Beneficial use
The recognized purpose a water right is put to — irrigation, municipal, industrial, mining, domestic, livestock, recreation or environmental — which both defines and limits the right.
Beneficial use is often described as the measure and the limit of a water right. You hold the right only to the extent you actually put the water to the stated use; water diverted and wasted is not protected, and in most states an unused right can eventually be forfeited.
Beneficial use also constrains what you can do with a right you buy. Converting an irrigation right to industrial or municipal use is a change application that requires state approval and frequently a no-injury showing to other users. That approval process, not the purchase price, is often the real risk in a water acquisition.
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