Following months of talks concerning the severe drought conditions in the Colorado River Basin, the U.S. Department of the Interior has announced that representatives from seven Colorado River Basin states have agreed to the submission of a proposal by representatives of three Lower River Basin states — California, Nevada and Arizona — to take billions […]
After years of unrelenting drought, federal forecasters reported there are better-than-even odds that the nation’s largest reservoir will decline into shortage conditions by 2020, forcing Arizona, Nevada and Mexico to reduce their Colorado River water use. Millions of U.S. residents and farmers are served by the Lake Mead reservoir that’s supplied by the Colorado. However, […]
Conservation groups on Thursday sued Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and the Bureau of Land Management for approving new leases to allow fracking on more than 45,000 acres in western Colorado, including within communities and within a half-mile of a K-12 public school, without analyzing or disclosing environmental and public health threats as required by federal […]
A lawsuit filed Monday is seeking to establish personhood rights for the Colorado River–a unique move that could have larger implications for environmental law. The suit, brought by Denver lawyer Jason Flores-Williams against Colorado and Gov. John Hickenlooper, names the river itself as a plaintiff and environmental group Deep Green Resistance as an ally of […]
A draft letter backed by officials in Arizona and Utah is urging the Trump administration to review the uranium mining ban near the Grand Canyon. The letter, which is expected to be sent to Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke on Monday, asks the department to completely overturn the Obama-era environmental protections. The 20-year ban was issued […]
By Tim Radford The Colorado River is dwindling, and climate change is officially to blame. In the first 14 years of this century, the flow declined to only four-fifths of the 20th century average, according to new research. The water lost would have been enough to supply two million people for a whole year. [facebook […]
A study released in Science Advances Wednesday finds strong evidence for severe, long-term droughts afflicting the American Southwest, driven by climate change. A megadrought lasting decades is 99 percent certain to hit the region this century, said scientists from Cornell University, the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University and the NASA Goddard Institute for Space […]
President Obama made a historic announcement Wednesday, saying that the federal government is considering investing in the geothermal power in the rock formations under the Salton Sea in Southern California. Considered to be “the most powerful geothermal reservoirs in the world,” the Salton Sea announcement could play a critical role in the future management of […]
The 16-year drought on the Colorado River has drained Lake Mead and Lake Powell to their combined lowest level in history. But that’s nothing compared to what could happen, according to a new study from the State of Colorado. The study indicates that a drought like the one that happened in 2000 – 2006 “would […]