The idea that the lakes’ bounty will quench the thirst of the western United States is an obstacle delaying the West’s inevitable reckoning with the unsustainable status quo.
In 2012, the city was spending five times more on sewers than it was on drinking water. In 2017, it was losing an increasing amount of water to leaky pipes. Last month’s crisis reiterated a history of jumping from crisis to crisis without fixing long-standing issues.
The new state department will be housed at Florida Atlantic University. It seeks to harness public and private research, education, technology and business applications involving fresh and salt water.
The Panoche Water District allegedly stole 130,000 acre feet of water and redistributed it to farmland across Fresno and Merced counties. Now the feds want retribution but not everyone in the region agrees.
Recent events highlight the fact that water systems are targets for cyber attacks. There are ways of strengthening defenses at little to no cost, but more needs to be done to implement them.
The state has begun scanning 2 million pages. It’s part of a $60 million project to build a database integrating a century of water rights records, geospatial mapping and up-to-date water diversion data.
The Delta Conveyance Project is a 45-mile tunnel that would run beneath the delta and move more water from Northern California to cities further south. Opponents worry about the tunnel’s impact on the delta’s fragile ecosystem.
In places as varied as Tucson and Bangkok, ways are being found to replenish shrinking aquifers. It’s a matter of “water consciousness.”
About a dozen states have passed legislation to promote sales of water and wastewater utilities. Although private money can fund upgrades, environmentalists say drinking water shouldn't be a for-profit enterprise.
Washington state’s Lower Valley has had excess levels of nitrate in groundwater since the early 90s and in 2017, 20 percent of wells exceeded the state’s drinking water standards.
Nearly one million residents get their drinking water from municipal wells contaminated with toxic forever chemicals. For the 1.4 million that depend on private wells, individual well owners must take on the onus of testing their water.
In The Three Ages of Water, Peter Gleick traces the history of a resource humans can’t do without. While there’s enough water to go around, he says, state and local leaders from both sides of the aisle need to act now on what we know.
The users of the river need to treat its needs as equal to their own. That means looking out for its environmental health.
The reductions would surpass 10 percent of the total water use in the lower Colorado River basin: More than 1.5 million acre-feet would be conserved by the end of next year, according to the plan.
Record rain and snowfall are easing drought pressures, but California can’t overcome long-term water challenges if infrastructure is neglected.
The river’s Lower Basin states need a water-sharing agreement. It’s time for them to check their historical grievances at the door, make difficult compromises and be open to new and innovative solutions.
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