The utility of a model is seldom in its ability to deliver a precise value but rather in whether it provides an improved understanding of a system that would not have existed in its absence. – Kevin Wheeler, Modeling to Support Water Management Negotiations
We identified fallowed land—an unplanted agricultural land parcel—as a key anthropogenic dust source in California. Specifically, we find that the Central Valley accounts for about 77% of total fallowed land areas in California, where they are associated with about 88% of major anthropogenic dust events. We also find that the geographic coverage of these fallowed …
Total flow to date on the Rio Grande at Otowi is the lowest since 1964. Otowi is the place where the river leaves the upper valleys and enters the canyons that lie at the head of the valley of Albuquerque, what we in New Mexico call the “Middle Rio Grande.” The graph shows total …
Continue reading ‘The driest year on New Mexico’s Middle Rio Grande since 1964’ »
A bunch of odds and ends cluttering my brain, blog posts that are half written in my mind that are in the way: Quoting Luis Villa on accessing the open data commons We’ve been talking about open data for a long time, but since using data is hard to consume and manipulate, open data has …
Continue reading ‘“the nearest thing I have seen to being true”’ »
By Eric Kuhn, Anne Castle, John Fleck, Kathryn Sorensen, Jack Schmidt, and Katherine Tara As negotiators for the seven Colorado River Basin states rapidly approach Reclamation’s November deadline for providing a framework for a seven-state agreement for the Post-2026 Operating Guidelines for Lakes Powell and Mead, a larger threat looms. Reclamation’s recently released September 24-Month …
Props to the artists who tagged the vacant Two Park Central Tower at Central and San Mateo in Albuquerque. I like to think Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer would approve. I noticed the art today while out on my morning dérive, walking and riding my bike through one of the weirder and more interesting neighborhoods …
Enrique Romero joins Rin and I on Water Matters to discuss acequias and querencia. (This podcast thing is a blast!)
Autumnal equinox news briefs: I was on the phone in the front room of our house yesterday evening, facing east, as the setting sun dropped beneath the clouds after a short burst of rain. Rainbow. And the conversation, with the cousin of an old friend who died earlier this year, was rich. The Rio Grande …
Continue reading ‘A rainbow, a river, and the first cranes of fall’ »
Deepening and widening of stream channels in the Southwest is a phenomenon that has taken place within the memory of men now living. It began at different dates from 1860 on and has progressed at different rates on several streams, as summarized in a recent paper.²? The flood plains of numerous minor streams are yet …