The colorado river is in crisis, and it's getting worse every day (Cortez: ski resorts, real estate)

[Colorado Rambler]

The Colorado River is in crisis — one deepening by the day.

It is a powerhouse: a 1,450-mile waterway that stretches from the Rocky Mountains to the Sea of Cortez, serving 40 million people in seven U.S. states, 30 federally recognized tribes and Mexico. It hydrates 5 million acres of agricultural land and provides critical habitat for rare fish, birds and plants.

But the Colorado’s water was overpromised when it was first allocated a century ago. Demand in the fast-growing Southwest exceeds supply, and it is growing even as supply drops amid a climate change-driven megadrought and rising temperatures.

States and cities are now scrambling to forestall the gravest impacts to growth, farming, drinking water and electricity, while also aiming to protect their own interests.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/busin...-river-crisis/

This is an excellent article from the WaPo - well worth checking out. The pictures are very good as well. The seven states which formed the Colorado River Compact near the beginning of the last century are in serious trouble, and many people who live here don't even realize it.

Among other things, it is highly likely that Lake Mead will be sacrificed in order to save Lake Powell. I always thought it would be the other way around, but apparently Powell's ability to generate hydroelectric power outdoes that of Mead.

Arizona is in worse trouble than any other state except possibly California. Yet still, new housing developments continue to rise up in the desert around Phoenix. Where the water for these projects will come from is anyone's guess, but people continue to flock to the desert and throw away their money at what can only become mirages.

The same is true on Colorado's Front Range. New housing developments are popping up everywhere along with prices that seem to be aiming for the moon and beyond. Frankly, I cannot think of a worse time to buy a new home in Colorado then now. Costs have risen to impossible sums and the water which will sustain all those new developments is evaporating off into the clear blue sky thanks to climate change. And then there's the upcoming war with agricultural interests on the Western Slope. Buy your tickets now - seating will be limited!

[StealthRabbit]

Just visited Lake Mead last week.

Good time for a field trip to influence water behavior.

A reservoir near our rural Texas home is at 17% full (that's really low!, practically dry, considering the reduced storage volume at this low level. )

Crisis brewing, and soon to be realized by more than the farmers and fisheries who have been impacted for decades.

On the other hand... our PNW location has had the wettest spring on record. (Our 'normal' is 120" of drizzle / year). It was 34F and rainy this week (20 degrees below normal). Tough for pollination during full bloom (Bees are not active at cold temps)

[Ruth4Truth]

Try to post on the Arizona forum, that water scarcity is a serious concern, and you get nothing but howls of denial, and links to state government sources, saying Arizona's water supply is secure through the foreseeable future. The state government has been waging such a powerful propaganda campaign, that everyone believes beyond the shadow of a doubt, that there's nothing to worry about. It's strange, like they're living in a separate bubble from the rest of the Southwest.

[Vision67]

Originally Posted by Ruth4Truth

Try to post on the Arizona forum, that water scarcity is a serious concern, and you get nothing but howls of denial, and links to state government sources, saying Arizona's water supply is secure through the foreseeable future. The state government has been waging such a powerful propaganda campaign, that everyone believes beyond the shadow of a doubt, that there's nothing to worry about. It's strange, like they're living in a separate bubble from the rest of the Southwest.

De-Nile

It ain't just a river in Egypt.

[interloper1138]

Originally Posted by Ruth4Truth

Try to post on the Arizona forum, that water scarcity is a serious concern, and you get nothing but howls of denial, and links to state government sources, saying Arizona's water supply is secure through the foreseeable future. The state government has been waging such a powerful propaganda campaign, that everyone believes beyond the shadow of a doubt, that there's nothing to worry about. It's strange, like they're living in a separate bubble from the rest of the Southwest.

I'm curious what the average age is of the users in that sub forum. Much easier to pretend a problem doesn't exist when you know you'll probably die before it gets too bad...

[Colorado Rambler]

Originally Posted by interloper1138

I'm curious what the average age is of the users in that sub forum. Much easier to pretend a problem doesn't exist when you know you'll probably die before it gets too bad...

You have a point there and the fact that Arizona is a heavily Republican state doesn't help matters. Forbidden words like "climate change" never pass anyone's lips.

[Willy702]

This is like the Social Security is going to be bankrupt by the time I'm retired argument. Tweaks and changes have to be made BUT almost all are manageable as long as politicians and their citizens don't live in total denial. Funny you mention subdivisions being built in Arizona. Those almost all replaced farmland which requires 5x-20x more water than residential, especially in the desert with all the controls on residential developments these days. Or how about in Colorado where almost 90% of the freshwater is used by farms, with only 10% used by homes and businesses?

This is the issue with the politicization of water supply. The issues really aren't so dire from a where will we get water perspective. The issues are in things like land becoming unusable for agriculture or things like not enough snow in the mountains for ski resorts. Even worse are issues such as higher temperatures leading to more energy usage that causes a negative cycle of higher carbon usage to create that energy. Politicians instead focusing on serving all of us to balance out needs turn this into one group against another. I think we know which party most farmers vote for so is it any surprise their preferred party stalls the shift of land to residential use and the shifting of water resources to urban areas where the "other" party tends to have its strength?

[Mike from back east]

Willy said it for me.

Ag in COLO uses 90% of the water that is retained in COLO for in-state use, i.e., a lot of water in COLO flows out of the state for other states to use.

Much of that 90% is used to grow corn for feeding cattle, which is why the water footprint for a pound of beef is 1800 gallons per pound of beef we buy at the store. I've seen the spraying methods used on the cornfields in this country and those rotating arm sprayers lose a lot of water to evaporation before it even hits the ground. These wasteful methods harken back to the days where our population was half of what it now is and the aquifers were full of "old" water that took centuries to fill. But the aquifers keep shrinking, there's no plan to restore them, and all too soon they will not support millions of acres of corn.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by Willy702

This is like the Social Security is going to be bankrupt by the time I'm retired argument. Tweaks and changes have to be made BUT almost all are manageable as long as politicians and their citizens don't live in total denial. Funny you mention subdivisions being built in Arizona. Those almost all replaced farmland which requires 5x-20x more water than residential, especially in the desert with all the controls on residential developments these days. Or how about in Colorado where almost 90% of the freshwater is used by farms, with only 10% used by homes and businesses?

This is the issue with the politicization of water supply. The issues really aren't so dire from a where will we get water perspective. The issues are in things like land becoming unusable for agriculture or things like not enough snow in the mountains for ski resorts. Even worse are issues such as higher temperatures leading to more energy usage that causes a negative cycle of higher carbon usage to create that energy. Politicians instead focusing on serving all of us to balance out needs turn this into one group against another. I think we know which party most farmers vote for so is it any surprise their preferred party stalls the shift of land to residential use and the shifting of water resources to urban areas where the "other" party tends to have its strength?

Arizona has a serious problem, though, of not protecting its groundwater from overdevelopment. There's been an issue of Real Estate Investment Trusts coming in, sinking wells lower than existing communities nearby have, then using the water to build golf courses and luxury communities. Because they can afford to sink deeper wells, they end up sucking up the groundwater neighboring developments depend on. Those homes suddenly become useless, because they no longer have a water supply. People bought homes only to discover after a couple of years, that their wells have run dry.

Hopefully, the state legislature is doing something about this. It's just one more example, though an extreme one, of REITs wrecking the housing market.

The fight over water could get nasty, when corporations can come in from out of state, and commandeer water supplies with impunity.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by Mike from back east

Willy said it for me.

Ag in COLO uses 90% of the water that is retained in COLO for in-state use, i.e., a lot of water in COLO flows out of the state for other states to use.

Much of that 90% is used to grow corn for feeding cattle, which is why the water footprint for a pound of beef is 1800 gallons per pound of beef we buy at the store. I've seen the spraying methods used on the cornfields in this country and those rotating arm sprayers lose a lot of water to evaporation before it even hits the ground. These wasteful methods harken back to the days where our population was half of what it now is and the aquifers were full of "old" water that took centuries to fill. But the aquifers keep shrinking, there's no plan to restore them, and all too soon they will not support millions of acres of corn.

Water supplies in the midwest still are taken for granted, even as warnings have been sounded since the 80's, if not earlier, that large aquifers like the Ogalala, that runs mainly under much of Nebraska, Kansas and north and east Texas, is being depleted by wasteful watering methods. The only way to replenish aquifers, is to hope for sufficient precipitation. That's something that can no longer be taken for granted.