What is a LEMA? In December, CAWA and the Republican River Water Conservation District hosted a meeting in Burlington to discuss groundwater conservation. Part of the workshop included a group of irrigators from Sheridan County, Kansas, who have been a part of a LEMA: Local Enhanced Management Area. Declining groundwater levels, incomes, and population in the area led farmers to convene a series of meetings with their local Groundwater Management District (entities in Kansas)

Deficit irrigation is the generic term for applying less water than the full needs of a crop and can take many forms. It can be a planned, sophisticated strategy or an unplanned fact of life when water scarcity arises. Planned deficit irrigation is widely used with grapes to improve quality. Unplanned deficit irrigation occurs widely on forage crops that depend on diversions from mountain streams as the runoff pulse declines in late summer. Deficit irrigation has been investi

This article first appeared in BizWest on November 1, 2018 The Trump Administration’s emphasis on state empowerment has garnered significant attention, particularly in the environmental arena. So it is somewhat surprising that a recent change in policy having major implications for state permitting authority under the Clean Water Act has gone relatively unnoticed. The process that precipitated this change actually began under the Obama Administration. The CWA establishes two