We ended up with 1.2 million acre feet of water flowing down the Rio Grande past Albuquerque this year, according to my quick and dirty calculations based on the USGS Central Avenue gauge. That would be the biggest flow through town since 1995. That’s 42 percent above the long term mean (this gauge’s data goes …
New Mexico has dithered long enough in its efforts to build a federally funded Gila River diversion, Interior Assistant Secretary Tim Petty said in a letter to state officials today: More from the Silver City Daily Press.
As has become my December tradition, I’m in a Las Vegas hotel room preparing for this year’s meeting of the Colorado River Water Users Association/finishing up grading my University of New Mexico Water Resources students’ final papers for the just-finished semester. This year’s class – our introductory course for graduate students in our Masters of …
So happy to be a part of this.
We’re closing out 2019 with big flows on the Rio Grande through Albuquerque – at least big for this time of year. Flow at the Albuquerque gauge Friday topped 2,000 cubic feet per second, setting a record for Nov. 29 at a gauge that goes back to the mid-1960s. A couple hundred of those cubic …
Continue reading ‘On New Mexico’s Rio Grande, the biggest year since 1995’ »
Water policy folks in other western states may yawn at this, but in New Mexico it’s a big deal. The New Mexico Office of the State Engineer has approved the state’s first instream flow water right. Here’s a summary from Audubon, the group that put the deal together, explaining how it works. The deal would …
Continue reading ‘Historic New Mexico Instream Flow Right Approved’ »
I look forward every year to the annual gathering of the New Mexico Water Dialogue. It’s always a great meeting – the speakers etc. But even more so, it’s a great gathering of our version of “the network” – the diverse collection of folks across cultures and geographies in our state who understand the importance …
Continue reading ‘Building resilience in New Mexico water – Water Dialogue meeting, Jan. 9’ »
If we’re not allowed to divert some of this water, then Arizona continues to get it all, and they become wealthier and wealthier as time goes by. That’s Darr Shannon, head of the government entity hoping to build a diversion to take water out of New Mexico’s bits of the Gila River. From a fascinating …
Continue reading ‘How resentment of Arizona drives New Mexico water policy’ »