Dear HCN,
The
article on water problems in the Imperial Valley (HCN, 9/16/02: The
Royal Squeeze) was interesting, informative, and in my view, a good
example of HCN‘s dedication to balanced
reporting, which is especially difficult with hot-button issues
like water, salmon and prairie dogs.
I was struck
by one of the figures stated in the article: that California is
being pushed to reduce its use of Colorado River water by 800,000
acre-feet per year. That number is smack in the middle of the range
of estimates of water wasted because of Glen Canyon Dam and the
reservoir known as Lake Powell.
The loss of
water caused by the dam cannot be precisely known, but Glen Canyon
Institute’s studies indicate that between 600,000 and 1 million
acre-feet of water are lost every year through evaporation and bank
storage from Powell. These are net amounts, mind you – over and
above the water removed from the river elsewhere.
The terrible costs of our great mistake in
building Glen Canyon Dam come in many forms. When Glen Canyon Dam
is decommissioned (either by us or by the river itself when silt
fills the reservoir entirely), there will be more water for
downstream users like the farmers in Imperial Valley, the people of
Los Angeles, and the birds on the Pacific Flyway.
F.R. Pamp
Flagstaff,
Arizona
The author is executive director of the
Glen Canyon Institute.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Save water, drain Lake Powell.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
