Nevada journalist George Knapp has a wacky suggestion for Pat Mulroy on her way out the door at the Southern Nevada Water Authority: [I]t is still possible for Mulroy to make a grand, parting gesture by starting the ball rolling on a plan to drain Lake Powell…. This’d make an excellent final chapter for my …
Continue reading ‘Pat Mulroy, the Hayduke of the 21st century’ »
Back in the 1980s, a researcher named Lawrence Hamilton (gated JSTOR paper here) studied water use and conservation behavior among the residents of 431 homes in Concord, New Hampshire. Concord’s a classic case – a slow, steady population increase putting pressure on supply that’s manageable during wet times but that became a problem in 1980, …
Continue reading ‘Vegas: It’s easier to conserve water if you’ve been wasting a lot to begin with’ »
Henry Brean reports on lawn removal efforts in Las Vegas, Nev.: Since the turf rebate program was launched in 1999, it has paid out $189 million in rebates and helped eliminate more than 167 million square-feet of thirsty grass, saving an estimated 9 billion gallons of water per year. Translated: a reduction of approximately 4,000 …
Continue reading ‘Municipal and agricultural use of Colorado River water: a comparison’ »
With Lake Mead water levels dropping, Pat Mulroy is in a race against Mother Nature. That’s how the risks facing by Las Vegas, Nev., were framed this week in a piece in The Henderson Press. But as one of the members of my water geek brain trust, Phil King, likes to point out, reservoir levels …
Henry Brean on Pat Mulroy, arguably the most significant water manager in the Colorado River Basin: She got her bachelor’s degree from UNLV, then stayed on to earn her master’s in German literature. Laugh if you will, she said, but “it’s a great study in human nature, and it’s a great study in political theory.”
Here’s Henry Brean: Long-time Southern Nevada Water Authority chief Pat Mulroy is preparing to retire but won’t make a formal announcement until “she’s ready,” Clark County Commissioner Steve Sisolak said Monday. And Conor Shine: Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager Pat Mulroy is planning to retire after 22 years on the job. Reached Monday evening, …
Lake Como, the Italian lake on which the real village of Bellagio sits, averages 42 inches of rain per year. The Las Vegas, NV, replica averages less than 5 inches. But they built a little lake thingie, and it’s got an awesome fountain:
My post last week on the Bellagio fountain and the fact that it got its water from wells originally drilled to water an old golf course drew questions. Today, we have answers. Jeffrey Prest asks: “What was the name of the old golf course?” Doug Bennett at the Southern Nevada Water Authority shared this old postcard of …
Continue reading ‘More on where the Bellagio fountain gets its water’ »
I’ve been getting this wrong. The water in the Bellagio Fountain in Las Vegas does not come from recycled sewage: The Bellagio fountains are mostly using well water that exists beneath the Bellagio landscape. That well water was used previously to maintain a golf course that previously existed there. The beauty of that is the …
Continue reading ‘Where the Bellagio Fountain’s water comes from’ »
Via Nora Reed, via Sociological Images, a particularly odd way of viewing water sustainability in Las Vegas, Nev.: As commenter Rishi noted, “Pretty much all of the water in Las Vegas is imported.” And Vegas is in the midst of an effort to import a whole lot more. Image courtesy Sociological Images, cc, some rights …