Lake Mead has a 50-50 chance of becoming a dry lake bed by 2021, according to new research from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography/UC San Diego.
Marine physicist Tim Barnett and climate scientist David Pierce reached that conclusion after analyzing the region’s current and planned water usage and taking into account the ongoing impact of climate change.
Furthermore, they acknowledge their projections are based on conservative estimates … meaning the prognosis for Lake Mead could be even worse than their study indicates. Even if the area implements current water-use mitigation plans, they warn, Lake Mead could still go dry.
“We were stunned at the magnitude of the problem and how fast it was coming at us,” Barnett said. “Make no mistake, this water problem is not a scientific abstraction, but rather one that will impact each and every one of us that live in the Southwest.”
Barnett and Pierce concluded that current conditions are creating a net deficit of almost 1 million of acre-feet of water — enough to meet the needs of about 8 million people — every year in the Colorado River system, which includes both Lake Mead and Lake Powell. That volume is likely to increase as a warming Earth causes more water evaporation, they add.
The Colorado River system supplies water to large parts of the Southwest, including Los Angeles, San Diego and Las Vegas.
Barnett’s and Pierce’s study also found there’s a one in 10 chance Lake Mead could go dry by 2014 … a mere six years from now. The researchers say there’s also a 50 percent chance that, by 2017, water levels will be too low to support hydroelectric power generation.
Projections like that make Las Vegas’ current mortgage crisis pains pale in comparison. Could an evaporating Lake Mead lead to the first wave of climate evacuees in the U.S.? Sad to say, we might know the answer in a few short years.
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Shirley Siluk Gregory
Shirley Siluk Gregory, a transplanted Chicagoan now living in Northwest Florida, represents the progressive half of Green Options' Red, Green and Blue segment. She holds a bachelor's degree in Geological Sciences from Northwestern University but graduated in 1984, just when the market for geologists was flatter than the Florida landscape. Just as well, though: she had little interest in spending her life either in a laboratory or, heaven forbid, an oil field. So, of course, she went into journalism. After extremely low-paying but fun and educational stints at several suburban Chicago weeklies and dailies, Shirley and her then-boyfriend/now-husband Scott found themselves displaced by a media buyout and spending the next several years working as freelancers. Among their credits: The Chicago Tribune, a publication for the manufactured-housing industry, and Web Hosting Magazine, a now-defunct publication that came and went with the dotcom era. Shirley's always been concerned about nature and conservation (and an avid pack-rat, as her family can attest to), but became even more rabidly interested in the environment primarily due to two factors: the growing signs that global warming was real and threatening, and the birth of her son, Noah, in 2003. Suddenly, the prospect of a world that might not be quite as habitable in 40 or 50 years took on a whole new, and personal, meaning. Living where she lives now also helped light the fire of Shirley's environmental awareness: her hometown was severely damaged by Hurricane Ivan in 2004, and beaten up again by Hurricane Dennis in 2005. That, and the fact that she and her family were vacationing in New Orleans until the day before Katrina -- and spent 12 hours driving home for a trip that normally takes 3 -- has made Shirley deeply appreciate how fragile our lifestyles are, and how dependent they are on sound management of natural resources and sustainable living practices. That's why she's become a passionate reader and writer about all things green and sustainable.
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[...] R.I.P. Lake Mead, U.S. Southwest [...]
[...] R.I.P. Lake Mead, U.S. Southwest [...]
[...] recent news that Lake Mead has a 50-50 chance of going dry in the next 13 years was scary enough, but there doesn’t seem to be any shortage of ominous Earth news these days. [...]
Why does my alma mater always have to be the bearer of bad environmental news?