Study: Next U.S. president faces Colorado River problem

[bluedigger]

Lack of Lake Mead water could trigger ‘shortage’ declaration


LAS VEGAS – The next U.S. president will have to act quickly to chart a course so the Colorado River can continue supplying water to millions of city-dwellers, farmers, Indian tribes and recreational users in the U.S. Southwest, according to a university research study made public Monday.

A survey of policy- and decision-makers by the University of Colorado concluded that the president who takes office in 2017 could almost immediately face the prospect of Colorado River water supply cuts to Arizona and Nevada in January 2018.

“This is a nonpartisan issue. There’s a confluence of urgent issues that need to be dealt with,” said Anne Castle, former assistant U.S. Department of the Interior secretary for water and science.

The new presidential administration “will have an opportunity, no matter who it is, to help bring balance to this system,” said Castle, now a senior fellow at the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy and the Environment, which conducted the study.

http://www.the-journal.com/article/20161031/NEWS01/161039975

[Orrex]

1. Donald Trump knows more about the Colorado River than environmentalists, believe me

He's going to fix this river, and it'll be tremendous.



Dear god, it's horrifying even to contemplate.

[lapfog_1]

2. So if we simply build the wall like 1000 feet high

And that will stop the Colorado from entering Mexico!

And we will have a tremendous reservoir in Yuma!

(yes this is fun... but seriously in California's central valley, the know nothings want to build more reservoirs so that we can fix the drought - think about it for about 10 seconds)

[dalton99]

3. President Trump will make it a Trump Schlitterbahn.

It's going to be huge. HUGE. And very beautiful. Just beautiful. It's going to be fantastic, trust me.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

4. Stop growing lettuce in the desert

Solved!

[hunter]

7. Do you want year round inexpensive lettuce or not?

Winter lettuce is grown in the desert using Colorado River water.

Winter lettuce grown in hothouses or flown in from the Southern hemisphere would be rather expensive. Or maybe we could just switch to cabbage and kale in the winter. It would be healthier for us. The nutritional value of cheap lettuce is pretty much nothing.

If we cared about the future we would ban all fossil fuels and knock down all dams, worldwide. If we don't do it, Mother Nature will eventually get around to it.

The collapse of this world civilization is going to be a very ugly thing. Exponential population growth always ends badly. We're not the first innovative exponentially growing species this planet has seen and we won't be the last.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

11. widespread desert agriculture is an accident of history

The railroads were pretty good at keeping meat and veggies frozen solid, but it was the 1970's before they could reliably transport fresh produce, until that time the markets were relatively local.

The world is perfectly capable of feeding itself even with continued population growth, the issues is political and economic dysfunction in those regions experiencing it.

[maxsolomon]

5. solution: kick the can down the road

its the American way!

[Mendocino]

6. It is time to dismantle

Glen Canyon Dam. Due the porosity of sandstone there and massive evaporation, it is a sieve. Lake Powell is filling up with sediment, the dam will become useless regardless. Worse yet is having what is called a dead pool, where water enters but never leaves. No use having two partially filled impoundments, the other being Lake Mead.

[hunter]

8. Yep, that dam was a mistake. It nearly failed in 1983.

A failure would have been one of the great catastrophes of modern engineering.

Catastrophe was averted by quick thinking and a few truckloads of lumber and plywood.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risks_to_the_Glen_Canyon_Dam

[Mendocino]

9. Imagine having to fix

a multi million dam by building a thin wooden wall on the top of it. Maybe next time they'll use duct tape and bailing wire.

[haele]

10. And if we let the "Wise Use" A-holes back into national "land management", we could experiance...

...un-potable Colorado river water in the near future, with all the chemicals from toxic materials dumping, mining and fracking being dumped into it, along with added fertilizers from industrial farming. Well, farming until the water becomes too toxic to use for farming.

Not to mention all the multi-national bottled water companies and sovereign citizen compounds placing mini-dams and unauthorized irrigation channels all up and down the Colorado. "Wise Use" a-holes are only concerned about how much water they can get their hands on to use or sell, and screw anyone downstream - even if it's an entire state that goes dry.

Haele