The dispute over pumping water from the Catawba River to Cabarrus County may be one of a kind.
"It will be more difficult for anyone to get another transfer," said Hickory Mayor Rudy Wright when a compromise to end the water war was approved Tuesday night.
Hickory is part of a coalition of municipalities along the river that approved a plan to end litigation and give Concord and Kannapolis access to the Catawba.
The dispute that erupted in 2006 spurred legislation that places stringent regulations on transferring water from one river system to another.
Initially, the state Environmental Management Commission approved a request from Concord and Kannapolis to draw up to 26 million gallons a day from the Catawba River and 10 million gallons a day from the Yadkin River.
That set off a storm of protest from Hickory and municipalities and counties that use the Catawba as their main water source.
They formed Protect the Catawba Coalition to challenge the state ruling.
The Environmental Management Commission amended its decision to allow Kannapolis and Concord 10 million gallons a day each from the Catawba and Yadkin.
That did not satisfy the coalition and environmental groups, including the Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation.
The coalition and Riverkeeper filed lawsuits to stop the transfer in 2007. The actions were consolidated.
Concord and Kannapolis jumped into the fray on the side of the state.
After three years and combined expenses of $2 million, the two sides agreed to a settlement.
In the meantime, the General Assembly stepped in with sweeping legislation in an effort to prevent another water war.
North Carolina has several river basins. They are formed by main rivers, such as the Catawba, tributaries and natural drainage.
Transferring water from one to another was loosely regulated before the Concord-Kannapolis plan that coalition members called a raid on one of their most precious resources.
Normally, water taken from a river system for public or industrial use makes its way back to the river in the form of runoff or treated wastewater.
An interbasin transfer, however, permanently removes water from one river system and puts it in another. An "IBT" adds more water to the receiving system than it normally contains.
Environmentalists say a significant transfer can create problems for both systems.
The new law mandates a public hearing process, environmental impact statements, a drought plan, commercial and residential impact determinations and — perhaps most important — proof that an IBT is necessary and the party wanting to transfer the water has no other option.
The coalition claimed Concord and Kannapolis had a viable alternative, the Yadkin River Basin that Riverkeeper members said is bigger than the Catawba.
The litigants landed in Administrative Court that was to decide if the state acted properly.
Facing more expenses, the sides agreed to mediate the dispute.
Concord and Kannapolis got water. The coalition cut the transfer by more than half. And the state has a new law that gives the primary users of a river system preference in water transfer petitions.
The compromise reflects the new law.
"The agreement provides a model for water conservation and efficiency measures that ... could help protect all the state's rivers," said Julie Youngman, for the Southern Environmental Law Center that represented Riverkeeper.
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