In March, President Obama nominated New Mexican Estevan López, who at the time was head of the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission, to head the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. It was a big deal in a number of ways, not least of which was that, in replacing Mike Connor, López would be the second New Mexican …
“The average daily water consumption across the south east in November 2014 was 190 litres per person per day. This is a stark contrast to consumption levels before the millennium drought, when the region’s residents were using an average of 330 litres per person per day.” That’s Queensland, Australia. To translate to U.S. measures, that’s …
Excited to see Cynthia Barnett’s Rain: A Natural and Cultural History, is now available for pre-order, which means we don’t have to wait too much longer. (If you have time to kill between now and then, may I recommend Blue Revolution: Unmaking America’s Water Crisis?)
Even with the release of extra water from upstream reservoirs, Lake Mead outside Las Vegas is forecast to continue dropping in 2015 and into 2016, according to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s latest monthly “24-Month Study” (pdf). At this point, as Lake Mead drifts deeper into record emptiness, it goes without saying that the big …
Continue reading ‘As Lake Mead drops, Las Vegas plays the long game’ »
The best part of doing this story was standing by the Rio Grande at dusk with Chris Witt, watching the sandhill cranes fly in to roost. The birds were great, but the really extraordinary part was watching Chris watch them – eyes flitting, counting, listening and hearing. As they flew by, they announced their presence …
Continue reading ‘Stuff I wrote elsewhere about deceptive bird sex’ »
So the folks at Island Press will be publishing my book, tentatively titled Beyond the Water Wars, about the problems facing the Colorado River Basin and how we might fix them. I couldn’t be happier. Its basic themes will be familiar to readers of this blog – the end of the age of fat reservoirs and full …
Continue reading ‘Coming, not quite so soon: Beyond the Water Wars’ »
The International Boundary and Water Commission today released its initial science report (pdf) on this spring’s Colorado River pulse flow. A few key bits: When you add water, stuff grows. Satellite imagery in June ’14 compared to a year earlier showed a 36 percent increase in the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index. The NDVI increased in all …
Continue reading ‘First Colorado delta pulse flow science findings’ »
David Zetland really cares about water policy, and he wants you to think better about it: I confess that I’m not a fan of the “educate the general public” model of water policy problem solving, which might seem odd given my profession as a journalist. That’s an “educate the general public” job, right? But …