What Water Rights Are, Why They Matter, and How Sunrise Helps Clients
Water rights engineering plays a critical role in how communities, developers, and agricultural operations plan for growth and long-term sustainability. Yet for many clients, water rights are complex, unfamiliar, and often addressed too late in a project.
According to Sunrise Water Rights Engineer Chad Withers, PE, clients typically reach out when they realize water rights could affect their project, but are unsure how to proceed. Those conversations often involve “confusion, anger, curiosity, fear, or any combination of those,” he said.
At Sunrise Engineering, water rights services focus on clarifying that uncertainty and helping clients protect a resource that is both legally regulated and financially valuable.
Understanding Water Rights and Common Misconceptions
A water right is a legal authorization to use water from a specific source for a defined purpose, location, and quantity. These rights are governed by state law and require ongoing compliance, documentation, and monitoring.
One of the most common misconceptions in water rights work is confusing water rights with water shares. While related, they are not the same, and treating them as interchangeable can lead to incorrect assumptions about ownership, usage, or compliance responsibilities. These misunderstandings often surface during development, permitting, or expansion, when timelines are already tight.
Sunrise helps clients understand what they own, what is required to maintain it, and how those rights support their broader goals.
How Water Rights Connect to Sunrise Engineering Services
Water rights intersect with many Sunrise Engineering services, especially municipal engineering, land development, and infrastructure planning. Any project involving land or water has the potential to involve water rights considerations.
Many municipalities operate in basins that are closed to new appropriations, making existing water rights limited and expensive to replace. In these cases, protecting existing rights becomes critical. Chad noted that, depending on the basin, losing a water right because of missed paperwork “could be a more expensive problem to solve than having a spring or well dry up.”
Sunrise supports municipal clients with water rights portfolio evaluations, well permitting, long-range water planning, and compliance support. Water rights engineering is also essential for agricultural clients, where access to water directly affects operations, productivity, and long-term viability.
Why Early Water Rights Evaluation Is Critical
Water rights issues can cause delays similar to permitting or regulatory setbacks if they are not addressed early. Missed deadlines, lapsed filings, or incomplete documentation can stall projects or require costly corrective action.
Evaluating water rights early in the planning process allows Sunrise teams to identify risks, coordinate across disciplines, and keep projects moving forward without surprises.
Managing Water Rights as a Long-Term Asset
Water rights portfolios often represent one of a client’s most valuable assets. Chad encourages clients to approach water rights management with the same care they would apply to any high-value investment. Some of the water rights portfolios Sunrise works with are worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
Having a written water rights management plan and conducting regular reviews helps clients protect those assets, maintain compliance, and plan confidently for the future.