New paper with Anne Castle on Risk of Colorado River curtailments in Colorado, Upper Basin

The framing questions I’ve used for my work on water over the last decade go something like this: When the water runs short, who doesn’t get theirs? What does that look like? Those are the motivating questions behind a new paper Anne Castle and I have written. We’ve also added an increasingly important third question: …

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What does it take to win public acceptance of wastewater reuse?

Q: What does it take to win public acceptance of direct potable reuse of wastewater? A: “a daily lived experience with the effects of drought or water scarcity” That’s one of the key findings from a new paper I coauthored with a team led by the University of New Mexico’s Caroline Scruggs, working with Water …

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Screamin’ deal on that other book I wrote

My friends at Island Press (an amazing outfit, so grateful to have had the chance to work with them) are offering all their titles, including Water is For Fighting Over, for 50 percent off right now. You of course already have your copy, but it’s a perfect holiday gift for that water nerd on your …

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How much might Utah’s Lake Powell pipeline cost?

My Colorado River policy attention time is a finite resource, and I admit I’ve not paid terribly close attention to Utah’s Lake Powell Pipeline proposal. My reasoning has been that it’s likely so expensive relative to the water it would provide that, with the end of big federal subsidies, Utah’s eventually going to wake up …

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A book arrived at my house yesterday by post

My early review copy arrived yesterday, ahead of the “official” Nov. 26 publication of the new Eric Kuhn-John Fleck book Science Be Dammed: How Ignoring Inconvenient Science Drained the Colorado. River. I’ve got but one – I talked to Eric this morning up in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, (in the Upper Basin) and he’s got a …

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Metropolitan Southern California’s use of Colorado River water on track to be the lowest this year since the 1950s

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California’s deliveries of Colorado River water this year are currently forecast at 550,518 acre feet, and depending on conditions over the two-and-a-half months of the year could drop as low as 506,000 acre feet, according to forecast data from the Bureau of Reclamation and what folks at MWD told …

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From “The Great Mistake” to “Science Be Dammed”

When I was wrestling six years ago with a path through what became my book Water Is For Fighting Over, I collected material about what I came to call “the great mistake” – the overallocation of the Colorado River’s water. One of my favorite stories surrounded William Sibert: It is quite probable that the compact …

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How resentment of Arizona drives New Mexico water policy

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 …

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Albuquerque’s water use continues to decline

The decoupling between water use and economic and population growth continues in Albuquerque, where we’ve cut per capita water use by more than half since the mid-1990s: Albuquerque endured a hot, dry summer this year. Temperatures are still above average, and the monsoon season never made a big splash. But that hasn’t stopped the city …

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More Colorado River “grand bargain” buzz

There was more buzz this week at two big Colorado River Basin events about the idea of a “grand bargain” to deal with coming collisions between water overallocation and the Law of the River. The idea crept into the title of the Water Education Foundation’s 2019 Santa Fe Symposium – “Can We Build a Bridge …

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