Mega-farms face potential limits on water-sucking irrigation

Mega-farms in a seven-county area between Aiken and Columbia would for the first time face limits on the amount of groundwater they can siphon under an effort to oversee water use by large industries, big agricultural operations and others.

The plan under consideration by the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control would require big water users to obtain permits in Aiken, Lexington, Barnwell, Calhoun, Orangeburg, Bamberg and Allendale counties before they could pull water from the ground.

Until Thursday, DHEC had not publicly revealed that a study it was conducting would recommend state oversight, or the extent of the area to be regulated. The department’s staff outlined that area during Thursday’s monthly board meeting. The agency’s board would have to approve any groundwater permitting plan.

DHEC officials said they will provide details of the study later this month, but the agency’s water bureau chief said the report will likely recommend regulation for the seven county area.

“We wouldn’t be here talking about it if we didn’t think the technical data supported it,’’ said David Baize, director of the agency’s water division.

Big farms and industries would have to show how water withdrawals affect the environment and other users before DHEC would decide on whether to issue permits. As it stands, big farms and major industries can take as much water as they want without state oversight.

Requiring permits for anyone to withdraw more than 3 million gallons per month has been under discussion since a Department of Natural Resources study recommended regulating groundwater in central South Carolina thirteen years ago.

But DHEC has been reluctant to regulate groundwater in the Aiken-Lexington area, as it does in coastal counties, because the agency didn’t think it was necessary. That has changed since Aiken County leaders asked for regulation last year.

Meanwhile, The State newspaper reported last month that large out-of-state agribusinesses have taken billions of gallons of groundwater since opening farms in the Aiken-Barnwell county area about four years ago. The series of stories sparked an outcry from some lawmakers to better regulate river and groundwater irrigation.

Large industrial scale farms, commonly referred to as mega-farms, have caused a major stir since their arrival in the Windsor area of Aiken County. Two out-of-state agribusinesses have purchased nearly 10,000 acres in the upper Edisto River basin since 2013, cleared at least 6,000 acres and established large vegetable farms.

Neighbors have complained about foul odors, crop dusting and road closures associated with the big farms, but one of the biggest issues has been the use of water by companies that provide relatively few jobs in the region.

Since their arrival in the past four years, the Walther and Woody farm companies have siphoned more water than some local utilities use to supply customers, The State reported in April. Some people have complained of sputtering backyards wells, and federal scientists documented a temporary 22-foot drop in groundwater levels next to a mega corn farm last summer, the newspaper reported.

Baize said Thursday the department is looking at requiring permits because the seven county area pulls from the same groundwater supply.

After DHEC releases its recommendation report later this month, the department will hold public meetings and ultimately present a plan to the agency’s board for approval, Baize said. The department would then develop a management plan and begin requiring permits.

Baize could not say whether a formal proposal would go to the DHEC board this year.

Two environmental groups, the Congaree Riverkeeper and Friends of the Edisto, applauded DHEC’s proposal. Both said protecting groundwater supplies will also protect rivers that are fed by seepage from underground aquifers.

“It’s a no-brainer,’’ said Tim Rogers, who heads Friends of the Edisto. “It would be good, unquestionably, if DHEC got more involved in a regulatory capacity. And that certainly includes groundwater.’’

S.C. Farm Bureau president Harry Ott said his organization “will participate in the process to determine if DHEC needs to say that is a capacity use area,’’ or an area where groundwater is regulated. Ott has previously said farmers are careful users of water needed to irrigate crops.

The state’s groundwater oversight program, already in effect in coastal counties, has been criticized for not being effective enough, but Baize told the DHEC board Thursday that groundwater levels have improved in the Charleston area since the state began a permitting program about 15 years ago.

While much of the debate over mega farms has been in Aiken County, other counties have big farms that take large amounts of water.

Walter P. Rawl and Sons, which operates in Lexington County, siphoned 1.8 billion gallons of groundwater in 2015, ranking the company third in the state in groundwater withdrawals for agriculture, according to DHEC statistics. Haigler Farms in Calhoun County was the top agricultural groundwater user, taking 2.3 billion gallons that year.

Attempts to reach officials at Rawl or Haigler farms were unsuccessful Thursday.

Walther Farms, which has industrial scale potato farms in eastern Aiken and Barnwell counties, ranked seventh in agricultural withdrawals at 621 million gallons that year, according to DHEC. Jeremy Walther declined comment on his business’s position on groundwater regulations.

Aiken County resident Peter DeLorme, who attended Thursday’s meeting, said he expects farming interests to fight the groundwater regulation plan. DeLorme lives near a mega-farm in the Windsor area.

He said the plan may be harder to get approved because it contains multiple counties, rather than only Aiken, which had led the effort for groundwater regulations.

“My initial concern is that if it contains a much larger area, it will become politicized and it would slow down the process,’’ he said. “But I can understand DHEC saying it needs to be more than the Aiken area. That’s the geology of the aquifer.’’

This story was originally published May 11, 2017 at 7:49 PM with the headline "Mega-farms face potential limits on water-sucking irrigation."