Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) reintroduced the Sloan Canyon Conservation and Horizon Lateral Water Pipeline Act. This bill would allow the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) to construct a new water pipeline to provide water for over one million Nevadans, dramatically improving the reliability of Las Vegas’s water system and protecting residents from outages, while safeguarding ecosystems in Sloan Canyon. The bill also expands the Sloan Canyon National Conservation (NCA) area by nearly 9,300 acres – increasing its size by nearly 20 percent.
“Completing the Horizon Lateral pipeline is a critical step in ensuring that Southern Nevada’s water infrastructure is reliable, sustainable, and resilient for decades to come,” said Senator Cortez Masto. “My bill allows SNWA to build this pipeline in a way that saves taxpayer dollars, minimizes disruptions to the City of Henderson and to our public lands, and protects the water supply for residents across the Las Vegas Valley.”
Currently, SNWA operates one large water pipeline, the South Valley Lateral, that serves approximately 40% of the residents and businesses in the Las Vegas valley, including the entire City of Henderson. The Las Vegas valley needs another water pipeline to increase the reliability and capacity of the existing water delivery system and protect Las Vegas residents from water outages in the event of an emergency.
After years of study and engagement with valley stakeholders, SNWA determined the safest, most effective, and least disruptive route for the Horizon Lateral would be via an underground pipeline below the Sloan Canyon NCA, as opposed to constructing it through the City of Henderson. This route saves ratepayers $200 million, minimizes disturbances to both Henderson residents and the land in Sloan Canyon. Cortez Masto’s legislation to support the pipeline’s construction on this route would also expand Sloan Canyon’s conservation area by 9,290 acres to bring the total NCA acreage to 57,728 acres. Last Congress, this legislation passed out of the Senate with bipartisan support.
Senator Cortez Masto has been a leader working to support conservation efforts and combat drought. As part of the Great American Outdoors Act, she secured permanent funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). Cortez Masto fought to deliver $4 billion to combat drought in the states bordering the Colorado River in the Inflation Reduction Act and helped pass the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which will continue to make a historic amount of funding available for water and wastewater infrastructure improvements across the country over five years.
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