8 ms·

In a Warming West, the Rio Grande Is Drying Up

67 points by farseer 8y ago

nkrisc 8y ago
> Others may not have to hope for rain. Chris Sichler, who farms 650 acres near San Antonio, has wells to pump groundwater onto his fields should the irrigation canals dry up and the rains not materialize. “I’m droughtproof,” he said. “When we plant in the spring we don’t even take into consideration how much snowpack or surface water there’s going to be.” What an astonishing attitude for someone who is watching one natural resource actively disappear. He's only "droughtproof" for as long as the groundwater remains. I'm sure past farmers could never imagine the Rio Grande being used up.
- antisthenes 8y ago
  Maybe he means he's droughtproof for as long as he lives, which is a reasonable assumption (albeit quite selfish). After all, the Rio Grande didn't dry up overnight, and for someone who was a farmer, say, 50 years ago, it was reasonable to assume that it would last their lifetime as well.
  - nkrisc 8y ago
    You're probably right, but that's the sort of thing I'm talking about.
mainliningfbs 8y ago
Those who don't believe in Natural Selection will be victims of it.
Animats 8y ago
This could work out. We can build the Trump Wall right down the middle of the river.
- cozzyd 8y ago
  I wouldn't put it past Trump to run the wall down the middle of New Mexico.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
techsupporter 8y ago
This is what worries me the most about my home region. The surface water is turning to be unreliable, the groundwater is being siphoned out at an alarming rate, yet we still continue to add more and more pressure to the system. Not just farming and agriculture, either. People are moving to Phoenix and Santa Fe and Dallas and Houston at amazing rates, but the water systems can't keep up. In the Dallas suburbs, one public water system owns exactly one lake and has partial rights to three others but all of those lakes drop to alarming levels almost every summer. Yet, the cities inside that water district keep adding more and more houses and commercial buildings and water connections because nobody wants to say "we might not have enough water for those who are already here." I don't even know if a city government could say that. But here we are. More people moving into dry areas expecting to be able to drink, wash, and clean, but with less water every day with which to do it.
- gascan 8y ago
  Cheap water seems to give the idea it will always be cheap & plentiful. And rules preventing market pricing will perpetuate that notion right up until the day your faucet dries up. Increasing tap fees are the closest thing to a market driver- although they have not stopped development, they have been rising. I think they are around $30k in my area.
  - niftich 8y ago
    Factors like water supply make me think that the Sunbelt migration, whose targets, especially the southwest, were are among the most water-poor areas, is a trend that won't last beyond another 40 years. As these areas become built out, they will begin to experience factors that make them less appealing: rising property values, rising utility prices, and demographic pressures from natural deaths among the elderly and low incomes among new arrivals. Areas that are unremarkable now because they've gone through a deindustrialization transition (upstate NY, northeast Ohio) will cycle back as sites of opportunity, and non-southern metros that have heretofore been able to maintain a liveable compromise between affordability and demand (represented by Chicago, but also Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indianapolis) will face an influx of out-migrants from the declining fortunes of the southwest. Southeast metros that are targets of opportunity now (Atlanta, Dallas, Raleigh, Nashville, Charlotte, Orlando) will have cycled further along the affordability transition, so they won't draw nearly as much residents during the southwest's decline as they do now.
rayiner 8y ago
The south west is a damning indictment of big government short sightedness. The army corps of engineers diverted all these rivers to create irrigation, and now you’ve got all these people populating a region that wouldn’t naturally have been able to handle that kind of population.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  You could say the same thing about CA Earthquakes, fires and mudslides but it's ok because "surf and ski in the same day bro". Something something glass houses, stones, pots and kettles...
  - tmh79 8y ago
    california has plenty of water for the people here, we do not have plenty of water to grow almonds and alfalfa in millions of acres in the central valley. Agriculture is like 80% of all CA water usage. If you include golf courses and lawns in that, it bumps it up to ~95%.
    - TooBrokeToBeg 8y ago
      Also the Nestle and other commercial water rights holders from the 1800s who siphon the southbound rivers dry, flowing toward Los Angeles. Good thing they just bottle that water and sell it back.
    - adventured 8y ago
      Water used to grow almonds - 1.1 trillion gallons per year - is just about enough to provide water for around 23 million people in California (~59% of the population). A $5-$6 billion crop, consuming half the residential water for a $2.7 trillion economy. If you include alfalfa, which is even worse than almonds, it's something comparable to 150% of all the residential water use in California. It's a spectacular failure on the part of the state of California. Where are the famous CA voter propositions when you need them? A large share of the alfalfa and almonds - aka California's water - gets exported to Asia. It's social and economic suicide for meager benefits.
imbokodo 8y ago
Texas's governor, Greg Abbott sued the federal government to stop climate change regulations. Then when Hurricane Harvey hit, he said the federal government needed to give him over $100 billion for the cleanup.
- warmwaffles 8y ago
  What is your point?
lumberingjack 8y ago
Meanwhile around the great lakes where water is plentiful we are bulldozing farm land for new homes. I wonder if this could make problems later on when water is rare out west and the farms can't produce. They will be bulldozing homes to put the farm land back in because it is near water.
- robohoe 8y ago
  We'll just pump it out and run it hundreds of miles away like it's done with Lake Mead. What could go wrong?
diebir 8y ago
We have not had a good snow year since 2011 or so. The upside is that maybe Lake Powell will finally dry out. Too many people, too many farms and ranchers. Desert was not meant for people, it will expel them. Good. The needs to be wild again.
Bjorkbat 8y ago
In case anyone is wondering why on earth we're growing so much food in the middle of the desert, you can look to lack of disease as an answer. I mean, there's more to it than that. The warmer climate means the southwest has more growing days, but that's kind of a no-brainer for a lot of people. The disease part is a little less obvious though. Take a look at grapes. A lot of grapes are grown in very arid environments. Why is that? Well, that's because grapes are susceptible to a particular fungus called Black Rot. In parts of the United States with particularly wet and humid summers, this disease can pretty much destroy your entire harvest. In dry, arid parts of the country, however, it's unheard of. So that's just on example, but the rule can apply for just about any type of fungus. If you are growing fruits and vegetables in a water-rich but particularly humid part of the United States then you are going to have to contend with more fungus than those parts of the United States that are considered a desert. It's not just fungus either mind you. Pretty much every agricultural pest known to man thrives in water-rich but humid parts of the country, but is less common in those parts of the country considered desert. So, there you go, that's why we don't grow more fruits and vegetables in, say, southeastern Texas, which is especially wet. That being said, overcoming the pests that come with humid weather isn't a terribly hard problem to solve. There are plant varieties out there that have been bred to be more resistant to humid-weather diseases. Some of these are even heirloom crops, meaning they've been around for a while. Unfortunately, there's usually some kind of downside. Maybe the crops in question are less flavorful. Maybe the yields are smaller. Maybe they don't ship well over long distances. Each of these are pretty serious commercial considerations that usually restricts these crops to the niche market of quirky local organic farmers. When it comes to grapes in southeastern Texas, you're dealing with a less familiar taste and an utter lack of brand recognition. As a consequence, southeastern Texas wine producers really need to rely on agritourism to sell their product, otherwise I doubt a single one of them would be in business. I see ag-tech as a potential solution, but the end result wouldn't necessarily be solutions that make urban farming more feasible, but rather solutions that make it possible to control pests more effectively, preferably in a non-GMO and organic fashion, so we can grow the same crops cultivars typically grown in the desert. Removing the various middle-men that stand between small farms and the consumer would also help. Smaller farms can manage pests more effectively and they're more open to trying out atypical crop cultivars, including cultivars that may taste better but have smaller yields or don't ship well. Problem is, small farms typically aren't economically viable due to the bargaining power that crop buyers and grocers possess. If you want to stop growing food in the desert, give them more price bargaining power so they can at least make a living.

67 points by farseer 8y ago

> Others may not have to hope for rain. Chris Sichler, who farms 650 acres near San Antonio, has wells to pump groundwater onto his fields should the irrigation canals dry up and the rains not materialize. “I’m droughtproof,” he said. “When we plant in the spring we don’t even take into consideration how much snowpack or surface water there’s going to be.” What an astonishing attitude for someone who is watching one natural resource actively disappear. He's only "droughtproof" for as long as the groundwater remains. I'm sure past farmers could never imagine the Rio Grande being used up.

antisthenes 8y ago
Maybe he means he's droughtproof for as long as he lives, which is a reasonable assumption (albeit quite selfish). After all, the Rio Grande didn't dry up overnight, and for someone who was a farmer, say, 50 years ago, it was reasonable to assume that it would last their lifetime as well.
- nkrisc 8y ago
  You're probably right, but that's the sort of thing I'm talking about.

mainliningfbs 8y ago

Those who don't believe in Natural Selection will be victims of it.

Animats 8y ago

This could work out. We can build the Trump Wall right down the middle of the river.

cozzyd 8y ago
I wouldn't put it past Trump to run the wall down the middle of New Mexico.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

techsupporter 8y ago

This is what worries me the most about my home region. The surface water is turning to be unreliable, the groundwater is being siphoned out at an alarming rate, yet we still continue to add more and more pressure to the system. Not just farming and agriculture, either. People are moving to Phoenix and Santa Fe and Dallas and Houston at amazing rates, but the water systems can't keep up. In the Dallas suburbs, one public water system owns exactly one lake and has partial rights to three others but all of those lakes drop to alarming levels almost every summer. Yet, the cities inside that water district keep adding more and more houses and commercial buildings and water connections because nobody wants to say "we might not have enough water for those who are already here." I don't even know if a city government could say that. But here we are. More people moving into dry areas expecting to be able to drink, wash, and clean, but with less water every day with which to do it.

gascan 8y ago
Cheap water seems to give the idea it will always be cheap & plentiful. And rules preventing market pricing will perpetuate that notion right up until the day your faucet dries up. Increasing tap fees are the closest thing to a market driver- although they have not stopped development, they have been rising. I think they are around $30k in my area.
- niftich 8y ago
  Factors like water supply make me think that the Sunbelt migration, whose targets, especially the southwest, were are among the most water-poor areas, is a trend that won't last beyond another 40 years. As these areas become built out, they will begin to experience factors that make them less appealing: rising property values, rising utility prices, and demographic pressures from natural deaths among the elderly and low incomes among new arrivals. Areas that are unremarkable now because they've gone through a deindustrialization transition (upstate NY, northeast Ohio) will cycle back as sites of opportunity, and non-southern metros that have heretofore been able to maintain a liveable compromise between affordability and demand (represented by Chicago, but also Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indianapolis) will face an influx of out-migrants from the declining fortunes of the southwest. Southeast metros that are targets of opportunity now (Atlanta, Dallas, Raleigh, Nashville, Charlotte, Orlando) will have cycled further along the affordability transition, so they won't draw nearly as much residents during the southwest's decline as they do now.

rayiner 8y ago

The south west is a damning indictment of big government short sightedness. The army corps of engineers diverted all these rivers to create irrigation, and now you’ve got all these people populating a region that wouldn’t naturally have been able to handle that kind of population.

dsfyu404ed 8y ago
You could say the same thing about CA Earthquakes, fires and mudslides but it's ok because "surf and ski in the same day bro". Something something glass houses, stones, pots and kettles...
- tmh79 8y ago
  california has plenty of water for the people here, we do not have plenty of water to grow almonds and alfalfa in millions of acres in the central valley. Agriculture is like 80% of all CA water usage. If you include golf courses and lawns in that, it bumps it up to ~95%.
  - TooBrokeToBeg 8y ago
    Also the Nestle and other commercial water rights holders from the 1800s who siphon the southbound rivers dry, flowing toward Los Angeles. Good thing they just bottle that water and sell it back.
  - adventured 8y ago
    Water used to grow almonds - 1.1 trillion gallons per year - is just about enough to provide water for around 23 million people in California (~59% of the population). A $5-$6 billion crop, consuming half the residential water for a $2.7 trillion economy. If you include alfalfa, which is even worse than almonds, it's something comparable to 150% of all the residential water use in California. It's a spectacular failure on the part of the state of California. Where are the famous CA voter propositions when you need them? A large share of the alfalfa and almonds - aka California's water - gets exported to Asia. It's social and economic suicide for meager benefits.

imbokodo 8y ago

Texas's governor, Greg Abbott sued the federal government to stop climate change regulations. Then when Hurricane Harvey hit, he said the federal government needed to give him over $100 billion for the cleanup.

warmwaffles 8y ago
What is your point?

lumberingjack 8y ago

Meanwhile around the great lakes where water is plentiful we are bulldozing farm land for new homes. I wonder if this could make problems later on when water is rare out west and the farms can't produce. They will be bulldozing homes to put the farm land back in because it is near water.

robohoe 8y ago
We'll just pump it out and run it hundreds of miles away like it's done with Lake Mead. What could go wrong?

diebir 8y ago

We have not had a good snow year since 2011 or so. The upside is that maybe Lake Powell will finally dry out. Too many people, too many farms and ranchers. Desert was not meant for people, it will expel them. Good. The needs to be wild again.

Bjorkbat 8y ago

In case anyone is wondering why on earth we're growing so much food in the middle of the desert, you can look to lack of disease as an answer. I mean, there's more to it than that. The warmer climate means the southwest has more growing days, but that's kind of a no-brainer for a lot of people. The disease part is a little less obvious though. Take a look at grapes. A lot of grapes are grown in very arid environments. Why is that? Well, that's because grapes are susceptible to a particular fungus called Black Rot. In parts of the United States with particularly wet and humid summers, this disease can pretty much destroy your entire harvest. In dry, arid parts of the country, however, it's unheard of. So that's just on example, but the rule can apply for just about any type of fungus. If you are growing fruits and vegetables in a water-rich but particularly humid part of the United States then you are going to have to contend with more fungus than those parts of the United States that are considered a desert. It's not just fungus either mind you. Pretty much every agricultural pest known to man thrives in water-rich but humid parts of the country, but is less common in those parts of the country considered desert. So, there you go, that's why we don't grow more fruits and vegetables in, say, southeastern Texas, which is especially wet. That being said, overcoming the pests that come with humid weather isn't a terribly hard problem to solve. There are plant varieties out there that have been bred to be more resistant to humid-weather diseases. Some of these are even heirloom crops, meaning they've been around for a while. Unfortunately, there's usually some kind of downside. Maybe the crops in question are less flavorful. Maybe the yields are smaller. Maybe they don't ship well over long distances. Each of these are pretty serious commercial considerations that usually restricts these crops to the niche market of quirky local organic farmers. When it comes to grapes in southeastern Texas, you're dealing with a less familiar taste and an utter lack of brand recognition. As a consequence, southeastern Texas wine producers really need to rely on agritourism to sell their product, otherwise I doubt a single one of them would be in business. I see ag-tech as a potential solution, but the end result wouldn't necessarily be solutions that make urban farming more feasible, but rather solutions that make it possible to control pests more effectively, preferably in a non-GMO and organic fashion, so we can grow the same crops cultivars typically grown in the desert. Removing the various middle-men that stand between small farms and the consumer would also help. Smaller farms can manage pests more effectively and they're more open to trying out atypical crop cultivars, including cultivars that may taste better but have smaller yields or don't ship well. Problem is, small farms typically aren't economically viable due to the bargaining power that crop buyers and grocers possess. If you want to stop growing food in the desert, give them more price bargaining power so they can at least make a living.