Desalination of seawater along the coasts is the west’s water supply backstop, the reason we won’t in the worst case scenarios abandon southwestern cities. The water is very expensive as compared to the current system of dams, canals, pipes and pumps, but it’s cheaper that bailing out of the region entirely. So what does this …
Chris Brooks notes the good news: Lake Mead is finally beginning to climb. At this writing, its surface elevation is at 1082.30, after dropping below 1082 during the last week of November. And DG points us to some other good news. That’s snow pack as of Friday in the Upper Colorado River Basin. Those of …
From the morning paper (sub/ad req) a look at the rising costs (four to seven-fold) and long delays (being generous, nine years) facing a proposed plutonium lab at Los Alamos: Among the most vocal critics of the agency’s nuclear project management are a cadre of retired nuclear weapons experts. “This is mismanagement,” said Bob Peurifoy, …
Continue reading ‘Stuff I Wrote Elsewhere: Nuke Costs Rising’ »
Residents of the arid southwestern US like to think we’re the ones who know drought. But drought’s a relative thing – not how dry it is in absolute terms, but in comparison to what you’re used to. Take New Orleans, for example, which received 2.75 inches in rain in November. Here in Albuquerque, that would …
To Emily Green’s monthly dirge to document as well as accompany the declining levels of Lake Mead, I would add this: Mead’s end-of-October surface elevation, 1081.94 feet above sea level, was 1.31 feet below the level forecast just a month ago. Recall that 1075 is the trigger level for the first lower basin shortage declaration, …
I got a sad note today from a friend who recently lost his beloved HP 15C calculator: It had worked flawlessly for 28 years. One set of batteries lasts 7 years or more. One key was getting a bit worn. Dropped a few times, of course. A relic of what the U.S. could once do.
In which I spend my morning observing the construction of a tumbleweed snowman: (We also made a video. Story coming in tomorrow’s newspaper, too. We take this shit seriously, and did I mention I have the best job? Ever?)
Via Patricia McBroom, a fascinating look at a group studying tree rings in the redwoods along the Northern California coast for clues about climate: The plan is to chart the health of the trees over time and use laboratory analysis of carbon and oxygen isotopes to figure out how the trees have reacted in the …
As we enter a new era of U.S. fiscal austerity, in which some members of Congress push to foreswear the dreaded “earmark” (pork barrel funding), Kitty Felde points out the importance of the practice in western water development: In Congress, seniority is power. Senate historian Donald Ritchie says small states re-elect incumbents more often than …
When I was in Nevada last month, I heard from a number of lay people that the answer to a shrinking Lake Mead was simple: stop hoarding water upstream in Lake Powell. Henry Brean did a nice job today of explaining why it ain’t that simple – that the current lake levels (as of today …
Continue reading ‘It’s not as simple as just releasing more water from Lake Powell’ »