By Lydia Dishman
SCBIZ Daily

GREENVILLE -- Soaring gas prices may be squeezing South Carolinians, but the severity of the state’s drought is causing enough concern to push a water-sharing agreement with one of its neighboring states.

“It is unprecedented in modern times,” declared Dean Moss, general manager of the Beaufort-Jasper Water and Sewer Authority as he flipped through slide after slide of a presentation that showed 10 years scant rainfall during a meeting of the Greenville Rotary Club at the Poinsett Hotel on Tuesday.

Five Upstate counties were upgraded to extreme drought status by the state Drought Response Committee on June 30.

Moss, an expert on interstate water disputes serves as a member of the South Carolina Governor’s Savannah River Committee and is the governor’s appointee to and chairman of the Savannah River Maritime Commission. He is taking part in negotiations between officials in South Carolina and Georgia over water-sharing issues of the Savannah River basin, which includes Lake Hartwell.

He thinks that the two states are about 18 months away from reaching an agreement for planning and operating.

“There are some frustrations on the South Carolina side because Georgia has been very deliberate, and we just want to move,” Moss said.

A critical component, he said, would be for each side to agree on what he called “the science” of water usage. 

“So much involves the manipulation of natural ecosystems. Engineering judgments need to be calculated as such,” said Moss, explaining that considerations such as the amount of dissolved oxygen in water to support fish need to be taken into account when determining how much treated waste water can be released into lakes and streams.

To the crowd of more than 150 Rotarians and guests, Moss emphasized the importance of water as a resource for economic development. 

“Water quality is just as important as quantity,” said Moss, noting that for Anderson County, low lake levels can have a negative impact on tourism revenues, while in coastal areas industry depends on the quality of river water to dispose of treated waste.

He also predicted that consumers could expect price increases for water usage as the resource dries up through continued drought.

“Until we get rain, mandatory conservation will help slow the take,” Moss said. “How bad it is, is dependent on where you are.”

He said Columbia near Lake Murray was doing well but the small streams that run through Spartanburg are drying up.  He praised the Greenville Water System’s foresight in planning for back up resources especially since the city uses approximately 45 million gallons per day.

Pointing out that Georgia and North Carolina are faced with similar concerns, Moss offered another reminder, “We are inexorably tied to our sister states, and we’ve got to be willing to compromise.”