Enrolled Bill Summary

            House Bill 3037 amends the Water Code to clarify a groundwater conservation district's rulemaking authority to regulate water well spacing and production, expanding the purpose of such regulation to include the prevention of interference between wells and the prevention of water quality degradation and establishing guidelines for such regulation. Specifically, spacing regulation may include a requirement that all wells be set a certain distance from property lines or adjoining wells or a requirement that wells with a certain production capacity, pump size, or other construction or operation characteristic be set at specific distances from property lines or other wells. Regulation of water production may include setting production limits on wells; limiting production based on acreage or tract size, including consideration of a retail water utility's service area; limiting the water that may be produced from a defined number of acres assigned to an authorized well site; setting a production maximum on the basis of acre-feet-per-acre or gallons-per-minute per well site; or using any combination of those methods. Regulation may preserve, to the maximum extent practicable consistent with a district's comprehensive management plan, historic water use before the effective date of the district's groundwater production rules.