Kent Jones has been chewing on the question now for more than two years.

He’s heard from the developers who want to build a pair of nuclear reactors that would be cooled with water from the Green River. He’s listened to the critics who insist nuclear anything is too risky for a Colorado River tributary and the people who rely on it, from melon farmers to regular Utahns worried about having enough water for their grandkids.

He’s gotten the message from politicians that it might be time to add nuclear to the state’s energy portfolio. He’s taken heed of the lawyers’ advice that whatever he decides must be able to stand up to a nearly certain legal challenge.

Jones is the state engineer, the guy with his hand on the master spigot for all the water Utah uses for drinking, farming and power generation. He is the only state-level official whose OK is make-or-break for the first commercial nuclear power plant proposed in Utah.

To him, deciding on the Blue Castle Holdings project is mostly clear-cut: His job is to check the request against tried-and-true water law. But he also can’t help but see the big picture — how his decision in the next few weeks might change Utah’s future.

“What I’m trying to do here is what I’m required to do, what’s necessary legally,” says Jones, whose nearly bald head and tendency to listen thoughtfully rather than talk give him a certain Zen-like quality.

“People certainly need water and they need water to meet certain demands,” he goes on to say. “But it is not a lot of fun to sit in the dark and drink your cup of water when you don’t have your lights. So what is in the public interest here?”

Nowhere is the weightiness of Jones’ nuclear question clearer than in the problem of the Central Utah Project. A $3 billion taxpayer-funded water system that has been a half-century in the making, the CUP brings drinking water to more than 600,000 people on the Wasatch Front.

But, under the principle that first in time is first in right, a cornerstone of Western water law, the nuclear power plant would be ahead of CUP in line if there were a shortage, because part of its water was spoken for a year before the CUP’s.

Put another way, someday someone might have to decide which is more important: protecting drinking water for Utah’s population center or keeping electricity flowing to customers and returns flowing to the investors who, it’s expected, will pump more than $13 billion into the nuclear plant.

Though few think such a showdown is likely, it is conceivable. And it is one of the concerns that Jones has been asked to consider in his decision-making.

Said Wayne Pullan, of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation: “He’s going to have to have the wisdom of Solomon on this one.”

Jones admits he has been cautious and he is no less so when asked which way he’s leaning.

“We don’t know where we’re going to go yet,” he says.

—

Blue Castle » The nuclear plant must have water to keep the reactors cool, just as coal- and gas-fired plants do. The Kane County Water Conservancy District has agreed to lease 29,600 acre-feet of water per year to Blue Castle. San Juan County has offered to lease 24,000 acre-feet. And Blue Castle would use all of it if Jones approves the water-rights change and the company is successful in licensing and building its 3,000 megawatt plant. None of the water would be returned to the river.