Nestle Waters North America Inc. is gearing up for a major expansion of its Michigan water bottling business with a plan that targets some of the area's most treasured river systems.

Nestle, which bottles water in Michigan under the Ice Mountain label, currently bottles about 270 million gallons of spring water annually at its sprawling facility in Stanwood, company officials said. That water comes from underground springs in rural Mecosta County and the city of Evart's municipal water system.

Nestle is seeking state permission to pump 70 million gallons of spring water annually from the headwaters of two trout streams that flow into the Muskegon River near Evart in Osceola County. If approved, that project would reduce the annual flow of the Muskegon River by 70 million gallons, according to company documents.

Nestle also is considering seeking permission to pump millions of gallons of spring water each month from a site in Newaygo County's Monroe Township that is the headwaters of the White and Pere Marquette rivers.

Anglers, environmentalists and property owners in the White and Pere Marquette watersheds are up in arms over Nestle's bid to pump groundwater from natural springs that feed those rivers.

"We have to take a stand; we can't look the other way," said Tom Thompson, chairman of the White River Watershed Partnership. "This is just not right."

Nestle officials said they are careful to ensure their water pumping doesn't adversely affect the environment, and that the company needs new drilling sites so existing wells don't dry up.

Nestle will conduct a series of well tests over the next several months that will determine whether it seeks state approval to pump groundwater from the natural springs in Monroe Township.

"The location -- a 460-acre property in Monroe Township -- is an attractive source of water for several reasons," Ice Mountain officials said in a recent letter to property owners near the proposed pumping site.

"It has significant water resources, both underground and in the White River," according to the company's letter. "This is important because a water withdrawal at this site would be unlikely to adversely affect the environment."

Because the White and Pere Marquette rank among Michigan's best trout streams, Nestle's plans could further escalate the raging controversy over water bottling in Michigan.

The White is a state-designated "Natural River" and the Pere Marquette is a federally designated "Wild and Scenic River." Those designations afford the rivers more protections than most rivers in Michigan.

"It's not an issue about the amount of water they want to pump -- it's a question of saying yes or no," said Dick Schwikert, a member of the Pere Marquette Watershed Council board of directors. "We don't want any water taken from the watershed."

Neither the Pere Marquette Watershed Council nor the White River Watershed Partnership has taken a formal position on Nestle's proposal.

Many Monroe Township residents, however, are opposed, township Supervisor Joe Catalano said.

"I haven't heard any positive comments about the proposed Ice Mountain water withdrawal -- it's all been negative comments," Catalano said.

Nestle officials will explain their plans at a Jan. 10 public meeting at the Monroe Township Hall.

Officials from the state Department of Environmental Quality, which has the final say on all water withdrawal projects in Michigan, said they will make a decision on Nestle's proposed Osceola County well in January, and then take public comment on that ruling.

A Nestle study concluded that that proposal -- pumping 70 million gallons of water from the headwaters of Chippewa and Twin creeks, two trout streams that flow into the Muskegon River near Evart -- would not harm the streams or the river.

Critics alleged that Nestle wants to further exploit groundwater, which they said is a public resource owned collectively by the people of Michigan.

Nestle officials countered that Michigan's water is a commodity that is subject to commercial use, just as water is used to make beer, soda pop, shampoo, baby food or other food products.

"From a scientific perspective, an ecosystem doesn't care where the water that is withdrawn ends up -- it doesn't care if the water goes in a bottle of shampoo, a soft drink or a bottle of water," said Gregory Fox, Nestle's Midwest natural resource manager.

"Ecosystems only care about a water withdrawal if it has an effect on them."

Company spokeswoman Deb Muchmore said Nestle wants to develop more water wells so that it can meet increased demand for Ice Mountain spring water without harming nearby surface waters.

"We want to ensure that we have sufficient water supply to meet the needs of our growing business," Nestle officials said in the letter to Monroe Township residents. "By using water from multiple and diverse sources, each of them remain sustainable for the support of the ecosystem and for everyone's use."

Nestle's existing Ice Mountain bottling facility south of Big Rapids has divided the community since opening in 2001.

Company officials said the bottling plant supplies a product consumers demand and created 250 well-paying jobs at a factory that boosts the local economy without polluting the environment.

Nestle plans to announce in late 2007 where it will build a second water bottling plant. That facility will be built either in Evart, northeast of Big Rapids, or at a site in Indiana, Muchmore said.

Muchmore said the new bottling plant will be the same size as the Stanwood facility, which spans 739,000 square feet, cost $150 million to build and cranks out about a half billion individual bottles of water annually, according to company reports.

Critics portrayed Nestle, already the world's largest water bottler, as a corporation driven by greed.

"This is a carpet-bagging foreign company that wants to bottle our water and send the profits back to Switzerland (where Nestle's world headquarters are located)," said Jay Peasley, a member of the White River Watershed Partnership.

Mecosta County resident Terry Swier, who heads a citizen group that fought Nestle's Stanwood bottling plant in the courts, said she is appalled that the company would seek to expand its operations while its legal battle still is pending before the Michigan Supreme Court.

"I'm in shock, this is so disgusting and so discouraging," said Swier, who heads the Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation, or MCWC. "I don't think they should be pursuing new well sites when their case is still in the courts."

Swier's group sued Nestle in Mecosta County Circuit Court in 2001, claiming the company's water wells harmed surface waters downstream. MCWC won in circuit court, but the Michigan Court of Appeals reversed the lower court's ruling that landowners along surface waters had water rights that superseded Nestle's.

After a protracted legal battle, the two sides reached a compromise that allowed Ice Mountain to pump 114 million gallons of spring water annually from beneath a Mecosta County hunting preserve called The Sanctuary.

In 2005, the MCWC asked the state Supreme Court to overturn the appellate court ruling because, Swier said, a Nestle court victory would open the door to more water bottling operations in Michigan. The Supreme Court is now reviewing whether MCWC has legal standing in its lawsuit against Nestle.

Noah Hall, a Wayne State University law professor and expert on water use, said the court likely will not answer the major debate surrounding the bottled water industry.

"The $64,000 question is whether a private company can bottle and sell a public resource for a profit," Hall said. "That's really the heart of the legal, political and emotional debate surrounding bottled water."

Hall said there is no state or federal law that defines whether bottling pure water is any different, legally speaking, than pumping water out of the ground and using it as an ingredient in other beverages or food products.

"It's because we have this uncertainty in the law that these legal issues become cultural debates," Hall said.