That long, painful drip-drip-drip of “when will we have Lower Colorado River shortage?” has been pushed out again, with a new set of modeling runs from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation putting the odds at one in five in 2017 and 50-50 by 2018. Hidden in that “one in five” next year is some good …
Continue reading ‘One in five chance of Colorado River shortage in 2017, 50-50 by 2018’ »
This is something we’ve seen in Albuquerque over the last two decades of remarkable municipal water conservation success: revenue shortfalls with the old business model of selling water and, ickier, a change in what my UNM colleague Bruce Thomson calls “turd mechanics”. Matt Stevens in the LA Times: Shorter showers, more efficient toilets and other …
Continue reading ‘Water conservation = less water to move our poo’ »
I’ve begun putting scare quotes around “retirement” for some of my University of New Mexico water mentors. To that list, add Cliff Dahm, the ecologist and Inkstain brain trust member whose “retirement” party in May paved the way for this: SACRAMENTO – Dr. Clifford Dahm, an internationally recognized expert in aquatic ecology, climatology, restoration biology, …
Continue reading ‘Cliff Dahm returns to Sacramento to help sort out the delta mess’ »
The Imperial Irrigation District’s board tomorrow will consider an expanded agreement with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California that would provide additional flexibility for water conservation in the big desert agricultural district and move water to meet near term drought response needs in the region’s coastal cities. The deal uses the “Intentionally Created Surplus” …
Continue reading ‘Another Southern California ag to municipal water sharing deal takes shape’ »
The book’s going well, thanks for asking. See below. What motivates me In my new gig as a university lecturer, my colleague and co-teacher Bob Berrens has the gray old faculty members (there are three of us) talk to the students on the opening day of class about what motivates us. It is the first …
“Resilience”, as defined by these folks, is a useful framework for understanding drought and water management. The goal is a system that can withstand shock and retain its basic structure and function. For example by that metric, as Charles Fishman has pointed out, California during the current drought has demonstrated resilience. New Orleans and Katrina …
Continue reading ‘In pursuit of resilience, it helps to be rich’ »
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”’ »