By Lois Henry, SJV Water
A settlement between a desert mining company and groundwater authority in eastern Kern County will erase $24 million in past groundwater fees by allowing the company to use other sources, including 2,000 acre feet of reclaimed water.
In exchange Searles Valley Minerals agreed to drop its lawsuits against the Indian Wells Valley Groundwater Authority and not oppose its planned pipeline project to import water from the Antelope Valley, according to recent press releases.
Searles will, however, continue to “actively participate” in a larger legal action, known as an “adjudication,” in which a judge will ultimately determine how much water can be pumped from the Indian Wells Valley basin and who has rights to that water.
Though the groundwater authority characterized the settlement as a “partnership” and the “beginning of cooperative planning” in its Nov. 20 press release, Searles was less collegial.
In its own press release, the company stated it would actively participate in the “safe yield” portion of the adjudication set for trial in June 2026. It will also continue to oppose Assembly Bill 1413, which would require judges in adjudications to accept local groundwater authorities’ safe yield figures. AB 1413 was tabled in the last legislative session but could come back as a two-year bill.
The Indian Wells Valley is one of several ongoing adjudications, including one in the Cuyama Valley on the far western fringes of Kern County.
The Indian Wells authority’s safe, or sustainable, yield figure and its pipeline project are highly contentious issues in the region and two of the main reasons the Indian Wells Valley Water District filed the adjudication action.
Safe yield is the amount of water that can be pumped out of a basin without causing negative consequences, such as drying up domestic wells or driving down the water table.
“The price and availability of water rights has changed over time, and not in our favor.”
Keith Lemieux, attorney for Indian Wells Groundwater Authority
The authority has set the safe yield at 7,600 acre feet per year while a water district study shows up to 14,000 acre feet a year can be safely pumped out.
The water district also objected to the authority ceding 7,000 acre feet, almost all the basin’s safe yield, to the U.S. Navy, which operates China Lake Naval Weapons Station. As part of the adjudication, in July the court cut the Navy’s right to 2,008 acre feet per year.
That means at least 5,000 acre feet of safe yield water is, as yet, unclaimed.
In any event, current demand in the basin is about 20,000 acre feet, leaving a gap of either 12,400 acre feet or 6,000 acre feet.
To bridge that gap, the authority has embarked on building a 50-mile pipeline to bring imported water from the Antelope Valley, which it estimates will cost $200 million. The authority was approved for a $50 million federal grant toward the pipeline through the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) and has initiated the planning phase to begin using that funding.
The water district has also disputed the authority’s estimated costs for the pipeline, releasing a study in summer 2024 that it says shows the pipeline and imported water program could cost $352 million to $491 million, depending on the amount of water delivered each year.
The authority had estimated it would need 5,000 acre feet a year of imported water to meet local demands. It created a “replenishment fee” of $2,130 per acre foot for any water pumped that was above the “safe yield” amount. Because nearly the entire safe yield had initially been ceded to the Navy, that meant almost all pumping by Searles and the water district was subject to the replenishment fee.
Searles never paid into the replenishment fee, racking up what the authority said was $24 million in past due fees and leading to mutual legal actions between Searles and the authority.
Since Searles is now considering using 2,000 acre feet of reclaimed water from the City of Ridgecrest – if the quality suits its needs – and may possibly be awarded a portion of the 5,000 acre feet that was formerly ceded to the Navy, it will likely not need to pump above the safe yield making the replenishment fee moot, according to Keith Lemieux, the authority’s attorney.
If Searles ever does need more water, it will be eligible to buy imported water through the pipeline project either directly from the authority or through third parties, per the settlement.
When asked if this settlement would change the authority’s plans on how much water it needs to buy, Lemieux said that was a possibility.
But whether it would lower the steep replenishment fee is unlikely.
“The price and availability of water rights has changed over time, and not in our favor,” Lemieux said.
