doomsteaddiner | The title of first American city to be abandoned for lack of water
will be awarded in the next decade or so, and it’s hard to decide
whether to bet on Las Vegas or Phoenix. It could be a tie. Those among
us who still like our stories to end with a moral are rooting for Vegas,
whose demise would round out a lovely wages-of-sin, Sodom-and-Gomorrah
kind of fable. Phoenix seems less blameworthy, but only if you think
what’s about to happen is retribution for sin. If you lean more toward
the inevitable-consequences-of-stupidity theory, then there’s not much
to differentiate between Dumb Phoenix and Dumber Las Vegas.In
Vegas, “the situation is as bad as you can imagine,” according to
climate scientist Tim Barnett at the Scripps Institution of
Oceanography. Vegas gets its water from Lake Mead, impounded by the
Hoover Dam on the Colorado River. Lake Mead is less than half half full,
and is dropping fast, probably by another 20 feet this year. It is
lower now than it ever has been since the lake was filled in 1938.
Another 37 feet and the Las Vegas intake pipe will be sucking air. (All
this was updated thoroughly last week in the London Telegraph. Why are the best stories about America’s environmental problems found in British newspapers?)
Not to worry, there’s another water intake for Las Vegas, 50 feet
below the present one. Oh, good, two more years. Assuming drought
conditions get no worse than they are now, and that is far from a safe
assumption. Then what? Vegas has a plan. A boring machine the size of
the Pentagon is chewing through solid rock at the rate of one inch a day
to punch a line through to the very deepmost bottom of Lake Meade.
Another few years, if they make it in time. The country can’t find the
money to fix its roads and bridges, but it found $817 million to keep
Las Vegas in flushing water for a few more years.
Then what? According to Rob Mrowka, a scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity, “As the water situation becomes more dire we are going to start having to talk about the removal of people (from Las Vegas).”
Who else gets half its water from the very same lake Mead on the very
same Colorado River?
Phoenix, Arizona, that’s who. A city that has been
in drought conditions for ten years and is expected to remain so for
another 20 or 30 years. (To say that Vegas is in a 14-year drought is
redundant. It’s in a desert. Four inches of rain a year is normal.) Yet
until two weeks ago, no one had told Phoenix, officially, that unless
there are substantial (and unexpected) improvements in the flows of the
Colorado River and the level of Lake Mead and Lake Powell farther
upstream, deliveries of water to Phoenix are going to be curtailed.
Now the Central Arizona Project, which manages the lower Colorado
watershed, has said exactly that. “We’re dealing with a very serious
issue,” board member Sharon Megdal told the New York Times, “and people need to pay attention to it.”
In other words — Brace for Impact.
15 comments:
Interesting.
I am curious as to why you overlooked the opportunity to tie this particular "Water Crisis" to the more popular "Water Crisis" in Detroit.
One (Lake Mead ) has its roots in environmental conditions (the snow capped mountains that feed the water system have had a dearth of snow).
The other (Detroit Water shutoffs) is an economic challenge where an area with an abundant water supply has a water processing entity that is attempting to remain as a fiscally viable entity by managing the growth of its "accounts receivable"
Ironically - the "Humanitarian Crisis" that has been reported to the United Nations for relief is the one that has a more POLITICAL solution.
However, despite the claim of Detroit being "Chocolate City" - the crisis which looks more closely like the challenge that a large number of African people suffer from, with a desperate need for structural solutions in order to save masses of human lives, cattle and wildlife is the crisis at Lake Mead which can't be reduced to a matter of a wildcat protest for "Social Justice".
Brother CNu:
Could you give us a hint as to why MSNBC and "The Black Press" are today not "chomping at the bit" over this "Terrorist Watch List"?
As you recall - even when the much broader "State Of Emergency" color coding system was rolled out by the previous administration this drew rebuke by the "usual suspects".
When we move from the usual scrutiny between administrations and instead LOOK INTO THE CONGREGATION and then upward into the balcony where the "Church Audio/Visual system operators" sit - and NOTE THEIR CHANGES IN BEHAVIOR as seen in the reduction of their "Hoot'in and Holl'rin" it is HERE we can see "CHANGE HAS COME".
lol, both crises are manmade. Both have political solutions. The human-experimental petri dish gets bigger day-by-day...,
Los Angeles and San Diego also draw from the Colorado and are further downstream,They would be First-to-Thirst....
nah..., the littorals are non-negotiable http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_25859513/nations-largest-ocean-desalination-plant-goes-up-near
Good answer. Carry on.
Just think BIGot DonO Ne:
If Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix and Las Vegas residents are forced to clear out en masse - this will be the first time that YOU cast an eye on "Massive White Flight" but you could not credibly blame it on Black people moving in.
("Credibly" being the operative word)
WHOA!!! CF is being SUCCINCT! And he is MAKING a GOOD POINT. (Did I ALL-CAPS the right words?)
Although, I don't think it will be white people leaving. As Detroit is playing out, it's obviously going to be only the whites left...
Folks will probably still leave the area - they won't wanna pay the outrageous resulting utility bills for desal (if you read your link...). This works best in places like Dubai/UAE where energy/oil is essentially free....
Not so fast there, Feed. White folks will leave because they won't wanna pick up the fiscal slack for Watts/Compton/LongBeach Blacks stiffing the utility companies Detroit style...
See white people don't need water, because we can condense water out of the atmosphere using our gigantic brains.
See, you think you playing, but HBD PRR has carefully studied the effects of northern latitude gravity on gene expression, and determined that there is indeed a non-trivial correlation. In fact, big brains be so swole that all y'all need to do is be "dreaming of a white christmas" and SHAZZAM!!!!
Down in the near equatorial reaches of Arizona, and Cali and such, not so much....,
Big Don... California actually has very few Blacks. Inglewood is 39% Black, Compton is %38 and Long Beach is only %15 Black. The state overall is less than %7 Black.
California has first rights to much of the water pumped from the Colorado in addition to water from it's own mountain ranges. Pueblo Rights also make it easy for San Diego and L.A. to maintain their water supply.
So.. With only 7% of the total population being Black and water rights which guarantee water which recognizes treaties granted by Mexico and Spain to the original pueblo settlements - it's kind of hard to blame minorities for California's water issues.
But Earth is smart. She could take a big dump and cause a big earthquake and wash most of the more populated cities in Cali into the ocean. Vegas and Phoenix could be ocean front property.
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