Abstract
Although water is the most abundant natural resource on the planet, fresh and potable water is limited. Surface water has long supported human development. However, technological improvements in the mid-twentieth century facilitated and ultimately encouraged states to look below the surface to groundwater. The extraction of groundwater from aquifers at tremendous rates has since transformed the once little-understood resource into one that states depend on to meet the needs of their citizens. Unlike surface water, however, groundwater has historically faced exclusion from regulatory regimes. Groundwater is simple to extract and often sourced near its point of use, making it easy to pretend that groundwater supplies are infinite. But, though abundant, groundwater is exhaustible. After decades of unrestrained groundwater pumping, states are beginning to face the consequences through rapidly depleting reserves that may take hundreds to thousands of years to recharge. In addition to these consequences, scientists have begun to recognize both the negative effects of overuse and the compounding impacts of climate change on groundwater.
Because surface water and groundwater sources do not neatly adhere to state lines, states must inevitably compete for water resources. When disputes arise and states fail to negotiate, states can appear before the United States Supreme Court to resolve their disputes. The Court’s method for resolving these disputes is known as the doctrine of equitable apportionment. Unfortunately, this doctrine is overly complicated and unpredictable, presenting problems for states that will inevitably seek apportionment to preserve their increasingly scarce water resources. This Note chronicles the Court’s apportionment jurisprudence and its flaws and explains the Court’s recent decision to expand the doctrine to apply to groundwater. This Note then adds to the relatively small body of existing literature aiming to refine equitable apportionment standards, and it does so uniquely in the context of depleting groundwater reserves and shifting climate conditions.
Recommended Citation
Julia C. Kitt,
Troubled Waters: Equitable Apportionment and the Future of Interstate Groundwater Wars,
77 Fla. L. Rev.
811
(2025).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol77/iss2/9
