78.33 percent of the United States is in “not drought or abnormally dry” conditions in this week’s Drought Monitor. That’s the best we’ve seen since June 2010. In writing this note, I am reminded of the linguistic dilemma posed by our lack of a good word for “not drought”.
Amid the Colorado River water management attention last week rightly focused on the fact that a wet winter in the Upper Basin means a big release this year from Lake Powell to help refill Lake Mead, I missed another bit of business that may be even more important. The Bureau of Reclamation’s planning model is …
Continue reading ‘declining Lower Colorado River Basin water use’ »
Lovely Felicity Barringer piece on our language of water. My favorite bit: In a bone-dry landscape like the Navajo reservation at the corner of Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico, water names proliferated. Places like Tohatchi and Toadlena, New Mexico or Tonolea, and Tolani Lakes, Arizona, begin with tó, the Navajo word for water.
Riding my bike late this morning, I stopped to admire a roadrunner in the trail. As you can see from the picture, it’s a ratty bit of trail (Gritty? We have more words for the sublime than the mundane.) flanked by the freeway to the north and a treeline to the south bordering old farm …
My friend and collaborator Becky Bixby, a University of New Mexico biologist and the associate director of our Water Resources Program (she is our program’s science brain), on why she wasn’t at the March For Science yesterday: UNM’s Becky Bixby won’t be at the march. But that’s only because since the beginning of the semester, …
I’m moving out of my policy wonk comfort zone this morning, talking about The River in some new ways, about some new work I’ve been doing. It will be livestreamed, 9 a.m. MT:
Dan Elliott has details on yesterday’s USBR announcement of a 9 million acre foot release from Lake Mead: The Bureau of Reclamation, which manages dams and reservoirs on the Colorado River, said it will release 9 million acre-feet from Lake Powell, sending it down the Colorado into Lake Mead, where it will be tapped by …
Continue reading ‘Bonus water for Lake Mead, with the chance for more next year’ »
Friday’s announcement of an 85 percent California State Water Project allocation was, tentatively at least, good news for Lake Mead. When the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California gets a small supply from up north via the State Water Project, it needs more Colorado River water. Conversely, with a big State Water Project supply coming …
Happy to report that my book, Water is for Fighting Over and Other Myths About Water in the West, has received a Gold Medal in the “IPPYs”.
The University of New Mexico water posse had a great visit yesterday with Christopher Scott, the new director of the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the University of Arizona. Scott spoke a couple of times and met with students at our Community and Regional Planning program, who have been doing a lot …