The primary purpose of the Inventory is to identify storage capacity available to the Arizona Water Banking Authority to meet its water storage goals. Inclusion of a facility in the Inventory does not equate to a commitment by the AWBA to utilize any specific facility in the future. The AWBA will continue to determine annually which facilities will be used through the development of the Annual Plan of Operation. Conversely, not including a facility in the Inventory does not preclude the AWBA from utilizing that facility in a future Annual Plan. It does, however, preclude the facility from being utilized for interstate water storage, until such time as it is included in an updated Inventory.

Water banking is one of Arizona's most important water management strategies, and its success depends on effective planning. This joint plan helps advance the objective, articulated in the intergovernmental agreement among CAP, ADWR and AWBA, to develop a coordinated and cooperative planning process that includes distribution and recovery of water stored by the AWBA.

Conventional wisdom often views the urban water sector as being among the more sensitive sectors in the arid U.S. Southwest. To test this assumption, the Climate Assessment Project for the Southwest analyzed the water budgets of five Arizona cities to determine how severe the impacts would be from the deepest one-, five-, and ten-year droughts on record. Case study sites for the analysis included the Phoenix Active Management Area, Tucson Active Management Area, Santa Cruz Active Management Area, and the Benson and Sierra Vista subwatersheds of the San Pedro River.

Research into the sensitivity and vulnerability of urban water systems in Arizona reveals that managers are more concerned about factors such as population growth projections, economic trends, and revenue flows. Reliance on groundwater resources in many cases obscures recognition of any direct impact of precipitation on water supply. Given the low level of perceived climate risk among many providers interviewed for this study, it would seem unlikely that climate information would be needed. However, pockets of sensitivity and vulnerability to climatic impacts do exist in the four study areas covered in this study.

The purpose of the Inventory is to determine whether storage facilities exist in this state to meet the water storage needs of the authority for the following ten years. The Authority approved the initial Inventory in 1997. Because additional storage facilities are continually being constructed, the Authority updates the Inventory at least once every five years. The Authority has been annually updating all new facilities that could be utilized by the Authority in its Annual Report. It is important to note that the primary purpose of the Inventory is to identify the capacity that is available for potential storage by the Authority to meet its objectives. The inclusion of a facility in the Inventory does not equate to a commitment by the Authority that the facility will be utilized for water banking purposes in the future. The Authority will continue to determine annually which facilities will be used through the development of an Annual Plan of Operation. Conversely, a facility that is not included in the Inventory may be utilized in a future Annual Plan of Operation.