Sammy Roth, a reporter for the Desert Sun in Palm Springs, took a trip this month to Las Vegas to share with his California readers how they do the water conservation thing in urban Nevada: When it comes to saving water, Sin City has the Coachella Valley beat. Las Vegas can credit its water frugality …
Does the looming El Niño mean we can expect a big year on the Rio Grande? Not necessarily. The scatter in the data is huge, but hidden in the data is a bit of a nudge in the direction of wet: That’s native flow at Otowi, the key Rio Grande measurement point north of Albuquerque. There’s …
Brett Walton returns to Monson, Calif., to visit a community losing its water, and finds some signs of hope, but serious problems yet: An unincorporated rectangle of land in Tulare County, tiny Monson, home to no more than 200 people, became an international symbol of the rural heartache that is flowing from California’s drought wound. …
Continue reading ‘In Monson, Calif., where the drought problem is really a poverty problem’ »
Preparing for a lecture for next week for the University of New Mexico Water Resources Program class I’m co-teaching, I’m having the students read this piece by my drought guru Kelly Redmond: Most concepts of drought involve a water balance. This implies that both supply and demand must be considered, as well as the question …
Continue reading ‘In California, clarifying what we mean by “drought”’ »
Peter Gleick in the Sacramento Bee: As California swelters and burns through the fourth year of the worst drought in 1,200 years, nonpartisan and bipartisan efforts have been increasingly effective. A multibillion-dollar bond measure passed by voters last year is providing funds for drought relief and new supply and conservation programs. Water utilities are expanding …
Continue reading ‘From Peter Gleick, an optimistic take on California drought response’ »
For the first time since January 2011, none of New Mexico is classified as being in “severe drought” in this week’s Drought Monitor:
No Lower Colorado River shortage for now, but don’t break out the party hats. Lake Mead is forecast to end calendar year 2015 with a surface elevation of 1,082.33 feet above sea level, according to new numbers released yesterday by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. The current forecast for the end of 2016 is 1,079.57. …
Lissa spotted this California desert treat this morning at Trader Joe’s in Albuquerque: It’s a cantaloupe from Fisher Ranch in Blythe, Calif., owned by Bart Fisher, vice president of the Palo Verde Irrigation District board and chairman of the Colorado River Board of California. I pronounce this a fine use of senior Colorado River water …
Continue reading ‘Colorado River produce in Albuquerque (courtesy Fisher Ranch)’ »
Tony Perry in the Los Angeles Times had a good story this weekend talking about the agreement between the Palo Verde Irrigation District and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to move ag water to city use in the cities’ time of need: Next year the agreement between MWD and the Palo Verde Irrigation …
Continue reading ‘Palo Verde: what Colorado Basin water problem solving looks like’ »
This is part of a Library of Congress collection of photographs taken as part of the Historical American Engineering Record surveys, an amazing body of documentation of America’s built environment. The pictures in this LOC on line archive aren’t dated, but my best guess based on clues (a distinctive URL) is 1987. Mead was close …