Palm Beach rock pits won’t deliver water for 10 years

The state of Florida spent $250 million in 2003 on rock pits that a Palm Beach mining company, Palm Beach Aggregates, sold as reservoirs. Now there are reports that water from the pits is environmentally risky, and it could be years before they are actually tapped, according to a report by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which forecasts delivery by 2020 at the earliest. Before the original deal, proponents worked, successfully, to include the pits as part of Everglades renewal. But that work, along with other plans to use the pits, even for proposals unrelated to drinking water, is on hold. [Palm Beach Post]