From the Paris Review, poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s journal of his 1961 visit to El Centro and the Salton Sea: Even at the Salton Sea, the face of death has its smile. In the morning the wind is still blowing but the sun is bright, and life is stirring. Even at the bottom of a well, there’s …
Continue reading ‘That time Lawrence Ferlinghetti visited the Salton Sea’ »
I sometimes think that, in trying to understand the impacts of drought, we pay too much attention to the water numbers. It’s not that it doesn’t matter how much is in the reservoir, or is being pumped from the ground, but it’s only the first link in the chain of impacts. California economist Jeff Michael …
Continue reading ‘Despite drought, California farm employment rising’ »
The Southern Nevada Water Authority’s board will take up a proposal this Thursday to ship 150,000 acre feet of Las Vegas’s unused Colorado River water to Southern California to help out during California’s epic drought. The water will help the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California make up for shortfalls in its supplies from Northern …
The question of what is included in the “Colorado River Basin” is in part a legal one. The seven-state Colorado River Compact of 1922 defined a weird legal geography: [T]he term “Colorado River Basin” means all of the drainage area of the Colorado River System and all other territory within the United States of America …
Continue reading ‘Grand Junction: A view from higher up in the watershed’ »
Mike Cohen, writing for National Geographic’s “Water Currents”, explains what’s at stake in the current discussions over what to do to mitigate reduced flows to the Salton Sea as ag water conservation efforts in Imperial Valley grow: The shrinking Salton Sea will expose tens of thousands of acres of lakebed. The dry lakebed could emit …
Continue reading ‘Cohen sees signs for Salton Sea optimism’ »
Just when I think I’ve got the Colorado River Basin’s problems all sorted out, I keep bumping up against this crazy Salton Sea thing. This USDA Cropscape landcover map really nicely illustrates the geography of the thing. The brightly colored bits are the irrigated agriculture of the Imperial Irrigation District. Agricultural runoff flows to the …
Continue reading ‘California names someone to solve the Salton Sea mess’ »
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’ »
“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’ »
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’ »