From the work blog, a quick look at how the Storms of the Decade have been playing out in terms of western snowpack. In short: it’s raining like hell where all the people live, but the upper Colorado Basin, which feeds Lake Powell, has been pretty much left out with the exception of a blast …
Continue reading ‘Stuff I Wrote Elsewhere: The Storms, the Snowpack’ »
The folks at the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation have crunched the numbers on how the latest 2010 Colorado River runoff forecast will affect the river’s major storage reservoirs, and the news is not good for Lake Mead. At this point, according to the Bureau of Reclamation, there is just a one in five chance that …
Continue reading ‘Chances of Extra Water for Mead Diminish’ »
Tony Davis reports in this morning’s Arizona Daily Star that the Central Arizona Project could see a shortage in its Colorado River allocation by 2012: For decades, most water experts have expected the Central Arizona Project to eventually run short, as population growth outstripped the supply of the Colorado River that long ago was over-allocated …
Continue reading ‘Arizona Could See Colorado Shortage by 2012’ »
The January Colorado River forecast for 2009-10, out last Friday, is the lowest at this point in the year since 2002-03: The range of uncertainty right now is enormous. In an average year, about 8 million acre feet flows into Lake Powell in the April-July period, which is the peak of the runoff season. This …
It has long been apparent that the water supply of the Colorado is inadequate for all the demands that will be made upon it, as is the case with many other streams in the West. That is G.E.P. Smith of the University of Arizona, writing in the Proceedings of the American Society of Civil Engineers …
As an addendum to Emily Green’s year-end look at Lake Mead (High good, low bad) I’d like to extend the analysis back a bit farther in time. Emily points out that, while population has risen over the past decade in the region served by Mead (one of the two large storage reservoirs on the Colorado), …
David Zetland posted on the Salton Sea today, arguing that we should just give it up: Today’s Salton “Sea” is NOT natural. It’s replenished by irrigation runoff, of dubious quality. As water evaporates, it leaves behind higher concentrations of salts and other nasty stuff. Time to dry out the Salton Toilet, clean up the mess …
Pat Mulroy on how Las Vegas (Nevada) plans to meet its long term water needs – desal! I know, I know, you’re saying, “But don’t you have to be by, like, an ocean or something?” Here’s the scheme: build big desal plant down on the Gulf of California, give that water to Mexico to meet …
Continue reading ‘Pat Mulroy on How Vegas Plans to Do It: Desal, Baby!’ »
From Shaun McKinnon, a must-read story for water geeks on Arizona’s thinking about its water future – specifically where to get more (or use less?): Drop 2 is no Lake Mead, the huge reservoir outside Las Vegas that holds Colorado River water until cities and farms in Arizona, Nevada and California need it. The new …
It’s far too early in the season to draw any conclusions regarding 2010 runoff. The first serious forecasts don’t come out until January, and with months of snowmaking weather still to come, no one takes the January forecast terribly seriously. But this is a blog, so I won’t let that stop me. Currently, the NRCS …