Nevada Vanadium has reached an agreement with Fish Creek Ranch to lease water rights to meet the water supply requirements of the project for a period of ten years, according to Section 3.19.2.2 of the Draft EIS.
Figure 2 in Supplemental Environmental Report 1 shows the arrangement.
As specified in the agreement, Fish Creek Ranch would remove 818 acres of alfalfa from production during the term of the lease to compensate for water that would otherwise be used for irrigation.
Water would pumped from a take-off near Fish Creek Springs to the project site.
A Rangeland Management Specialist with the Battle Mountain District confirmed that Fish Creek Ranch qualifies as a base property and has grazing preference on the Fish Creek Allotment, which overlaps the project area.
The advocates issued a bizarre statement last week claiming that “BLM NV is preparing to dig in and use millions more gallons of precious water for mining operations while ousting federally protected wild horses from their homes, and continue the destruction of our lands and wildlife.”
The SER and EIS were posted to the Gibellini project folder in ePlanning.
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Western Horse Watchers Association 