Tag Archives: Arizona

Hydrowonk’s Strategy for Addressing Arizona’s Colorado River Water Challenges: Voluntary Transfers with Owners of Arizona’s Senior Colorado River Water Rights

Arizona’s Colorado River Water Challenge

Arizona is facing a critical water supply challenge. The over-appropriation of the Colorado River requires new water conservation to meet the water demands of economic development in Arizona. With groundwater use reaching its limit in Central Arizona, Arizona’s future economic development faces unprecedented challenges in securing adequate surface water supplies. A case example of these challenges are playing in Buckeye, where, as explained in a recent article in Axios, limited water supplies and resulting challenges have halted development and left some houses stranded (approved but unbuilt).

Meeting surface water supply challenges require institutional reform today.

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COVID-19 Economic Recovery and the Colorado River Basin: Part 5: Deconstructing the Impact of COVID-19 on each Colorado River Basin State

Hydrowonk breaks down the COVID-19 Economic Recovery for each Colorado River Basin state.  Channeling Rod Stewart, “every picture tells a story” regarding the context of the economies of each state in the Colorado River Basin.

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Water Issues on the Ballot in the 2016 Election

With Election Day upon us, are you getting voter fatigue? If so, you are not alone. In a New York Times/CBS News poll conducted between October 28th and November 1st, one question asked, “Has the 2016 campaign made you feel more excited, disgusted, or neither?” An overwhelming 82% of respondents said that the 2016 campaign cycle made them feel more “disgusted,” with only 13% saying the election made them feel more “excited.” Also, the poll is telling because only 3% were undecided by answering “neither.” Regardless of your political affiliation, this has been a long and divisive campaign cycle. We have witnessed much drama at the top of the ticket, from Donald Trump’s “locker room talk” to the multiple FBI reviews of Hillary Clinton’s private e-mail server. These issues as well as the in-fighting within the Republican Party which escalated when House Speaker Paul Ryan told fellow House Republicans in early October that he would spend the last month before the election “focused entirely on protecting our congressional majorities” have distracted the American public from some of the real challenges that our nation faces. Continue reading →

Can Arizona Avoid Future Cutbacks in Allocation from the Colorado River?

As I wrote in a March 2016 Hydrowonk Post, the El Niño rains did not provide even drought relief across the western United States. Some areas have seen record rainfall. For example, Houston, Texas recorded the wettest April on record this year. A slow moving storm from April 15-18 dumped almost a foot of rain in some areas of greater Houston, more than 3 times the average rainfall for the entire month of April. The Pacific Northwest also received very plentiful rainfall. At the beginning of the water year (September 30, 2015), Washington State had 100% of its land mass covered in some form of drought according to the US Drought Monitor. As of this week, 96.71% of the state was drought-free. Unfortunately, not all areas in the west fared as well as the Pacific Northwest in terms of drought relief. Continue reading →