Catawba River

Catchment area of ​​Santee with the course of the Catawba River

The Catawba River is the source river of the Wateree River in the neighboring states of North Carolina and South Carolina in the United States of America. The river is about 350 kilometers long and rises in the Appalachian Mountains, the catchment area is predominantly on the Piedmont Plateau. The Catawba River is dammed by many dams on reservoirs, which are mostly used for flood control and the production of electricity by hydropower. The river was named after the tribe of Catawba, Native Americans, whose name in the tribal language " River People " ( Kawahcatawba ) means.

Course

The source of the Catawba is located in the Blue Ridge Mountains in the west of the McDowell County, about 30 kilometers east of the city of Asheville, North Carolina. It flows east-northeast after and together with the Linville River to Lake James. The river then passes north of the municipality of Morganton and then turns to the southeast by the lake Lake Norman. From there, the Catwba flows south, on the west by Charlotte past first in the Mountain Iceland Lake and then into Lake Wylie, where it forms the river about a length of 15 kilometers of the border between North and South Carolina. It flows over into northern South Carolina, to the city of Rock Hill, by the Fishing Creek Reservoir near Great Falls and Lake Wateree reservoir about 50 kilometers northeast of Columbia. Below the Lake Wateree Wateree River, the river is called.

Water withdrawal conflict

2006 was the river in the center of a conflict over the water supply, which was fought between the inhabitants of the Catawba River Basin and the Cabarrus County. The cities of Concord and Kannapolis expected for the year 2035 about 832 780 hectoliters per day to supply the cities are missing and want daily up to 1.36275 million hectoliters from the liters pumped into their water supply. The Concord / Kannapolis Interbasin Transfer (IBT ) proposal calls for a permanent drainage of water from one river system to another, in contrast to the usual situation is taken in the water in the river basin for the local population and this after use and water treatment is fed back into the system.

Although neither Concord nor Kannapolis are in the Catawba River basin, argue this, the river is a regional water source and the IBT was necessary to secure the future growth and to meet the increased demand in the future of both cities. Opponents of the IBT argue that the cities along the Catawba River Basin also grow and the demand was too high, as this plan would take into account the low water levels during drought not appropriate.

On 10 January 2007 allowed the North Carolina State Environmental Panel, a committee of the Environmental Protection Agency of the State of the cities of Concord and Kannapolis, the removal of 247,500 hectoliters from the Catawba River. This decision constituted a compromise was proposed by the Environmental Management Commission, a Commission for Environmental Management. The Mayor of Morganton and Valdese explained that they were adamantly opposed to this scheme and the decision was wrong and biased. Concord mayor commented that the decision was " bittersweet " because the permitted water withdrawal amount well below the lie that the city had initially requested and the probability is high that this would be even delayed by court orders. The City of Hickory will appeal, said the biggest concern of the mayor, is the disturbance of the natural exchange of river systems.

Endangering

In the early autumn months of 2007 began in many parts of the southern United States, a period of drought, affected by the extreme was the Catawba River. On 15 October 2007, the Morganton News Herald reported that described the drought by the Governor of North Carolina, Mike Easley as the worst drought in recorded history.

In April 2008, the Catawba - Wateree River from the environmental group American Rivers was declared "America's most vulnerable river " to. Among the causes of poor water quality and the condition of the river, next to the drought of 2007, eleven hydroelectric power plants, global warming and the uncontrolled development on the banks of the river are mentioned.