One of the biggest battles over Colorado River water is being staged in one of the west’s smallest rural enclaves.
Tucked into the bends of the lower Colorado River, Cibola, Arizona, is a community of about 200 people. Maybe 300, if you count the weekenders who come to boat and hunt. Dusty shrublands run into sleepy residential streets, which run into neat fields of cotton and alfalfa.
On a warm November morning, John Durand squints over the stern of a small research boat, and gestures toward gray-blue water, and the chaotic tangles of tube-like tule reeds.
The network of clear streams comprising California’s Strawberry Creek run down the side of a steep, rocky mountain in a national forest two hours east of Los Angeles. Last year Nestlé siphoned 45m gallons of pristine spring water from the creek and bottled it under the Arrowhead Water label.
Though it’s on federal land, the Swiss bottled water giant paid the US Forest Service and state practically nothing, and it profited handsomely: Nestlé Waters’ 2018 worldwide sales exceeded $7.8bn.
Conservationists say some creek beds in the area are now bone dry and once-gushing springs have been reduced to mere trickles. The Forest Service recently determined Nestlé’s activities left Strawberry Creek “impaired” while “the current water extraction is drying up surface water resources”.
Los Angeles can sometimes feel like a sprawling hellscape of heat: in the northern valleys and the southern city, metal playground equipment, car steering wheels, even the ground itself effectively become weaponized. The more than 300 days of sunshine a year that for generations have made LA such an attractive place to live and visit are becoming a grave liability due to the climate crisis. The city gets so murderously hot all year-round, its residents routinely suffer heat-related death even in winter. Last summer, city residents in endured some of its highest temperatures ever recorded. Worse is likely to come.
A handful of US states – including New Mexico and California – are facing significant strains on their water supplies that will only intensify with global heating, according to new rankings. New Mexico tops the list and is the only state with “extremely high” pressures on its water availability. The state’s score is on par with the United Arab Emirates in the Middle East and Eritrea in Africa, the World Resources Institute (WRI) found. California ranks second, followed by Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska. “We’re stretching our water supply pretty much as far as it can go … and even further,” said Leah Schleifer, a spokeswoman for WRI’s water program. Experts with WRI said the data shows a global water crisis. “The picture is alarming in many places around the globe, but it’s very important to note that water stress is not destiny,” said Betsy Otto, WRI’s global water director. “What we can’t afford to do any longer is pretend that the situation will resolve itself.”
Drinking California tap water over the course of a lifetime could increase the risk of cancer, according to a study published on Tuesday. Researchers with the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy non-profit, studied the combined health impacts of contaminants found in 2,737 community water systems throughout California and calculated that prolonged consumption of the contaminated water could cause almost 15,500 new cases of cancer. The study found traces of arsenic, hexavalent chromium, and disinfection byproducts in the water systems. All of these contaminants are regulated federally and on a state level. Trace amounts of some arelegally allowed in the water.
Four hours east of Los Angeles, in a drought-stricken area of a drought-afflicted state, is a small town called Blythe where alfalfa is king. More than half of the town’s 94,000 acres are bushy blue-green fields growing the crop. Massive industrial storehouses line the southern end of town, packed with thousands upon thousands of stacks of alfalfa bales ready to be fed to dairy cows – but not cows in California’s Central Valley or Montana’s rangelands. Instead, the alfalfa will be fed to cows in Saudi Arabia.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
