Page 53 - Azerbaijan State University of Economics

COST ANALYSIS AND WATER CONSERVATION POTENTIAL OF IRRIGATION
TECHNOLOGIES IN THE TEXAS PANHANDLE WATER PLANNING AREA

1980s factors such as continuing groundwater depletion of the Ogallala

Aquifer, escalating pumping energy costs, low farm profits, and
government set-aside programs stimulated a decline in irrigated area in

Region A until the early 1990s. This decline continued until the mid-
1990s (TWDB, 2001)

Labor shortage, strict laws and liability associated with hired labor

encouraged the producers to move from conventional to mechanized
irrigation systems. With the adoption of more efficient irrigation

technology at a large scale, the producers are able to irrigate more acres
with the same amount of water pumped. Therefore, irrigated acres in

Region A increased in 1997, Table 1. However, the increase in total

irrigated acres is less than the increase in acres under sprinkler irrigation.
This means that the producers are not only adopting sprinkler irrigation

for newly irrigated acres but also are converting the existing irrigated
acres under conventional surface irrigation systems.

The estimates of irrigated acres in Region A in 2008 under furrow
and sprinkler are 304,666 and 913,998 respectively (New, 2009). The

acres under sprinkler irrigation are further subdivided into three systems,

MESA, LESA and LEPA. The irrigated acres by irrigation system,
application efficiency, efficiency indices and estimated water use by

each system for 2008 are presented in Table 2. The low application
efficiency of furrow irrigation is a significant reason for the higher

estimated water use i.e., 36.75 percent. The major share of the estimated
water use, 59.05 percent, is distributed through the more efficient LESA

to irrigate 71 percent of the irrigated acres.

The ratio of estimated water use to acre irrigated for furrow is 1.72
while for LESA the ratio is 0.98. The difference in these ratios is due to

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