SAN ANTONIO — A critical vote Monday morning on a pipeline to import water from Central Texas could set the stage for a vigorous debate in the weeks ahead.

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The San Antonio Water System board will decide at its 9 a.m. meeting at SAWS headquarters whether to move forward on the $3.4 billion project, which would transport up to 16.3 billion gallons annually, enough to serve about 160,000 homes, from wells in Burleson County that draw from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer.

SAWS Chairman Berto Guerra has said the city must move quickly to enter a contract with the private Vista Ridge Consortium. If a contract is approved by the board and the consortium, he hopes to present it to the City Council by Oct. 30 for final approval.

Vista Ridge would then have 18 to 30 months to arrange financing through a special-purpose entity before it builds the pipeline. Guerra said he's worried about a potential rise in interest rates, possibly in connection to hostilities in the Middle East, before rates are locked in for the project.

“I'm concerned about interest rates. The faster we move this thing, the better,” Guerra said.

Opponents have called on the city to slow the process until there can be a thorough discussion of the plan and its relationship to growth and water management, locally and statewide. Under the proposal, the outcome of a three-year competitive process, SAWS would buy water from the consortium for 30 years, at which time SAWS would own the pipeline and have the option to extend the water leases another 30 years.

Environmental advocates have said SAWS will face opposition like it did 10 years ago, when it sought to buy up to 17.9 billion gallons per year from the same aquifer in Lee, Milam and Bastrop counties. That deal died in 2005 because of transport costs and local resistance.

Today, residential growth and increased gas and oil drilling in that rural region east of Austin fuel concerns about depletion of water supplies in the Carrizo-Wilcox. On its official website, the Lost Pines Groundwater Conservation District, which regulates the sand aquifer in Lee and Bastrop counties, mentions the Alamo City as another threat.

“As cities like San Antonio grow and need more water, they are looking to our aquifer,” the website warns.

The proposed SAWS project, a 142-mile pipeline, would use water rights and permits obtained not through Lost Pines, but the neighboring Post Oak Savannah Groundwater Conservation District, which oversees Milam and Burleson counties. That district, with a philosophy giving more credence to landowners' rights to lease water, has been criticized by conservationists for issuing pumping and export permits to BlueWater Systems, a partner in the Vista Ridge Consortium.

BlueWater has 3,400 leases on water rights held by landowners about 8 miles west of Caldwell in Burleson County. Abengoa, the consortium's lead partner, plans to develop a well field drawing from the aquifer's Simsboro and Carrizo formations.

Proponents have said the project guarantees an average of roughly 12 billion gallons annually and does not obligate SAWS to pay for any water not delivered. But critics have said hydrology studies suggest the project could affect wells in neighboring counties and flows in nearby rivers. The Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance and Communities Organized for Public Service/Metro Alliance, as well as the League of Independent Voters of Texas, a statewide group, have begun mounting opposition.

Margaret Day, executive committee chair of the Alamo Sierra Club, said the project would be too costly, energy-intensive and regionally divisive, spurring a “water war.” She wants the city to slow down the decision-making process, like it did with its $32 million contribution to a local streetcar plan that was recently shelved.

“The Vista Ridge deal, at more than 100 times that cost, and with many glossed-over downsides, needs the pause button,” Day said at a news conference last week.

State Rep. Lyle Larson, who has called for development of a “strategic water reserve for the state,” said he supports careful aquifer management but views the Vista Ridge proposal as “the best project I've seen on the horizon for San Antonio.” The conflicting approaches between the Lost Pines and Post Oak Savannah districts underscores a problem with the way the state regulates aquifers, he said.

“The best approach is probably right in the middle,” said Larson, R-San Antonio. “We've got to get some uniformity.”

Statewide cooperation and development of pipelines and aquifer storage and recovery facilities, such as the one SAWS operates in southern Bexar County, could help the state develop a network to store and move water to communities that need it in dry times, Larson said.

“A lot of decisions are being made, and they're not made using science. They're based on unwillingness to let water flow out of their region,” he said. “There's got to be an understanding that we're all Texans.”

City Councilman Ron Nirenberg, who had a staff member listening in on many of the seven public negotiation sessions for the project, said he is “very excited by the prospect” of the Vista Ridge project and “its place in addressing water security in San Antonio.” He stopped short of saying he would vote for it, even though he said SAWS is addressing concerns raised by critics about water conservation and aquifer protection.

Nirenberg said he has helped SAWS develop a slate of neighborhood meetings in October to discuss the pipeline. Some residents have spoken of a “clear need for more water,” and others mentioned the “nuances of pumping from another basin,” he said.

But Nirenberg said he also wants to begin a dialogue, leading to further study in 2015, on ways the city can stretch its supplies through water-friendly development codes and policies.

“Conservation does not start and end with SAWS,” Nirenberg said. “It also extends to how we grow our city.”

SAWS has posted on its website the latest version of a roughly 600-page contract, including appendices providing early details of the project's design. A free public forum at the UTSA Downtown Campus is set for 6 p.m. Monday in Room BV 1.326 of the Buena Vista Street Building. Free parking will be provided in Lot D-3 under Interstate 35.

shuddleston@express-news.net

Twitter:@shuddlestonSA