Instagram, Follow us on Page Contact Information: Missouri Water Data Support Team Page Last Modified: 2023-03-04 08:46:14 EST . The idea of diverting water from the Mississippi to the Colorado River basin is an excellent one, albeit also fantastically expensive. China, unlike the US, is unencumbered by NEPA, water rights and democratic processes in general. Buying land to secure water rights would cost a chunk of cash, too, which leads to an even larger obstacle for such proposals: the legal and political hoops. All rights reserved. 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 list of projects that run on similarly magical thinking goes on: Utah wants to build a pipeline of its own from Lake Powell to the fast-growing city of St. George, but Lake Powell has almost no water left. Large amounts of fossil fuelenergy neededto pump water over the Rockies would increase the very climate change thats exacerbating the 1,200-year drought afflicting the Colorado River in the first place, said Newman, who in his previous job helped the state of Colorado design a long-term water conservation plan. The only newsroom focused on exploring solutions at the intersection of climate and justice. Such major infrastructure is an absolute necessity, said Tom Buschatzke, director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources, who said he represents the governor on all things Colorado River.. But the loss of so much water from the. A federal report from a decade ago pegged an optimistic cost estimate for a similar pipeline at $14 billion and said the project would take 30 years to build; a Colorado rancher who championed the idea around the same time, meanwhile, estimated its costs at $23 billion. It willtake liquid sewage, treat it, and either percolate it back into area groundwater, or, if California law is changed,pipe itto water tanks across the basin. Certainly not the surrounding communities. A 45-mile, $16 billion tunnel that would mark California's largest water project in nearly 50 years took a step closer to reality this week, with Gov. Siphon off a big portion, and youd be swapping oneecological catastrophe for another, said Audubons Johnson. Butbig water infrastructure projects aren't just of interest to the general public. Major projects to restore the coast and save brown pelicans and other endangered species are now underway, and Mississippi sediment delivery is at the heart of them. Arizona state legislators asked Congress to consider a pipeline that dumps Mississippi water into the Green River, but there are alternate possibilities. Experts we spoke with agreed the feat would be astronomical. But if areas like the Coachella Valley continue to approve surf waveparks and "beachfront" developments in the desert, "we're screwed," he said bluntly. Moreover, we need water in our dams for. Nevertheless, Million hasnt given up, and hes currently working to secure permitting for the fourth iteration of the project. But it's doable. Additionally, building large infrastructure projects in general has become more difficult, in part thanks to reforms like the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires that detailed environmental impact statements be produced and evaluated for large new infrastructure projects. The idea of diverting water from the Mississippi to the Colorado River basin is an excellent one, albeit also fantastically expensive. The state also set aside funds in 2018 to study possible imports from the Missouri or Mississippi Rivers, but to date, the study hasnt been done, he said. WATER WILL SOON be flowing from Lake Superior to the parched American Southwest. Email: newsroom@coloradosun.com You tellgolf courses how much water they can use, but one of thelargest wave basins in the world is acceptable? Trans-national pipelines would also impact ecological resources. Rescue the oceans from the pollution that flood waters pick up and dump into the ocean, creating dead zones. Buying land to secure water rights would also cost a chunk of cash, which leads to an even larger obstacle for such proposals: the legal and political hoops. "I'm an optimist," said Coffey, who said local conservation is key. An in-depth feasibility study specifically on pumping Mississippi River water to the West hasnt been conducted yet to Larsons knowledge. No one wants to leave the western states without water, said Melissa Scanlan, a freshwater sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Formal large-scale water importation proposals have existed in the United States since at least the 1960s, when an American company devised the North American Water and Power Alliance to redistribute Alaskan water across the continent using reservoirs and canals. It would cost at least $1,700 per acre-feet of water, potentially yield 600,000 acre-feet of water per year by 2060 and take 30 years to construct. On Tuesday, the Scottsdale City Council agreed on a proposal to treat water and deliver it to the community for three years. The state is expected to lose 10% of its water over the next two decades, reports the . Tribes in the Colorado River Basin are fighting for their water. 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. Its one of dozens of letters the paperhas received proposing or vehemently opposing schemes to fix the crashing Colorado River system, which provides water to nearly 40 million people and farms in seven western states. This story is a product of theMississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an editorially independent reporting network based at the University ofMissouri School of Journalismin partnership withReport For Americaand theSociety of Environmental Journalists, funded by the Walton Family Foundation. Gavin Newsom if he's. Even if the government could clear these hurdles, the odds that Midwestern states would just let their water go are slim. "I don't think that drought, especially in the era of climate change, is something we can engineer our way out of.". Opinion: California gave up on mandating COVID vaccines for schoolchildren. Gavin Newsom also touted desalination in adrought resilience plan he announcedlast week, though in brackish inland areas. To be talking about pipe dreams when thats not even feasible for decades, if at all Its a disservice, Scanlan said. PROVISIONAL DATA SUBJECT TO REVISION. When finished, the $62 billion project will link Chinas four main rivers and requiresconstruction of three lengthy diversion routes, one using as its basethe1,100-mile longHangzhou-to-Beijing canal, which dates from the 7th century AD. Each year worsens our receipt of rain and snow. 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. But interest spans deeper than that. Pitt, who was a technical adviser on Reclamation's2012 report,decried ceaselesspipeline proposals. A man from Minnesota wrote to the Palm Springs Desert Sun earlier this month and expressed similar sentiments, warning, If California comes for Midwest water, we have plenty of dynamite.. Each edition is filled with exclusive news, analysis and other behind-the-scenes information you wont find anywhere else. This latest version would curve up through the Wyoming flatlands and back down to Fort Collins, a distance of around 340 miles. As the largest single contractor of the SWP and a major supporter of Southern California water conservation and recycling programs, Metropolitan seeks feasible alternatives to convey Colorado River Aqueduct supplies or Diamond Valley Lake storage from the eastern portion of its service area or purified water from Pure Water Southern California . The Great Lakes Compact, signed by President George W. Bush in 2008,bans large waterexportsoutside of the areawithout the approval of all eight states bordering them andinput fromOntario and Quebec. 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. At one point, activists who opposed the project erected three large billboards warning about the high cost and potential consequences, such as the possibility that drawing down the Green River could harm the rivers fish populations. Formal large-scale water importation proposals have existed in the United States since at least the 1960s, when an American company devised the North American Water and Power Alliance to redistribute Alaskan water across the continent using reservoirs and canals. Another businessman in New Mexico has pushed plans to pump river water 150 miles to the city of Santa Fe, but that water would have to be pumped uphill. If officials approve this, the backlash willresult in everyone using as much water as wecare to. For as long as this idea has been proposed. after the growth in California . My water, your water. But we need to know a lot more about it than we currently do.. We want to have more sustainable infrastructure. Politics are an even bigger obstacle for making multi-state pipelines a reality. The Western U.S. is experiencing its driest period in more than a thousand years, according to scientists from UCLA and Columbia University. Vessels ran aground and had to navigate very carefully. John Kaufman, the man who proposed the Missouri River pipeline, wants to see the artificial boundaries expand. 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. As western states grew over the twentieth century, the federal government helped them build several massive water diversion projects that would hydrate their growing urban populations: The Central Arizona Project aqueduct brought water from the Colorado River to Phoenix, for instance, and the Big Thompson system piped water across the Colorado Rockies to Denver. This is the country that built the Hoover Dam, and where Los Angeles suburbs were created by taking water from Owens Lake. But in the face of continuing, ever-worsening drought and ongoing growth of the cities of the desert Southwest, is there a better idea out there? 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 to pump even more water out of the already-depleted Lake Powell. Dothey pay extra for using our water? But, as water scarcity in the West gets more desperate, the hurdles could be overcome one day. Just this past summer, the idea caused a firestorm of letters to the editor at a California newspaper. Opinion: How has American healthcare gone so wrong? Famiglietti also said while oil companies are willing to spend millions because their product yields high profits per gallon, that's not the case with water, typically considered a public resource. But, he said, the days of mega-pipelines in the U.S. are likely over due to lack of environmental and political will. Every year, NAWAPA would deliver 158 million acre-feet of water to the US, Canada, and Mexico more than 10 times the annual flow of the Colorado River. "Arizona really, really wants oceanfront," she chuckled. Last updated on: February 10, 2023, 10:54h. Precedents set by other diversion attempts, like those that created the Great Lakes Compact, also cast doubt over the political viability of any large-scale Mississippi River diversion attempt, said Chloe Wardropper, a University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign professor researching environmental governance. Physically, some could be achieved. But we need to know a lot more about it than we currently do.. Even if the sticker price werent so prohibitive, there are other obstacles. Water from these and other large rivers pour. 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. Meanwhile, watershed states in the U.S., and even counties havetaken actionto preventsuch schemes. The idea is as old and dusty as the desert Southwest: Pipe abundant Great Lakes water to parched cities out West, such as Phoenix and Las Vegas. Filling Lake Mead with Mississippi River Water No Longer a Pipe Dream. In the meantime, researchers encourage more feasible and sustainable options, including better water conservation, water recycling, and less agricultural reliance. But Westford and her colleague Brad Coffey, water resources manager,said desalination is needed in the Golden State. To the editor: I'd like to ask if the reader from Chatsworth calling for the construction of a water pipeline from the Mississippi River to Colorado River reservoirs has ever been to . It is time to think outside the box of rain. We've had relatively rich resources for so long,we've never really had to deal withthis before, andwe don't want to change.". The resulting fresh water would bepiped northto the thirsty state. The project entails the construction of thousands of miles of pipelines and canals, 427 water treatment facilities, countless pumping facilities, and the displacement of 300,000 residents. Follow us on Every day, we hear about water conservation, restrictions. Famiglietti saidit's time for a national water policy, not to figure out where to lay down hundreds of pipesbut to look comprehensively at the intertwining of agriculture and the lion's share ofwater it uses. Last time I heard, we are still the United States of America.". States wish they wouldnt. Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. Were doing everything we can to minimize impacts, maximize benefits, and this project has a lot of benevolence associated with it. In his vision of the Wests future, urban growth will necessitate more big infrastructure projects like his. The Arizona Legislature wants the federal government to study the feasibility of constructing a pipeline . I find it interesting that households have to watch how much water theyare usingfor washing clothes, wateringlawns, washing cars,etc. The water would be drained via a 36 inch pipe already installed four miles west of Sugarloaf Mountain outside Marquette. Most notably, the Mississippi River basin doesnt always have enough water to spare. Many sawSiefkes' idea and others like it as sheer theft by a region that needs to fix its own woes. 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. "Yes, a Superior-Green River pipeline seems unrealistic, even impossible at first glance," Huttner wrote for Minnesota Public Radio. Under the analyzed scenario, water would be conveyed to Colorados Front Range and areas of New Mexico to help fulfill water needs. The lawsuit, originally filed in southern Texas' federal courts Jan. 18, was amended to include Idaho on Monday. 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. Thats not to mention the housing development again, for the very wealthy with its own lagoon.