The Salton Sea spreads across a remote valley in California’s lower Colorado Desert, 40 miles (65 kilometers) from the Mexican border. For birds migrating along the Pacific coast, it’s an avian Grand Central Station. In midwinter tens of thousands of snow geese, ducks, pelicans, gulls and other species forage on and around the lake. Hundreds of other species nest there year-round or use it as a rest stop during spring and fall migration. At the dawn of the 20th century, this massive oasis didn’t even exist. It was created in 1905 when Colorado River floodwaters breached an irrigation canal under construction in Southern California and flowed…
Category: Commentaries
Arizona thinks ocean desalination will bring it the water it needs. It won’t – Robert Glennon and Brent M. Haddad
Opinion: There are far cheaper and more secure options to find new water for Arizona than desalinating ocean water from the Sea of Cortez. The allure of seawater desalination seems irresistible. All that ocean water just waiting to have the salt removed and be delivered to your tap. It can be done, but there are three hurdles: It’s costly. It’s energy intensive. And it creates a need to dispose of the leftover salt. Gov. Doug Ducey’s State of the State address in January, followed by enactment of Senate Bill1740 in July, pledges more than $1 billion over three years to…
Salton Sea’s fate is dependent upon the Imperial Irrigation District – Robert Glennon and Brent M. Haddad
On Sept. 30 the Independent Review Panel set up by California’s Salton Sea Management Program issued its final report. SSMP charged the panel with evaluating proposals to import water to the Salton Sea. In the end, the panel did not endorse any of the 18 proposals. The panel found that the key issue is not the size of the sea, it’s the salinity, which is nearly twice that of the ocean and getting worse. A smaller sea can achieve the principal objectives of salinity reduction, environmental restoration and regional air quality improvement. First, the state should embark as soon as…
Robert Glennon Opines: ‘If You Live in New York City, Why Should You Care What Happens to the Colorado River?’
Guest post from Robert Glennon, Regents Professor Emeritus at the University of Arizona College of Law and author of Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What To Do About It and his first book Water Follies: Groundwater Pumping and the Fate of America's Fresh Waters. He is also a co-author if the Brookings report Shopping for Water: How the Market Can Mitigate Water Shortages in the American West. I first met Robert at an NGWA meeting in Orlando in the early 2000s where he keynoted. Imagine speaking about his popular (not technical) book before a bunch of groundwater scientists and engineers at their annual conference! What hubris! He had us…
Rethinking a finite resource
National Hockey League teams in the United States and Canada annually use 300 million gallons of water to operate their arenas. Most facilities use a surprising amount of water. Yet facility managers, much like everyone else, might take water for granted. When people turn on the tap in the morning, out comes a limitless supply of high-quality water for less than the cost of cell phone service or cable television. Most people think that water is like air, infinite and inexhaustible. On the contrary, it is finite and exhaustible. Even though water is critical to the operations of facilities, most…
A water strategy for the parched West: Have cities pay farmers to install more efficient irrigation systems
“Are you going to run out of water?” is the first question people ask when they find out I’m from Arizona. The answer is that some people already have, others soon may and it’s going to get much worse without dramatic changes. Unsustainable water practices, drought and climate change are causing this crisis across the U.S. Southwest. States are drawing less water from the Colorado River, which supplies water to 40 million people. But levels in Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the river’s two largest reservoirs, have dropped so low so quickly that there is a serious risk of one or both…
What is dead pool? A water expert explains
Journalists reporting on the status and future of the Colorado River are increasingly using the phrase “dead pool.” It sounds ominous. And it is. Dead pool occurs when water in a reservoir drops so low that it can’t flow downstream from the dam. The biggest concerns are Lake Powell, behind Glen Canyon Dam on the Utah-Arizona border, and Lake Mead, behind Hoover Dam on the Nevada-Arizona border. These two reservoirs, the largest in the U.S., provide water for drinking and irrigation and hydroelectricity to millions of people in Nevada, Arizona and California. Some media reports incorrectly define dead pool as the point at…
Water is cheap…should it be?
SYLVIE DOUGLIS, BYLINE: NPR. (SOUNDBITE OF DROP ELECTRIC SONG, "WAKING UP TO THE FIRE") SALLY HERSHIPS, HOST: All this week, we are talking about water or the lack of it. The climate crisis means intense heat, drier weather and drought, and today at least one uncontained fire, which is causing evacuations in Lake Tahoe. And California and Nevada have both declared a state of emergency. But despite these extreme consequences from water scarcity, often, we do not seem to treat this incredibly valuable commodity with the respect it deserves. ROBERT GLENNON: The water for your flush toilet is something you…
As Colorado River Basin states confront water shortages, it’s time to focus on reducing demand
The U.S. government announced its first-ever water shortage declaration for the Colorado River on Aug. 16, 2021, triggering future cuts in the amount of water states will be allowed to draw from the river. The Tier 1 shortage declaration followed the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s forecast that the water in Lake Mead – the largest reservoir in the U.S., located on the Arizona-Nevada border – will drop below an elevation of 1,075 feet above sea level, leaving less than 40% of its capacity, by the end of 2021. The declaration means that in January 2022 the agency will reduce water deliveries to the Lower Colorado…
Containing the Spread of COVID-19: The Importance of Continued Wastewater Testing and Surveillance
We seem to have turned a corner on COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2. Infection and death rates are way down. Multiple vaccines, developed in record time, seem to be helping. More than a hundred million American have been fully vaccinated. More than half of all Americans have received at least one dose. But this horrible virus and accompanying disease are not going away anytime soon. We're nowhere near herd immunity. The delta variant is more infectious and virulent. Pockets of resistance to getting vaccinated exist for various reasons, including fear and mistrust. More than a dozen European countries suspended the use…