The town of Batesburg-Leesville has been struggling with water supply and quality issues for the past few years.  The town's dwindling water supply is a major issue in their upcoming mayoral election.  The current mayor of Batesburg-Leesville is proposing to quench their water shortage by pumping water from Lake Murray and piping it approximately 15 miles back to the town.

The transfer of water from one river basin to another is known as an Interbasin Transfer.  The mayor of Batesburg-Leesville is proposing to transfer water from the Saluda basin back to the town, which is located in the Edisto River basin.

Congaree Riverkeeper generally opposses Interbasin Transfers for the following reasons:

Source Basin Impacts

• Reduced water flows - freshwater and estuarine ecology and biodiversity depend on natural flow rates
• Downstream communities and aquatic life have less water for daily life
• Decrease in water's ability to naturally assimilate pollution and nutrients - less water means the pollution is more concentrated
• Upstream reservoirs are drawn down to provide the additional water to meet the new demands of the interbasin transfer

Receiving Basin Impacts

• Promotes sprawl in an area that would not otherwise have the water resources to facilitate high growth
• Increases point source pollution-more wastewater to be discharged
• Potential for increased runoff pollution from resultant sprawl-adds more fecal coliform bacteria, nitrogen, phosphorus and heavy metals to the river

Community Impacts

• Pits communities against each other because water resources are permenantly taken from one community and given to another community
• Can results in future water wars
• Years of costly litigation

In general, Interbasin Transfers injure the health of one river while increasing the pollution in another river.  Congaree Riverkeeper opposes water being permently drained out of our beloved rivers and encourages an emphasis on increased water efficiency so that future Interbasin Transfers are not necessary.  Although this Interbasin Transfer is in the proposal phase, it is an issue that we will continue to monitor as it develops to ensure that water is not permenantly robbed from our rivers.