ABQ will not buy San Augustin water

REGARDING CAROL Pittman’s Nov. 17 letter cautioning against the export of groundwater from San Augustin, Albuquerque’s Water Authority wishes to make it clear that the agency does not intend — or need — to purchase water from the Augustin Plains Ranch.

The water authority’s recently adopted resource management strategy, Water 2120, looks at a 100-year planning horizon and focuses on the responsible and optimal use of what the water authority already owns. Rather than pipe new water in from elsewhere, the utility will rely on a combination of approaches to ensure it can continue to meet the community’s needs now and into the future. By greatly expanding our water reuse efforts, storing excess surface water underground — “aquifer storage and recovery” — continuing our focus on conservation and carefully managing our groundwater and surface water supplies, we are confident we will be able to meet demand even as the community grows in coming decades.

The Water 2120 plan takes various climate change and population growth scenarios into account and does not call for the acquisition of additional water rights from farmers or from outside sources like the Augustin Plains Ranch. The policies identified in Water 2120 provide a framework for wise management of our existing water resources in keeping with our successful practices of the past.

A video about Water 2120 is available for viewing on YouTube at: https:// www.youtube.com/ watch?v=sYhINqjtDuc. KLARISSA PENA Chairwoman, Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority