If you are in the desert and need water to live and survive how much will you pay for water.
Now every economics class uses this scenerio to drive home a point of the law of supply and demand and also the utility price level.
Well let's talk water utilities and water rights.

"Pickens' new company, Mesa Water, has been buying up ground water
rights in Roberts County, Texas -- 200,000 acres in all. He says that over a
30-year period, he expects to make more than $1 billion on his investment of
$75 million."

Pickens wants to take the water from the Ogallala Aquifer and pump about
200,000 acre-feet of groundwater annually to El Paso, Lubbock, San
Antonio or Dallas-Fort Worth -- for a price, of course.
Pickens has no qualms about charging people for water and has a ready quip
for those who think it wrong to do so: "I know what people say -- water's a
lot like air. Do you charge for air? 'Course not; you shouldn't charge for
water," says he. "Well, OK, watch what happens. You won't have any
water."

Pickens is right. Many others are coming to the realization that water is too
cheap. Hence, water rights are a great buy today.
Continued.

PICO owns 134,130 acre-feet of water rights in Nevada and Arizona, plus a
small amount in Colorado.

In the pipeline, so to speak, the company seeks approval for an additional
42,800 acre-feet of water in its Nevada lands. The company is constantly
looking to acquire new water rights. It does this by legally establishing
water rights in property it already owns, or by purchasing outright already
established legal water rights.

Just on the strength of the water rights alone, I think PICO merits a
place in your portfolio.

T. Boone Pickens thinks he's going to make his next billion in water rights.
That's a pretty strong endorsement that maybe you should take a look at
water rights too.