Posted on 04/11/2003 10:15:15 AM PDT by cogitator
Water Demands Draining U.S. Rivers
WASHINGTON, DC, April 10, 2003 (ENS) - Many of America's rivers are suffering from severe water shortages, with drought and human water consumption placing some of these waterways in acute peril, warns a new report released today by American Rivers.
The conservation organization's report, "America's Most Endangered Rivers of 2003," details 10 rivers that face immediate and severe danger, but paints a larger picture of a nation tumbling towards a possible water crisis.
"America's seemingly insatiable demand for fresh water is nearing nature's limits," American Rivers President Rebecca Wodder told reporters at today's press conference. "And we have designed much of the human landscape to make the problem worse, not better."
At the center of the concern is a simple fact - the United States uses more water per person than any other country with little regard for waste or cost. The U.S. average of 1,300 gallons per day is some 60 times the average for many developing countries, according to the World Water Council, with some 85 percent used to for irrigation.
CAPTION The Ipswich River is being starved of water by excessive groundwater pumping and human consumption. (Photo courtesy American Rivers) You gotta see this picture!
U.S. irrigation habits, urban sprawl, increased groundwater pumping and loss of wetlands are endangering the nation's rivers and draining its fresh water supply, Wodder explained, and more often than not government policies are making things worse.
Two federal government projects, one to drain 300 square miles of wetlands and another to scour more than 100 miles of river bottom, put Mississippi's Big Sunflower River at the top of this year's list. These U.S. Army Corps of Engineer flood control projects are poised to go forward this year, unless reviews by state officials or the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) judge otherwise.
"Unless the EPA stands up to political armtwisting," Wodder said, "the Corps of Engineers will drain and scrape the life out of the Big Sunflower River to help a small number of farms collect bigger subsidy checks from American taxpayers."
CAPTION Americans love pristine rivers for relaxation and recreation, but the nation's water use choices are putting many rivers in danger. (Photo by Mark Lance courtesy American Rivers)
The effects of federal agricultural policy and subsidies have had a severe impact on the Klamath River, which is the second cited by American Rivers.
The Bush administration's decision to increase irrigation flows to farmers in the upper region of the river contributed to the deaths of some 33,000 salmon last September. This was the worst recorded fish kill in U.S. history.
Balancing the water needs of competing interests in the Klamath River Basin is not easy, said Representative Mike Thompson, a California Democrat. But the Bush administration's policy, by pitting upstream farmers against conservationists and fishers, is an attempt "to shoehorn a political solution to a scientific problem," Thompson said at today's press conference.
"The problem with the Klamath River is a uniquely local problem that is unfortunately exacerbated by this administration's policies," he said.
CAPTION Low water levels contributed to a massive fish kill in the Klamath River last September. (Photo by Northcoast Environmental Center courtesy American Rivers)
Thompson introduced legislation in the House today that would allocate $200 million to landowners and tribes throughout the Klamath Basin who participate in water conservation projects. It is designed to bring together stakeholders from the upper and lower basin, Thompson explained, to "eliminate competing interests and find feasible solutions."
"The communities within the Klamath Basin cannot afford to wait any longer," he said.
Severe water shortages earned the Ipswich River the number three slot on the list, but it is not agricultural policy that is causing the crisis in the Massachusetts river. It is excessive groundwater pumping and municipal water consumption that leave portions of the river dry each summer.
The river often looks more like a dirt road, said Kerry Mackin, executive director of the Ipswich River Watershed Association.
"We count more dead fish than living fish," Mackin said.
The combination of excessive municipal water consumption and groundwater pumping are directly related and threaten water supplies across the nation, warned Robert Glennon, a law professor at the University of Arizona and author of the book "Water Follies: Groundwater Pumping and the Fate of America's Fresh Waters."
CAPTION Low water levels at the Platte River could have a negative impact on migrating waterfowl, including the sandhill crane. (Photo courtesy U.S. National Park Service)
The United States now pumps some 28 trillion gallons of groundwater every year, Glennon explained, with little regard for how this affects the hydrological cycle.
"We are allowing limitless access to a finite resource," he said. "There is a disconnect between the law and science."
Pumping groundwater, Glennon explained, reduces the natural flow of water into the nation's rivers and depletes a resource that took thousands of years to accumulate. But as demand for water increases, local and state entities are increasingly looking below ground for additional supply.
This has created a direct threat to the Platte River, which is on the endangered list, and threatens to undermine an agreement to secure adequate flows in the Platte River and to protect its adjacent wetlands.
The Platte River, which runs through Wyoming, Colorado and Nebraska, is considered by conservationists to be the most important stopover for migratory birds in the nation's heartland.
Excessive diversion and consumption are also responsible for putting the Rio Grande on this year's list, Wodder explained, and water flow issues also led the organization to put Colorado's Gunnison River on its list.
In part because of population growth, the nation's municipal water consumption is the fastest growing sector of U.S. water use, in particular from low density sprawl development.
This is a serious concern for the Mattaponi River, which makes the endangered list because it is threatened by a planned reservoir that would provide water for the sprawling cities of Virginia's Tidewater region.
CAPTION Virginia's Mattaponi River is considered one of the most pristine coastal river systems on the eastern seaboard. (Photo by G. Warren Mountacastle, Jr. courtesy American Rivers)
"Healthy watersheds capture and store water for human and natural needs, but sprawl development creates landscapes that shed water like a raincoat," Wodder said. "Water rushing down storm drains when it rains is water that will not come up from your well when it is sunny."
Wodder also warned that the Bush administration's decision to revise the scope of the Clean Water Act's protection for wetlands could add to the long list of threats to the nation's rivers. Conservationists believe the reinterpretation of the law by the administration effectively removed protection for as much as 20 percent of the wetlands in the lower 48 states.
"Draining, filling or paving over wetlands and small streams sets off a chain reaction that eventually reduces the water available in river for people and wildlife," Wodder explained. "As wetlands are lost, flash floods increase but less rainfall soaks into the ground. As groundwater levels fall, springs dry up and stream flows drop."
U.S. Representative James Oberstar, a Minnesota Democrat, told reporters at the press conference that he supports a legislative effort to reverse the Supreme Court decision that the Bush administration has used to justify its narrow reinterpretation of what constitutes a protected wetland under the Clean Water Act.
"The Supreme Court decision is undermining a 30 year effort to improve America's waterways," Oberstar said. "We have to get back on track to what the Clean Water Act intended."
The other rivers on the list are Colorado's Gunnison River, which is burdened by unnatural water flows, along with the Snake River and Georgia's Tallapoosa River, which are both threatened by impacts from dams, and the Trinity River in Texas, which could be severely affected by planned flood control and floodplain projects.
The water issues that are affecting America's rivers will only get more serious, said Glennon, and will require strong leadership at the local, state and federal levels of government.
"This is a tragedy of the commons," he said. "We need to start to recognize the economic value of water."
The usualy environmental sky-is-falling nonsense, in other words.
Rivers and lakes which were dead have regenerated. The rivers in this country in 1880 were ten times filthier than today, especially the urban area stretches.
I have flown sea planes all over the country since 1979. The rivers today are the healthiest ever. There are even fresh water clams in the Delaware river and Schukyll River that run thru Philadelphia. The Hudson is amazingly clean despite the temptation to stir up PCB's to whip up some campaign cash.
If a dry river bed disturbs you, for heaven's sake never set foot west of the Mississippi.
Why won't it last much longer? Are consumption patterns going to change suddenly?
It looked to me like American Rivers is concerned about actually having water in the Ipswich River, not about getting it to above-average levels.
According to the article, the threat to the Platte is due to groundwater pumping. Since most migratory birds move in the spring, I would imagine that the spring flow volume is the most critical, not the late summer volume.
We are talking about a huge amount of water here. In the last 100 years the Sierra Nevada range has gone from 20 trees/acre to 300 trees/acre. A 12% drop in the runoff is a huge amount of water in this range. If we logged the trees, we would have healthier forests, more runoff and less need for pumping from aquifers.
Water quality isn't really the issue; rivers have recovered significantly since the low ebb in the late 1960s. The issue is how much is being used, and rivers that are in significant trouble due to over-use. Not all rivers are in the same "boat", so to speak. But an illustration of what can happen occurred last summer in the Washington D.C. metro area just before the drought broke. The regional water council had to start releasing water from upstream reservoirs into the Potomac for two reasons; one, to keep the ecosystem of the river in decent shape, and two, to supply enough water to the interests that use Potomac River water. The situation was critical enough that the Montgomery County executive was starting to worry about whether there would be enough water in the Potomac in a couple of months.
Yes, the drought broke, but this region cut it very close. Had the drought been 3-4 months longer (and it could be next time), the situation would have become increasingly critical. And the next time there will be even more people using the water.
The town of Orange, Virginia, actually had to institute controls on the length of time people could shower, due to their dependence on a small river as their main water source. Restaurants couldn't use dishwashers, they had to use paper plates and plastic utensils.
So in many cases the problem is not water quality, it's simply how much is being used.
It's like saying that there is a shortage of breathable air because everyone just took a breath at the same instant!
People don't live at 18,000 feet above sea level because there is an air shortage there too?
Water just moves from one place to another. That is unless Bill Gates is secretly hiding it somewhere in a big container.
So let's say you have a groundwater-based irrigation system on the central plains. When do you pump: spring, or late summer?
The high spring flows are necessary not so much to provide water for the cranes, as to sweep away garbage from the mid-channel islands where they roost. The problem recently has been the lack of snowmelt in Colorado and Wyoming to fill the reservoirs in the winter-time. Groundwater pumping along the Platte starts long after the cranes have flown north to Alberta.
Back before indoor plumbing and city water supplies everybody had a rain barrel or two -- I guess we aren't allowed to do that anymore.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.