STEVE PIECZENIK TALKS

The Water Wars are Heating up on the Colorado River! Damn the dams and let the rivers flow naturally.

In a May 20th NY Times Op Ed, writer Abraham Lustgarten, implores the Dept.of Interior to eliminate most of the dams built in the 20th century on the Colorado River:

“Many of the West’s big dams— Utah’s Glen Canyon Dam; Nevada’s Hoover Dam; Arizona’s Coolidge Dam—have been proven far less efficient and effective than their champions for water reclamation had hoped. They altered the ecosystems and disrupted fisheries. They have left taxpayers saddled with debt”.

When I wrote the novel, State of Emergency, I warned the American people of the impending water wars that would occur over the Colorado River which could no longer provide the necessary waters to Arizona, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and California.The river was becoming depleted of its asset—water.

I posited that the federal government would have to intercede on the state and local level to arbitrate and even mandate the proper allocation of water required in these and other states.

“The losses of water [through the aforementioned dams] undercut the longstanding benefits of damming rivers like the Colorado, and may now be making the West’s water crisis WORSE.”
Despite the imminent, massive shortage of water resulting from the dams and climate change; four states will construct new dams as well as implement water diversion projects. All of this to partake in a greater percentage of water for their respective populations-- before flowing downstream.

This is a recipe for major water wars among the following states: Utah,Arizona,Colorado,New Mexico,Nevada,California and possibly even Mexico. For the most part, dam-building was a 20^th century attempt to save water and redirect it to the major population centers in each of the respective states affected by draught.

Yet, dams have proven to be a major source of water loss. Facts: about 160 BILLION GALLONS of water evaporate from the surface of Lake Powell and another 120 BILLION GALLONS leak out of the bottom of the canyon into the earth fissures. Therefore, the amount of water lost by the Glen Canyon Dam [280 Billion Gallons] amounts to the equivalent of one year’s flow of the entire COLORADO RIVER.
Very little research has been dedicated to hydrology. Yet, the micro and macro study of water is critical to our future survival. There are the more obvious causes of water depletion which will have to be modified, curtailed or stopped completely. These include mining for minerals [phosphate]; animal husbandry; deforestation; fracking; oil-well digging; watering lawns, etc.

Clearly, I don’t propose to know all the answers. I do know that since I wrote my novel some twenty years ago, water wars have erupted in Syria; Egypt/Ethiopia [Nile River]; South East Asia [Vietnam and China over the Mekong Delta]; Middle East; Tibet/China; India/China.

Preserving water is our biggest national security problem in the next fifty years. Stop eating and you can live for over a week. Stop drinking water and your life is bracketed by days.

General George S. Patton said the following: “Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.”