Water.....

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An extraordinary drought in the West is drying up the Colorado River and draining the nation's largest reservoirs -- Lake Mead and Lake Powell. And amid the overuse of the river and the aridification of the region, the federal government is implementing new mandatory water cuts and asking states to devise a plan to save the river basin.


The federal government announced Tuesday the Colorado River will operate in a Tier 2 shortage condition for the first time starting in January as the West's historic drought has taken a severe toll on Lake Mead.

According to a new projection from the Department of the Interior, Lake Mead's water level will be below 1,050 feet above sea level come January -- the threshold required to declare a Tier 2 shortage starting in 2023.

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Is it getting real enough yet?

It is getting very grim. Wells drying up, trucking water from further away in some spots. Awaiting the next great migration East.

Is the current monsoon season going to make any real difference?

The Times seems to think y'all are gonna be under water any minute btw.

I’ve thought about starting this type of thread for a long time, so thanks for pulling the trigger.

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Originally Posted by ötzi

Is the current monsoon season going to make any real difference?

The Times seems to think y'all are gonna be under water any minute btw.

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It sure helps in the short term. It’s nice not being inundated with smoke this summer. But the groundwater and aquifers are so depleted, and the actual amount of water to be replenished would need some Noah’s Ark shit to help in one year. We need a sustained shift to bigger snowpack and regular monsoons for the next decade to start to get some real bankable water I would guess.
So yeah, we’ll be fine.

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Originally Posted by Bunion 2020

Is it getting real enough yet?

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Not until peoples faucets go dry, and then they'll finally figure it out

https://www.scottsdaleaz.gov/news/Wa...tial-customers
For some AZ folks, this shit is going to get really real, real quick like. Really.

At what point do they stop watering all the golf courses? Good bit of their economy revolves around golf so will be interesting. Once those golf courses go brown the shit has hit the fan.


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I’m all for cool southwest canyon photos from the canyons that were previously drowned for golf courses catering to fat pasty Midwest asshole fratboys

While monsoon storms can drop a lot of water in a very short time the total amount of rainfall is not enough by itself to make a serious dent. In the lower basin in particular a lot of the monsoon water runs off into the sand or evaporates and never makes it to a reservoir or an acquifer. The water that fills Lakes Mead and Powell comes from year round precipitation in the Rockies and Colorado Plateau.

Anyone know how much water the golf courses in the lower basin states use? I’m curious if golf courses alone are enough to make up the 2-4 M acre feet they need to cut.


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Another culprit behind the megadrought: Big Ag. In the West, thirsty farms abound. Agriculture makes up 80% of California’s water use, most of it industrial. We see this pattern in other Western states like New Mexico and Oregon, too.

The West’s agriculture industries are so thirsty in part due to water-intensive crops that aren’t suited for our dry climate. Of California’s 80% freshwater used for agriculture, 20% goes to water-intensive tree nuts. 60% of these crops, like almonds and pistachios, are exported abroad.

Similarly, 16% of that agricultural water goes to growing alfalfa — another water intensive crop, some of which is exported. In New Mexico, it’s the same story: Big Ag uses scarce water resources to grow alfalfa for hay, 30% of which it exports.

Much of what Big Ag doesn’t export, it uses to support factory farms. These operations also suck up large amounts of water while causing massive amounts of water and air pollution.

In Oregon, there are 11 mega-dairies with over 2500 cows each. Combined, they consume 8.2 million gallons of water a day just for drinking and washing. This doesn’t even include the water used to grow feed. All this water could meet the average daily indoor water needs of over 124,000 Oregonians.

In New Mexico, mega-dairies (500 head or more) use over 32 million gallons a day. And in California, mega-dairies use a whopping 142 million gallons a day. That’s enough water for every resident of San Diego and San Jose combined.

At the same time, factory farms produce huge amounts of waste, polluting air and water and contributing to climate change. Those 11 Oregon mega-dairies produce emissions equivalent to that of 318,000 passenger vehicles.

^Ding ding ding

Technologically speaking, modern day agriculture might as well be taking notes from the stone age playbook.


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The corporate interests in Ag with keep convincing the masses to turn off the faucet while brushing your teeth. The puffy coat mafia will continue with their outrage about the actions of others. And so it goes.

Make sure your water district has a good attorney. Consider punching in another well. I love cheeseburgers as much as the next guy but its not really a good use of water. Ranchers will keep selling their water rights downstream but wet water will be the problem.

Anyone wanna buy some land in St. George?

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Originally Posted by SkiBall

https://www.scottsdaleaz.gov/news/Wa...tial-customers
For some AZ folks, this shit is going to get really real, real quick like. Really.

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from what I understand from people who follow this saga, this cut for AZ was agreed upon by AZ in 2007, and then the agreement was modified in 2019. So this is no surprise to anyone managing water in AZ. AZ didn’t submit plans on time on what they are going to do to cut back water, and are seeing what the government will do about it, if anything. The headlines make it seem this cut all came out of nowhere due to drought. Which is not exactly how it went down.

so what happens if AZ doesn’t cut back enough but says they will cut back what they are asked to? And will the water levels of lake Powell drop so hydropower stops with cuts, no matter what the government tries to do by 2023 or 2024?

Also ski balls - your link is about tier 1 cutbacks. That’s old news we are now dealing with their 2 cutbacks.

But hey, you live close to good skiing and mtn biking besides golf courses amirite?

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Originally Posted by muted reborn

I’ve thought about starting this type of thread for a long time, so thanks for pulling the trigger.

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https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...612-Water-2018

If you are interested in how the conversation actually goes down, this would be a pretty good place to start https://www.coloradoriverdistrict.or...water-seminar/ Not ironically being held in the desert.

Remember, it all makes more sense when you substitute the word money for the word water. It makes for some strange partnerships. Here in the Headwaters, we love videos of fly fishing and rafting overlaid with some swamp donkeys chomping on willows. Most of the time those are funded by downstream Ag users that want their pipes full of money.

So you get the welfare grass farmers in their King Ranch's and the Trout Unlimited retiree do gooders in their Telsa having coffee and donuts while putting the stick eye on Denver Water and Northern Water representatives. Then you have the politicians that need to figure out if the dress code is Wranglers, Carhartt's or Prana.

I heard they were just gonna pump water over from the Mississippi River. Problem solved. Next!

Vertical agriculture in empty East Coast retail and factory space powered by solar from the desert is the answer.

Only half kidding. Eliminate even 25% of Western ag usage and there's plenty of water there for now. And we don't need to be growing alfalfa and almonds in the desert.

Pretty much Ice. The water problem is an energy problem which makes is a $ problem. Oh...and gravity is a bitch. Consumptive use of residential water is something like 3%. Said a different way, 97% of the water that comes out of my faucet is returned to the shit plant and then the river. Ag and irrigation is a bit harder to model. Estimate something like 80%.

Now look at Florida Cattle ranches vs. Colorado Cattle ranches and check on the yield per acre and also flood irrigation for grass production. Then look at the Central Valley of California. Next dig into the Farm Bill and notice that piece of shit is one of the longest standing money for votes scheme that we've got.

For better or worse, its a pretty easy problem to solve until you overlay the longstanding political enviroment.

The Central Valley of California is ~1% of the nations ag land and produces 1/4 of the nations food. But carry on foghead Caulfield. Florida, not an ecological disaster at all.

Remember back in the day when your burns were sweet? You've turned into such a fucking hard on that you don't even know how to agree with people.

On second thought people, don't go look anything up. Just check with the Dunfree-apedia. Please, enlighten me. I'm serious. Is not industrial and inefficient ag use a big part of the problem moving forward?

Remember, I'm dumb and I vote....just the type of simpleton that the people like you need to win over. I'll catch up on my reading tonight.

Remember when you acted like some east coast asshole who’d moved to where he wanted to be, not a wannabe local looking down a jaded nose at all the phonies Foggy?

jesus you dumb fuck California ag is incredibly efficient. But It’s unsustainable. So is most ag. Even Florida, where they ripped out forests, drained swamps, and murdered the Everglades.

anyways, back to a bunch of salad munching beef eating beer drinking suv driving assholes pretending they aren’t the problem

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Originally Posted by SkiBall

It sure helps in the short term. It’s nice not being inundated with smoke this summer. But the groundwater and aquifers are so depleted, and the actual amount of water to be replenished would need some Noah’s Ark shit to help in one year. We need a sustained shift to bigger snowpack and regular monsoons for the next decade to start to get some real bankable water I would guess.
So yeah, we’ll be fine.

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Ya never know - we (lower Columbia Basin) were in a severe drought, more than 8 inches behind in rainfall, but are now back to normal. Of course it brought a bit a flooding with it as we rec'd more than 3x the normal amount of rain in a one month but hey... we're not in a drought anymore.

The book “Where the Water Goes” by David Owen is an interesting read. He follows the CO River from headwaters to where it goes dry. Talks about the complexity of water rights, consumptive vs nonconsumptive uses, and previous agreements. I found it a good primer for this whole situation and recommended it to those who are interested in learning more.


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Originally Posted by Core Shot

Another culprit behind the megadrought: Big Ag. In the West, thirsty farms abound. Agriculture makes up 80% of California’s water use, most of it industrial. We see this pattern in other Western states like New Mexico and Oregon, too.

The West’s agriculture industries are so thirsty in part due to water-intensive crops that aren’t suited for our dry climate. Of California’s 80% freshwater used for agriculture, 20% goes to water-intensive tree nuts. 60% of these crops, like almonds and pistachios, are exported abroad.

Similarly, 16% of that agricultural water goes to growing alfalfa — another water intensive crop, some of which is exported. In New Mexico, it’s the same story: Big Ag uses scarce water resources to grow alfalfa for hay, 30% of which it exports.

Much of what Big Ag doesn’t export, it uses to support factory farms. These operations also suck up large amounts of water while causing massive amounts of water and air pollution.

In Oregon, there are 11 mega-dairies with over 2500 cows each. Combined, they consume 8.2 million gallons of water a day just for drinking and washing. This doesn’t even include the water used to grow feed. All this water could meet the average daily indoor water needs of over 124,000 Oregonians.

In New Mexico, mega-dairies (500 head or more) use over 32 million gallons a day. And in California, mega-dairies use a whopping 142 million gallons a day. That’s enough water for every resident of San Diego and San Jose combined.

At the same time, factory farms produce huge amounts of waste, polluting air and water and contributing to climate change. Those 11 Oregon mega-dairies produce emissions equivalent to that of 318,000 passenger vehicles.

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so here's a question - do we need to change the way we eat?

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Originally Posted by KQ

so here's a question - do we need to change the way we eat?

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my lay-person first take is no, we need to change the way we grow things.

Michael Pollan and a bunch of others say yes

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Originally Posted by KQ

so here's a question - do we need to change the way we eat?

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Here in New England, we have plenty of water (most of the time) but small and medium farms are closing down at crazy rates due to the inability to make $. Even the large operations (300+ head) are struggling to some extent. The farmer that hays the fields in my neighborhood is retiring next year and we are having a hard time finding someone to replace him. I foresee a lot of time on the brush mower next year to keep some of the land open.
I realize the length of growing season (4.5 months in NE vs almost year round in the SW) is why irrigating the dry SW has been the trend. But as we are seeing, that trend is not sustainable and maybe some of that ag will come back to the northeast.

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Originally Posted by KQ

so here's a question - do we need to change the way we eat?

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I believe so. I'm a big believer in buying local as much as possible. Local meat, eggs, dairy, produce, honey, and more. Much lower overall personal footprint. Keeps all the microfarms in business, and it's awesome knowing your food sources. Organic and far more sustainable in my opinion. We have literally met the happy cows from whom we get our milk from and even the ones we've gotten our meat from. We're fortunate in that we have a fantastic local farming co-op we can participate in to score all sorts of stuff easily. Many places do too though. You just have to actually put in SOME minimal level of effort to source your food.

Oh yeah. And screw California nut farming. SO asinine. And then they guilt the plebes in LA like THEY'RE the problem.

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Originally Posted by MontuckyFried

I believe so. I'm a big believer in buying local as much as possible.

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So the next vehicle will be domestic brand?

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Originally Posted by Foggy_Goggles

Then you have the politicians that need to figure out if the dress code is Wranglers, Carhartt's or Prana.

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Just didn't want this gem to go unnoticed.

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Originally Posted by KQ

so here's a question - do we need to change the way we eat?

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telling people to eat less bovine products isn’t popular. And let’s not pretend eating local is more efficient, much less that people here actually eat local all year round without compromises (unless you live in the tropics, or somewhere with unsustainable water usage)

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Originally Posted by KQ

so here's a question - do we need to change the way we reproduce?

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FFY

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Originally Posted by From_the_NEK

Here in New England, we have plenty of water (most of the time) but small and medium farms are closing down at crazy rates due to the inability to make $. Even the large operations (300+ head) are struggling to some extent. The farmer that hays the fields in my neighborhood is retiring next year and we are having a hard time finding someone to replace him. I foresee a lot of time on the brush mower next year to keep some of the land open.
I realize the length of growing season (4.5 months in NE vs almost year round in the SW) is why irrigating the dry SW has been the trend. But as we are seeing, that trend is not sustainable and maybe some of that ag will come back to the northeast.

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We are dry this year. My lawn is California golden brown. At least I'm not burning gas cutting the stupid thing.

Thinking more about this and it seems we need to change the way we live.

Travel - airplanes, hotels, cruise ships and all the associated cleaning.

Dining out.

Sporting events

Elective surgeries and all the sterilization they required.

Health clubs instead of just jogging.

Showering multiple times a day everyday.

Washing our cars. Washing street signs. Watering flowers to beautify downtown areas.

Washing clothes, house exteriors, windows etc etc.

Our society is hung up on things being their whitest and brightest. From the actually washing to the products that make it happen (and making their packaging) there is a lot of water usage going on everywhere.

Y'all are forgetting about the ginormous gorilla in the room: HOME AQUARIA!!!!!!

I, for one, would be perfectly happy eating goat meat.

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Originally Posted by PB

Y'all are forgetting about the ginormous gorilla in the room: HOME AQUARIA!!!!!!

I, for one, would be perfectly happy eating goat meat.

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Mmm... goat vindaloo...