Senate panel considers water plan

COLUMBIA— How much water does it takes to make a stream a stream? A state Senate committee might well decide that today.

The Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee today will debate for a third time a proposed state water plan, a law that would create a permitting system and set withdrawal limits for most large surface water users.

The fight is over minimum stream flow, the least amount of water that must be left in a stream as water is drawn down for commercial use.

Having a permit plan has become critical with water use increasing and recent severe droughts causing some rivers to run almost dry.

State resource agencies want to set a minimum flow that would vary from 20 percent to as much as 60 percent more than a stream's mean low flow, mimicking seasonal natural flow to assure the health of river habitats. Conservation groups support that.

The biggest water users — power plants, industries, water treatment plants, large farms — are pushing for the mean low flow plus 20 percent year-round. That's enough to assure seasonal variation, they say.

"The floods, the rains, the total amount of water in that river varies as it is. The notion that the bill will allow us to pull all the rivers down to 20 percent doesn't make a lot of common sense," said Eddie Twilley, a MeadWestvaco lobbyist, who emphasized he was speaking for a group of business interests. The varied-flow regulation "is too conservative, ultra-conservative, just overly protective of the resource."

A vote on the manufacturers' proposal was postponed last week by Sen. Chip Campsen, R-Isle of Palms, and other committee members.

Campsen said river ecosystems are a state heritage, and recreational and fishing businesses are an economic engine.

"It's not for the sake of some salamander somewhere. It's about whether when we drop a boat in a river is it going to hit the sand? It's about preserving a way of life," he said. "It's not about shutting down existing industry. It's about allocating uses in the future. It's not an infinite fountain."

Reach Bo Petersen at 745-5852 or bpetersen@postandcourier.com