Success Stories

WestWater’s proven experience and outstanding project performance shows we can integrate resources to deliver innovative solutions. Over the last ten years WestWater has successfully completed over 150 unique projects across the United States and internationally.

Transaction Advisory Services

The City of Olympia’s primary source of water is McAllister Springs located at the headwaters of McAllister Creek, in Thurston County, Washington. Due to lower productivity from the springs and potential threat of contamination, the City of Olympia made the decision to develop the McAllister wellfield and supplement their water supply through groundwater. The McAllister wellfield is located north of the city and in close proximity to Lake St. Clair. The drawdown from the new well reduced the flow into Lake St. Clair Lake at an estimated rate of 0.12 cubic feet per second. To mitigate the flow impacts, the city was required to acquire mitigation water supply.

The City of Olympia contracted with WWR to identify and acquire, on behalf of the city, 70 acre-feet of water that would satisfy mitigation requirements for flow depletion in Lake St. Clair created by the city’s McAllister well. WWR worked with city staff to determine the quantity of water needed to mitigate impacts to Lake St. Clair and worked closely with the Washington Department of Ecology to ensure the city’s mitigation requirements would be met through acquisition of water rights. WestWater initiated the acquisition process by identifying and reviewing over 150 water rights in the Lake St. Clair area, ranking and prioritizing those water rights based on size, geographic proximity, ease of transferability, and priority. WWR contacted the water right owners and conducted the contract negotiations to purchase the water rights. WWR negotiated purchase price, set up escrow, reviewed titles, and created a contract structure that worked for all parties involved. WWR finalized the transactions by shepherding the water right transfer and water right purchase through closing.

In 2006, a national development company based in Boise, Idaho, was proposing to develop a 204-acre parcel located on the north side of Highway SR-270 between Pullman, Washington, and Moscow, Idaho. The property lies within Washington state along the state line in Whitman County. In order to move forward with the 714,000 square foot development, the developer needed additional water supply. The Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) had previously closed the region to new water right appropriations. In order to meet their additional water supply needs, the developer contracted with WWR to assist them in acquiring the needed water supply.

As a first step in identifying potential water rights that were transferable to the development site, WWR first had to understand the hydrogeology of the area. WestWater subcontracted with a local hydrogeology firm and conducted meetings with Ecology to get a better understanding of the unique hydrogeology in the area. Using this information, WWR identified 180 potentially transferable water rights. WWR conducted due diligence on the identified water rights including aerial photo analysis, ownership review, reliability, and transferability review. WWR’s due diligence revealed that the area had undergone a conversion from irrigated agriculture to dryland wheat farming, thus many of the water rights had not been used in over five years and would not likely survive a transfer. Site visits were conducted to determine the validity of the 180 water rights, and a prioritized list of potentially transferable water rights was developed.

Throughout this process, WWR identified the prospective water rights, contacted and negotiated transaction terms with water right owners, conducted due diligence on the validity of the water rights, and assisted with regulatory approvals to transfer the water rights to the development. WWR ultimately was able to acquire three water rights for the development. The water rights transferred to the development site enabled the developer to move forward with the first phase of the development.