It's 2011 and the technology exists to build a series of water pipelines across the US, to channel flood water to holding tanks in other areas, and to supply water to drought stricken areas. 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? A Canadian entrepreneur's plan published in 1991 diverted water from eastern British Columbia to the Columbia River, then envisioned a 300-mile pipeline from the river through Oregon to a reservoir near Alturas, California. We need to protect our water supply, at allcosts, and forgo our financialgains. 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. Million told Grist that hes secured partial funding for the project from multiple banks and the infrastructure company MasTec, but it remains unclear how much he would have to charge to make the project profitable. The water will drain into the headwaters of the Colorado river. The Associated Press Climate team contributed images and page design. Rescue the oceans from the pollution that flood waters pick up and dump into the ocean, creating dead zones. Senior citizens dont go to wave parks. In 2012, the U.S. Department of the Interiors Bureau of Reclamation completed the most comprehensive analysis ever undertaken within the Colorado River Basin at the time, which analyzed solutions to water supply issues including importing water from the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. The river's web, if some have their way, could become even larger. Whereas I understand water rights, but globalwarming has introduced new priorities. People need to focus on their realistic solutions.. after the growth in California . 2023 www.desertsun.com. It boggles the mind. What's the solution to West's water crisis? Desperate ideas explained All three officials said the construction of a45-mile Delta Water Project tunnel to keep supply flowing from the middle of the state to thirsty cities in the south isvital. . Its possible that the situation gets so dire that there is an amount of money out there that could overcome all of these obstacles, Larson said. All rights reserved. The idea of drinking even heavily treated liquid wastemay seem unpalatable, but Westfordthinks people will adapt. Physically, some could be achieved. Most notably, the Mississippi River basin doesnt always have enough water to spare. Hydrologic Unit Code 07110009. But Westford and her colleague Brad Coffey, water resources manager,said desalination is needed in the Golden State. Arizona state legislators asked Congress to consider a pipeline that dumps Mississippi water into the Green River, but there are alternate possibilities. No one wants to leave the western states without water, said Melissa Scanlan, a freshwater sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. These realities havent stopped the Wests would-be water barons from dreaming. 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. The memorial is seeking Mississippi River water as a solution to ongoing shortages on the Colorado River as water levels reach historic lows in the two largest reservoirs on the river, Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Gavin Newsom if he's. 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. continue to approve surf waveparks and "beachfront" developments in the desert, Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. But, as water scarcity in the West gets more desperate, the hurdles could be overcome one day. The pipeline would help it tap another 86,000 acre-feet of . Pumping Mississippi River water west: solution or pipe dream? Is California still in a drought? Recent storms fill many CA reservoirs Instagram, Follow us on Stories of similar projects often share the same ending, from proposals in Iowa and Minnesota to those between Canada and the United States. States wish they wouldnt. How can we bring water from Mississippi river to west, Arizona - Quora Can Water Megaprojects Save The US Desert West? (Part 2) Local hurdles include endangered species protections, wetlands protections, drinking water supply considerations and interstate shipping protections. I think it would be foolhardy to dismiss it as not feasible, said Richard Rood, professor of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering at the University of Michigan. Those will require sacrifices, no doubt but not as many as building a giant pipeline would require, experts said. This One thousand mile long pipeline could move water from the Eastern USA (Great Lakes, Ohio River, Missouri River, and Mississippi River) to the Colorado River via the Mississippi River. But interest spans deeper than that. Filling Lake Mead with Mississippi River Water No Longer a Pipe Dream. "To my mind, the overriding fatal flaw for large import schemes is the time required to become operational. Page Contact Information: Missouri Water Data Support Team Page Last Modified: 2023-03-04 08:46:14 EST . I can't even imagine what it would all cost. Noting about 4.5 million gallons per second of Mississippi River flow past the Old River Control Structure in Louisiana, the letter writer explains diverting 250,000 gallons per second would. Widespread interest in the plan eventually fizzled. Why are they so hard to catch? We can move water, and weve proven our desire to do it. He said hes open to one but doesnt think its necessary. 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. Even if the government could clear these hurdles, the odds that Midwestern states would just let their water go are slim. "Recently I have noticed several letters to the editor in your publication that promoted taking water from the Mississippi River or the Great Lakes and diverting it to California via pipeline or . "We do not expect to see (carbon capture and storage) happen at a large scale unless we are able to address that pipeline issue," said Rajinder Sahota, deputy executive officer for climate change . Wildfire, flooding concerns after massive snowfall in Arizona, Customers will have to ask for water at Nevada restaurants if bill passes, Snow causes semi truck to crash into Arizona DPS Trooper SUV near Williams, A showdown over Colorado River water is setting the stage for a high-stakes legal battle, In Arizona and other western states, pressure to count water lost to evaporation, While the much-needed water has improved conditions in the parched West, Arizona state legislature passed a measure in 2021, RELATED: Phoenix city officials celebrate final pipe installation in the Drought Pipeline Project, the most comprehensive analysis ever undertaken within the Colorado River Basin. Filling Lake Mead with Mississippi River Water No Longer a Pipe Dream People fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta's Elk Slough near Courtland, California, on Tuesday, March 24, 2020. Much of the sediment it was carrying was dropped in the slow moving water of the Delta. Tina Peters convicted of government obstruction charge, acquitted of obstructing a police officer, (720) 263-2338 Call, text, Signal or WhatsApp, Proudly powered by Newspack by Automattic. On Tuesday, the Scottsdale City Council agreed on a proposal to treat water and deliver it to the community for three years. The price tag for construction would add to this hefty bill, along with the costs of powering the equipment needed to pump the water over the Western Continental Divide. But, he said, the days of mega-pipelines in the U.S. are likely over due to lack of environmental and political will. On the heels of Arizonas 2021 push for a pipeline feasibility study, former Arizona Gov. The 2012 study didn't discount either option but. Column: Building a pipeline to the Mississippi? An idea as harebrained Arizona, for instance, has invested millions of dollars in wastewater recycling while other communities have paid to fix leaky pipes, making their water delivery systems more efficient. The Southern Delivery System in the nearby Arkansas River Basin pipes water from Pueblo County more than 60 miles north to Colorado Springs, Fountain and Security. 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. Then take it out of the southern tip of the aquifer in Southern Colorado. California wants to build a $16 billion pipeline to draw water out of the Sacramento River Delta and down to the southern part of the state, but critics say the project would deprive Delta farmers of water and destroy local ecosystems. Arizona needs water. But a Mississippi pipeline is a pipe dream John Kaufman, the man who proposed the Missouri River pipeline, wants to see the artificial boundaries expand. The distance between Albuquerque, for example, and the Mississippi River perhaps the closest hypothetical starting point for such a pipeline is about 1,000 miles, crossing at least three. The lawsuit, originally filed in southern Texas' federal courts Jan. 18, was amended to include Idaho on Monday. Letters to the Editor: Antigovernment ideology isnt working for snowed-in mountain towns, Letters to the Editor: Ignore Marjorie Taylor Greene? And biologists andenvironmental attorneys saidNew Orleans and the Louisiana coast, along with the interior swamplands, need every drop of muddy Mississippi water. "This sounds outlandish, but we have a massive problem," Paffrath said. You tellgolf courses how much water they can use, but one of thelargest wave basins in the world is acceptable? Clouds of birds hundreds of species live in or travel through Louisianas rich Atchafalaya forests each year, said National Audubon Society Delta Conservation Director Erik Johnson. "The engineering is feasible. Twitter, Follow us on An additional analysis emerged a decade later when Roger Viadero, an environmental scientist and engineer at Western Illinois University, and his graduate students assessed proposals suggested in last summers viral editorials. As part of our commitment to sustainability, in 2021 Grist moved its office headquarters to the Bullitt Center in Seattles vibrant Capitol Hill neighborhood. In 2012, the U.S. Department of the Interiors Bureau of Reclamation completed the most comprehensive analysis ever undertaken within the Colorado River Basin at the time, which analyzed solutions to water supply issues including importing water from the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. Design and build by Upstatement. Idaho joins Texas lawsuit against Biden administration over federal But there are tons of things that can be done but arent ever done.. Yes, it would be hugely expensive. Widespread interest in the plan eventually fizzled. Photos of snowfall around northern Arizona. What goes into the cat-and-mouse game of forecasting Colorados avalanche risks? Mississippi River drought will impact your grocery bill. Still, its physically possible. As recently as 2021, the Arizona state legislature urged Congress to fund a technological and feasibility study of a diversion dam and pipeline scheme to harvest floodwater from the Mississippi River to replenish the Colorado River. But Denver officials have expressed skepticism,because Missouri or Mississippi water isof inferior quality to pure mountain water. The most obvious problem with this proposal is its mind-boggling cost. Most recently, the Arizona state legislature passed a measure in 2021 urging Congress to investigate pumping flood water from the Mississippi River to the Colorado River to bolster its. Studies and modern-day engineering have proven that such projects are possible but would require decades of construction and billions of dollars. The project would have to secure dozens of state and federal permits and clear an enormous federal environmental review; moving the water would also require the construction of several hundred megawatts of power generation. 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 . There are at least half a dozen major water pipeline projects under consideration throughout the region, ranging from ambitious to outlandish. An earlier version of this story misidentified for which agency Jennifer Pitt was a technical adviser. The Colorado River's 1922 compact allocated about 23% of the Upper Basin's water to Utah, and the state uses about 72% of that water. To the editor: With the threat of brownouts and over-stressed power grids, dwindling water resources in California and the call to reduce consumption by 15%, I want to point out we are not all in this together. Grab hydrogen and oxygen from the air and make artificialrain. According to DPS, the driver of the semi-truck lost control of the truck on the icy I-40 freeway near Williams, striking a DPS patrol car parked by the side of the highway. Is sending Mississippi water to West feasible? Experts weigh in The Mississippi used to flow through a delta full of bayous, shifting sad bars, And islets. Can you solve drought by piping water across the country? - New York Times "My son will never know what a six-gallon toilet looks like," she said. Pipeline | Definition, History, Types, Uses, & Facts | Britannica Other legal constraints include the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Protection Act and variousstate environmental laws, said Brent Newman, senior policy director for the National Audubon Society's Delta state programs. 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. "I don't think that drought, especially in the era of climate change, is something we can engineer our way out of.". The memorial also suggests that the pipeline could be used as stormwater infrastructure to prevent regular flooding along the . Los Angeles-area water districts have implemented much of what Famiglietti mentioned. While they didnt outright reject the concepts, the experts laid out multi-billion-dollar price tags, including ever-higher fuel and power costs to pump water up mountains or over other geographic obstacles. Water Pipeline of America - Colorado-Mississippi Pipeline - Zamboanga Infrastructure is one of the few ways well turn things around to assure that theres some supply.. Two hundred miles north of New Orleans, in the heart of swampy Cajun country, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 1963 cut a rogue arm of the Mississippi River in half with giant levees to keep the main river intact and flowing to the Gulf of Mexico. Diverting that water also means spreading problems, like pollutants, excessive nutrients and invasive species. 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. Doug Ducey signed legislation this past July that invested $1.2 billion to fund projects that conserve water and bring more into the state. As a resident of Wisconsin, a state that borders the (Mississippi) river, let me say: This is never gonna happen, wrote Margaret Melville of Cedarburg, Wisconsin.

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