Finish the Odessa Groundwater Replacement Program
- Photo 1: Breaking ground on water security: OGWRP partners celebrate the EL 80.6 groundbreaking on June 10, 2026, marking another step toward replacing declining groundwater supplies with reliable Columbia Basin Project water. Photo courtesy of ECBID.
Maintaining momentum protects Washington farms and the investments already made to secure their water supply.
Washington State Potato Commission
Every year, Washington potato growers, processors, and rural communities depend on reliable irrigation water to produce food, support jobs, and sustain local economies. The Odessa Groundwater Replacement Program (OGWRP) is one of Washington's most important opportunities to secure a reliable long-term water supply for agriculture. The program replaces groundwater pumping from the severely declining Odessa aquifer with Columbia Basin Project (CBP) surface water. It protects existing farmland, strengthens food production, supports food processing and rural employment, and reduces the energy, cost, and water-quality problems that come with deeper wells. Completing the OGWRP should remain a top priority for Washington State water policy.
- Photo 2: A more sustainable source: Columbia Basin Project water delivered through the East Low Canal provides Odessa-area farms with a long-term alternative to reliance on the declining aquifer. Photo courtesy of ECBID.
The need for sustainable irrigation water has been building for decades. The state of Washington issued groundwater rights in the Odessa Subarea in the 1970s with the understanding that those rights would be needed only temporarily, expecting the CBP would eventually reach these lands. However, the East High Canal has to date never been built, so farms (on the order of 100,000 acres of farmland) have continued to rely on deep groundwater. The result has been a long and steady declining trend in the regional aquifer water levels – the aquifer has been being “mined”. Today, the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) reports that some wells reach depths of 2,400 feet. Water from those depths can be hot, high in sodium, and costly to lift. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) warns that the aquifer decline threatens irrigation as well as domestic, municipal, commercial, and industrial uses.1, 2 The OGWRP was conceived to reduce groundwater pumping for irrigation in the Odessa Subarea while sustaining the commercial agriculture important to the region. The basic concept of the OGWRP is to rely on the existing East Low Canal, plus a number of new lateral pump stations and pipe conveyance systems, to deliver CBP water to fields.
Progress that can be measured
The OGWRP is no longer just a proposal on a map. Ecology says enough water has been secured to move 90,000 acres from groundwater to surface water when the OGWRP system is built out. That supply includes applying East Columbia Basin Irrigation District conserved water to 7,700 acres, Lake Roosevelt incremental storage release water to 10,000 acres, and the Odessa Subarea Special Study water to 70,000 acres. The state of Washington and Reclamation have also invested in major shared facilities, including new siphons, a widened East Low Canal, bridge replacements, and other conveyance improvements to accommodate the increased flows in the East Low Canal.1
The delivery systems show what that investment produces. East Columbia Basin Irrigation District completed the East Low (EL) Canal mile 47.5 project in 2021, serving 10,500 acres. EL 86.4 began deliveries on April 1, 2025, converting 5,426 acres and allowing 16 deep wells to stop pumping. ECBID estimates that this single system leaves 16,143 acre-feet, or about 5.3 billion gallons, in the aquifer each year. EL 84.7, designed for 6,209 acres, and EL 80.6, designed for 5,862 acres, are currently under construction.3
The next major system is EL 22.1, north of Interstate 90 and east of Moses Lake. The Washington State Legislature provided $38.5 million in the 2025-27 capital budget for construction of this system. Ecology reports that the complete design would serve 17,324 acres through a new canal turnout, a large pump station, power-system modifications, and about 12 miles of large-diameter pipeline.1 Each completed segment brings more farms within reach of surface water, but only a complete and operable delivery system produces the intended groundwater replacement.
These accomplishments demonstrate that groundwater replacement is no longer a theoretical concept. Farmers are already receiving surface water deliveries, wells are being retired, and groundwater pumping is being reduced significantly. Each completed delivery system validates previous public investments and builds confidence that the broader program can succeed with adequate funding and coordination.
Delay carries a growing cost.
A loss of momentum to the OGWRP would increase both the costs and risks associated with aquifer decline. The aquifer would continue to decline while the remaining groundwater users face higher pumping lifts, higher energy costs, deteriorating water quality, and greater operational risk. A pause could also strand the significant public and private investments already made. Canal capacity, pump stations, mainlines, farm turnouts, power service, and on-farm systems must work together. Completing only part of that chain leaves water unavailable at the field even after millions of dollars have been spent.
The effects of a delay would extend beyond individual farms. The Columbia Basin contains 47 percent of Washington's irrigated cropland and accounts for roughly one-third of the state's agricultural production value. More than 90 crops are grown on over 3,500 farms in the region.4 Potato production is especially dependent on timely, predictable irrigation as growers, storage facilities, processors, shippers, and consumer markets plan around a continuous supply. Water uncertainty creates risk throughout the supply chain, affecting the rural communities that depend on agriculture-driven employment. The Washington State Potato Commission's (WSPC) most recent economic reporting describes a statewide potato sector that supports tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in economic activity.5 Water reliability is therefore a statewide food-production and employment issue.
The work needed to finish
Washington State and federal policymakers should keep OGWRP moving through coordinated, multi-biennium state and federal funding. Appropriations should be sequenced around delivery systems that can become fully usable, rather than isolated components that cannot yet deliver water. State agencies, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the East Columbia Basin Irrigation District, the Natural Resource Conservation Service, utility providers, landowners, and conservation districts also need predictable schedules for design, permitting, power, construction, and farm connections.
Completion of the OGWRP should also recognize what growers have already contributed. Farms have financed bonds and on-farm facilities, adopted precision irrigation, and accepted the operational changes required to move from wells to CBP water. Those investments strengthen the public case for completing the shared system. They also show why conservation and infrastructure belong in the same strategy: efficient farms cannot conserve their way out of a failing aquifer, and a public delivery system cannot succeed without efficient water use at the field.
WSPC encourages continued support for four practical commitments: finish the systems already funded or under construction; prepare the next systems before current work winds down; protect existing water users during construction and operation; and report results in acres converted, wells retired, aquifer water retained, and farms receiving reliable service. That approach maintains public accountability while keeping the program's purpose in focus.
Odessa is the immediate test of Washington's ability to replace an unsustainable supply with a durable one. The state, federal government, irrigation district, and growers have already built the foundation. Maintaining momentum will turn that foundation into working water deliveries and protect one of Washington's most productive agricultural regions for the next generation.
Photo Cred: Columbia Basin Conservation Dist.
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