Severe drought threatens Hoover dam reservoir - and water for US west

[marmar]

(Guardian UK) Had the formidable white arc of the Hoover dam never held back the Colorado River, the US west would probably have no Los Angeles or Las Vegas as we know them today. No sprawling food bowl of wheat, alfalfa and corn. No dreams of relocating to live in a tamed desert. The river, and dam, made the west; now the climate crisis threatens to break it.

The situation here is emblematic of a planet slowly, inexorably overheating. And the catastrophic consequences of the extreme weather this brings.

....(snip)....

Surveying the dam’s sloping face from its curved parapet, Michael Bernardo, river operations manager at the US Bureau of Reclamation, admits the scarcity of water is out of bounds with historical norms. While there is no “average” year on the Colorado River, Bernardo and his colleagues were always able to estimate its flow within a certain range.

But since 2000, scientists say the river’s flow has dwindled by 20% compared to the previous century’s average. This year is the second driest on record, with the flow into Lake Mead just a quarter of what would be considered normal.

“These are scenarios that aren’t necessarily where we expect to be in our models,” said Bernardo, whose work helps deliver a reliable level of water to thirsty western states. Nearly 40 million people, including dozens of tribes, depend on the river’s water. “We’re getting those years that are at the extreme ends of the bell curve. We’ve seen extremes we haven’t seen before, we now have scenarios that are very, very dry.” .........(more)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/13/hoover-dam-lake-mead-severe-drought-us-west?

[CrispyQ]

1. It's looking pretty grim for the southwest.

In the guts of the Hoover dam, down bronze-clad elevators and through terrazzo corridors, a line of enormous turbines help funnel water out downstream, creating hydro-power electricity for more than 1m households in the process. Five of the 17 turbines, each weighing the same as seven blue whales, have been replaced in recent years with new fittings more suited to operating in lower lake levels.

Even with these adaptions, however, the decline of Lake Mead has caused the amount of hydro power generated by the dam to drop by around 25%. The drought is expected to cause the hydro facility at Lake Oroville, California, to completely shut down, prompting a warning from the United States Energy Association that a “megadrought-induced electricity shortage could be catastrophic, affecting everything from food production to industrial manufacturing”. The association added that such a scenario could even force people to move east, in what it called a “reverse Dust Bowl exodus”.

And we're basically doing nothing about it. Nothing. Our big brain will save us. Yeah, right.

[Thunderbeast]

2. What a surprise

John Wesley Powell forsaw this in 1869.

When Congress sent him on his mission to survey the southwest, he warned that the shortage of water would prevent the kind of development that politicians dreamed of.

"RAIN WILL FOLLOW THE PLOW" was the orthodox belief system in the day. Powell wisely dissented in his report. The arid west would never turn into the lush swavannah dreamed of by Washington.

When snow packs fail, and the Midwest aquifer is depleted, we will have to figure out new ways to feed ourselves.

[kysrsoze]

3. Time to get serious about desalination and expand wind/solar. It's the only long-term way forward.

Solar is on a good track right now - required for all new home builds in California. But the state needs to push it for more existing homes, expand wind power and provide more credits for home battery backup systems to ease pressure on the grid.

And we absolutely need those 11 planned desalination plants to come online. Otherwise, we'd better stock up on Brawndo.