Muskingum Watershed District Sells only 136M Gal of Water So Far

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The Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District (MWCD), organized in 1933 to reduce the effects of flooding and conserve water for beneficial public uses, oversees 16 dams and reservoirs across 22 counties in Ohio, covering 20% of the state. It is a massive area under the oversight and control of the MWCD. We've previously covered their deals with Antero Resources to lease District property for drilling. We've also covered District deals to sell water to Antero and other shale drillers (see Muskingum Watershed Votes to Sell 209M Gals of Water for Fracking). Although the district has voted to sell 209 million gallons of water, so far in 2014 they've only sold 136 million gallons--or the amount of water used in four days by the city of Akron, OH. According to officials with the MWCD, water sales have had a "negligible" impact on the reservoirs--lowering the several reservoirs used by less than 3/4 of an inch. MWCD lowers reservoirs more than that each year for winter anyway--so actually there's been no impact, especially since much of the water sold flows through pipelines instead of tanker trucks...

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