Science and Society

Honorable Mention: Brian Pompeii, Arizona State University
Private Water Companies in a Desert City

There is a growing global trend to privatize water service providers. Lietner and others have criticized this trend for creating socially constructed resource scarcities. Phoenix, Arizona will be used as a case study, in a preliminary research process, to view the population characteristics of areas privatizing water services. Phoenix is experiencing a period of rapid population growth on the urban/suburban fringe. As a result, proper municipal-regulated water providers do not have the time or resources to establish a water providing infrastructure to these new desert developments. To accommodate the water needs of this new population, the Arizona Corporate Commission (ACC) offers permits, called CCNs (Certificate of Convenience and Necessity), that grant private water companies the sole right of providing water in a given area. This study uses GIS and data from the U.S. Census, Arizona Water Infrastructure Authority, and Arizona Department of Water Resources to evaluate pricing differences between municipal and private water providing areas. It is hypothesized that CCNs are creating socially constructed scarcity and exacerbating social inequities in access to resources. The outcome will illustrate whether private providers charge higher rates, have increased rates more steeply, rely on less secure water sources, and serve more socio-economically and demographically vulnerable populations than regulated public municipal providers.