There will be 2,003 new irrigated acres in the Lower Loup Natural Resources District in 2010. The NRD Board of Directors approved applications for the new acres at their monthly meeting in November.
NRD General Manager Leon "Butch" Koehlmoos said forty one of the nearly 200 applications received by the NRD for new irrigation scored the highest using ranking criteria established by the NRD Board. The Board had set a limit of 2,000 new acres for 2010, the first of four years that new irrigation could be allowed. Landowners had submitted applications for 12,925 new irrigated acres in the District. To view the list of approved applications, click here.
State law allows NRDs in river basins where a fully-appropriated designation has been reversed to develop up to 10,000 new irrigated acres over a four year period. The Nebraska Department of Natural Resources reversed a determination that the lower Platte River Basin was fully-appropriated earlier this year. A basin is considered fully-appropriated when the maximum level of sustainable development of both groundwater and surface water has been reached.
NRD Assistant Manager Russell Callan said that through use of the Elkhorn-Loup Model (ELM), District staff was able to determine that the newly approved irrigated acres would not lead to the river basin being declared fully appropriated. The NRD staff ranked applications using criteria that included river depletion factors, irrigation concentration, and soil types.
Callan said each parcel approved for the new irrigation was visited by NRD field staff after the applications were ranked. The newly approved irrigation was approved for parcels ranging in size from four to 132 acres.
Koehlmoos said that the NRD Board would have the discretion to consider additional irrigated acres over the next three years. He said that, should the Board approve additional irrigation development, they would also set the number of new acres allowed for that year. NRD rules state that the application period will run from September 1st through the 20th each year that new acres are allowed.
