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Utah’s water forecast: Thirsty times are a-brewin’

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on May 31, 2008 at 6:39 am

From the Salt Lake Tribune:

Maj. John Wesley Powell began his exploration of the Colorado River and Utah in 1869, and 10 years later his “Report on the Lands of the Arid Region of the United States, With a More Detailed Account of the Lands of Utah” cut straight to a fundamental truth. The West lacks water, Powell wrote. “Disastrous droughts will be frequent,” he said.

A better word than frequent, perhaps, could have been “persistent,” or even “the natural way of climate in an arid region becoming more so even as millions arrive to take up residence.” No matter - the warning was clear as the bluest Utah sky. Powell soon lost his job.

Nearly five years ago, after a little more than a year at the Water cycle primer helm of the state Division of Water Rights, State Engineer Jerry Olds committed what some observers said looked like a similar career suicide. Olds told lawmakers Utah’s groundwater was so over-allocated that if water rights weren’t adjusted to reality, aquifers that are the state’s primary water sources could be destroyed. That riled ranchers, farmers and county officials who consider themselves the guardians of Utah’s rural heritage and who thought Olds had fired on them. Today, they are working with Olds on a new task force whose ambitious vow in April was to reach consensus by October on a host of water puzzles that for 200 years have driven otherwise sane people to lunacy.

Like many of their Western neighbors, Utahns have been promised imaginary water. There is no way all the “paper rights” on file with the state can be converted to “wet water.” There is not even a requirement to tell the state when water rights sell or transfer, a routine matter with other properties, such as homes or cars. The state can’t even tell if some crook is selling the same right repeatedly, a matter that would come to light when the fleeced tried to get state approval for use.

And when push comes to shove, the law of the West says ranchers and farmers with senior rights rule the outcome, even though Utah, like the rest of the West, grows more cities than crops.

Meanwhile, we blithely turn on the tap and water comes out. But where does the water come from? How will it keep flowing? What’s the best way to use it? Can we find more? Should we just move to Wisconsin?

Read more from the Salt Lake Tribune by clicking here.

May 31, 2008 · Filed Under Southwest Water Issues

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