LeakBird

(March 21, 2009, Robert Glennon, AlterNet)
The following is an excerpt from “Unquenchable: American’s Water Crisis and What We Can Do About It” by Robert Glennon. Copyright 2009 Robert Glennon. Reproduced by permission of Island Press, Washington DC.
Editor’s Note: This excerpt is from the introduction of Glennon’s new book and follows a narrative about the water [...]

There’s an interesting ESPN article on the coming water policy crisis in America, in the context of fish and wildlife. Wikipedia defines the word “policy” as “a deliberate plan of action to guide decisions and achieve rational outcome(s)“.  Of course, it’s rooted in the word “police” as well, which “stems from the Greek word ‘politeia’ [...]

(March 18, 2009, Jeff Conant, Alternet)
Behind the World Water Forum’s public posture as a trade expo and an educational exchange among water advocates lies a labyrinth of political intrigue and corporate cronyism. Corporate interests that make up the World Water Council are in constant contact with the World Bank and other financial institutions; each Forum [...]

(March 14, 2009, The New York Times)
During the past four decades here in Quillagua, a town in the record books as the driest place on earth, residents have sometimes seen glimpses of raindrops above the foothills in the distance. They never reach the ground, evaporating like a mirage while still in the air.
What the town [...]

(March 5, 2009, The Salt Lake Tribune)

I have a classic Western postcard tacked to the bulletin board above my computer. It shows two men in a field holding shovels over their heads, locked in mock battle. Behind them runs an irrigation ditch. The caption reads: “Discussing Western Water Rights, A Western Pastime.”
I know firsthand how [...]

(March 11, 2009, Robert in Monterey, Calitics)
As someone who has written before of the water problems our state faces, and who has repeated the “omg worst drought ever” frame, it’s important that I give some necessary attention to Michael Fitzgerald of The Stockton Record, who called bullshit on the whole thing today:
California’s “drought” is overblown. [...]

(March 7, 2009, Arizona Geology)
There have been 550,000 applications to appropriate deep, “non-potable” water in New Mexico in recent months according to story in the Alamagordo Daily News.
The New Mexico legislature and the state engineer are seeking to take state control of water deeper than 2,500 feet in anticipation of efforts to desalinate brackish water [...]

(March 4, 2009, David Zetland, Aguanomics)
RT writes:
I am an economist from Australia who works on among other issues urban water policy.
I read with interest your nicely-written Forbes article.
We seem to have pretty much a similar situation here in Australia and a few of us make similar suggestions.
I’d love to understand more about the your situation [...]

(March 2, 2009, John Laumer, Treehugger)
The Las Vegas Review-Journal cites the general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority saying ‘now may be the time to take a serious look at a decades-old idea of capturing floodwater from the Mississippi River and using it to recharge the massive groundwater aquifer beneath the Central Plains.’
Was She [...]

(Feb. 28, 2009, Kelly Zito, The San Francisco Chronicle)
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a statewide drought emergency Friday, urging cities to cut their use of water 20 percent and paving the way for projects such as desalination plants and water recycling projects to bypass standard environmental reviews.
Despite heavy rainstorms this month, state officials say California’s water [...]

(Feb. 26, 2009, Associated Press)
As more companies become conscious of their carbon footprint, a new movement is urging corporations to track their “water footprint” as well, or risk financial losses as freshwater supplies dry up around the globe.
Major corporations such as Coca-Cola Co. now disclose the amount of water they use in financial reports, in [...]

(Feb. 26, 2009, Bloomberg News)
On a cloudless December day in the Nevada desert, workers in white hard hats descend into a 30- foot-wide shaft next to Lake Mead.
As they’ve been doing since June, they’ll blast and dig straight down into the limestone surrounding the reservoir that supplies 90 percent of Las Vegas’s water. In September, [...]

(Feb. 23, 2009, The Ludwig Von Mises Institute)
It is near impossible to imagine any private company not enjoying the “problem” of high demand for its products and services. Yet there are some products that are repeatedly reported as shortages. There is one thing these products have in common: government intervention, typically in the form of [...]

(Feb. 24, 2009, Aguanomics)
The battle is getting started:
The California Legislative Analyst’s Office recommends that the Legislature turn groundwater over to the state, which would remove local control
[snip]
[farmers] say they fear that the state would require water meters, find out how much water everyone’s using and charge for it.
Valente, vineyard and orchard manager for John Kautz [...]

(Feb. 15, 2009, The Colorado Water Examiner)
Mining engineer and hay farmer Gary Hausler was at a recent meeting of the Rio Grande Basin Roundtable pitching the idea for a 22 inch water pipeline from the Mississippi River west. The proposal would divert less than one half of one percent of the Mississippi’s flows and could [...]

(Feb. 13, 2009, Max Deveson, BBC News)
The arid states of America’s south-west have been getting drier in recent years.
Since 2000, the Colorado River – which provides water for seven US states in the region – has carried less water than at any time in recorded history.
And while the drought is worsening, the demand for water [...]

(Feb. 11, 2009, Alternet)

Just as the economic evidence shows that we’re in a recession, the scientific evidence shows that climate change will affect our natural resources.
One logical response to the constant news of the economic recession is cutting back on discretionary purchases and developing a household budget.  That is, if we know that times are [...]

(Feb. 11, 2009, Associated Press)
It’s been called a modern-day gold rush. But the free-for-all isn’t for sparkling bits in a stream, it’s for the water – deep underground and salty – that developers and politicians hope will help keep New Mexico’s metro areas growing.
In Albuquerque and Santa Fe, developers and local governments have staked claims [...]

(Feb. 10, 2009, Alternet)

The basin has proven how difficult it can be to determine who holds what rights in western water and how it can put ecosystems at risk.

Last week, the Oregon Supreme Court agreed to decide whether irrigators in the Klamath Basin “own” water delivered by the federal Klamath Reclamation Project. This [...]

(Feb. 9, 2009, Las Vegas City Life)
Reader Dean Baker, president of Baker ranches, writes:
Pipelines built to take the water and the future of rural Nevada to grow the metropolitan cites of Nevada will be the biggest disaster the people of Nevada have ever faced.  It will affect every single person.  Some in Nevada believe cities [...]

(Feb. 10, 2009, The Wall Street Journal)
MENDOTA, Calif. — Dwindling water supplies are compounding economic woes in California’s Central Valley, causing farmers to leave fields fallow and confront the prospect of going under.
The state’s water supply has dropped precipitously of late. California is locked in the third year of one of its worst droughts on [...]

(Feb. 8, 2009, ActivelyMovingWater.com)
Interview with Delbert Hawkins
I had the opportunity to work with Delbert Hawkins, a 3rd generation Montana cattle rancher, while I was project manager at the Montana Water Trust. Delbert holds the largest storage water right in Lake Mary Ronan (Lake County, Montana). Delbert also controls the outflow of the lake and has [...]

(Feb. 6, 2009, Phoenix Business Journal)

A bill in the Arizona Legislature would allow Colorado River water to be used for municipal and consumer needs in northwestern Arizona.
Current water laws state Colorado River water pumped into Mohave County may be used only for industrial applications such as mines, mills, utility plants and golf courses. The requirement [...]

(Feb. 5, 2009, Seacoast Online)

The subject is water — locally, nationally, internationally. The issue isn’t new but it is definitely moving front and center these days.
Ecologists worldwide are now using the term “peak water” in the same way as the phrase “peak oil” came into common parlance over a decade ago. Back in the year [...]

(Feb. 4, 2009, Steamboat Pilot & Today)
Steamboat Springs — Steamboat Springs residents would be left with only half of the water needed to serve current demands if downstream states made a call on the Colorado River Compact, officials told the Steamboat Springs City Council on Tuesday.
The sobering revelation un­­derscored council’s consideration of adopting a water [...]

(Feb. 2, 2009, The Merced Sun Star)
An unprecedented shift of San Joaquin River water from farmers in the east Valley to those in the west could further complicate the scramble to save crops from drought this year.
At stake is precious San Joaquin River water, which has helped east-side farmers cultivate a multibillion-dollar economy on 1 [...]

(Jan. 29, 2009, AlterNet)
The privatization of public water supplies is occurring in many places around the world. Sold like a common commodity, the rights for distribution and management of community water are being bought and controlled more and more by private entrepreneurs and corporations. But a global movement of activists say this most basic element [...]

(Jan. 18, 2009 WaterBlogged.Info)
In a December 28, 2008 posting, The Human Right to Water: The Time Has Come, Michael Campana of WaterWired has expressed a change of heart about the right to water. At the risk of misconstruing the story of his conversion, its primarily geo-political and pragmatic concerns that dictate the need for a [...]

(Jan. 12, 2009, WRDWAugusta)
Georgia’s long-term water plans face another threat, this time from the US Supreme Court. A court decision today questioned the state’s right to use more water from Lake Lanier, northeast of Atlanta.
Florida and Alabama are angry about Georgia’s use of more water for drinking purposes.
Georgia has been in a severe drought for over [...]

(Dec. 30, 2008, Denver Post)
Finances are tight for a lot of folks these days.
Unfortunately, money isn’t the only thing that’s lacking. There’s another type of shortage that threatens our quality of life.
Colorado needs more water. As things stand right now, the state will not have enough water for our population in the near future.
We’re not [...]

(Jan. 4, 2009, MySanAntonio)
More than a decade ago, Texas kicked off an ambitious and comprehensive program to guarantee that the state’s urban and rural regions would have the water supplies they needed through 2050. Much good work has been done under the framework established by 1997’s Senate Bill 1, but Texas still faces alarming trends [...]

(Dec. 22, 2008, Chicago Tribune)
Detroit may has been stealing Canadian water for 44 years.
It seems the Motor City’s drinking-water intake pipe extends about 100 yards across the international boundary in the Detroit River, and it’s been siphoning as much as 32 billion gallons a year since 1964 without a water-taking permit.
“The City of [...]

(Nov. 17, 2008, GreenTech)

Water has long vexed investors. Statistics and news reports all confirm that many parts of the world face serious shortages of water that is suitable for human consumption and agriculture. Conservation measures, which would likely induce public panics if placed on gasoline, are being imposed on water supplies in the developing and [...]

(Oct. 28, 2008, The Houston Chronicle)
A Texas water district has won a court decision in its lawsuit over Oklahoma’s ban on out-of-state water sales.
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Monday denied a request by Oklahoma to throw out the lawsuit filed by the Tarrant Regional Water District in Fort Worth.
The judges [...]