Million sued, and he says he expects a ruling this year. Most notably, the Mississippi River basin doesn't always have enough water to spare. The largest eastern river, the Mississippi, has about 30 times the average annual flow of the Colorado, and the Columbia has close to 10 times. Water use has gone down 40% per capita in recent years, said Coffey. It might be in the trillions, but it probably does exist.. You should worry, Hidden, illegal casinos are booming in L.A., with organized crime reaping big profits, Look up: The 32 most spectacular ceilings in Los Angeles, Elliott: Kings use their heads over hearts in trading Jonathan Quick, This fabled orchid breeder loves to chat just not about Trader Joes orchids. Drought conditions plagued the region throughout 2022, prompting concerns over river navigation. Is this a goo. As zany as the ideas may sound, could anywork, and if so, what would be the costs? No one wants to leave the western states without water, said Melissa Scanlan, a freshwater sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Certainly not the surrounding communities. For instance, a Kansas groundwater management agency received a permit last year to truck 6,000 gallons of Missouri River water into Kansas and Colorado in hopes of recharging an aquifer. Viaderos team estimated that the sale of the water needed to fill the Colorado Rivers Lake Powell and Lake Mead the largest reservoirs in the country would cost more than $134 billion at a penny a gallon. Each state along the Colorado River basin had the rights to a certain quantity of river water, divided among major users like farms and cities, and the projects were designed to help the states realize those abstract rights. Every day, we hear about water conservation, restrictions. Still, he admits the road hasnt always been easy, and that victory is far from guaranteed. Could a water pipeline from the Mississippi River to Arizona be a real solution? Take for instance the so-called Water Horse pipeline, a pet project of a Colorado investor and entrepreneur named Aaron Million. ", Westford of Southern California's Metropolitan Water District agreed. John Neely ofPalm Desert responded: "All of these river cities who refuse to give us their water can stop snowbirding to the desert to use our water. But water expertssaid it would likely take at least 30 years to clear legal hurdles to such a plan. of Engineers has turned back official requests for more water from the Missouri River to alleviate shortages on the Mississippi. USGS 05587500 Mississippi River at Alton, IL. Heres how that affects Indigenous water rights, Salton Sea public health disaster gets a $250 million shot in the arm. And, here in the land of the midnight 90-degree temperatures, we are building our very own ice hockey rink, because there is more than enough electricity to freeze that body of water and keep the arena cold enough to keep the ice from melting. he said. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Unrecognizable. Lake Mead, a lifeline for water in Los Angeles and the West, tips toward crisis. Martinez, an engineer who oversaw the construction of pipelines in the Sierra Nevada for Southern California Edison, agrees a 1,500-mile pipeline from the Mississippicould physically be built. Meanwhile, a rookie Democrat running for governor in Californias recall election last year proposed declaring a state of emergency in order to build a similar project. In the meantime, researchers encourage more feasible and sustainable options, including better water conservation, water recycling, and less agricultural reliance. "Arizona really, really wants oceanfront," she chuckled. Each edition is filled with exclusive news, analysis and other behind-the-scenes information you wont find anywhere else. Just this past summer, the idea caused a firestorm of letters to the editor at a California newspaper. Follow us on More by The Associated Press, Got a story tip? This latest version would curve up through the Wyoming flatlands and back down to Fort Collins, a distance of around 340 miles. These realities havent stopped the Wests would-be water barons from dreaming. Meanwhile, watershed states in the U.S., and even counties havetaken actionto preventsuch schemes. Would itbe expensive? Savor that while your lawns are dying. All that snow in Arizona is nice now but officials worry that it could create disastrous flooding and wildfire conditions. The idea of diverting water from the Mississippi to the Colorado River basin is an excellent one, albeit also fantastically expensive. The idea of diverting water from the Mississippi to the Colorado River basin is an excellent one, albeit also fantastically expensive. A retired engineer suggested a rather outlandish-in-scope but logical-in-approach solution to the seemingly growing floods in the central U.S. and the water woes of the West Coast - build a nearly 1,500-mile aqueduct to connect the two. 1999-2023 Grist Magazine, Inc. All rights reserved. Terms of Use | Privacy Policy. About 60% of the region remains in some form of drought, continuing a decades-long spiral into water scarcity. The snowbirds commonly stay here for at least six months. So moving water that far away to supplement the ColoradoRiver, I don't think is viable. A recent edition of The Desert Sun had twoletters objectingto piping water from the Mississippi River to the Colorado River, and on to California. The total projected cost of the plan in 1975 was $100 billion or nearly $570billion in today's dollars,comparable to theInterstate Highway System. Facebook, Follow us on Some plans call for a connection to. One benefit would be flood control for the Eastern USA . The sharing of water would greatly contribute to California being able to feed the nation. To the editor: The states near the Gulf of Mexico are often flooded with too much water, while the Southwest is suffering a long-term drought. Absolutely not," said Meena Westford, executive director of Colorado River resource policy for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. Even if the sticker price werent so prohibitive, there are other obstacles. States have [historically] been very successful in getting the federal government to pay for wasteful, unsustainable, large water projects, said Denise Fort, a professor emerita at the University of New Mexico who has studied water infrastructure. Lower Mississippi River flow means less sediment carried down to Louisiana, where it's used for coastal restoration. About 33% of vegetables and 66% of fruits and nuts are produced in California for consumption for the nation. Pipeline sizes vary from the 2-inch- (5-centimetre-) diameter lines used in oil-well gathering systems to lines 30 feet (9 metres) across in high-volume water and sewage networks. Stories of similar projects often share the same ending, from proposals in Iowa and Minnesota to those between Canada and the United States. Either way, most of these projects stand little chance of becoming reality theyre ideas from a bygone era, one that has more in common with the world of Chinatown than the parched west of the present. Many sawSiefkes' idea and others like it as sheer theft by a region that needs to fix its own woes. No one wants to leave the western states without water, said Melissa Scanlan, a freshwater sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Releasing more water downstream would come at the expense of upstream users . Amid a major drought in the Western U.S., a proposed solution comes up repeatedly: large-scale river diversions, including pumping Mississippi River water to parched states. The Colorado River is drying up. At comment sessions on Colorado's plan, he said, long-distance pipelines wereconstantly suggested by the public. One method for simulating streamflow and base flow, random forest (RF) models, was developed from the data at gaged sites and, in turn, was . "We do not expect to see (carbon capture and storage) happen at a large scale unless we are able to address that pipeline issue," said Rajinder Sahota, deputy executive officer for climate change . Other legal constraints include the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Protection Act and variousstate environmental laws, said Brent Newman, senior policy director for the National Audubon Society's Delta state programs. CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa Waves of torrential rainfall drenched California into the new year. For decades, key stewards of the river have ignored the massive water loss, instead allocating Arizona, California, Nevada and Mexico their share of the river without subtracting whats evaporated. "The engineering is feasible. To Larsons knowledge, an in-depth feasibility study specifically on pumping Mississippi River water to the West hasnt been conducted yet. USGS 05587500 Mississippi River at Alton, IL. "To my mind, the overriding fatal flaw for large import schemes is the time required to become operational. Los Angeles-area water districts have implemented much of what Famiglietti mentioned. Coffey said the project isn't really a pipeline, but more "a bypass for an aging 60-year-old"system. Janet Wilson is senior environment reporter for The Desert Sun, and co-authors USA Today'sClimate Point newsletter. Still, its physically possible. About 33% of vegetables and 66% of fruits and nuts are produced in California for consumption for the nation. Clouds of birds hundreds of species live in or travel through Louisianas rich Atchafalaya forests each year, said National Audubon Society Delta Conservation Director Erik Johnson. Drainage area 171,500 square miles . Arizona lawmakers want to build a pipeline from the Mississippi River more than a thousand miles away, a Colorado rancher wants to pipe water 300 miles across the Rockies, and Utah wants. People fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta's Elk Slough near Courtland, California, on Tuesday, March 24, 2020. Heproposed usingnuclear explosionsto excavate the system's trenches and underground water storage reservoirs. Lake Mead is at its lowest level since it was filled 85 years ago. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); A nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. Pipelines usually consist of sections of pipe made of . Subscribe today to see what all the buzz is about. Historian Ted Steinberg said itsummed up "the sheer arrogance and imperial ambitions of the modern hydraulic West.". Ultimately the rising environmental movement squelched it the project woulddestroyvast wildlife habitats in Canada and the American West,submergewild rivers in Idaho and Montana,and requirethe relocation of hundreds of thousands of people. Yahoo, Reddit and ceaseless headlines about a 22-year megadrought and killer flash floods, not to mention dead bodies showing up on Lake Meads newly exposed shoreline, have galvanized reader interest this summer. Specifically, start with a line from the Mississippi River to the Colorado River at Lake Powell, where a seven-state compact divvies up the water. The idea of a pipeline transecting the continent is not a new idea. Parsons said theplanwould replenishthe upper Missouri and Mississippi Rivers during dry spells, increase hydropower along the Columbia Riverand stabilize the Great Lakes. She can be reached at jwilson@gannett.com or @janetwilson66 on Twitter. They also concluded environmental and permitting reviews would take decades. The California water wars of the early twentieth century are summed up in a famous line from the 1974 film Chinatown: Either you bring the water to L.A., or you bring L.A. to the water. Nearly a hundred years have elapsed since the events the film dramatizes, but much of the West still approaches water the same way.
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