WAILUKU, Maui — Although the County Council Water Resources Committee had heard it before, it heard it again Monday: All the cheap water is gone, The Maui News reported today.

Consultant Carl Freedman gave a quarterly update on the Water Use and Development Plan, which has advanced far enough now that he could offer a spreadsheet of options, in general terms, for the Department of Water Supply's two most troublesome systems: Central-South Maui and Upcountry.

He flashed up a slide, in capital letters: "ALL OF THE PLANS ARE EXPENSIVE!"Some are more expensive, some less; some offer greater security against future rises in energy costs, some less. But to put it in perspective, running just the Upcountry system for the next 25 years, no matter what option is chosen, will cost more than $200 million. That includes maintaining and operating the existing system, plus whatever additional infrastructure is required to catch up with unmet demand and new demand.

All scenarios include a strong dose of conservation, which is always cost-effective, Freedman said.

Each of the six regional systems — Lana'i, Moloka'i, West Maui, East Maui, Upcountry and Central-South Maui — presents different possibilities.

The Water Use and Development Plan has been mandated for 19 years, but little progress was being made until Freedman was hired as a consultant. The draft of the Lanai plan is under final review, and the Central and Upcountry drafts are now at the stage of drawing up the final list of potential strategies for meeting future water demands.

Freedman emphasized that he was evaluating options in economic terms, looking ahead to expected demand over 50 years. There are numerous other factors, from cultural to social, that will have to be considered in choosing which strategies to employ, he said.

And there remain huge unknowns, topmost of which are the petitions to determine in-stream flow standards for the major streams of Central Maui and East Maui.

In many respects, Freedman said, stored surface water is the cheaper alternative, especially if energy costs rise over time. That's because pumping water out of the ground eats up an enormous amount of electricity. Freedman also is assessing possible savings from using wind energy, although he did not present figures on that Monday.

While they may be cheaper, surface-water reservoirs aren't always as reliable as ground wells. For example, one of Freedman's calculations showed how many days a reservoir of a certain size would run dry during expected droughts.

For Central Maui, even a billion-gallon reservoir would go dry from time to time. How often depends on how much water the state Commission on Water Resource Management requires to be restored to Iao and other streams when it sets in-stream flow standards.

A billion-gallon reservoir is estimated to cost $109 million to build.

Water Committee Chairwoman Michelle Anderson asked Freedman about past plans to link the East and Central Maui systems to create redundancy. In the 1990s, the county planned to drill new wells in Haiku and connect them to the Central Maui system to reduce demand on the Iao aquifer, and later extend the connection to Upcountry for drought relief.

In the end, former Mayor Alan Arakawa abandoned the Ha'iku well field. Freedman said the plan to create redundancy would not have worked, because when one sector would need extra water, the other would not have it.

But Freedman said a renewed drive toward developing new sources in Haiku and, eventually, Waikamoi still would serve to succor Central Maui, just as the old BWS thought.

He said investigation and community meetings had revealed heavy use of existing resources in the Honopou aquifer already, so his study envisages skipping over that area and developing fields much farther out in Waikamoi — if groundwater wells are the chosen new source.

Going farther out, however, adds tremendously to pipeline costs.

Freedman said some of his calculations show that the cost of adding 600 gallons per day of source in Central Maui could cost $6,000 to $9,000 in capital costs. The same amount added Upcountry probably is going to cost $9,000 to $11,000.

Today's cost of a new small meter is about $6,000, with $2,000 devoted to developing new sources (and the rest for new storage and new transmission).

Anderson, who was presiding over her last committee session, said that had implications for the next budget. "There could be a huge bump in water-meter costs," she said.

Part of Monday's meeting was devoted to another old issue, the department's access to its intake above Lahainaluna School.

The road crosses property owned by Lahaina rancher Hans Michel, and in 1994 Michel and the department signed a contract for access and maintenance.

Fifteen years later, the contract has not been fulfilled, and Michel said flood damage from a storm a year ago remains unrepaired.

Ezekiela Kalua, who was an administrative assistant to Arakawa when the latter was mayor, begged the council for action after so many years. Michel has been more than cooperative, Kalua said, but it is unfair not to close on the land deal - either via easement or purchase — because without it Michel could be liable if a county worker were injured.

Michel, who has raised goats and donkeys in the valley for 40 years, said the issue really goes back to 1975, when the state drilled a well.

"The paperwork never got done," he said.

Deputy Water Director Eric Yamashige said the department has done quite a bit of work in the valley, cleaning out the intake after each rain. He said a title search contract is ready to be let to clarify the land ownership so that the department can decide what to do next.

Anderson urged Yamashige to hire outside contractors to repair the road if the department staff is too busy.

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