Rappahannock Named a Most Endangered River
Report cites growing pressure for water, inadequate approach to planning as reasons for placement on list. Data centers also listed as cause, which creates discussion.
By Martin Davis
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
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The Rappahannock River has been named as one of the ten most endangered rivers in America.
The report is put together by American Rivers and is based on “nominations for America’s Most Endangered Rivers® from individuals and organizations across the country.” The final selection is then made based on three criteria:
A major decision that the public can help influence in the coming year.
The significance of the river to people and nature.
The magnitude of threat to the river and its communities.
According to American Rivers, the Rappahannock earns its spot on the list for two major reasons: increased strain on water resources, and the absence of a unified water management plan. The latter of these two most concerns Friends of the Rappahannock.
“The focus of this Most Endangered River designation is the need for the creation of a comprehensive basin wide cumulative water supply plan,” said Brent Hunzinger, advocacy and coastal programs director for Friends of the Rappahannock, in an email to the Advance. “The regional approach is a step in the right direction (there are five planning regions in the Rappahannock watershed). We need a basin wide approach to water supply planning.”
A move to improve discussions and planning for rivers that cross multiple districts occurred in late 2023, when Virginia’s State Water Control Board began requiring local governments “in the same river basin to work together in crafting plans for water supply and use,” according to an article in the Virginia Mercury.
A planning strategy based on basins, and not regions, would help deal with issues like “reduced water availability for downstream users, potential harm to fish eggs and larvae, and changes in salinity levels which would negatively affect withdrawals for agricultural use,” according to the report.
Strain on all Virginia rivers is growing. The sources of the strain involve multiple factors.
The 2024 Virginia Annual Water Resources Report noted that surface water withdrawals in Virginia for 2023 (the last year for which data is available) were up 2.1% compared with the five-year average.
“Total reported withdrawals [including surface and ground water] in 2023 were approximately 5.26 billion gallons per day (BGD),” per the report, “including the cooling water withdrawals at nuclear and fossil fuel power generation facilities, which make up 76% of this total.”
The report, however, doesn’t stop at how the state approaches planning. Another important consideration is increasing demand.
More Localities Using Surface Water
Hunzinger told the Advance that “(l)ocalities east of Interstate 95 are being forced to transition from groundwater wells to surface water sources due to significant declines in the Potomac Aquifer. The Department of Environmental Quality has been encouraging this transition away from groundwater sources in the Eastern Virginia Groundwater Management Area for several years.”
The counties most pressed to do this currently are King George and Caroline.
“King George County will soon have to access the Rappahannock for water,” said Hunzinger. “There have been conversations between the County and Amazon for access to water from the Birchwood intake but there does not seem to have been much movement on that recently.”
Charlie Payne, a local land-use attorney who has represented Amazon noted the performance agreement between Amazon and King George County addresses this issue.
Data Centers Again in Water Debate
The report also claims part of the increased strain on the Rappahannock’s capacity is the arrival of data centers into the area. From the report: “Virginia is already the largest data center market in the world; the intense development in this thirsty industry, as well as continued population growth, have led to increased demand for surface water.”
Hunzinger wrote that while it is true that “most new data centers coming online in Stafford, Spotsylvania and Fredericksburg will be on reused water lines eventually,” there are “provisions in water service agreements (Fredericksburg not included as there is not yet a signed water service agreement) to allow them to use potable water as a bridge in between the times the data centers are completed and the reused water infrastructure is completed.”
Payne, however, said that “the potable water usage is limited in time and scale, and all capacity for such temporary usage is constructed and generated by the data center developer; hence not pulling from current community consumption requirements. Thus, no impact to residential or commercial potable water usage.”
Hunzinger also said that reuse lines do lose water through evaporation.
“[W]ater is consumed (evaporated) in the cooling process,” he wrote. “That percentage of water consumed varies depending on the project and cooling system. I have seen evaporation rates estimated to be from 40% to 75%”
Payne, however, says that estimate is a bit high.
“There is an evaporative process, but not 75%. Typically, 30-40% evaporates via a reuse system.”
The Long Term
As noted earlier, beyond the data center issue is the desire to create planning based on an approach that considers the entire basin, Hunzinger says, so that it will be possible to predict “how much more water will be required to be taken from the Rappahannock in the future and how much will be available at any one time basin wide for all beneficial users.”
Payne doesn’t fundamentally disagree with Hunzinger here. “I do not disagree with the concept,” he wrote, “but understand each planning area does have differential goals, population, and economies, so there is not one box [that] fits all.”
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