Downtown-based water infrastructure company Cadiz Inc. recently won a major victory when a federal agency approved the company’s latest pipeline plan to convey water from its desert aquifer to water-hungry communities nearby and throughout the Southwest. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management on July 8 approved Cadiz’s plan to convert an abandoned natural gas pipeline to transport aquifer water, a crucial step in the creation of what Cadiz calls the Mojave Groundwater Bank. “This is the last permit we need to begin construction,” said Susan Kennedy, chief executive of Cadiz. But will this victory truly bring Cadiz closer to its decades-long quest to monetize its aquifer under the eastern Mojave Desert?Or will it prove yet another mirage as project opponents manage to place yet more obstacles in Cadiz’s path?

Other groundwater news:

• Science News: Scientists say: subsidence