntary transfers of the existing water supply,” Mrs. White said. “Such transfers assumed active water markets. After twenty years of regional and state water planning, few water supply strategies identified in those plans have been implemented and few water markets have emerged. It’s time for a thorough reconsideration of the dynamic benefits of water markets and reform of state regulation that has stymied markets for two decades.”
“It is clear to many of us who deal with water in Texas that we cannot meet our future needs if we cannot move water from where it is to where it is not,” Rubinstein said. “It is appropriate to look back at the unintended consequences of our water regulations and address where impediments have been created that prevent voluntary, market-based transactions for the proper valuation and movement of water.”
To read the full publication, please visit: http://txpo.li/2qwvAe5
For more information or to request an interview with Mrs. White or Ms. Ingram, please contact Alicia Pierce at [email protected] or 512-472-2700.
Kathleen Hartnett White is a Distinguished Senior Fellow-in-Residence and Director of the Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment. She served as chairman of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) from 2001-2007 and was a director of the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB), the Lower Colorado River AuthorityIv and other state commissions and advisory bodies.
Carlos Rubinstein is the former chairman of the (TWDB, former commissioner of the TCEQ, Watermaster of the Rio Grande and other advisory bodies. He is now Principal member of RSAH2O, LLC, an environmental consulting firm.
Herman R. Settemeyer work in the water arena for TCEQ spans four decades including administration of five interstate compacts, international treaty compliance, and US Supreme Court litigation. He is now a Partner member of RSAH2O, LLC, an environmental consulting firm.
Megan Ingram is the research assistant with the Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
The Texas Public Policy Foundation is a non-profit free-market research institute based in Austin.
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