Posted on 06/10/2021 7:27:19 PM PDT by blam
Much of the Western half of the US is in a severe drought, and parts of the Southwest are “exceptionally dry,” the worst category, according to US Drought Monitor. Taking this into account, the iconic Hoover Dam has just recorded the smallest amount of water inside Lake Mead since the 1930s.
The damming of the Colorado River at the Nevada-Arizona border created Lake Mead and supplies water to 25 million people, including in the cities of Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson, Los Angeles, and San Diego.
We’ve explained in the past if Lake Mead drops to dangerously low levels, the entire town of Las Vegas is absolutely screwed because two pipes, known as straws, are at elevation 1,050 feet and 1,000 feet. However, a third straw was recently constructed at 860 feet just in case the water level continued to drop. For Vegas to prevent a total collapse if Lake Mead continues to drop, it will have to continue constructing straws at lower and lower depths.
Tim Barnett, a climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, wrote back in 2014 that Lake Mead wasn’t able to supply Vegas with water, “it’s just going to be screwed. And relatively quickly. Unless it can find a way to get more water from somewhere, Las Vegas is out of business. Yet they’re still building, which is stupid.”
… and this quote was over seven years ago, and the water situation has dramatically worsened.
As of Wednesday, the lake’s water level sank to 1,071.56 feet above sea level and broke the record low in July 2016. Since the early 2000s, the water level has plunged 140 feet due to years of drought that has gripped the region.
“Some states, especially parts of California and parts of the southwest, it’s really quite extreme drought conditions,” Ben Cook, a climate scientist at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, told Reuters. Here’s a map (as of June 3) of the drought situation, which is extremely severe.
Artificial lakes, such as Lake Mead, is no match for Mother Nature, and the latest drop in water level could force state governments (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming) to pass a water shortage declaration sometime this summer.
The demand for water downstream from Hoover Dam continues to increase. Farmers in the Southwest are itching for Lake Mead’s water to irrigate their crops as their land becomes fallow.
Over the past year, the lake has declined by more than 16 feet and is projected to fall nine more feet by the end of 2021. The lake’s trigger point for a “shortage,” declared by the government, is 1,075 feet, which has already been broken.
Lake Mead’s downward spiral has also reduced Hoover Dam’s hydropower output by 25%. At some point, the dam could stop producing electricity.
“Our previous number [for cutoff] was at elevation 1,050, and now we’ve lowered that number to 950,” Hoover Dam, facility manager Mark Cook told CBS News. “So, we bought ourselves 100 feet.”
For more than a half-decade (see: here & here), we have the ongoing problems of Lake Mead and how it could impact the water supply of tens of millions of people. Now that the lake is at levels not seen since it was filled in the 1930s, and below levels for an official “shortage.” This means an emergency declaration of water shortage could be seen sometime this summer.
The drought is so severe that the governor of Utah is urging people to pray for rain.
Desalinization plants use energy. The amount of energy needed would require nuclear reactor or fossil fuels. Solar and wind won’t cut it. So there would be carbon dioxide or nuclear waste to deal with. However it is fine if China does the same for arid regions because carbon dioxide from China does not lead to global warming, only carbon dioxide from Western countries can warm the planet.
“...the present draught is a more normal condition...”
Climate Change Back in action.
Not that the Left would EVER permit it, but if we wanted to spend money on ‘infrastructure’ the way that FDR did when he expected RETURNS on what was built (such as Hoover Dam), we could build a water transfer network, so Eastern Texas could send some of its drenching rains to places like Lake Mead.
But since not even Republicans will propose anything big like that, we’ll wind up with another 100 or so Solyndras.
Instead of wasting billions on high speed trains, the state government of CA should have invested that money in large-scale desalination plants. Las Vegas would have been one very logical customer for that production if they couldn’t find enough takers in CA.
I think the gradual drop of Lake Mead is 90% water use and 10% drought in the long-term analysis, Lake Powell further up the Colorado is also well below its original and designed levels and has a similar bathtub ring.
Wetter years may return and partially fill these man-made lakes but unless there are other sources of irrigation water they will never return to their original levels.
Our weather is best described as a series of droughts separated by floods.
Pretty soon a lost city will appear at the bottom.
California in particular has a very foolish leadership.
Rolling in money, California hasn’t the slightest intention
of going all in for desalinization.
While that is terrible for California, particularly the North
where water is taken and directed to southern California, it’s
also a big deal for neighboring states.
If California would take responsibility for it’s own water
needs, it could free up water it prevents other states
from using.
Israel has been taking big strides in desalinating water for
its use.
I believe California has the longest coastline of any state
in the nation (Florida may top it), but it doesn’t matter
since it has the shortest list of intelligent people in its
leadership.
Every ten minutes (it seems), another gun bill is squeezed
out of the posterior or the state legislature. Incredibly,
it’s been a number of decades since that same body birthed
a good idea from its womb.
Desalinization should be the first of many to change that
abhorrent reality.
Time to cut Mexico off? Did they contribute anything to the building of Hoover Dam?
We can’t take them seriously in Nevada or Southern California until they stop irrigating golf courses.
Thanks.
So the state is dumping into the ocean, enough to heal the
farmers and California’s need for water.
Some activists need to stop breathing.
Another alternative that’s been around for decades — an aqueduct or pipeline from the Pacific to Death Valley. Sized right, this could flow forever, due to the high rate of evaporation that would take place in the Death Valley inland sea.
As Death Valley is over 250’ below sea level, a large amount of electricity could be generated by the in-flow water. That energy could be used to desalinate a large amount of water, every year.
Most of the water would not need to be desalinated though. Evaporation would lift most of it into the (literal) clouds, where it would rain down upon surrounding (now) desert lands. The deserts around Las Vegas are the result of the rain-shadow effect of the Sierra Nevada range, which squeezes out most of the water that had evaporated from the Pacific. A nearby inland sea would not have that problem.
Israel and Jordan are planning this, with the Red Sea-Dead Sea Water Conveyance project. There are really no technical or economic barriers to getting the project done — although there would be plenty of regulatory barriers.
As a Coloradoan, I must quote the first rule of water law: A shovel upstream beats an agreement downstream...
Salts.....
Of course they kept building. Money had changed hands, deals had been made.
“a large waterfall fountain going as the surrounding countryside was dry as a bone.”
Have to keep the rubes and marks dazzled.....
As Rep Nunes explained, much of the drought is man-made.
“America really needs to get started with the next phase of the Central Arizona Project which is building a canal from sea water de salinination plants on California’s Pacific Coast to hook up with the CAP.”
Or build the Grand Canal project and channel the abundance of fresh water from the Hudson Bay region to the Southwest U.S. via the Great Lakes.
The good news: It can't get any worse!
Regards,
ALASKA has the longest coastline of any U.S. state. In fact, its coastline is greater than the combined coastlines of all 49 other states.
Regards,
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