Are billions needed for saving western Kansas?

Flying east to west over Kansas, the land transforms from lush green to desert brown. Rectangular farm plots fill in with emerald circles, the work of center-pivot irrigation.

Outside Garden City, in the middle of one of those circles, Duane Roth scoops up soil to reveal an inconspicuous PVC pipe. It’s a soil moisture probe that tells Roth exactly how much water his crops need. The device is one of many new technologies designed to help farmers make the most of every drop.

“All that you have to do is open up your app,” said Roth. “It’s going to tell you, you don’t need to irrigate or you’re going to need to apply an inch within six days.”

For generations, farmers like Roth have looked not to the heavens for the rain to nurture their crops, but to wells, pumps and sprinklers that heaved water up from the Ogallala Aquifer — America’s largest underground reservoir. They transformed the semi-arid region into some of the nation’s most productive farmland.

But the water’s running out.

“Those shallower wells, there’s no more water left in them,” said Roth.

If pumping continues at current rates, most of southwest Kansas will exhaust its water reserves within 25 to 50 years. That could dry up the agriculture at the heart of the region’s economy.

The threat of that impending crisis drives farmers, Roth among them, to adopt technology that helps preserve their wells without hurting the bottom line.

Other farmers are rallying together to self-impose strict local pumping limits.

But yet another faction fears conservation efforts can’t stave off the inevitable. They think the region needs a more radical solution. And soon. They want to create a giant canal to pump new water west — even if it means spending billions.

Pushing pumping limits

In 2013, Sheridan County farmers created the state’s first local enhanced management area, or LEMA, to set strict, enforceable limits on how much farmers could pump.

A 2017 study showed that farmers within that water district pumped 25 percent less water, in part from switching from corn to less thirsty crops such as sorghum and wheat. Notably, they made similar profits to nearby farmers who didn’t face pumping limits.

After that success in Sheridan County, the entire surrounding water district adopted limits. Its water restrictions are less severe, but it expands the conservation approach into parts of 10 counties in Northwest Kansas.

“We’ve put in some restrictions which should lessen the decline rate,” said Ray Luhman, the manager of Groundwater Management District 4, which contains Sheridan County. “But, you know, we’re not anywhere near anything that would stabilize the water table.”