Month: August 2020

#Drought news: For the week, avg. temps were mainly above normal with the greatest anomalies occurring in E. #Colorado, S.E. #WY, W. #NE, S.W. #SD, temps = 2-to-8 degrees above normal

Click on a thumbnail graphic to view a gallery of drought data from the US Drought Monitor.

US Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.
US Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.
West Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.
West Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.
Colorado Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.
Colorado Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.

Click here to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:

This Week’s Drought Summary

This U.S. Drought Monitor week saw intensification of drought across parts of the western U.S. as hot and dry conditions persisted with a historic heat wave currently gripping much of the region. Since last Friday, dozens of high temperature records were broken across the West including a scorching 130° F recorded at the Furnace Creek Visitor’s Center in Death Valley National Park. If verified, this high would represent the hottest temperature on Earth since 1913. Accompanying the extreme heat, numerous lightning-ignited wildfires broke out across California during the past week causing air-quality issues across parts of the region. In the Southwest, the continued weak monsoon has led to expansion and intensification of drought-related conditions with areas of Arizona and New Mexico observing less than 50% of normal precipitation since the beginning of the monsoon season. Similarly, drought conditions in the western half of Texas have deteriorated from persistent dry conditions and extreme heat. In the Midwest, short-term precipitation deficits (past 60 days) have led to the expansion of areas of drought, particularly in Iowa, where impacts are being reported in the agricultural sector. In the Northeast, anomalously warm temperatures and below-normal precipitation during the past 90-day period have led to deterioration in drought-related conditions in parts of New England—including Massachusetts where state officials declared a Level 2 drought on August 14 for all regions of the state…

High Plains

On this week’s map, areas of the region—including central North Dakota and western Nebraska—saw modest expansion in areas of Moderate Drought (D1) and Severe Drought (D2) in response to below-normal precipitation during the past 30-to-90-day period. Elsewhere, drought-related conditions deteriorated in southwestern South Dakota leading to the expansion of areas of Moderate Drought (D1). In northeastern Wyoming, some minor improvements were made in an area of Moderate Drought (D1) where precipitation has been above normal during the past 30-60-day period. For the week, average temperatures were mainly above normal with the greatest anomalies occurring in eastern Colorado, southeastern Wyoming, western Nebraska, and southwestern South Dakota where temperatures were 2-to-8 degrees above normal. Overall, the region was generally dry with some lesser accumulations (generally < 1 inch) observed in the Dakotas, eastern Montana, Nebraska, and Kansas…

West

During the past week, an intense heat wave impacted the region as a strong mid/upper level ridge of high pressure parked over the region. Since Friday, numerous high temperature records were broken in cities across the West including Phoenix, Flagstaff, Oakland, Sacramento, and Reno—to name a few. In addition to the extreme heat, thunderstorm activity caused dozens of lightning-ignited wildfires to break out across central and northern California leading the Governor to declare a state of emergency on Tuesday, August 18. The wildfires have intensified and spread quickly leading to large-scale evacuations across numerous communities in northern California. On the map, areas of Severe Drought (D2) and Extreme Drought (D3) expanded in Arizona, Colorado, and Utah. To date, the monsoon has been a “bust” across much of the Southwest with cities like Phoenix, Tucson, Albuquerque, Las Vegas, and El Paso all reporting well below-normal precipitation totals for the monsoon season…

South

On this week’s map, drought intensified across the western half of Texas in response to continued anomalously hot temperatures, high winds, and mounting precipitation deficits. Changes on the map for Texas include expansion of areas of Moderate Drought (D1), Severe Drought (D2), Extreme Drought (D3) as well as the introduction of an area of Exceptional Drought (D4) in the Trans-Pecos region. According to the Texas A&M Agrilife Extension (August 11), the Far West region had reports of very poor rangeland conditions with many grass fires in addition to reports of a number of crops struggling—including cotton, corn, and sorghum. In Oklahoma, areas of drought intensified in the extreme southwestern part of the state with agricultural producers reporting very poor rangeland conditions and dry stock tanks. According to the Oklahoma Mesonet, for the period from January 1 to August 18, southwestern Oklahoma had experienced more than 30 days with temperatures exceeding 100° F. Elsewhere in the region, improvements were made in areas of Abnormally Dry (D0) in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee in response to showers and thunderstorm activity during the past week. For the week, most of the significant rainfall activity occurred in areas not experiencing drought with the heaviest accumulations observed in west-central and southwestern Arkansas where 5-to-8 inch accumulations were observed. Average temperatures were well above normal across much of Texas with areas in the Trans-Pecos and West Central Texas experiencing temperatures ranging from 6-to-10 degrees above normal for the week…

Looking Ahead

The NWS WPC 7-Day Quantitative Precipitation Forecast (QPF) calls for light-to-moderate accumulations ranging from 1-to-5 inches across portions of the South, Southeast, and the Mid-Atlantic with Florida and eastern portions of the Gulf Coast expected to receive the heaviest accumulations. In the Upper Midwest and northern portions of New England, accumulations of less than 1 inch are expected. Elsewhere, generally dry conditions are expected across the remainder of the conterminous U.S. with some isolated thunderstorm activity expected across the Southwest, central and northern Rockies, and the Great Basin—although rainfall accumulations are expected to be light (<1 inch). The CPC 6-10-day Outlook calls for a moderate-to-high probability of above-normal temperatures across most the conterminous U.S. with the exception of the far northern portions where temperatures are expected to be normal except for the Upper Midwest where below-normal temperatures are expected. In terms of precipitation, there is a moderate-to-high probability of above-normal precipitation across parts of the West including the Great Basin and areas of the Intermountain West including Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana. Other areas with a moderate probability of above-normal precipitation include much of the Midwest and the eastern tier. Conversely, drier-than-normal conditions are forecasted for western portions of Oregon and Washington as well as the Desert Southwest, northern Texas, and the Southern Plains.

US Drought Monitor one week change map ending August 18, 2020.

Rare weather phenomenon casts strange light over Southwest #Colorado — The Durango Herald

From The Durango Herald (Jonathan Romeo). Click through for the photos:

‘Pyrocumulous’ cloud collapses at wildfire, sending ash and smoke toward Durango

No, the skies above Southwest Colorado on Wednesday aren’t a sign of a coming armageddon, though given everything that’s happened in 2020, perhaps it wouldn’t be all that surprising.

Instead, the strange light over the region is the result of a unique and rare weather phenomenon set off after a series of events associated with the Pine Gulch Fire burning north of Grand Junction.

Erin Walter, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Grand Junction, said a storm in northeast Utah late Tuesday night brought a burst of cold air and strong wind crashing into the Pine Gulch Fire.

That collision caused what’s known as a “pyrocumulous” cloud, basically a thunderstorm driven by smoke and hot fumes from a fire, to collapse.

“When that storm collapsed, it pushed a lot of hot and dry air down into the Grand Valley, along with a lot of debris and smoke,” Walter said.

As a result, temperatures in Grand Junction spiked around midnight from 78 degrees to 90 degrees within just a few minutes, Walter said.

As ash and soot continued to fall, winds started to bring the plume south, hitting Durango with smoke and haze by late morning.

“That’s really why today has been so different and drastic,” Walter said.

Agricultural Emergency #Drought Response Program — @COWatershed

From Colorado Watershed:

Funding Opportunity

Following the Governor’s official drought declaration in Colorado, the Agricultural Emergency Drought Response Program – a temporary grant program to mitigate drought impacts – is now open and accepting applications.

Click here for more information.

High Plains Drought Monitor August 18, 2020.

Seven top oil firms downgrade assets by $87bn in nine months — The Guardian #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround

Hydrocarbon processing in the Wattenberg Field east of Fort Lupton, Colo., on July 2, 2020. Photo/Allen Best

From The Guardian (Jillian Ambrose):

The world’s largest listed oil companies have wiped almost $90bn from the value of their oil and gas assets in the last nine months as the coronavirus pandemic accelerates a global shift away from fossil fuels.

In the last three financial quarters, seven of the largest oil firms have slashed their forecasts for future oil market prices, triggering a wave of downgrades to the value of their oil and gas projects totalling $87bn.

Analysis by the climate finance thinktank Carbon Tracker shows that in the last three month alone, companies including Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Total, Chevron, Repsol, Eni and Equinor have reported downgrades on the value of their assets totalling almost $55bn.

The oil valuation impairments began at the end of last year in response to growing political support for transition from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources, and they have accelerated as the pandemic has taken its toll on the oil industry.

Lockdowns have triggered the sharpest collapse in demand for fossil fuels in 25 years, causing energy commodity markets to crash to historic lows.

The oil market collapse, which reached its nadir in April, has forced companies to reassess their expectations for prices in the coming years.

BP has cut its oil forecasts by almost a third, to an average of $55 a barrel between 2020 and 2050, while Shell has cut its forecasts from $60 a barrel to an average of $35 a barrel this year, rising to $40 next year, $50 in 2022 and $60 from 2023.

Both companies slashed their shareholder payouts after the revisions triggered a $22.3bn downgrade on Shell’s fossil fuel portfolio and a $13.7bn impairment on BP’s oil and gas assets.

Andrew Grant, Carbon Tracker’s head of oil, gas and mining, said the coronavirus had accelerated an inevitable trend towards lower oil prices – a trend that many climate campaigners have warned will lead to stranded assets and a deepening risk for pension funds that invest in oil firms.

A wildlife refuge under siege at the border — @HighCountryNews

San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge, Arizona. Photo credit: Hillebrand Steve, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

From The High Country News (Jessica Kutz):

New emails detail drained ponds, salvaged fish and a tense relationship with the Department of Homeland Security.

During the fall of 2019, the Department of Homeland Security began pumping large amounts of water from a southern Arizona aquifer to mix concrete for the Trump administration’s border wall. The aquifer is an essential water source for the San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge, so when the pumping escalated, U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials watched helplessly as the water levels at several ponds — the main habitat for the endangered fish at this Sonoran Desert refuge — dropped “precipitously.”

In what Bill Radke, who has managed the refuge for two decades, called “life support” actions, staff was forced to shut off water to three of the ponds to minimize broader damage. As a result, biologists had to salvage endangered fish from the emptying ponds. It was “like cutting off individual fingers in an attempt to save the hand,” Radke wrote in an email to staff.

Since its creation in 1982 the 2,300-acre refuge’s sole mission has been to protect the rare species of the Río Yaqui, including endangered fishes like the Yaqui chub and Yaqui topminnow, and other species, such as the tiny San Bernardino springsnail and the endangered Huachuca water umbel, a plant that resembles clumps of tubular grass. Through a series of artesian wells connected to an aquifer, the refuge has kept ponds filled in this fragile valley for nearly 40 years.

Under normal circumstances, a significant construction project like a border wall would be required to go through an extensive environmental review process as dictated by the National Environmental Policy Act. The Department of Homeland Security says it operates under the spirit of NEPA and solicits public comment. But with environmental laws — including NEPA, the Endangered Species Act and the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act — waived for the border wall, the refuge lacks any legal protection, either for itself or the endangered species in its care. So wildlife officials have tried to work with the department, sending hydrological studies and providing recommendations about how to reduce water use near the refuge — information that the Department Homeland Security has repeatedly claimed it takes into consideration.

Border wall construction infrastructure is seen cutting through the landscape of southern Arizona. Bill Radke called the water withdrawals for the border wall Òthe current greatest threat to endangered species in the southwest region. Photo credit: Russ McSpadden/Center for Biological Diversity via The High Country News

But as emails recently obtained by High Country News through a Freedom of Information Act Request show, Homeland Security consistently ignored the expertise of Radke and his team. The emails, which were sent from August 2019 to January 2020, chronicle months of upheaval at the refuge and dysfunctional communication between Fish and Wildlife and Homeland Security. During crucial moments, Homeland Security kept wildlife agency staff in the dark as land managers and hydrologists worked to anticipate damages.

“What we are seeing in these FOIA documents confirms a pattern with CBP and DHS that goes back 15 years,” said Randy Serraglio, Southwest conservation advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity.

Matthew Dyman, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman, stated that “DHS and CBP have and continue to coordinate weekly, and more frequently on an as needed basis, to answer questions concerning new border wall construction projects and to address environmental concerns from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.” Nevertheless, documents confirm that border wall construction caused groundwater levels to plummet and harmed endangered fish at the refuge.

The Yaqui Chub is one of the four endangered R’o Yaqui species protected at San Bernardino Wildlife Refuge. W.R. Radke/US Fish and Wildlife Service

IN OCTOBER 2019, RADKE wrote to Fish and Wildlife staff that “the threat of groundwater depletion” at the San Bernardino Refuge had gone from “concerning” to a “dire emergency.” Subsequent emails detail the refuge’s difficulty in obtaining water usage estimates from DHS contractors for an accurate risk assessment. Fish and Wildlife officials sent the department a hydrology analysis to raise an alarm and requested a five-mile buffer around the refuge for well drilling.

According to the emails, though, the Department of Homeland Security did little in response. “I was disappointed today to see first hand that DHS and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not abide by the (most recent) October 16, 2019, Fish and Wildlife Service request to minimize water withdrawal from the aquifer that supports all wetlands on San Bernardino NWR,” Radke wrote. “Instead contractors made plans to drill even closer to the refuge, drilling their second new well 480 feet east of (the refuge).”

CBP spokesman Dyman maintains that construction contractors honored the buffer request. But emails show otherwise: At least one well was drilled less than 500 feet from the refuge boundary; it was abandoned only after it didn’t produce water. And Fish and Wildlife soon learned that even more well locations were being considered near the refuge, according to emails. Homeland Security also continued to pump large volumes of water from a private landowner whose well is just 1.5 miles from the refuge.

Despite a request by FWS that all wells be outside a 5 mile buffer around San Bernardino Wildlife Refuge, wells have been built as close as 1.5 miles and 480 feet from the refuge border. Photo credit: Russ McSpadden/Center for Biological Diversity

Around the same time, pond levels in the refuge dropped. In a series of emails in late November, Radke grew increasingly frustrated. On Nov. 22, he wrote to agency employees, “Our refuge water monitoring is already showing harm to our aquifer during months when the refuge has always demonstrated an increase in groundwater levels. We have ponds dropping precipitously (as much as a foot already) that have never gone low during the winter months — not ever.” Fish and Wildlife had warned Homeland Security that this would happen, but no apparent action was ever taken. “I do not know what reaction to expect from DHS or (the Army Corps of Engineers) to our continuing requests for them to minimize or mitigate impacts to the refuge,” Radke wrote, “but so far our requests have been consistently met with indifference.”

ON DEC. 12, RADKE CALLED the water withdrawals for the border wall “the current greatest threat to endangered species in the southwest region.” By that point, refuge staff had begun to track the impact themselves; there was little else they could do. The monitoring became “an overwhelming priority that diminishes our ability to adequately meet other important objectives, obligations and due dates,” Radke wrote.

By January, the impact on the ponds was obvious. According to a Fish and Wildlife memo, swings in water pressure and depth were clearly documented. The report noted that these changes “began to occur as water was used off refuge for border wall construction.” Earlier emails speculated that the situation would only grow more dire at the refuge during the sweltering summer months, when evaporation both from the ponds and the water being pumped would use even more of the precious desert resource.

In an email, Dyman told High Country News that Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers “are working closely with the construction contractor on estimated water usage requirements for barrier construction in Arizona as well as working with San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge to mitigate the impacts of groundwater use for the project.” Beth Ullenberg, a spokeswoman for the Fish and Wildlife Service, confirmed that the refuge is working with Homeland Security. The agency “has identified that larger capacity pumps are now needed in order to maintain pond levels and appropriate pond outflows,” Ullenberg wrote. She said the contractor is purchasing and will install the new pumps at the refuge.

Those pumps came too late for at least three ponds and according to a document obtained by Defenders of Wildlife, as recently as May water pumping near the refuge was still having a direct and detrimental impact to the refuge. Environmental groups say a pattern of secrecy, lack of communication and failure to coordinate with land managers at the border continue to endanger other biodiverse regions, such as Quitobaquito Springs in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, where they intersect with border wall construction.

“(The Department of Homeland Security and Customs and Border Patrol) have consistently ignored the input of land managers and landowners and other stakeholders along the border with regard to these construction projects,” Serraglio said, “and it has resulted in serious damage time and time again.”

Mud plantain is an aquatic annual-perennial plant of the pickerelweed family. It grows partly or wholly in water, whether rooted in the mud, as a lotus, or floating as the water hyacinth. Photo credit: W.R. Radke/US Fish and Wildlife Service

Jessica Kutz is an assistant editor for High Country News. Email her at jessicak@hcn.org.

Colorado River, St. Vrain districts asking voters for millions in new tax revenue — @WaterEdCO

Colorado River headwaters tributary in Rocky Mountain National Park photo via Greg Hobbs.
Colorado River headwaters tributary in Rocky Mountain National Park photo via Greg Hobbs.
Left Hand Creek NW of Boulder, Colorado. By Kayakcraig - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48080249
Left Hand Creek NW of Boulder, Colorado. By Kayakcraig – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48080249

From Water Education Colorado (Sarah Kuta):

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and with a recession looming, two Colorado water districts will ask voters this November to approve property tax increases for millions of dollars in new funding for water education, water quality improvement, infrastructure and water use management.

The St. Vrain and Left Hand Water Conservancy District, made up primarily of Boulder County, is asking voters for more money for the first time in 50 years. Similarly, the 15-county Colorado River Water Conservation District in western Colorado is also going to the polls to ask for more funding.

Historically, funding for water has been hard to come by in Colorado, with voters reluctant to help pay for a statewide water program. But these two districts are hoping for more success at the local level, where voters can more easily see and feel the direct impact of their dollars on local watersheds.

“Whether your relationship with water is limited to water that comes out of your kitchen faucet, or you’re a rafter or kayaker, or a farmer or rancher, or somebody who works in mining and energy production, we all need a secure water supply,” said Andy Mueller, general manager of the Colorado River District. “These efforts that we’re talking about are vitally important to securing that water supply for the next 50 years. And if we don’t do this, our kids will not have the same quality of life.”

Both districts are grappling with a confluence of social and economic pressures: the ongoing drought in Colorado and the West, a rapidly growing population, increased demand for water, declining oil and gas revenue, and declining property tax levels under the state’s Gallagher Amendment.

Both are also hoping to leverage the new property tax revenue to access additional state, federal and private money for water projects.

“It allows us a driver’s seat at the table rather than a passenger seat,” said Mueller.

Local water, local use

The Colorado River District will ask voters to increase the mill levy from 0.252 mills to 0.5 mills, which would generate an additional $4.9 million per year starting in 2021. Under the proposal, the district’s taxpayer-funded budget would more than double from its current $4.5 million level.

The district, home to some 500,000 residents in an area that covers 28 percent of the state, encompasses the Colorado River and its major tributaries, including the Yampa, the White, the Gunnison and the Uncompahgre rivers.

The proposal translates to a median residential property tax increase of $7.03 per year for residents in Grand, Summit, Eagle, Pitkin, Garfield, Routt, Moffat, Rio Blanco, Mesa, Delta, Ouray, Gunnison and parts of Montrose, Saguache and Hinsdale counties.

The district, which has 22 employees, plans to use the extra money to help fund projects and initiatives within its top priority areas: productive agriculture, infrastructure, healthy rivers, watershed health and water quality, and conservation and efficiency. No new staff positions will be created if voters approve the increase.

Already, the district has tightened its expenses as much as possible, Mueller said, but projections show cuts alone won’t be enough. The district’s board members, who have varied political leanings, thought long and hard before deciding to move forward with the ballot question.

“This is essentially government closest to the people,” said Dave Merritt, the district’s board president. “This protects western Colorado water, for use in western Colorado, and gives us the ability to bring some money to bear or some water to bear when we need to solve problems.”

Historic ask

The St. Vrain and Left Hand Water Conservancy District, which spans roughly 500 square miles along the St. Vrain and Left Hand creeks, will ask voters to increase the mill levy from the current 0.156 mills to 1.25 mills for the next 10 years, according to Sean Cronin, the district’s executive director.

If voters agree to the proposed property tax increase, they’ll send an extra $3.3 million to the district each year starting in 2021. For comparison, the current mill levy generates $416,000 annually. (The district’s budget also includes an enterprise fund that generates between $100,000 and $150,000 per year, Cronin said.) The tax would add $9 to the annual property tax bill for a $100,000 home.

The tax increase would be used for projects that support the district’s five main goals, which were outlined in a strategic plan the board approved in January: the protection of water quality and water supply, infrastructure for agricultural water use, water education, creek improvement facilities and conservation.

It’s a historic decision to ask voters for more money: The district has not asked for a property tax increase since its founding in 1971, nearly 50 years ago.

“It’s been an evolution, this isn’t a sudden thing,” said Dennis Yanchunas, the district’s board president. “We believe [the strategic plan] is what our citizens are looking for from the district, and we can provide that leadership. In order to do that, you also have to have the kind of financial base that puts you in a position to do projects and make significant contributions.”

The district’s board members initially discussed asking voters for an even larger tax increase to 1.5 mills, but ultimately decided on the more conservative proposal. The board also added a 10-year sunset clause to help make the idea more palatable.

“There was very much a concern and a discussion around, ‘What’s the potential economic climate in November?’” said Cronin.

Indeed, the board considered the appropriateness of asking voters for a tax increase at all. Ultimately, however, they decided there’s no time like the present.

“I’m not sure that there is ever a good time to ask somebody for more money,” said Yanchunas. “There’s an awful lot of stuff we just have to set aside and say, ‘We have the right plan, we have a mission we believe in and we think the citizens believe in.’”

Sarah Kuta is a freelance writer based in Longmont, Colorado. She can be reached at sarahkuta@gmail.com.

Community Agriculture Alliance: What is Reg 85? — Steamboat Pilot & Today

From Steamboat Pilot & Today (Greg Peterson):

In 2012, the state of Colorado passed Regulation 85, or Reg 85, which dealt with point source and nonpoint source water contaminants. Point sources, like wastewater treatment plants, were hit with strict measures for managing pollutants. Nonpoint sources, like parks, golf courses and agriculture, were not.

However, Reg 85 began a 10-year period where the agricultural community is encouraged to do voluntary measures for managing nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus. Agricultural organizations like the Colorado Livestock Association and Colorado Corn Growers Association were involved in those early discussions and pushed back against the assumption that agriculture is the main contributor of nutrients to streams and rivers in Colorado.

In 2022, the Water Quality Control Commission will determine if the agricultural community needs regulations or if we will continue voluntary measures. The first hearing on Reg 85 is in October, and it is an opportunity for the agricultural community to tell their story and keep Colorado as a voluntary state.

The main issue is not the voluntary measures. Farms and ranches throughout the state have been changing and adapting their practices constantly. Many practices, which have been implemented to simply keep a farm or ranch efficient or profitable, have also improved the management of nitrogen and phosphorus. Colorado producers will continue to invest and adopt practices that manage nutrients and are compatible with their operations.

The issue is telling this story to those outside of the agricultural community, and there are multiple opportunities to do just that.

A team with Colorado State University is conducting multiple edge-of-field studies to show the benefit of specific operations and practices on nutrient management. These studies provide us with valuable data to show the positive benefit of practices on the majority of farms and ranches today.

Additionally, these studies can help the landowner have a better understanding of their own application rates of nitrogen and phosphorus and how well those are being used by the crop.

There is also work being done to demonstrate past improvements through programs like EQIP — Environmental Quality Incentives Program —administered by Natural Resources Conservation Services. Every year, millions of dollars in federal and private funding are spent on Colorado farms and ranches that have had positive impacts on managing nitrogen and phosphorus. These studies can show us how much work has been done throughout the state in reducing loads of nitrogen and phosphorus because of new agricultural practices.

If there is a project that will benefit your farm or ranch and have a positive water quality impact, there is a lot of funding out there. We want to focus that money on projects that are compatible with farms and ranches, making them even better.

If you are interested in participating in any of these opportunities, want to know more about Reg 85 or are interested in project funding, please contact Greg Peterson at the Colorado Ag Water Alliance at coagwater@gmail.com or 720-244-4629.

Greg Peterson is the executive director of the Colorado Ag Water Alliance.

The essential nutrients needed for lucrative agricultural production, nitrogen and phosphorus, have been linked to adverse water quality in streams and rivers. Edge of field water quality monitoring of best management practices (BMP’s), like vegetated filter strips, helps the agricultural industry quantify potential water quality benefits and impacts of BMP’s. Photo credit: Colorado State University

Routt County dips into Stagecoach Reservoir to boost #YampaRiver amid hot, dry conditions — Steamboat Pilot & Today #ColoradoRiver #GreenRiver #COriver #aridification

From the Steamboat Pilot & Today (Derek Maiolo):

The Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District has started releasing water from Stagecoach Reservoir to boost flows into the city of Steamboat Springs’ waste water treatment plant.

The release of 350 acre-feet of water also has the aim of keeping water temperatures cooler to protect the health of the ecosystem and to meet local supply needs, according to a news release from the district. This comes as rivers across Colorado are experiencing varying degrees of drought…

The district also initiated its annual drawdown of Stagecoach Reservoir, during which managers will gradually release an additional 1,000 acre-feet of water through Sept. 30.

All of this means higher flows on the local river. As of Tuesday, the Yampa River was flowing at about 160 cubic feet per second at the U.S. Geological Survey’s stream gauge at the Fifth Street Bridge, up from 90 cfs on Aug. 11…

Thanks to a grant from the Yampa River Fund, the Colorado Water Trust will lease an additional 500 acre-feet of water from the Conservation District, which is intended to improve river health and enhance flows during the hot, dry weeks ahead, according to the news release. The Water Trust can purchase additional water if necessary, up to 4,000 acre-feet for the rest of the year…

This marks the seventh year in the past decade that the Water Trust leased water from Stagecoach River to maintain healthy flows and water temperatures. The organization uses forecast models and historical data to gauge how much water to release during any given year.

Yampa River Basin via Wikimedia.

New #wastewater treatment plant, refined system close to completion — The #Snowmass Sun

Anaerobic Digester

From The Snowmass Sun (Maddie Vincent) via The Aspen Times:

By Sept. 16, the new plant — which started being constructed in 2017 and has now been up and treating local wastewater for more than a month — will be fully working in tandem with the newly renovated current plant, creating a refined wastewater treatment system that goes beyond more stringent state and federal requirements and discharges cleaner water into Brush Creek.

“To see the water flow from that plant through this and actually go out to the stream, to actually see the clarity of the water that goes out to the stream is very gratifying,” Hamby said.

As Hamby stood in the sanitation district parking lot looking at the three buildings, he explained that the primary reason for creating this newly refined wastewater treatment system was the need to align with Regulation 85, the state Nutrients Management Control Regulation passed in 2012 to help reduce phosphorus and inorganic nitrogen pollution to Colorado waterways.

According to Colorado Department of Public Health and Safety documents, Regulation 85 established new limits for how much phosphorus and inorganic nitrogen could be in the clean water discharged from state wastewater treatment plants, new and existing, and put new nutrient monitoring requirements in place.

All 44 wastewater treatment districts in Colorado must meet these new requirements by specified dates, with Snowmass being one of the first on deadline due to its size and location in a priority watershed, as previously reported.

Snowmass Water and Sanitation District voters approved a mill-levy tax to help construct the new plant in May 2016 and the district also was able to sell $23.3 million in bonds for the project, Hamby said.

The total cost for the whole renovated system — including construction of the new plant and renovation of the current plant — is around $27.6 million, Hamby said. The district anticipates it will be about 1% over budget when the project is completed this fall, but will be able to cover the extra cost with system development fee revenue from village construction projects, he explained.

And once it is fully up and running, the improved wastewater system will be able to filter out phosphorus to 1 milligram per liter and nitrogen down to 11.4 milligrams per liter, Hamby said. This is even stricter than the state’s limit of 1.75 milligrams of total phosphorus per liter at the 95th percentile (or 95% level of all samples taken in a given year) and 14 milligrams per liter of total inorganic nitrogen for new treatment plants.

Utilizing aerobic and anaerobic bacteria, the wastewater moves between plants through various aeration tanks, clarifiers, filters, UV disinfecting light and eventually out to Brush Creek. The predominately biological nutrient removal process will take around three days from start to finish and have a multitude of automated data collection and monitoring in place along the way to ensure it all runs smoothly.

“The idea of the process is we go from no air, to very, very little air, to a lot of air … that helps grow different types of bacteria. Different steps get you different nutrient removal,” Fineran explained.

Fineran and Hamby said the type of treatment plant and refined process isn’t unprecedented, but that the district was able to carry out the $3.5 million worth of improvements to the current plant in-house, or without any outside contractors to do the work — a feat the three men are proud of and a part of the district’s cost-effective philosophy.

Kids are bigger #coronavirus spreaders than many doctors realized – here’s how schools can lower the risk — The Conversation #COVID19


Students and parents at California’s Hollywood High School go through temperature checks before picking up laptops for online learning.
Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images

Phyllis Sharps, Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and Lucine Francis, Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing

The first U.S. schools have reopened with in-person classes, and they are already setting off alarm bells about how quickly the coronavirus can spread.

Georgia’s Cherokee County School District, north of Atlanta, had over 100 confirmed COVID-19 cases by the end of its second week of classes, and more than 1,600 students and staff had been sent home after being exposed to them. By the third week, three of the district’s high schools had temporarily reverted to all-online learning. Schools in Mississippi, Tennessee, Nebraska and other states also reported multiple cases, quarantines and temporary school closures.

Deciding whether to open schools for in-person classes during a pandemic is a complex decision. Children often learn better in school, where they have direct contact with expert teachers and the social-emotional learning that comes from being around other children. But they also risk spreading the disease to their teachers and one another’s families without even being aware they have it.

For schools that do reopen classrooms, there are important choices that can help them keep students, families and teachers safe. As nursing professors, we’ve been following the developing research on children’s risks of getting and spreading COVID-19, and we have some advice.

How infectious are kids?

Initially, it appeared that COVID-19 had minimal effects on children and that they didn’t spread it easily, but new research is changing that view.

A large study from Korea published in July found that older children, ages 10 to 19, were just as likely as adults to spread the virus to others. Younger children were suspected of infecting fewer people; however, a hospital in Chicago found that children under 5 with mild to moderate COVID-19 actually had more coronavirus genetic material in their upper respiratory tracts than older children and adults.

A COVID-19 outbreak at a summer camp in Georgia clearly showed how children of all ages are susceptible to infection: 51% of the campers ages 6 to 10 tested positive, as did 44% of those ages 11 to 17.

By mid-August, data from several states showed that children represented about 9.1% of all reported COVD-19 cases, and that the average had risen to 538 cases in every 100,000 children. The American Academy of Pediatrics found a sharp rise in the number of U.S. children testing positive, suggesting that far more children were infected than people realized.

How at-risk are kids?

Children do generally have milder symptoms than adults. In young bodies, it may show up as a fever, runny nose, cough, sore throat, shortness of breath, fatigue, headaches, muscle aches, nausea or diarrhea. Research suggests that children may have more stomach issues and diarrhea compared to adults.

But that isn’t the story for all kids. Some have died after contracting COVID-19, and others have developed severe complications after they appeared to have recovered.

Similar to adults, children face higher risks of developing severe symptoms if they have underlying medical conditions such as diabetes, obesity, asthma, lung disease, suppressed immune system, congenital heart disease and serious genetic, neurologic or metabolic disorders. And children with none of these conditions can still end up in intensive care units because of COVID-19.

In very rare cases, several weeks after getting COVID-19, children have developed multi-system inflamatory syndrome (MIS-C), with symptoms similar to Kawasaki disease, including fever, rash, gastrointestinal problems, inflammation, shock and heart damage. At least six children in the U.S. have died from it.

A big concern for schools is that children who are infected but have no symptoms may be silently spreading the disease to their teachers and friends, who then take it home to their families and out into the community.

Ways to keep kids and their families safe

If a school decides to reopen for in-person instruction, it won’t be the same environment students found last fall. Officials will have to make difficult decisions that will ultimately affect the culture of school life.

Here are 10 recommendations to look for in schools that can help keep children, families and faculty safe:

  • Check everyone for symptoms each morning, including temperature checks, but recognize that the virus starts spreading before symptoms show.

  • If possible, set up quick-response testing. These tests can flag people who are infectious but don’t have symptoms, though they can be expensive, hard to find and have higher rates of false-positives than the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests that take longer.

  • Ensure everyone who can wear a face mask does. Research shows the coronavirus primarily spreads through the air. Masks can limit how far an infected person spreads the virus and how much mask-wearers breathe in.

  • Keep desks 6 feet apart for physical distancing. On the school bus and where lines form, mark off seating and line spacing to make physical distancing easy to remember.

  • Rather than having students change classrooms, keep them together in cohorts and have teachers move from classroom to classroom to limit contact in the halls. Hold classes outside when possible, and ensure outside air circulates into rooms.

  • Suspend extracurricular activities with a high risk of transmission, such as singing and sports with physical contact. Some activities are less risky, such as tennis, swimming and running.

  • Frequently clean high-touch areas, such as bathrooms and door handles.

  • Make sure students are current on all immunizations and get the flu shot.

  • Be prepared to provide emotional and behavioral support to students dealing with stressful and sometimes traumatic experiences during the pandemic.

  • Get a school nurse. During a pandemic like this, every school should have a nurse to check for symptoms and manage illnesses, but many schools don’t have one full-time.

Schools should have a plan and be ready to change it. If students and staff become infected or the school can’t meet safety requirements, the schools need the flexibility to take classes online.

COVID-19 presents an opportunity to reflect on the learning disparities and disadvantages many students will encounter without in-person learning. Out of the ashes of COVID-19, all key stakeholders of the school community will need to work together to develop innovative, sustainable solutions that benefit students who have been most disadvantaged by the pandemic.The Conversation

Phyllis Sharps, Professor of Nursing, Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and Lucine Francis, Assistant Professor of Nursing, Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In a Move That Could be Catastrophic for the Climate, [@POTUS’s] @EPA Rolls Back #Methane Regulations — Inside Climate News #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround

The Four Corners methane hotspot is yet another environmental climate and public health disaster served to our community by industry. But now that we’ve identified the sources we can begin to hold those responsible accountable for cleaning up after themselves. The BLM methane rule and EPA methane rule are more clearly essential than ever. Photo credit: San Juan Citizens Alliance

From Inside Climate News (Phil McKenna):

Several oil and gas giants opposed loosening restrictions on the ‘super-pollutant,’ a greenhouse gas 86 times more potent than carbon dioxide in warming the planet.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a long-anticipated rollback of methane emission regulations for the oil and gas industry on Thursday, marking the latest in a long series of attacks on federal climate policy by the Trump administration.

The move, which was opposed by several leading oil and gas companies, could result in a catastrophic increase in the release of a climate “super-pollutant,” at a time when global methane emissions from human activity are already rising yet, to limit future warming, they must be quickly reduced.

A pre-publication draft of the rules released by the EPA on Thursday would weaken Obama-era rules requiring oil and gas companies to monitor and fix points where methane—the second largest driver of human-made climate change after carbon dioxide—leaks from wells and other infrastructure. The change in rules would result in the release of an additional 4.5 million metric tons of preventable methane pollution each year, according to an assessment by the advocacy group Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).

EDF President Fred Krupp said in a written statement on Thursday that the organization planned to sue the Trump administration over the rollback…

Reducing methane emissions makes economic sense for oil and gas companies because methane, the primary component of natural gas, is a valuable commodity. Leading oil companies BP, Royal Dutch Shell and ExxonMobil have all urged the Trump administration to maintain strong methane emission regulations…

The rollback comes as global methane emissions caused by humans are rapidly increasing, fueled in part by an increase in emissions from the U.S. oil and gas industry, according to a study Jackson and others published in July in the journal Environmental Research Letters.

Anthropogenic methane emissions have gone up by about 13 percent worldwide since the early 2000s, with roughly half the increase coming from fossil fuels in the United States and elsewhere, according to the study. Agriculture, including emissions from rice cultivation and methane emissions from cows and other animals, accounts for the other half of the increase and is a larger overall source of methane emissions, according to the report.

Jackson said the rollbacks would lower the bar for the oil and gas industry, allowing the worst performing companies to continue polluting as they have in the past.

“We want to reward the companies that are doing the most and bring the rest of the market to the same level of environmental stewardship, and that is what we are abandoning here,” he said.

High Emissions from Many Sources

The rollback comes as recent studies show that methane emissions from the U.S. oil and gas sector are consistently higher than official EPA estimates.

For example, emissions from the Permian basin of West Texas and southeastern New Mexico, the second largest natural gas production region in the country, are more than two times higher than federal estimates, according to a study published in April in the journal Science Advances.

Methane emissions from coal mines saw some of the largest growth from the early 2000s to 2017, according to the study Jackson and others published in July.

A 2019 report by the International Energy Agency found that coal mine methane emissions in 2018 were roughly equal to the annual emissions from international aviation and shipping combined.

Abandoned oil and gas wells that leak methane are another large source of emissions, and one that could increase as well operations are shuttered in response to plummeting oil demand as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. EPA data indicates that, as of 2018, there were already 2.1 million unplugged abandoned oil and gas wells in the United States, which emitted an estimated 280,000 tons of methane per year.

The April study looking at the Permian basin estimated that 3.7 percent of all the methane produced from wells in the region was released, unburned, into the atmosphere. While the leakage rate might seem small, methane’s potency as a greenhouse gas means that even a small rate of emissions can have a big impact.

Climate scientists estimate that if as little as 3.2 percent of all the gas brought above ground leaked into the atmosphere rather than being burned to generate electricity, clean-burning natural gas could be worse for the climate over the near term than burning coal.

However, with the time left to address climate change quickly running out, the question of whether burning natural gas or coal is worse for the climate is increasingly irrelevant, said Drew Shindell, an earth science professor at Duke University.

To limit warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century—the more ambitious of two targets set in the Paris Agreement—developed countries need to reduce their emissions by 40 to 50 percent by the end of the decade, Shindell said.

“That is just inconsistent with building new fossil fuel infrastructure,” he said. “Even if gas is better than coal, it still has a large enough CO2 footprint that it doesn’t get you toward where you want to go.”

Methane emissions also contribute to the formation of ground level ozone, or smog, which causes respiratory and cardiovascular disease, particularly in low income communities and communities of color where ozone levels are disproportionately high, Shindell said…

“That is just inconsistent with building new fossil fuel infrastructure,” he said. “Even if gas is better than coal, it still has a large enough CO2 footprint that it doesn’t get you toward where you want to go.”

Methane emissions also contribute to the formation of ground level ozone, or smog, which causes respiratory and cardiovascular disease, particularly in low income communities and communities of color where ozone levels are disproportionately high, Shindell said.

Methane emissions lead to approximately 165,000 premature deaths worldwide each year, according to a 2017 study Shindell published in the journal Faraday Discussions, looking at the societal costs of methane emissions. The study concluded that the social cost of methane—a tally of the overall damage to public health and reduced yields from farms and forests due to methane emissions—is 50 to 100 times greater than similar costs from carbon dioxide emissions.

“There is a compelling need to reduce emissions of methane,” Shindell said earlier this month in testimony before a U.S. House committee in a hearing on “the devastating health impacts of climate change.”

Ellis of BP America added that reducing methane emissions also made economic sense. “Simply, the more gas we keep in our pipes and equipment, the more we can provide to the market,” Ellis said.

“Unlike many CO2 measures, which can be expensive and challenging, controlling methane is generally a gain financially, that’s why this rollback is so disappointing,” Shindell said.

He added, “Not only would it improve climate change, but it’s actually good for the bottom line of companies that do it. If we can’t even manage that, that’s pretty pathetic and not very optimistic for our future.”

Court Strikes Down [@POTUS] Administration Policy That Let Companies Kill Birds — @Audubon

From the Audubon Society (Andy McGlashen):

In a major victory for conservation groups, a federal judge ruled that the Migratory Bird Treaty Act covers unintentional but avoidable avian deaths.

No law degree is required to get the gist of the ruling U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni handed down on Tuesday. Sure, the decision—the latest blow to the Trump administration’s efforts to weaken environmental laws—is marbled with the typical Latin and legalese. But beginning with its opening nod to the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Caproni’s ruling in the Southern District of New York makes it plain that the Interior Department’s interpretation of the century-old Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) isn’t merely flawed—it’s flat-out wrong.

The decision strikes down a 2017 legal opinion issued by Daniel Jorjani, Interior’s top lawyer, which claimed the MBTA did not prohibit “incidental take,” a term for the unintentional but foreseeable and avoidable injury or killing of birds, often through industrial activity. For decades, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has used the threat of potential prosecution under the MBTA to convince companies to take steps to prevent killing birds, such as covering oil waste pits or marking power lines to make them more visible to birds in flight.

Under Jorjani’s opinion, even mass killings of birds—such as the 2010 BP oil spill, which killed an estimated 1 million birds and resulted in a $100 million fine against the company under the MBTA—would not be punishable if killing birds wasn’t the intention. Guided by that interpretation, the FWS has opted not to investigate cases of incidental take, and even counseled companies and local governments that they need not take steps to protect birds.

Caproni eviscerated that reading of the law. “It is not only a sin to kill a mockingbird, it is also a crime,” she wrote. “That has been the letter of the law for the past century. But if the Department of the Interior has its way, many mockingbirds and other migratory birds that delight people and support ecosystems throughout the country will be killed without legal consequence.”

he ruling is a major win for six environmental groups and eight states whose three consolidated complaints argued that the law clearly makes it illegal to kill, hunt, capture, or attempt to capture a bird or egg without a permit “by any means or in any manner.” Caproni agreed, ruling that Interior’s position was “simply an unpersuasive interpretation of the MBTA’s unambiguous prohibition on killing protected birds.” The judge also rebuked Jorjani for issuing an opinion without tapping the expertise of federal wildlife officials. “There is no evidence of input from the agency actually tasked with implementing the statute: FWS,” she wrote.

Conservationists were thrilled at the judgment’s forceful endorsement of their position. “The ruling is completely unambiguous on every count. Every rationale the government gave to try to uphold this rollback of the MBTA, the judge shot them all down,” says Erik Schneider, policy manager for the National Audubon Society, which was among the plaintiffs. “The experts had no bearing on [Jorjani’s opinion]. It was a political decision made without their input.”

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, another plaintiff, said in a statement that the ruling “recognizes the critical importance of protecting our precious wildlife and upholding the rule of law. We hope the Department of the Interior and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service learn their lesson and renew their commitment to acting in the best interest of the public.”

People on both sides of the case expect the administration to appeal. “Three circuit courts have already weighed in supporting the opinion underlining the MBTA rule,” said Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Western Energy Alliance—an association of oil and gas companies that lobbied for ending enforcement of incidental take—in an email. “One district court ruling from New York will not be the final word.”

Sgamma’s reference was to other MBTA cases prior to Jorjani’s opinion. Interior cited those earlier rulings as evidence that courts hadn’t settled whether the law covers incidental take and that prosecuting accidental bird deaths was therefore legally dubious. But Caproni found that line of reasoning unconvincing. “Interior’s argument vastly overstates circuit disagreement and blurs the actual boundaries that have been drawn,” she wrote. “Tensions between the circuits certainly exist, but they are not of the magnitude or kind Interior presents.”

Caproni’s decision is a significant blow to Interior’s effort to enshrine Jorjani’s opinion in a formal rule, which would make the allowance of incidental take more difficult for a later administration to reverse. Part of the justification for such a reversal could come from the department’s recent draft environmental impact statement on the proposed rule, which says it is likely to push some bird species onto the endangered species list.

An Interior spokesperson declined to say if the department would continue work to finalize that rule despite the court decision, instead offering an emailed statement: “Today’s opinion undermines a common sense interpretation of the law and runs contrary to recent efforts, shared across the political spectrum, to de-criminalize unintentional conduct.”

Interior also declined to say how the ruling would affect day-to-day enforcement of the MBTA by the FWS. Gary Mowad, who spent 25 years with the FWS and was deputy chief of enforcement, says the agency should return to investigating industrial threats to birds and engaging companies to reduce those threats. “I hope that the Department of the Interior and the Fish and Wildlife Service take the special agents off the leash and let them do their jobs,” he says. “What I fear is that the service always has the ability to establish enforcement priorities, and they may still make this type of mortality a low enforcement priority.”

To buttress Tuesday’s victory, conservationists want Congress to step in and spell out even more clearly that the MBTA does not apply only to killing birds on purpose. The Migratory Bird Protection Act, which has passed a House committee but hasn’t yet received a vote in the full chamber or a companion bill in the Senate, would affirm that the MBTA prohibits incidental take. It also would set up a permitting program whereby companies would be protected from legal action as long as they adopt industry best practices to limit harm to birds. “Congressional action could potentially build on this victory,” Schneider says, “and help provide even greater stability going forward.”

Swim class on the San Juan River. Photo: Brent Gardner-Smith/Aspen Journalism
Swim class on the San Juan River. Photo: Brent Gardner-Smith/Aspen Journalism
Mallard
Mallard
Photo credit: Colorado Parks and Wildlife
Photo credit: Colorado Parks and Wildlife
The sandhill cranes are back in the San Luis Valley (2020) on their spring migration. Photo credit: Colorado Parks & Wildlife
The sandhill cranes are back in the San Luis Valley (2020) on their spring migration. Photo credit: Colorado Parks & Wildlife
Sandhill cranes. Photo: Scott Helfrich/Audubon Photography Awards
Sandhill cranes. Photo: Scott Helfrich/Audubon Photography Awards

Bald eagle takes down Michigan government drone — NBC News

Adult bald eagle on the Alsek River. Photo credit Wikimedia Commons.

From NBCNews.com (Dennis Romero):

A bald eagle took down a government drone in Michigan, state officials said Thursday.

The bird of prey attacked the Phantom 4 Pro Advanced quadcopter drone about 162 feet in the sky on July 21, “tearing off a propeller and sending the aircraft to the bottom of Lake Michigan,” according to the state Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy.

“The attack could have been a territorial squabble with the electronic foe, or just a hungry eagle,” the department said.

An environmental quality analyst and drone pilot, Hunter King, was mapping shoreline erosion on Lake Michigan with the device, which was flying at 22 mph, when it began twirling out of control and he spotted an eagle flying away, it said.

A bird-watching couple nearby said it saw the eagle strike something and appear to fly away uninjured, department officials said.

A search for the drone days later was unsuccessful. The device was 150 feet offshore, in about 4 feet of Lake Michigan water, the department said.

State officials say #YampaRiver water users are complying with measuring requirement — @AspenJournalism #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification #WhiteRiver

Scott Hummer, water commissioner for District 58 in the Yampa River basin, checks out a recently installed Parshall flume on an irrigation ditch. Hummer said most water users in the Yampa are complying with a state order issued nearly a year ago that requires measuring devices. Photo credit: Heather Sackett/Aspen Journalism

From Aspen Journalism (Heather Sackett):

State regulators in the Yampa River basin say most water users are now willingly complying with an order to measure how much water they are taking — an order once greeted with suspicion and reluctance. But challenges to compliance remain, including the cost of installing equipment.

Last fall, the Colorado Division of Water Resources ordered nearly 500 water users in the Yampa River basin to install measuring devices to record their water use. Nearly a year later, most of those water users are embracing the requirement, according to water commissioner Scott Hummer.

“I am fully confident that over 90% of the people who have orders pending have either complied, are in the process of complying or have asked for an extension,” Hummer said. “So we are getting the cooperation and buy-in that we are requesting from our water users. They are understanding why we are doing it, at least in my area.”

Hummer is the water commissioner for Water District 58, which spans 400 square miles and includes all the water rights above Stagecoach Reservoir. He oversees between 350 and 400 diversion structures.

Measuring water use is the norm in other river basins, especially where demand outpaces supply. But the tightening of regulations is new to the Yampa River basin, and the order was initially met with resistance from some ranchers.

John Raftopoulos, whose family ranches along the Little Snake River, a tributary of the Yampa in Moffat County, said he thinks most irrigators are complying. His cattle ranch has about 15 measuring devices, and he has to install a few more to be completely compliant.

“I know (the state) has to use them. There’s no other way they can control the water; they’ve got to have the measuring device,” Raftopoulos said. “You just got to bite the bullet and install them.”

State law requires water users to maintain measuring devices on their canals and ditches, but this rule was not enforced in Division 6 — consisting of the Yampa, White, Green and North Platte river basins — because historically there was plenty of water to go around in the sparsely populated northwest corner of the state. Long seen as the last frontier of the free river, there has been little regulatory oversight from the state when it came to irrigators using as much water as they needed. But that changed in 2018 with the first-ever call on the river.

A call is prompted when streamflows are low and a senior water rights holder isn’t receiving their full amount. They ask the state to place a call, which means upstream junior water rights holders must stop or reduce diversions to ensure that the senior water right gets its full amount.

Although the order for a measuring device comes with a deadline and the threat of fines, Division 6 engineer Erin Light has been lenient with water users and willing to give them extra time to get into compliance. The process to request an extension is simple: A water user can simply email Light.

“If a water user is working with our office, we are not going to go shut their headgate off,” she said. “We are going to work with them.”

Light doesn’t have an exact count on how many water users have complied so far — water commissioners are working in the field this summer and haven’t had time to enter the most current information into the division’s database yet — but as of January, the Yampa had 49% compliance.

“I am not hearing anything (from water commissioners) about concerns of noncompliance. If there were problems, they would let me know,” Light said. “I have a fair amount of confidence that things are going well in all my areas as to compliance.”

This recently installed Parshall flume in the Yampa River basin replaced the old, rusty device in the background. Division 6 engineer Erin Light is granting extensions to water users who work with her office to meet a requirement for measuring devices. Photo credit: Aspen Journalism/Heather Sackett

Financial burden

Still, some worry that the cost of installing the devices — which in most cases are Parshall flumes — is too big a financial burden for some water users. The devices, which channel diverted water and measure the flow below the headgate, can cost thousands of dollars, which adds up for water users who need to install multiple devices.

The Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District and the Yampa-White-Green Basin Roundtable have teamed up in recent months to create a $200,000 grant program to help water users with infrastructure-improvement expenses. According to Holly Kirkpatrick, the communications manager for the conservancy district, water users so far have completed about $3,500 worth of work. That money will be reimbursed through the grant program.

“We expect to see a huge influx of applications as the season comes to an end,” she said.

In March, Light issued notices to water users in the other Division 6 river basins — White and Green — but decided to delay sending orders after talking with some who had concerns over the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a June letter to Light, signed by four water conservancy districts — White River, Rio Blanco, Yellow Jacket and Douglas Creek — representatives said they would be interested in seeking opportunities for financial assistance for their water users. Under the best-case scenario, it would take until spring to secure grant money and begin installing devices, the letter said.

“This year is a tough year to try and ask people to do anything above and beyond what they already have to do,” said Callie Hendrickson, executive director of the White River and Douglas Creek Conservation Districts. “I know (Light is) willing to give extensions, but right now, our folks don’t need that additional financial or emotional stress.”

Scott Hummer, water commissioner for District 58 in the Yampa River basin, points out how snowmelt flows from high elevation down to the valley where the water is used for irrigation. Hummer said most water users in the Yampa are complying with a state order issued nearly a year ago that requires measuring devices. Photo credit: Heather Sackett/Aspen Journalism

Colorado River Compact influence

Some water users have questioned why, after years of not enforcing requirements for measuring devices in Division 6, the state is now doing so. One answer is that more and better data about water use is becoming increasingly necessary as drought and climate change reduce streamflows, create water shortages and threaten Colorado’s ability to meet its Colorado River Compact obligations.

Division 6 has traditionally enjoyed abundant water and few demands, but as state regulators saw with the 2018 call, that dynamic is no longer guaranteed every year. As the threat of a compact call and the possibility of a state demand-management program grow, state officials say the need to measure water use grows, too.

A major unknown is what would happen in the event of a compact call. A compact call could occur if the upper-basin states — Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico — were not able to deliver the 75 million acre-feet of water over 10 years to the lower basin states — California, Arizona and Nevada — as required by the 1922 compact. Colorado water managers desperately want to avoid this scenario, in part because it could trigger mandatory cutbacks for water users.

State engineer Kevin Rein said that without knowing how much water is being used, it’s a blind guess as to which junior water users would have to cut back.

“We could see the (cubic feet per second) amount that the water right is decreed for, but we don’t know how much is really being diverted and we don’t know how much is really being consumed, so we don’t know what effect it’s going to have on meeting our compact obligations,” Rein told Aspen Journalism last week.

It’s a similar scenario with a potential demand-management program. At the heart of such a program is a reduction in water use in an attempt to send as much as 500,000 additional acre-feet of water downstream to Lake Powell to help the upper basin meet its compact obligations. Agricultural water users could get paid to take part in the temporary, voluntary program to fallow fields and leave more water in the river.

But before they could participate in a demand-management program, the state needs to know how much water that an irrigator has been using.

“The first thing we need is diversion records,” Rein said. “If there’s no measuring device, no record of diversions and somebody wants to participate, they are simply not going to have the data to demonstrate their consumptive use.”

Since nearly everyone is making progress, Hummer said he doubts that enforcement will reach a point where he has to fine someone for not measuring their water use. Still, the transition is a tough one for an area not accustomed to state government oversight of their ditches.

“We are just dealing with difficult circumstances within the whole Colorado River basin system that dictates change, and folks don’t like change, especially in rural areas,” Hummer said. “But it’s here and it’s not going away. The demand for measurement will become more stringent in the future, not less.”

Aspen Journalism is a local, nonprofit, investigative news organization covering water and rivers in collaboration with The Aspen Times, along with other Swift Communications newspapers. This story ran in the Aug. 15 edition of the Steamboat Pilot & Today and the Aug. 17 edition of The Aspen Times.

The next energy frontier: “It’s crazy to be building 40,000 new homes a year with natural gas (Eric Blank)” — The Mountain Town News #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround

Photo credit: Allen Best/The Mountain Town News

From The Mountain Town News (Allen Best):

‘It’s crazy to build 40,000 houses a year’ with natural gas infrastructure in Colorado

In 2010, after success as a wind developer, Eric Blank had the idea that the time for solar had come. The Comanche 3 coal-fired power plant near Pueblo had just begun operations. Blank and his company, Community Energy, thought a parcel of sagebrush-covered land across the road from the power plant presented solar opportunities.

At the time, Blank recalled on Wednesday, the largest solar project outside California was less than 5 megawatts. He and his team were looking to develop 120 megawatts.

It didn’t happen overnight. They optioned the land, and several times during the next 3 or 4 years were ready give up. The prices of solar weren’t quite there and, perhaps, the public policies, either. They didn’t give up, though. In 2014 they swung the deal. The site made so much sense because the solar resources at Pueblo are very rich, and the electrical transmission as easy.

Comanche Solar began operations in 2016. It was, at the time, the largest solar project east of the Rocky Mountains and it remains so in Colorado. That distinction will be eclipsed within the next several years by a far bigger solar project at the nearby steel mill.

Eric Blank. Photo via Allen Best/The Mountain Town News

Now, Blank has moved on to other things. He wants to be engaged in the new cutting edge, the replacement of natural gas in buildings with new heating and cooling technology that uses electricity as the medium.

“There’s too much benefit here for it not to happen,” he said in an interview.

California has led the way, as it so often has in the realm of energy, with a torrent of bans on natural gas infrastructure by cities and counties. Fearing the same thing would happen in Colorado, an arm of the state’s oil-and-gas industry gathered signatures with the intention of asking voter in November to prevent such local initiatives. An intervention by Gov. Jared Polis resulted in competing parties stepping back from their November initiatives.

In Colorado, Blank sees another route. He sees state utility regulators and legislators creating a mix of incentives and at the same time nudging along the conversation about the benefits.

“It will happen because the regulators and the Legislature will make it happen,” he says. Instead of natural gas bans, he sees rebates and other incentives, but also educational outreach. “Maybe someday you need a code change, but to me public policies are in this nuanced dance. The code change is way more acceptable and less traumatic if it is preceded by a bunch of incentives that allow people to get familiar with and understand (alternatives) than just come in from the outside like a hammer.”

Blank says he began understanding the value of replacing natural gas about a year ago, when conducting studies for Chris Clack of Vibrant Clean Energy about how to decarbonize the economy. “This is just another piece of that. I think building electrification is the next frontier.”

And it’s time to get the transition rolling, he says. It just doesn’t make sense to build houses designed for burning natural gas for heating, for producing hot water and for cooking. Retrofitting those houses becomes very expensive.

“It’s crazy to be building 40,000 new homes a year with natural gas,” he says. Once built for natural gas, it’s difficult and expensive to retrofit them to take advantage of new technology. But the economics of avoiding natural gas already exists.

To that end, Blank’s company commissioned a study by Group14 Engineering, a Denver-based firm. The firm set out to document the costs using two case studies. The study examined a newer 3,100-square-foot single-family house located in Arvada, about 10 miles northwest of downtown Denver. Like most houses, it’s heated by natural gas and has a water heater also powered by natural gas.

A house in the Denver suburb of Arvada was used as a case study. Photo credit: Allen Best/The Mountain Town News

The study found that employing air-source heat-pumps—the critical technology used at Basalt Vista and a number of other no-gas housing developments—can save money, reducing greenhouse gas emissions—but would best be nudged along by incentives.

“For new construction, the heat pump scenarios have a lower net-present cost for all rates tested,” the report says. “This is due to the substantial savings from the elimination of the natural gas hookup and piping. Although net-present costs are lower, additional incentives will help encourage adoption and lower costs across the market.” The current rebates produce a 14% savings in net-present costs.

The same thing is found in the case study of a 28,000-square-foot office building in Lakewood, another Denver suburb.

The study digs into time-of-use rates, winter peak demand and winter-off peak use, and other elements relevant to the bottom lines.

The bolder bottom line is that there’s good reason to shift incentives now, to start changing what business-as-usual looks like. Blank points out that natural gas in every home was not ordinary at one time, either. It has largely come about in the last 50 to 60 years. With nudges, in the form of incentives, builders and others will see a new way of doing things, and electrification of buildings will become the norm.

Colorado’s natural gas pivot

Blank says he began to understand how electrification of building and transportation could benefit the electrical system that is heavily reliant on solar and wind and perhaps a little bit of natural gas when conducting studies last year with Clack at Vibrant Clean Energy .

“I was just blown away by the benefits of electrification (of buildings and transportation) to the electric system,” he says.

Greater flexibility will be introduced by the addition of more electric-vehicle charging and water heating by electricity, both of which can be done to take advantage of plentiful wind and solar during times when those resources would otherwise be curtailed, he explains.

Already, California is curtailing solar generation in late spring, during mid-afternoon hours, or paying Arizona to take the excess, because California simply does not have sufficient demand during those hours. Matching flexible demand with that surplus renewable energy allows for materially greater economic penetration of highly cost-effective new solar.

“In our Vibrant Clean Energy study, with building and transport electrification, we found that Colorado could get from roughly 80% to 90% renewables penetration before the lack of demand leading to widespread renewable curtailment makes additional investments in wind and solar uneconomic,” says Blank.

Electrification of new sectors also expands the sales base for distribution, transmission and other costs. Since the marginal cost of meeting this additional demand is low (because wind, solar, and storage are so cheap), this tends to significantly lower all electric rates.”

Colorado, he says, is unusually well positioned to benefit from this transition. It is rich with both wind and solar resources. Coal plants are closing, electricity costs flat or declining. Consumers should benefit. The time, he says, has come.

This is from the Aug. 14, 2020, issue of Big Pivots. To sign up for a free subscription go to BigPivots.com.

Larimer County kicks off public hearing on #NISP — The Loveland Reporter-Herald

Map of the Northern Integrated Supply Project via Northern Water

From The Loveland Reporter-Herald (Pamela Johnson):

All three Larimer County commissioners began listening to an application for the Northern Integrated Supply Project on Monday, with Steve Johnson and Tom Donnelly declining to step away from the upcoming decision.

“I have no doubts I can consider that application on its merits and weigh it against the land use code,” said Johnson at the start of the public hearing Monday night.

Three organized groups opposed to the project and its associated Glade Reservoir — Save the Poudre, No Pipe Dream and Save Rural NoCO — had asked Johnson and Donnelly, the two Republicans on the board, to step back from the decision.

They claimed that the two commissioners, both in their 12th year of service, have shown “decade-long support and endorsement of the project” and have had outside contact with Northern Water, which has applied for a 1041 permit for its reservoir project on behalf of 15 water providers.

Johnson and Donnelly both stressed they would make an impartial decision on the application during this public hearing, which is scheduled to run across four days, and denied any bias…

Right now, the county is considering its 1041 permit, which allows the county to have input and impose conditions on the reservoir construction and pipeline facilities. County planning staff members recommended approval as did the Planning Commission, by a split vote, and the county commissioners have the final say…

The three-member elected board heard from the planning staff and Northern Water on Monday night during a 3½-hour hearing. Next, they will hold both afternoon and evening sessions to take public comment on Aug. 24 and Aug. 31 before deliberating and making a decision Sept. 2.

To approve the permit, the commissioners must believe that the project meets 12 criteria that are listed in the land use code, including whether:

  • It would negatively impact health and safety.
  • It mitigates construction impacts.
  • It doesn’t adversely affect the environment and natural and cultural resources without adequate mitigations.
  • Alternatives were considered.

    • In evaluating the 1,600-page application, the county staff looked at issues ranging from traffic associated with construction and future recreation to water-quality and air-quality impacts to a plan for recreation on the land surrounding Glade. They dug into everything from truck traffic trips to dust levels to the costs of recreation, as well as the acres of habitat and wetland mitigations compared with the amount lost.

    The staff recommended approval with requirements that include noise, water- and air-quality monitoring and mitigation during construction.

    The three commissioners listened to staff members and representatives of Northern Water during the first segment of the hearing, asking about negotiating easements on private property, associated road work, flow levels in the Poudre River and more.

    All three said they will carefully consider all the input from both Northern Water and residents, who will be allowed to speak at hearings on the next two Mondays. Residents who want to speak during the upcoming sessions must sign up by 10 a.m. Aug. 24 at larimer.org/planning/NISP-1041.

    Aspinall Unit operations update: Releases to turn down 50 CFS on August 17, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    Looking downstream from Chasm View, Painted Wall on right. Photo credit: NPS\Lisa Lynch

    From email from Reclamation (Erik Knight):

    Releases from the Aspinall Unit will be decreased from 1650 cfs to 1600 cfs on Monday, August 17th. Releases are being adjusted to bring flows closer to the baseflow target in the lower Gunnison River. The actual April-July runoff volume for Blue Mesa Reservoir came in at 57% of average.

    There is a drought rule in the Aspinall Unit Operations EIS which has changed the baseflow target at the Whitewater gage. The rule states that during Dry or Moderately Dry years, when the content of Blue Mesa Reservoir drops below 600,000 AF the baseflow target is reduced from 1050 cfs to 900 cfs. Therefore, the baseflow target for July and August will now be 900 cfs.

    Flows in the lower Gunnison River are currently above the baseflow target of 900 cfs. River flows are expected to stay at levels above the baseflow target after the release decrease has arrived at the Whitewater gage.

    Currently, Gunnison Tunnel diversions are 1050 cfs and flows in the Gunnison River through the Black Canyon are around 650 cfs. After this release change Gunnison Tunnel diversions will still be around 1050 cfs and flows in the Gunnison River through the Black Canyon will be around 600 cfs. Current flow information is obtained from provisional data that may undergo revision subsequent to review.

    #YampaRiver Cleanup recap

    The Yampa River Core Trail runs right through downtown Steamboat. Photo credit City of Steamboat Springs.

    From Steamboat Today (Derek Maiolo):

    Seven-hundred-twenty-eight cigarette butts. Seven-hundred-nineteen pieces of plastic. Two-hundred-forty-five shards of broken glass.

    Those were among the most common items collected during the 2020 Yampa River Cleanup on Saturday. The annual event had to make some changes this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but it still managed to galvanize a local task force to remove harmful debris from the treasured river that flows through the heart of Steamboat Springs.

    To keep people safe, Friends of the Yampa and the city of Steamboat collaborated to turn the cleanup into a virtual event. Volunteers registered online, signing up as a household or small group to tackle a specific section of the river. Organizers handed out trash bags, gloves and face coverings.

    With 82 volunteers, participation was about on par with previous years, according to Emily Hines, the city’s marketing and special events coordinator who helped to organize the cleanup. Additional volunteers cleaned sections of the river in Hayden and Craig.

    A group of 20 people collected 420 pounds of trash from three sections of the Yampa River near Craig, according to Robert Schenck with Northwest Colorado Parrotheads.

    The inventory of litter represents just a fraction of what people collected. While not weighed, the trash from Steamboat almost filled an entire dumpster, Hines said.

    Volunteers at all locations noted picking up less litter than in previous years. Friends of the Yampa President Kent Vertrees attributes the cleaner conditions to individual endeavors prior to the weekend cleanup. Backdoor Sports in downtown Steamboat organized its own effort a couple of weeks ago, and people in search of volunteer hours have approached Vertrees to conduct their own river cleanup projects.

    He also believes people are getting better about picking up after themselves while on the river…

    Other interesting items collected during the cleanup include a rusty chair from a restaurant, a vehicle battery and a pregnancy test.

    Eastern plains sees gold in #renewable energy future — The #ColoradoSprings Gazette #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround

    Storm clouds are a metaphor for Republican strategy to politicize renewable energy for the November 2020 election. Photo credit: The Mountain Town News/Allen Best

    From Colorado Politics (Joey Bunch) via The Colorado Springs Gazette:

    Sun and wind on the wide-open spaces of Colorado could fill a gaping hole in the region’s economy with new opportunities. Late last month, my friends over at The Western Way released a report detailing $9.4 billion in investments in renewable energy on the plains already. The analysis provides kindling for a hot conversation on what more could be done to help the region and its people to prosper from the next big thing.

    Political winds of change are powering greener energy to the point that conservative organizations and rural farm interests are certainly paying attention, if not getting on board.

    Gov. Jared Polis and the Democrats who control the state House and Senate have the state on course for getting 100% of its energy from renewable resources in just two decades. Those who plan for that will be in the best position to capitalize on the coming opportunities.

    The eastern plains, economically wobbly on its feet for years now, doesn’t plan to be left behind any longer. Folks out there, battered by a fading population, years of drought and fewer reasons to hope for better days, are ready to try something new, something with dollars attached to it.

    Renewable energy is not the whole answer for what troubles this region, but it’s one answer, said Greg Brophy, the family farmer from Wray, a former state senator and The Western Way’s Colorado director. The Western Way is a conservative group concerned about the best possible outcomes for business and conservation in a changing political and economic landscape…

    It also makes a bigger political statement that bears listening to.

    “It’s a market-based solution to concerns people have with the environment,” Brophy said. “Whether you share those concerns or not, a lot of people are concerned, and rather than doing some silly Green New Deal, we actually can have a market-based solution that can provide lower-cost electricity.”

    Brophy was an early Trump supporter, candidate for governor and chief of staff to U.S. Rep. Ken Buck. He’s dismayed at the president for mocking wind energy. He thinks some healing of our broken nation could take place if people looked more for win-wins…

    Renewable energy checks all the boxes. It helps farmers, it helps the planet, and it gives Republicans and Democrats in Denver and D.C. one less thing to argue about.

    Contested water settlements inflamed the Navajo Nation’s health crisis — @HighCountryNews #COVID19 #coronavirus #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    From The High Country News (Andrew Curley) [August 11, 2020]:

    Colonial laws and federal neglect created a worse-case scenario during a global pandemic.

    Aaron Wood, a volunteer with the Water Warriors United Campaign, gives the remaining drips of water to a resident after filling their barrel. After a long history of underdeveloped water resources in the Navajo Nation, nonprofits have stepped up to provide residents with water.
    Photo credit: Paul Ratje via The High Country News

    The Navajo Nation is at the center of the worst global pandemic in recent memory. Although the total number of COVID-19 cases is small compared to national hotspots, the rate of infection is among the nation’s highest.

    Today, national media is focused on Navajo water insecurity — a clear threat to Diné people during the pandemic. About 30% to 40% of reservation residents do not have regular running water. But behind this statistic lies a history of racism and underdevelopment. Even as white communities benefited from decades of expensive water infrastructure, Diné communities were denied the rights and resources necessary to access the same water.

    Water settlements between tribes and states are a source of much of this continued underdevelopment. For Indigenous people, these settlements also represent colonial dispossession, because they often suspend allocation of water rights and funding for water infrastructure until tribal leaders give in to the state’s demands. In 2005, for example, then-Arizona Republican Sen. [Jon Kyl] denied the Navajo Nation 6,411 acre-feet of water until it resolved its claims to the Colorado River with the state of Arizona.

    While the U.S. was violently annexing the Western United States and vigilante militias murdered and displaced Diné and Apache people, settlers moved into Indigenous lands and dammed and diverted rivers. The settlers created a system that enabled them to monopolize the region’s limited water supply. A new legal and political concept became part of Western water law — a concept that favored the expansion of mining companies, farms and a booming livestock industry over the Indigenous communities already using the water.

    The Colorado Compact of 1922 brought the entire Colorado River and its tributaries into this water regime. It divided the river into 15 million quantifiable units…that enabled the U.S. and Western states to more easily divert and distribute water, subject to the laws of the states involved. At the same time, under Winters’ (1908), Indigenous water claims were limited to the date when reservations were established, ignoring centuries of tribal use and governance.

    During the New Deal, rural electrification bypassed reservations while the Army Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation competed to dam and divert rivers in the Western U.S. Dams flooded Indigenous lands, killing ecosystems while providing power to settler communities. Water security was soon taken for granted in Western cities, while Indigenous nations found their water supply becoming increasingly precarious.

    In the 1960s, cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas expanded. The federal government favored development policies that opened reservations for mining and energy. Coal was extracted from the Navajo Nation, converted into energy, and used to power huge generators near the Parker Dam along the Colorado River. Today, these generators move Colorado River water over the Buckskin Mountains and toward Phoenix and Tucson. It is an unnatural process only made possible by Diné coal. The water provided critical infrastructure for Arizona and allowed Phoenix to grow from a small Western town to a sprawling metropolis.

    Starting in the 1970s, state officials proposed settling Indigenous water claims, seeking to resolve lawsuits between tribes and states in favor of limited water rights for tribes. Today, these settlements often contain money for smaller water infrastructure projects.

    But these agreements come at a cost. State officials use them as bargaining chips during negotiations, creating an adversarial relationship between tribes and states. In two recent instances, Sen. Kyl deprived the Navajo Nation of federal funding for water infrastructure in order to pressure Navajo officials to settle water claims with the state.

    In the San Juan River settlement of 2005, Kyl denied Diné communities in the Window Rock area water from the Gallup Supply Project until the Navajo Nation settled all of its existing water claims with Arizona. And in 2010, in yet another proposed settlement, Kyl refused to bring forward legislation that would free the 6,411 acre-feet of water from the San Juan River settlement and also included $800 million in proposed water infrastructure for the western portion of the Navajo reservation. Kyl claimed the infrastructure was too expensive. But today, these are the very communities that are suffering from high COVID-19 infection rates.

    Construction of the Monument Valley waterline extension, which was funded by The Indian Health Service and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The pipeline provided 128 homes with water. Another water project, the Western Navajo Pipeline, has been on hold for at least 10 years.
    Photo credit: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

    There are many factors that create a crisis like this. Water settlements are not the only one, but they are a critical reason why the Navajo Nation lacks water infrastructure today. When we see statistics stating that 30% to 40% of Diné communities lack running water during a global pandemic, they are not statistics without history. The entire situation is an artifact of colonialism. It is the result of decades of indifference, neglect and deliberate underdevelopment.

    Today, however, there is hope: The Navajo Nation Council has allocated $651,000 of CARES act funding for water projects within the Navajo Nation. But a lasting solution will require greater investment in physical infrastructure on the reservation. The Navajo people should not have to wait for water-rights litigation or legal settlements before they get the water, infrastructure and power settler communities take for granted. That is why Congress should fund the Western Navajo Pipeline. This project, which has been on the shelf for at least 10 years, was part of a 2010 water settlement that Sen. Kyl rejected. Had it been funded in 2010, it might have reduced the impacts of COVID in the Navajo Nation. The communities the pipeline would have served are among those that have been hit hardest by the pandemic. A tremendous amount of pain and hardship could have been avoided if the state had simply funded the pipeline a decade ago.

    Andrew Curley is a member of the Navajo Nation and assistant professor in the School of Geography, Development, & Environment at the University of Arizona. Email High Country News at editor@hcn.org

    Many Indian reservations are located in or near contentious river basins where demand for water outstrips supply. Map courtesy of the Bureau of Reclamation.

    @USBR August 24-Month Study Predicts Tier Zero for 2021 — @CAPArizona

    Shown is Lake Mead’s location in the Colorado River Basin, Hoover Dam (the site where water elevations are measured) and water shortage tiers as determined by the 2007 Shortage Sharing Guidelines and the Drought Contingency Plan. Hoover Dam is iconic, so we recreating its massive intake tower to give visual perspective to the projected elevation in relation to the landmark. Equally as important was showing the natural slope of the lake to communicate that as elevation recedes, the amount of water is reduced, as well. Credit: Central Arizona Project

    Here’s the release from the Central Arizona Project:

    The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has issued its August 24-Month Study. The purpose of this study is to project the year-end elevation of Lake Mead, which in turn determines the 2021 Lower Basin water supply conditions for CAP. BOR projects the Lake Mead elevation will be 1085.3’ on Jan. 1, 2021, which signals the Tier Zero supply of Colorado River water will continue for 2021.

    Under Tier Zero, CAP’s water supply will be reduced by 192,000 acre-feet. This represents about a 12% reduction to CAP supplies. The Tier Zero reduction impacts CAP supplies previously available for underground storage, banking and replenishment. In addition, the reductions will likely reduce CAP agricultural uses by about 15%. While the word “reduction” is never popular, the fact that in 2021 Lake Mead will again operate in Tier Zero status shows that DCP is working to stabilize the reservoir from experiencing deeper shortages.

    The August 24-Month Study also shows, in the most likely projection, continued Tier Zero conditions in 2022. However, due to hot and dry conditions across the Colorado River basin, the risk of a deeper reduction under Tier One shortage has increased for 2022. The reductions under Tier One are almost three times larger than Tier Zero. But thanks to the continued hard work across the Arizona water community, including the mitigation programs implemented through the Arizona DCP framework, we are prepared to manage Tier One reductions if they occur.

    Hoover Dam from the Arizona side. Photo credit: Allen Best/The Mountain Town News

    Here’s the release from the Arizona Department of Water Resources:

    The United States Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) has released its August 24 Month Study, which projects Colorado River operations for the next two years. The study projects the operating conditions of the Colorado River system, as well as runoff and reservoir conditions. The Upper Basin experienced around average snowpack (107%) this year, and the April-July inflow into Lake Powell came in at 52% of average. The below-average projection was due to extremely hot and dry conditions in the Upper Basin during the spring and summer of 2020. Consistent with the 2007 Interim Guidelines, Lake Powell will operate under an annual release of 8.23 million acre-feet in water year 2021 with a potential of an April adjustment up to 9.0 million acre-feet.

    The August 24 Month Study projects Lake Mead’s January 1, 2021 elevation to be 1085.28 feet, putting Lake Mead in a Tier Zero condition for 2021. The Study also projects a Tier Zero condition for Lake Mead in 2022 with the projected January 1, 2022 elevation of 1086.90 feet. Tier Zero conditions require a 192,000 acre-foot reduction in Arizona’s 2.8 million acre-foot allocation. The Lower Colorado River Basin is in Tier Zero for 2020. The August 24 month study projects that the Lower Colorado River Basin will remain in the Tier Zero condition in 2021.

    “This is more evidence that the Drought Contingency Plan that was approved by the Arizona Legislature and signed by Governor Ducey in early 2019 was a success,” said Tom Buschatzke, Director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources.

    “Its implementation offsets potentially deeper cuts in Arizona’s Colorado River allocation beyond the 192,000 acre-feet that the State annually has stored in Lake Mead for several years.”

    These reductions will fall entirely on Central Arizona Project (CAP) supplies, impacting CAP supplies for water banking, replenishment and agricultural users. The Tier Zero reductions will not impact tribal or municipal CAP water users.

    While the Tier Zero reductions are significant, they are part of broader efforts being implemented to reduce the near-term risks of deeper reductions to Arizona’s Colorado River supplies. In addition to the Tier Zero reductions to CAP supplies, other programs to conserve and store water are being implemented in Arizona.

    These include programs with the Colorado River Indian Tribes, Gila River Indian Community, the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR), and the Central Arizona Water Conservation District (CAWCD), as well as Reclamation. Including the 192,000 acre-foot allocation reduction, Arizona entities conserved a total of 385,000 acre-feet in Lake Mead in 2020.

    The August 24 Month Study shows that in the near term, the programs being implemented in Arizona and across the Colorado River system, along with favorable hydrology, have helped avoid a near-term crisis in the Colorado River system. However, we continue to face significant near-term and long-term risks to Arizona’s Colorado River supplies. We have much more work to do to address our shared risks. ADWR and CAWCD have jointly convened Arizona water stakeholders to address these risks and to prepare for new negotiations regarding the long-term operating rules on the Colorado River.

    The construction of Hoover Dam created Lake Mead in 1935, which serves as the primary storage reservoir in the lower Colorado River Basin. Water levels in Mead have declined significantly since 2000 when the reservoir peaked at more than 1,200 feet above sea level. As of October 2019, the reservoir is less than 40 percent full at just over 1,080 feet above sea level. Credit: Jirka Matousek / Flickr via Water Education Colorado

    from The Associated Press (Sam Metz):

    The white rings that wrap around two massive lakes in the U.S. West are a stark reminder of how water levels are dropping and a warning that the 40 million people who rely on the Colorado River face a much drier future.

    Amid prolonged drought and climate change in a region that’s only getting thirstier, when that reckoning will arrive — and how much time remains to prepare for it — is still a guess.

    The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released projections Friday that suggest Lake Powell and Lake Mead will dip 16 feet (5 meters) and 5 feet (1.5 meters), respectively, in January from levels recorded a year earlier. Despite the dip, Lake Mead would stay above the threshold that triggers severe water cuts to cities and farms, giving officials throughout the Southwest more time to prepare for the future when the flow will slow.

    “It’s at least a couple of decades until we’re saying, ‘We don’t have one more drop for the next person that comes here,’” said Ted Cooke, general manager of Central Arizona Project, the canal system that delivers river water. “But people certainly ought to be aware that water — the importation of a scarce commodity into a desert environment — is expensive and, with climate change, going to get even more expensive.”

    […]

    Last year, with increasingly less water flowing to Lake Mead and Lake Powell — the two largest man-made reservoirs in the United States — Arizona, California and Nevada agreed to a drought contingency plan that built in voluntary cuts to prevent the reservoirs from dropping to dangerous levels. The other states historically haven’t used their full allocation of water and focus on keeping Lake Powell full enough to generate hydropower.

    Nevada and Arizona will make those voluntary cuts under the new projections, which they also made last year for the first time. But because neither state is using its full share of water, the impact has been minimal and hasn’t trickled down to homes. Mexico also is facing another round of cuts.

    Lake Mead’s expected level of 1,089 feet (332 meters) is almost identical to last year’s projections because conservation efforts and a snowy winter prevented an expected drop, said Michael Bernardo, Bureau of Reclamation river operations manager. The wet weather didn’t last, prompting engineers to forecast the lakes will keep receding.

    When projections drop below 1,075 feet (328 meters), Nevada and Arizona will face deeper cuts mandated by agreements between the seven states and Mexico.

    #Drought continues to shift across #Colorado; extreme conditions expand on the western slope — The Kiowa County Press

    From The Kiowa County Press (Chris Sorensen):

    Drought conditions in Colorado improved in southeast Colorado this week while parts of western Colorado saw an increase in extreme conditions according to the latest update from the National Drought Mitigation Center.

    In the southeast, extreme drought retreated from Baca County, as well as part of eastern Las Animas County, replaced by severe conditions. Southwest Kit Carson and central Cheyenne counties moved from extreme to severe drought as well.

    Colorado Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.

    Similar improvements were also seen in the San Luis Valley for Saguache, Alamosa and portions of Rio Grande, Conejos and Costilla counties. Nearby Custer and northern Huerfano counties also shifted to severe drought.

    On Colorado’s western slope, extreme drought expanded to cover all of Mesa County and the remaining western areas of San Miguel and Montrose counties. Extreme conditions also expanded into much of southern Garfield County where the Pine Gulch and Grizzly Creek fires are burning. Little to no rain has fallen in that area, while daily temperatures have been in the upper 90s and above.

    Moderate drought expanded further into abnormally dry areas of north central Colorado and central mountain counties.

    The monthly drought outlook for August from the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center – released July 31 – showed that drought was expected to develop in areas of Colorado that are currently abnormally dry. The prediction has been accurate for northwest Colorado and central portions of the state, which moved into moderate drought this week.

    Monthly Drought Outlook for August 2020 via the Climate Predication Center.

    @USBR announces 2021 #ColoradoRiver operating conditions #COriver #aridification

    Lake Powell, behind Glen Canyon Dam, shows the effects of persistent drought in the Colorado River Basin. (Source: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation)
    Lake Powell, behind Glen Canyon Dam, shows the effects of persistent drought in the Colorado River Basin. (Source: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation)
    Lake Mead in 2001 vs. 2015 via the Department of Interior.
    Lake Mead in 2001 vs. 2015 via the Department of Interior.

    Here’s the release from the Bureau of Reclamation (Patti Aaron):

    The Bureau of Reclamation today released the Colorado River Basin August 2020 24-Month Study, which sets annual operations for Lake Mead and Lake Powell in 2021. Based on projections in the Study, Lake Mead will operate in the Normal Condition in Calendar Year 2021 and Lake Powell will operate in the Upper Elevation Balancing Tier in Water Year 2021 (October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2021).

    The August 2020 24-Month Study projects:

    – Lake Mead’s Jan. 1, 2021, elevation to be 1,085.28 feet, about 10 feet above the Lower Basin shortage determination trigger of 1,075 feet.

    – Lake Powell’s Jan. 1, 2021, elevation to be 3,591.60 feet — 109 feet below full and 101 feet above minimum power pool.

    Because Lake Mead is projected to begin the year below the Drought Contingency Plan elevation threshold of 1,090 feet, Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will make water savings contributions to Lake Mead in calendar year 2021. Those Drought Contingency Plans, adopted by the seven Basin States, the U.S. federal government and Mexico in 2019, continue to proactively reduce risk in the basin.

    “After a promising start to the snow season last winter, spring and summer turned very dry,” said Reclamation Commissioner Brenda Burman. “Thankfully, our reservoirs continue to do what they were built to do and are providing reliable water by holding it over from wetter years.”

    The Upper Basin experienced a dry spring in 2020, with April to July runoff into Lake Powell totaling just 52% of average. The projected water year 2020 unregulated inflow into Lake Powell—the amount that would flow to Lake Mead without the benefit of storage behind Glen Canyon Dam—is only 58% of average. Total Colorado River system storage today is 51% of capacity, down from 55% at this time last year. Drought contingency plans are proactively addressing risks to the system from the ongoing 21-year drought.

    A key component of Reclamation’s Colorado River Basin activities is the integration of sophisticated modeling tools and scientific research to inform water management decisions. Through a decades-long partnership with the Center for Advanced Decision Support for Water and Environmental Systems at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Reclamation hydrologic engineers and hydrologists are actively collaborating with climate, hydrology and decision support scientists to provide advanced modeling tools.

    “This scientific expertise is key,” Commissioner Burman continued. “It helps us understand what’s happening in the basin now and how changes to climate and demand are likely to impact the river in the future so we can best operate our reservoirs to protect water reliability for generations to come.”

    Their work is helping Reclamation link advances in science to water resource management decisions in the face of greater uncertainty and increased hydrologic and operational risks. Reclamation’s modeling and operations teams further refine these tools, such as the 24-Month Study, to make annual operational determinations for Lake Powell and Lake Mead through close coordination with water and power customers throughout the basin.

    This giant #climate hot spot is robbing the West of its #water — The Washington Post #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    Orchard Mesa Irrigation District power plant near Palisade. Water from Colorado’s snowpack is distributed across the region through a complex network of dams, pipelines and irrigation canals. Photo credit: Orchard Mesa Irrigation District

    Here’s a deep-dive into the Upper Colorado River Basin climate from Juliet Eilperin that’s running in The Washington Post. Click through and read the whole article and to find your county on their dropdown to learn how much it has warmed. Here’s an excerpt:

    Here, on Colorado’s Western Slope, no snow means no snowpack. And no snowpack means no water in an area that’s so dry it’s lucky to get 10 inches of rain a year…

    A 20-year drought is stealing the water that sustains this region, and climate change is making it worse.

    “In all my years of farming in the area, going back to about 1950, 2018 was the toughest, driest year I can remember,” said [Paul Kehmeier’s] father, Norman, who still does a fair share of the farm’s tractor work at 94.

    Colorado Drought Monitor January 2, 2018.

    This cluster of counties on Colorado’s Western Slope — along with three counties just across the border in eastern Utah — has warmed more than 2 degrees Celsius, double the global average. Spanning more than 30,000 square miles, it is the largest 2C hot spot in the Lower 48, a Washington Post analysis found…

    On the Kehmeiers’ farm, like the rest of the area, just under two inches of rain fell between Jan. 1 and July 19. Less than half an inch has fallen since the farming season began on April 1, just 25 percent of the long-term average.

    “The seasons where you don’t want to see the warming are warming faster,” said Jeff Lukas, a researcher at the University of Colorado at Boulder’s Western Water Assessment…

    Farming in America’s dry interior has always amounted to an act of defiance. Water has reinvented the landscape that Kehmeier’s ancestors began working on more than a century ago. A vast irrigation network of pipes, tunnels and dams steers melted snow into fields across the valley and has transformed this sagebrush terrain into a thriving agricultural hub.

    Bicycling the Colorado National Monument, Grand Valley in the distance via Colorado.com

    With his family’s century-old water rights, Kehmeier stores water in a reservoir atop Grand Mesa. Facing long odds on the farm in 2018, he [leased] it for $100 an acre foot — quadruple the normal price — to a nearby fruit grower and Orchard City. (An acre foot is what it takes to cover an acre of land in a foot of water, roughly 325,000 gallons.)

    “It would have to come about 16 miles from the top of that mountain down the creek,” he said, pointing toward Grand Mesa, “and the chance of getting it down the creek in a hot dry year when there’s not much water in the creek and a lot of thieves beside the creek, it was questionable. So, let somebody else deal with that.”

    Kehmeier, who grows alfalfa and grass hay, didn’t agonize over his decision, but he didn’t like driving by his dried-up field every day. Call it a blessing or a curse, but farming is in his blood.

    “And if it’s in your blood, you want to do it,” he said. “I want to go out kicking and scraping if I have to, but I don’t want to give up.”

    He could always plant hay the following year, he thought. Surely, the snow would return…

    Starting in 1898, Henry Kohler recorded the monthly mean temperature, the total precipitation and other details. He and other observers sent their reports to be compiled in Denver.

    These early records, written in cursive, form the foundation of NOAA’s official temperature records, which show that around the close of the 19th century, Delta County’s climate was more than 2 degrees Celsius cooler than it is today…

    Winters in the Northeast are less cold, but experts cannot say yet whether a warmer Atlantic Ocean is driving it. Western Colorado is experiencing a feedback loop, according to Colorado State University senior scientist Brad Udall, because there is less soil moisture to absorb the solar energy and transfer it to the air through evaporation.

    “Heating begets drying, and then drying further begets heating,” he said.

    Dry areas warm faster for lack of moisture to cool things down, said Chris Milly, a senior resource scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey. Land use, irrigation and natural variability could also help explain part of the disparity.

    Milly and another colleague recently found that much of the Colorado River’s climate-induced decline — amounting to 1.5 billion tons of missing water — comes from the fact that the region’s snowpack is shrinking and melting earlier. That’s as much water as 14 million Americans use in a year…

    “What we’re seeing is changes in real time,” said Mark Harris, who directs the Grand Valley Water Users Association. “As water managers, regardless of our personal beliefs, we can’t totally disregard these worst-case scenarios. The trends are leading in one direction.”

    Screenshot of Washington Post graphic August 2020. Temperature change C 1895-2019. Credit: John Muyskens/The Washington Post

    August 2020 #ENSO update: ahoy, mateys — @NOAA

    From NOAA (Emily Becker):

    The chance of La Niña developing this fall is up slightly from last month, at around 60%. Our La Niña Watch continues!

    Becalmed
    The Oceanic Niño Index—the three-month mean sea surface temperature anomaly (difference from the long-term mean, 1986-2015 in this case) in the Niño3.4 region—was -0.2°C during May–July 2020. The Oceanic Niño Index is our official metric for ENSO (El Niño/Southern Oscillation). -0.2°C is solidly in the “neutral” category of greater than -0.5°C and less than 0.5°C, so we continue in ENSO-neutral conditions for now.

    Monthly sea surface temperature in the Niño 3.4 region of the tropical Pacific for 2019-2020 (purple line) and all other years starting from neutral winters since 1950. Climate.gov graph based on ERSSTv5 temperature data.

    The current 60% chance of La Niña is largely based on the dynamical computer models, most of which slightly favor La Niña in the fall and winter.

    Fair winds and following seas
    The near-surface winds over the equatorial region—the trade winds—blow steadily from the east to the west near the equator. Well, I always describe them that way, but technically they blow from the northeast to the southwest on the north side of the equator, and from the southeast to the northwest south of the equator! (You can see why I simplify it sometimes, especially since the easterly component is what matters the most for ENSO.)

    The trades result from the Hadley circulation—when heated air rises in the tropics, it ascends to the upper level of the atmosphere and then travels to the north and south. It descends again in the mid-latitudes, and travels back toward the equator near the surface.

    The Hadley circulation, in which heat is transferred from the Earth’s surface to the upper atmosphere through convection and latent heating. Map by NOAA Climate.gov.

    Because the Earth is spinning, the winds traveling toward the equator are bent to the right in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern hemisphere (the Coriolis effect). The Earth spins eastward, so winds headed toward the equator veer off to the west—the opposite direction of Earth’s rotation.

    The Pacific warm pool and trade winds. NOAA Climate.gov map from the Data Snapshots map collection.

    The trade winds help to keep warmer water piled up in the western side of the tropical Pacific (the Pacific warm pool), and we keep a close eye on them for ENSO prediction. When they relax, the surface water warms, and warmer-than-average water can shift eastward under the surface. (Form of: a downwelling Kelvin wave!) When they’re stronger than average, they can cool the surface, and result in an upwelling Kelvin wave: cooler-than-average subsurface water moving eastward.

    Recently, the trades have been stronger, and the surface has cooled in the east-central Pacific Ocean. Also, the amount of cooler water under the surface has begun to increase again, which is a bit of a relief for forecasters, because it had been diminishing when we issued the La Niña Watch last month. This development supports the models’ forecast of La Niña, since cooler subsurface water will reinforce the surface cooling.

    Daily near-surface (950 hPa) wind anomalies in the central Pacific, averaged over the area 5S-5N, 170E – 200E. January 1st 2020 is at the bottom of the graph, and August 6th 2020 is at the top. Purple areas show where the trade winds were stronger than average, while orange areas indicate weaker than average. Climate.gov image from CPC data.

    Red sun in morning
    As always, the world’s oceans have a lot going on.

    July 2020 sea surface temperature departure from the 1981-2010 average. Image from Data Snapshots on Climate.gov.

    Of course, we’ll note the slightly cooler-than-average water in our tropical Pacific ENSO monitoring regions. Also, though, you can see the warm tropical Atlantic, one of the major factors in NOAA’s updated Atlantic Hurricane Seasonal Outlook, which expects an “extremely active” season. Another element is our increased chance for La Niña, since La Niña conditions reduce wind shear over the tropical Atlantic. Shear, the difference between winds near the surface and high up in the atmosphere, makes it hard for hurricanes to form and grow.

    It’s also hard to miss the large red area in the northeastern Pacific. This certainly caught my eye, and I reached out to our NOAA colleagues and marine heatwave experts Mike Jacox and Andy Leising to find out more. They confirmed that this is a marine heatwave, a prolonged warm water event. “This current one has been going on since early June. It’s really like this whole series of [marine] heatwaves we’ve had this spring and summer are just continuations of the 2019 event,” said Andy.

    The current heatwave formed in the same location as the previous one. Andy went on to say “our current idea is that it’s very likely there is considerable sub-surface heat out there left over from previous heatwaves, which makes initiation of subsequent heatwaves easier.” Check out Andy’s Blobtracker website (props for an excellent name!) for more info.

    Walk the plank
    What’s with all the nautical nonsense in this post? I recently returned from a sailboat trip through the mid-Atlantic Intracoastal waterway, so I have water on my mind even more than usual! Thanks for staying on board with us on the good ship ENSO.

    Calm July morning on the Alligator River, NC. Photo by Emily Becker.

    @USBR begins constructing water system under Aamodt Indian Water Rights Settlement #RioGrande

    Albuquerque Area office Archaeologist Larry Moore oversees initial excavation at the Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System construction site. Photo credit: Bureau of Reclamation

    Here’s the release from Reclamation (Mary Carlson):

    POJOAQUE, N.M. – The Bureau of Reclamation began construction on August 10, 2020 on a water system that will bring clean drinking water to approximately 10,000 people and ensure a reliable water supply for residents of the Pueblos of Pojoaque, Nambé, San Ildefonso and Tesuque, as well as some residents of Santa Fe County.

    “This is an exciting day for Reclamation and all Aamodt Indian Water Rights Settlement parties,” said Commissioner Brenda Burman. “Countless hours of hard work and coordination between the many partners led to this moment, and we can now begin building this water system.”

    Construction officially began this week at the water intake features on San Ildefonso Pueblo. Phase one of the project includes water intake structures, a control building, 20 miles of water conveyance pipeline, three water storage tanks and a water treatment plant on San Ildefonso, Pojoaque and Nambe Pueblos.

    “The start of the construction of the Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System is a milestone that we at the Pueblo de San Ildefonso have heard and talked about for many years and it is hard to believe that it is finally happening. This is because the Pueblo has been involved in the Aamodt water rights litigation for decades and the regional water system is a core part of that settlement that previous San Ildefonso Governors and Tribal Council members have long discussed, debated, negotiated and fought for because the regional water system will insure clean drinking water for our Pueblo community and others in the Pojoaque Basin,” said Pueblo de San Ildefonso Governor Perry Martinez. “The Pueblo de San Ildefonso, along with leaders from my sister Pueblos of Nambe, Pojoaque and Tesuque, and our partners at the County of Santa Fe, the City of Santa Fe and the State of New Mexico have worked diligently for many years and overcame many hurdles to get to this point and I applaud everyone’s efforts today.”

    The water system will divert water from the Rio Grande in northern New Mexico. The system will include water treatment facilities, along with storage tanks and transmission and distribution pipelines with the capability to supply up to 4,000 acre-feet per year (about 3.57 million gallons per day) of drinking water.

    The Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System is part of the Aamodt Settlement Agreement and was authorized by Congress under the Aamodt Litigation Settlement Act of 2010 to settle Indian water rights disputes in the Pojoaque Basin.

    “The Pueblo of Nambé is pleased that the construction of the Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System is beginning, marking a significant step toward implementation of the Aamodt water rights settlement. Construction of the Regional Water System represents the cooperative resolution of over more than four decades of litigation,” said Nambe Pueblo Governor Phillip A. Perez. “The Pueblo, together with the Pueblos of Pojoaque, San Ildefonso and Tesuque, and their partners the County of Santa Fe, the City of Santa Fe and the State of New Mexico are finally starting construction of a water system that will provide reliable, clean water to the four Pueblos and the residents of the Pojoaque Basin. On behalf of the Pueblo of Nambé, please join me in celebrating this important occasion.”

    “We are excited to finally begin constructing this vitally important project that will soon deliver a firm, reliable, and safe water supply to all the Aamodt settlement parties in the Pojoaque Valley,” said New Mexico State Engineer John D’Antonio.

    “Santa Fe County applauds this significant step forward toward completion of the Pojoaque Basin Regional Water System, the signature feature of the Aamodt Settlement which will bring a new source of safe and reliable drinking water to the Pojoaque Basin. We look forward to working with all of our partners and the Bureau of Reclamation to ensure sufficient federal funds are authorized to complete the project beyond this stage of limited construction,” said Santa Fe County Manager Katherine Miller.

    Navajo Dam operations update: Releases to bump to 1,000 CFS August 14, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    The San Juan River’s Navajo Dam and reservoir above.U.S. Bureau of Reclamation

    From email from Reclamation (Susan Behery):

    In response to decreasing flows and a continued dry forecast weather pattern in the San Juan River Basin, the Bureau of Reclamation has scheduled an increase in the release from Navajo Dam from 900 cubic feet per second (cfs) to 1,000 cfs on Friday, August 14th, starting at 5:00 PM. Releases are made for the authorized purposes of the Navajo Unit, and to attempt to maintain a target base flow through the endangered fish critical habitat reach of the San Juan River (Farmington to Lake Powell).

    The San Juan River Basin Recovery Implementation Program has recommended flows in the critical habitat reach as close to 500 cfs as possible for the summer of 2020. This is within their normal recommended range of 500 to 1,000 cfs. This target base flow is calculated as the weekly average of gaged flows throughout the critical habitat area from Farmington to Lake Powell.

    The time to prepare for drought is not during a #drought — the Fence Post

    Storm clouds gather as cows graze at the USDA-ARS Central Plains Experimental Range near Nunn, Colo.
    Photo by David Augustine/USDA-ARS via the Fence Post

    From the Fence Post (Amy Hadachek):

    It’s the story of big climatological differences across Nebraska, as the state comes off of a year of records in 2019, with last year (2019) being the third wettest on record, while drought currently covers the western one-third of Nebraska, as well as northeast Nebraska and south central Nebraska.

    “2019 was exceptional, with highly impactful weather events,” said Martha Shulski, director of the Nebraska State Climate Office and associate professor in the School of Natural Resources, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, who was a key speaker during the virtual 20th annual Nebraska Grazing Conference on Aug. 11. “Timing and location of precipitation can mean everything. It wasn’t just a storm that caused the major impact in Nebraska last year, we had a cold, wet winter, a lot of snow on the ground, frozen soils, and rapid melting that all led to major impacts.”

    Shulski discussed past, current and future climate trends, noting Nebraska’s temperatures are more variable than global averages.

    THE FORECAST

    How will 2020 finish out? Some eyebrow-raising answers begin with temperatures trending higher than normal for 2020 in Nebraska…

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    off01_prcp0716thru10312020

    For autumn, the Climate Prediction Center’s outlook for September, October and November 2020 favors warmer than normal temperatures from western Kansas into the Rocky Mountain states. Precipitation points to wet (in North Dakota), however below-average precipitation is forecast for the Rocky Mountain states, southwest Nebraska, and the western half of Kansas and Oklahoma.

    “We also expect the warming in Nebraska to increase at an unprecedented rate, than what it’s been historically,” Shulski said. “We expect a shift of drier conditions in summer, with a wetter winter and spring, and more extremes with Nebraska’s climate future.” Her climate prediction includes a longer growing season by several weeks with more evaporative demand with an increased water requirement, longer summers, hot nights, more hot days with more extreme rainfall events.

    “The magnitude of expected changes will exceed those experienced in the last century. Regarding large scale events, luckily we’ve been pretty wet (2019) so we have a fair amount of water in soil profile. So when we dried out with high winds and evaporative conditions, it was actually okay since we came off a very wet year, she said.

    To deal with the new weather outlook, Shulski said producers should plan for overall warmer and wetter climate punctuated by droughts and weather extremes, which she expects to see magnified in the future…

    RANGELAND PRODUCTION

    There are a couple things that set the benchmark, in terms of exceptionally low rangeland production. When the ‘climate drivers’ Pacific Decadal Oscillation and El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) are both in cool phases together, dry conditions occur about 50 percent of the time, said Justin Derner, research leader for the USDA-ARS Rangeland Resources and Systems Research Unit. Derner was also a speaker during the Nebraska Grazing Conference.

    In the Great Plains, 1934 and 1956 were two of the worst years in 20th century records with tremendous soil loss and erosion.

    Precipitation has increased the past 30 years across Nebraska except for places in the Nebraska Panhandle.

    High Plains Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.

    @USDA Announces Changes to Emergency Haying and Grazing Provisions, August 7, 2020

    Photo credit: Aspen Journalism

    Here’s the release from the Department of Agriculture:

    WASHINGTON, Aug. 7, 2020 — The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA) today announced changes for emergency haying and grazing of acres enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP). This includes changes outlined in the 2018 Farm Bill that streamlines the authorization process for farmers and ranchers.

    “FSA authorizes emergency haying and grazing of Conservation Reserve Program acres under certain conditions to provide emergency relief to livestock producers in times of severe drought or similar natural disasters,” said FSA Administrator Richard Fordyce. “These program changes will simplify the authorization process with an automatic trigger by severe drought designation, allowing livestock producers to quickly access much-needed forage.”

    Program Changes

    Previously emergency haying and grazing requests originated with FSA at the county level and required state and national level approval. Now approval will be based on drought severity as determined by the U.S. Drought Monitor.

    To date, 500 counties nationwide have triggered eligibility for emergency haying and grazing on CRP acres. A list by state and map of eligible counties are updated weekly and available on FSA’s website.

    Producers located in a county that is designated as severe drought (D2) or greater on or after the last day of the primary nesting season are eligible for emergency haying and grazing on all eligible acres. Additionally, producers located in counties that were in a severe drought (D2) status any single week during the last eight weeks of the primary nesting season may also be eligible for emergency haying and grazing unless the FSA County Committee determines that forage conditions no longer warrant emergency haying and grazing.

    Counties that trigger for Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) payments based on the U.S. Drought Monitor may hay only certain practices on less than 50% of eligible contract acres. Producers should contact their local FSA county office for eligible CRP practices.

    Counties that don’t meet the drought monitor qualifications but have a 40% loss of forage production may also be eligible for emergency haying and grazing outside of the primary nesting season.

    CRP Emergency Haying and Grazing Provisions

    Before haying or grazing eligible acres, producers must submit a request for CRP emergency haying or grazing to FSA and obtain a modified conservation plan from the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS).

    Emergency grazing is authorized for up to 90 days and emergency haying is authorized for up to 60 days. Program participants must stop haying and grazing 30 days before the first freeze date in the fall based on the dates established for LFP.

    Under the emergency grazing provisions, producers can use the CRP acreage for their own livestock or may grant another livestock producer use of the CRP acreage. The eligible CRP acreage is limited to acres located within the approved county.

    For emergency haying, producers are limited to one cutting and are permitted to sell the hay. Participants must remove all hay from CRP acreage within 15 days after baling and remove all livestock from CRP acreage no later than 1 day after the end of the emergency grazing period. There will be no CRP annual rental payment reduction for emergency haying and grazing authorizations.

    More Information

    For more information on CRP emergency haying and grazing visit fsa.usda.gov/crp or contact your FSA county office. To locate your FSA office, visit farmers.gov/service-locator. For more disaster recovery assistance programs, visit http://farmers.gov/recover.

    All USDA Service Centers are open for business, including some that are open to visitors to conduct business in person by appointment only. All Service Center visitors wishing to conduct business with the FSA, Natural Resources Conservation Service or any other Service Center agency should call ahead and schedule an appointment. Service Centers that are open for appointments will pre-screen visitors based on health concerns or recent travel, and visitors must adhere to social distancing guidelines. Visitors may also be required to wear a face covering during their appointment. Field work will continue with appropriate social distancing. Our program delivery staff will be in the office, and they will be working with our producers in office, by phone and using online tools. More information can be found at http://farmers.gov/coronavirus.

    As Record Arctic Heat Continues, Canada’s Last Intact Ice Shelf Collapses — Yale 360 #ActOnClimate #KeepItInTheGround

    The Milne Ice Shelf in Canada lost nearly 40 percent of its ice over a two-day period in late July. ECCC CANADIAN ICE SERVICE

    From Yale360:

    Canada’s last fully intact ice shelf in the Arctic has collapsed, shrinking by about 80 square kilometers, or 40 percent of its area, over just two days at the end of July, according to scientists at the Canadian Ice Service. The breakup of the ice was driven by record-setting temperatures in the region, which have measured 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) above the 30-year average this summer.

    “Entire cities are that size. These are big pieces of ice,” Luke Copland, a glaciologist at the University of Ottawa who was part of the research team studying the Milne Ice Shelf, located on Ellesmere Island in the Canadian territory of Nunavut, told Reuters. “This was the largest remaining intact ice shelf, and it’s disintegrated, basically.”

    A research camp was lost in the collapse of the ice shelf. So was the northern hemisphere’s last known epishelf lake, a freshwater lake damned by ice that floats atop salty ocean water. In addition, two of Canada’s ice caps, located on the Hazen Plateau in St. Patrick Bay, disappeared completely this summer, two years earlier than scientists predicted, according to the National Snow & Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colorado.

    “When I first visited those ice caps, they seemed like such a permanent fixture of the landscape,” Mark Serreze, director of NSIDC and a geographer at the University of Colorado, Boulder, said in a statement. “To watch them die in less than 40 years just blows me away.”

    The Arctic has warmed at a rate twice the global average in recent decades, but scientists say this summer has been even more extreme. In July, Arctic sea ice hit its lowest recorded extent. And the Russian Arctic has experienced record heat and wildfires, with temperatures exceeding 100 degrees F in the Siberian town of Verkhoyansk in late June.

    Aspinall Unit operations update: Baseflow target adjusted to 900 CFS, August 13, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    Blue Mesa Reservoir, Curecanti National Recreation Area. Photo credit: Victoria Stauffenberg via Wikimedian Commons

    From email from Reclamation (Erik Knight):

    Releases from the Aspinall Unit will be increased from 1600 cfs to 1650 cfs on Thursday, August 13th. Releases are being adjusted to raise flows back to the baseflow target in the lower Gunnison River. The actual April-July runoff volume for Blue Mesa Reservoir came in at 57% of average.

    There is a drought rule in the Aspinall Unit Operations EIS which has changed the baseflow target at the Whitewater gage. The rule states that during Dry or Moderately Dry years, when the content of Blue Mesa Reservoir drops below 600,000 AF the baseflow target is reduced from 1050 cfs to 900 cfs. Therefore, the baseflow target for July and August will now be 900 cfs.

    Flows in the lower Gunnison River are currently below the baseflow target of 900 cfs. River flows are expected to trend up toward the baseflow target after the release increase has arrived at the Whitewater gage.

    Currently, Gunnison Tunnel diversions are 1050 cfs and flows in the Gunnison River through the Black Canyon are around 600 cfs. After this release change Gunnison Tunnel diversions will still be around 1050 cfs and flows in the Gunnison River through the Black Canyon will be around 650 cfs. Current flow information is obtained from provisional data that may undergo revision subsequent to review.

    State to host public confabs on next steps in study of #LakePowell drought pool — @WaterEdCO #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    The Grand River Diversion Dam, also known as the “Roller Dam”, was built in 1913 to divert water from the Colorado River to the Government Highline Canal, which farmers use to irrigate their lands in the Grand Valley. Photo credit: Bethany Blitz/Aspen Journalism

    From Water Education Colorado (Jerd Smith):

    A statewide public effort to determine whether Coloradans should engage in perhaps the biggest water conservation program in state history enters its second year of study this summer, but the complex, collaborative effort on the Colorado River has a long way to go before the state and its water users can make a go/no-go decision, officials said.

    On Aug. 26, the Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) will hold a virtual public workshop to unveil some of the key findings from the first year’s work, as well as to gather more input on where to go from here. Another meeting is scheduled for Sept. 2 to brief the agency’s board members and discuss next steps. It will also be open to the public.

    More than a year ago, Colorado launched the study involving dozens of volunteer ranchers, environmentalists, water district officials, and others to determine if water users should opt to help fill a newly authorized drought pool in Lake Powell. The concept has been dubbed demand management.

    Ken Curtis, general manager of the Dolores Water Conservancy District in Cortez, said farmers in his district remain skeptical of the conservation effort primarily because there isn’t enough clarity about how it would work.

    “Clearly, one of the themes of our conversations down here has been momentum. There has been a lot of talk but it’s not out there as a policy with well-defined terms that can be read,” he said. “That tells us that we’re nowhere near a demand management program.”

    The 500,000 acre-foot pool, approved by Congress last year as part of the historic Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan, would help protect Coloradans if the Colorado River, at some point in the future, hits a crisis point, triggering mandatory cutbacks in the Upper Basin above Lake Powell.

    But finding ways to set aside that much water, the equivalent of what roughly 1 million average Colorado households use in a year, is a complex proposition. Although the concept is still evolving, most agree the voluntary program, if created, would need to pay water users who agree to participate. And it would mean farmers fallowing fields in order to send their water downstream and cities convincing their customers to do with less water in order to do the same.

    The Colorado River Basin includes seven U.S. states, Mexico, and more than two dozen sovereign tribal nations. Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico comprise the Upper Basin, while Arizona, California and Nevada make up the Lower Basin before the river crosses the U.S.-Mexican border.

    The drought pool would belong to Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico. Each of those states is examining whether filling it is doable and desirable.

    In Colorado, eight demand management work groups involving dozens of volunteers and experts on such issues as agriculture, economics, stream health, and water law met throughout the past year. Among the overarching conclusions to date, based on a report issued in July, is the need for equity between rural and urban communities, the need to analyze environmental impacts and benefits, and the need for a multi-pronged approach to funding such a program, which could include taxes, water-user fees, and cash from the federal government. The CWCB is funding and facilitating the process.

    “This has never been done before,” said Russell George, a former Colorado Speaker of the House who helped create the state’s hallmark system of local water governance, where each of its eight river basins, as well as the Denver metro area, is represented by a public roundtable.

    “What we’re doing is writing the textbook from whole cloth,” he said.

    Bart Miller is healthy rivers program director at Western Resource Advocates, which has participated in the work groups. Miller said the first year of work was noteworthy because no one was able to identify “a fatal flaw. No one came up with a reason this can’t be done,” he said.

    Despite the pandemic and deep state budget cuts, the CWCB has enough funding to move forward with another year of work, according to Amy Ostdiek, deputy chief of the Federal, Interstate and Water Information Section at the CWCB. The agency spent nearly $268,000 in the last fiscal year, which ended June 30, and has set aside another $396,000 for the current year.

    George said the work done to date represents only the beginning of the collaborative search for a statewide drought protection plan on the Colorado River.

    “When we started this, we didn’t want to foretell the answer to the question, ‘What does the end look like?’ I don’t think we’re ready to say yet. This is still the beginning,” George said.

    Jerd Smith is editor of Fresh Water News. She can be reached at 720-398-6474, via email at jerd@wateredco.org or @jerd_smith.

    #Drought news: S. #UT W. #Colorado had severe and extreme drought expand this week along with moderate drought in N.E. Utah and N.W. Colorado

    Click on a thumbnail graphic to view a gallery of drought data from the US Drought Monitor

    US Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.
    US Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.
    West Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.
    West Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.
    Colorado Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.
    Colorado Drought Monitor August 11, 2020.

    Click here to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:

    This Week’s Drought Summary

    As Tropical Storm Isaias made its way up the east coast, many areas in the Northeast were beneficiaries of good precipitation amounts, but others missed out completely. In typical summer fashion, rains were hit and miss across the country, with the West and into the southern Plains as well as most areas of the South mainly being missed. Mixed precipitation was recorded through the Plains and Midwest as well as portions of the Southeast. A strong derecho ripped across the Midwest on August 10th with over 100 mph straight line winds doing damage to crops and property. Temperatures were cooler than normal over much of the Midwest and High Plains, with portions of Missouri and Illinois 6-8 degrees below normal for the week. Temperatures were near normal along much of the east coast and 6-8 degrees above normal over west Texas and into New Mexico…

    High Plains

    Spotty precipitation was common through the area, with dry conditions through most of Kansas and Nebraska and above-normal precipitation in central North Dakota, central to southeast South Dakota and pockets of northeast Wyoming and northwest South Dakota. Temperatures were cooler than normal over the eastern portions of the region to normal to slightly above over the western portions. Changes to drought status this week include an expansion of severe drought in both western and eastern Nebraska, expansion of moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions in central Nebraska, expansion of moderate drought in western Nebraska and some improvement of abnormally dry conditions in the central portion of the state. Southeast Kansas saw improvements to abnormally dry and moderate drought conditions this week. In South Dakota, abnormally dry and moderate drought conditions were expanded in the northeast while there was improvement to abnormally dry conditions in the east. North Dakota had some improvements to moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions over the north central portion of the state and expansion of moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions over the central area. Wyoming had an expansion of moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions over the southeast while portions of eastern Colorado had improvements to severe and extreme drought…

    West

    Much of the West was dry this week, with just some spotty summer rains along the coast and very spotty monsoonal rains in the Southwest. Temperatures were cooler than normal over southern Nevada and southern California as well as into the Pacific Northwest and northern Rocky Mountains. This was not the case in Arizona and New Mexico, where temperatures continued to be well above normal with departures of 3-5 degrees above normal. In Oregon, severe and extreme drought conditions were expanded slightly to account for the continued dry conditions throughout the current water year. Southern Utah and western Colorado had severe and extreme drought expand this week along with moderate drought in northeast Utah and northwest Colorado. Extreme drought was also expanded over southeast Nevada. Extreme drought was improved over southern Colorado in response to some rains in the area easing conditions. Moderate to severe drought was also expanded over most of central Colorado. Abnormally dry conditions were expanded over western Wyoming as well…

    South

    Temperatures were 2-4 degrees below normal over much of Oklahoma, Arkansas, western Mississippi and Tennessee, northern Louisiana, and portions of northeast Texas. Temperatures were warmer than normal from central Texas into the west and Panhandle, where departures were 3-5 degrees above normal. Outside of areas of Oklahoma, western Arkansas and north Texas, it was a dry week over the region. Coupled with the warm temperatures, much of the state of Texas had degradation shown this week. Improvements were shown over the Oklahoma and Texas panhandles as well as in eastern Oklahoma. Abnormally dry conditions and moderate drought were expanded over northeast Arkansas, with abnormally dry conditions expanded over western Mississippi. Tennessee had improvements to abnormally dry conditions in the east, but saw expansion of those conditions in the south along with the introduction of some moderate drought…

    Looking Ahead

    Over the next 5-7 days, it is anticipated that much of the area west of the Continental Divide will be dry. Areas of the central plains and upper Midwest will see an active pattern for precipitation while much of the area of the southeast into the Mid-Atlantic should also see the greatest precipitation during the period. Temperatures during this time should be well above normal over the West, with departures of 6-9 degrees above normal. In the areas anticipated to see the most precipitation, from the northern Plains to the Mid-Atlantic, temperatures will be cooler than normal as a trough digs into the region out of Canada.

    The 6-10 day outlooks show a divide in temperatures, with the western half of the United States, including Alaska, having above-normal chances of seeing above-normal temperatures and the eastern half having above-normal chances of below-normal temperatures. A drier than normal outlook is expected over much of the country, with the area having the greatest probability of below-normal precipitation centered on the Midwest. Areas of the Mid-Atlantic south to Florida have the greatest chances of having above-normal precipitation.

    US Drought Monitor one week change map ending August 11, 2020.

    #Drought taking toll on #Colorado’s dry land farmers, small town main streets — TheDenverChannel.com

    From TheDenverChannel.com (Lance Hernandez):

    This has been a windy, hot and dry summer for much of Colorado. Extreme drought has taken hold of a large swath stretching from from Mesa and Montrose Counties in the west, down to Montezuma and La Plata Counties and then eastward to Baca County.

    On the high plains, Washington, Lincoln, Kit Carson, Cheyenne and Kiowa Counties are also experiencing extreme drought conditions, according to the U.S. drought monitor.

    Many dryland farmers in those counties are seeing corn crops die in the field…

    Much of the dryland corn grown in Colorado is used as feed.

    Matt Pieper, noting that ditches and other low-lying areas have some corn stalks that are taller, said he’s not sure whether his field will produce enough of a crop to make it worth harvesting…

    With pasture land drying up, he said some farmers and cattlemen have had to shift their herds to hay and feed much sooner than usual, which is an additional expense.

    Tough times on the farm will trickle down to main street, explained Colorado State University Water Resource Specialist Joel Schneekloth.

    “If the farmers don’t have money, it could affect the coffee shop and the hardware stores,” he said. “It’s going to affect the diners.”

    Schneekloth is studying crops and water use on plots of land at the USDA Agricultural Research Station east of Akron.

    Those plots are a veritable oasis compared to the rest of drought-stricken Washington County because irrigation is a big part of the study.

    Schneekloth said they’re looking at newer genetics.

    He said they’ll monitor water use and do growth staging.

    “At the end, we’ll look at the yield,” he said. “That’s the ultimate goal. How much yield did we get versus the water used?”

    The water resource specialist said the study is all about getting the most out of every inch, every drop of water.

    Schneekloth said that the aquifer in the Republican River basin of Colorado is a dwindling resource.

    He said his study is intended to help extend the life of that resource by finding crops that will use less water on the arid plains.

    “We have a very different climate here than the cornbelt,” he said. “We don’t have spare water to waste.”

    It doesn’t look like much relief next week.

    Notice of Stakeholder Meeting on ISF Rules Revisions to Implement HB20-1157 — @CWCB_DNR

    From email from the Colorado Water Conservation Board (Rob Viehl):

    The CWCB staff has drafted proposed revisions to the Rules Concerning Colorado’s Instream Flow and Natural Lake Level Program (“ISF Rules”). The revisions to the ISF Rules will: (1) address the rulemaking requirements of HB20-1157; (2) update a reference to the CWCB’s website; and (3) update references to Colorado Parks and Wildlife.

    Staff will hold its second informal stakeholder meeting on Tuesday, August 18, 2020 from 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. to discuss the draft ISF Rules revisions, which are posted on the CWCB website . Staff intends to post a second draft of ISF Rules revisions by the end of this week, and invites interested parties to submit written comments on the draft ISF Rules revisions by emailing them to linda.bassi@state.co.us. Note that any comments received will be posted on the CWCB website . At the meeting, CWCB staff and attendees will discuss the draft ISF Rules revisions, comments received, and comments expressed at the meeting. If you have questions, contact Linda Bassi at linda.bassi@state.co.us or (303) 866-3441, ext. 3204.

    This meeting is a pre-Colorado Water Congress Conference Workshop for which no registration is required. The Colorado Water Congress Conference kicks off on Tuesday, August 25th at 12:00 p.m.

    Meeting Details:

    Tuesday, August 18, 2020 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM (MDT)

    Click on the following link: https://zoom.us/j/96023989153. Or dial in: 669-900-6833; Webinar ID: 960-2398-9153.

    The Roaring Fork River just above Carbondale, and Mt. Sopris, on May 3, 2020. Photo credit: Brent Gardner-Smith/Aspen Journalism

    #BlueRiver Watershed Group make a difference day 2020, August 29, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver

    Click here to volunteer or sponsor:

    Join us on Saturday, August 29, 2020 for a county-wide river cleanup. We have partnered with Summit County’s Make a Difference Day to create an event that will have a profound positive impact on the health of the Blue River Watershed.

    ​We will spend the morning cleaning our valley’s waterways. We had planned to
    have a small celebration in the afternoon, but due to the coronavirus
    we have decided not to hold that gathering.

    Volunteer Team Leaders will pick up supplies for their team starting at 8 am the day of the cleanup. Cleanup of your river section will run from 9 am to noon. Remember to take photos of your strangest find for a chance to win a prize.

    Navajo Dam operations update: 900 CFS in the #SanJuanRiver below the dam, August 12, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    From email from Reclamation (Susan Behery):

    In response to decreasing flows and a dry forecast weather pattern in the San Juan River Basin, the Bureau of Reclamation has scheduled an increase in the release from Navajo Dam from 800 cubic feet per second (cfs) to 900 cfs on Wednesday, August 12th, starting at 5:00 PM. Releases are made for the authorized purposes of the Navajo Unit, and to attempt to maintain a target base flow through the endangered fish critical habitat reach of the San Juan River (Farmington to Lake Powell).

    The San Juan River Basin Recovery Implementation Program has recommended base flows as close to 500 cfs as possible for the summer of 2020. This is within their normal recommended range of 500 to 1,000 cfs. The target base flow is calculated as the weekly average of gaged flows throughout the critical habitat area from Farmington to Lake Powell.

    The Navajo Dam on the San Juan River.Photo credit Mike Robinson via the University of Washington.

    On Climate, @KamalaHarris Has a Record and Profile for Action — Inside Climate News #ActOnClimate

    Kamala Harris. By United States Senate – This file has been extracted from another file: Kamala Harris official photo.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64332043

    From Inside Climate News (Marianne Lavelle):

    In choosing Kamala Harris as his running mate, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden put a spotlight on two key elements of his climate policy: environmental justice for minority communities and accountability for the oil and gas industry.

    Harris, who will be the first Black woman to run on a major political party’s presidential ticket, only last week sought to affirm her commitment to communities of color in the climate battle—and progressives in the Democratic party—by introducing climate equity legislation. The California Senator teamed up with Green New Deal avatar Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on the effort, an outreach to the climate activist community that Biden hopes to energize behind his candidacy.

    During her presidential run, Harris also frequently advocated for the federal government to take legal action against fossil fuel companies for their legacy of climate pollution. It’s another stance that resonates with many climate-focused voters, even though, as California’s attorney general, she did not go as far as other state law enforcers in pursuing litigation against the industry.

    Certainly, many factors beyond climate change will decide Harris’s value to the Democratic ticket, including her ability to win over voters in states beyond California. How she handles critiques of her past work as a prosecutor will be important, especially amid the national reckoning on race and law enforcement, and how well she stands up to President Donald Trump’s attacks will be critical, as well.

    But the environmental community is an important constituency that analysts believe Biden must activate to put together a winning coalition. He took an important step toward that goal last month with a greatly expanded $2 trillion plan, developed with input from advisers to his primary rival, Bernie Sanders. By bringing another rival, Harris, aboard as vice president, Biden chose a candidate already tested in the campaign spotlight with a record and profile for action on environmental issues that is winning the team praise throughout the activist community.

    “A true environmental champion,” said Tiernan Sittenfeld, vice president of government affairs for the League of Conservation Voters, noting that Harris has had a 91 percent pro-environmental lifetime voting record on the LCV scorecard (that’s better than Biden’s lifetime score of 83 percent). “Senator Harris has been a long-time champion for climate action and environmental justice….We know she will continue the fight for a more just solution to the climate crisis.”

    Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth Action, an environmental group that would like to see Biden’s recently expanded climate platform go even farther, also had praise for the choice of Harris.

    “Senator Harris’ commitment to environmental justice and her desire to hold corporate polluters financially and criminally accountable for their destructive behavior is a welcome sign,” Pica said. “We hope her inclusion on the ticket provides another opportunity for Vice President Biden to increase the ambition of his climate plan and cements climate justice and climate equity as a priority for their administration.”

    ‘There Has Been No Accountability’

    Harris brings a record on climate issues that dates back to her time as San Francisco’s district attorney, when she created that office’s first environmental justice unit in 2005. As California attorney general, she confronted the fossil fuel industry by opposing Chevron’s proposed refinery expansion in Richmond, a majority Black and Hispanic city that has waged a long battle against pollution at the Chevron site.

    Harris also sued the Southern California Gas Co. over a massive methane blowout from an underground storage facility on the outskirts of Los Angeles, citing the climate threat posed by the uncontrolled emissions of the super-potent greenhouse gas. The blowout was the largest known natural gas leak in U.S. history. The case was settled three years later, after Harris’ departure for the Senate, in an agreement that some environmentalists criticized as inadequate.

    As California attorney general, Harris lent her support to a coalition of 17 Democratic attorneys general who vowed in 2016 to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for climate change. The group—AGs United For Clean Power—was formed in the wake of disclosures that oil giant ExxonMobil had understood the magnitude of climate change for decades yet went on to mislead the public about the catastrophic consequences.

    During one primary debate last year, Harris said, “I have sued ExxonMobil,” but in fact, she never did. (The attorneys general of New York and Massachusetts took Exxon to court—with the company successfully defending itself against the New York charges and still in litigation with Massachusetts.) Harris’ campaign spokesman at the time said that she meant that she investigated the company.

    But as a presidential candidate, Harris was consistent in her call for accountability from the oil and gas industry over liability for their past actions on climate change. “Let’s get them not only in the pocketbook, but let’s make sure there are severe and serious penalties for their behaviors,” she told Mother Jones, in an interview last year on the campaign trail.

    At a CNN Town Hall on climate change, she said as president she would direct the Department of Justice to launch an investigation of the companies. “They are causing harm and death in communities. And there has been no accountability,” she said.

    Hungry for a ‘Transformative Change’

    Harris has sometimes struggled with Black and progressive voters because of her history as a tough-on-crime prosecutor in a state where the incarceration rate for African Americans is five times higher than their share of the population.

    That history looms large for Alexandria Villaseñor, a 14-year-old climate activist from New York, who founded the activist group Earth Uprising.

    “I think Kamala Harris is a big win for women of color and environmental justice, however she definitely has some work to do in order to show our generation that she’s become more progressive since her prosecutor days,” she said.

    But Robert Bullard, a professor at Texas Southern University and author, widely known as “The Father of Environmental Justice,” told InsideClimate News last week that he thought Harris would add value to a Biden ticket at a moment when people are hungry for “transformative change.”

    “We must center the fight for environmental and climate justice in the broader conversation” on race, Bullard said.

    Gina McCarthy, president and CEO of the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund, called Harris “a cross-generational consensus-builder with a solid record for getting things done.” McCarthy, who served as Environmental Protection Agency Administrator under President Barack Obama, said Harris’s work in the nation’s leading clean energy state makes her a good fit to lead a national transformation.

    “She’s worked to make California the nation’s leader in the clean energy jobs we need to confront the climate crisis head-on and build back better with a recovery that’s strong, durable and creates opportunity in every community in America,” McCarthy said.

    In a foreshadowing of the attacks that are sure to come, the Trump-Pence campaign sent a blast email to the media Tuesday night, calling Harris “the most radical, far-left Vice Presidential nominee in U.S. history.” But many climate activists see both her and Biden as centrists. Calvin Yang, an 18-year-old Canadian climate organizer and spokesman for Fridays for Future International, commented on the pragmatism of their policy approaches.

    “It’s great to have a green and relatively eco friendly duo on the presidency and vice presidency,” he said, “and the politics they implement wouldn’t be impossible to pass and would win the support of the American public.”

    One Black climate activist, Catherine Coleman Flowers, founder of the Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice, who served on the task force that helped craft Biden’s climate plan, sees Harris as a standard-bearer. “It is time to make change and history at the same time,” she said.

    From Grist (Zoya Teirstein):

    Harris — formerly the district attorney for the city of San Francisco and the attorney general of California — has been known to be somewhat of a political chameleon. Her once-promising presidential campaign failed in part because of Harris’s inability to nail down her political ideology. But, over time, the Democrat has become increasingly firm in her commitment to one particular issue: environmental justice.

    When Harris was running for president in 2019, she released a climate plan that put environmental justice front and center. Last July, she and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York unveiled a plan to introduce climate legislation in Congress that would ensure new environmental regulations and legislation get evaluated through an environmental justice lens before becoming law. Last week, the two Democrats made good on that plan by formally introducing legislation called the Climate Equity Act. The act would set up a new Office of Climate and Environmental Justice Accountability within the Office of Management and Budget.

    A week prior to that announcement, Harris introduced another piece of climate legislation in the Senate: a companion bill to the Environmental Justice for All Act introduced earlier this year in the House of Representatives by Democrats A. Donald McEachin of Virginia and Raúl M. Grijalva of Arizona. In an email interview with Grist ahead of the introduction of that bill, the senator explained why environmental justice is so important to her. “Our country is in the midst of multiple crises,” Harris told Grist:

    “First, there’s the public health crisis caused by the coronavirus that has killed over 148,000 people. It disproportionately affects Black and brown people in part due to the high frequency of pre-existing conditions like asthma and high blood pressure. These can stem from decades of toxic pollution being dumped in communities of color and which place people at higher risk of complications. Meanwhile, there is the continuing crisis of systemic racism in America that people of color have known and experienced for generations. All of these things intersect, and we must center the fight for environmental justice in the broader conversation.”

    Harris’ commitment to this kind of work dates back to her days as a district attorney. In 2005, she created a mini version of the Office of Climate and Environmental Justice Accountability she’s proposing now within the San Francisco district attorney’s office. “Crimes against the environment are crimes against communities, people who are often poor and disenfranchised,” she said at the time.

    In short, she’s got a good record on justice that’s getting better and better. That could serve Biden well as he continues to hash out his climate plans in the months leading up to the election. He’s already introduced a more comprehensive and equitable version of his initial climate plan and sought input from an array of formal and informal climate advisors from many different corners of the climate movement, including environmental justice advocates. Harris will no doubt continue to steer his campaign in a justice-friendly direction. She also supports abolishing the filibuster, a step that will likely be necessary to get any climate or environmental policy through Congress in a Biden administration.

    Saving our reservoirs from invading ‘cling-ons’ — News on TAP

    Vigilant inspections keep destructive mussels from causing millions in damage to Denver’s water infrastructure. The post Saving our reservoirs from invading ‘cling-ons’ appeared first on News on TAP.

    via Saving our reservoirs from invading ‘cling-ons’ — News on TAP

    #Drought spreads across large portions of U.S. — The Fence Post

    US Drought Monitor August 4, 2020.

    From the Fence Post (Holly Jessen):

    More than 33 percent of the continental U.S. is in moderate to extreme drought, with another 21 percent considered abnormally dry, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map.

    Compared to the previous week’s map, some areas of the U.S. saw some improvement while other areas went deeper into drought. The expansion of areas in drought outweighed the areas that showed improvement, however, meaning the U.S. drought footprint grew compared to the drought monitor update from last week…

    In Colorado, the entire state is considered to be in abnormally dry to extreme drought and 59 percent of that is severe to extreme. In western Wyoming 12 percent of the state is not in drought, down slightly from 14 percent in last week’s drought map. The remainder of the state is abnormally dry to extreme drought, with 5 percent of the state in extreme drought…

    In the Nebraska panhandle and northeast Colorado, moderate drought expanded from last week. A new area of severe drought was added to the map in eastern Nebraska and moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions expanded in areas of Wyoming…

    Drought isn’t new in Colorado, of course. “We have some areas usually in drought almost every year,” said Becky Bolinger, assistant state climatologist at Colorado Climate Center. “But this one is a little bit more severe.”

    […]

    Although conditions vary across the state, overall it’s been hot and windy with dry humidity, so a lot of precipitation evaporated before it could soak into the ground. “There has been rainstorms but they’ve been spotty,” she said. “So they are not widespread enough to be helpful.”

    It’s not quite as bad as in 2012 and 2013, which had hotter and drier conditions. But it’s worse than the drought of 2018, when moisture the previous fall helped farmers bring in a good winter wheat crop, Bolinger said. This year’s winter wheat struggled and although it’s good news some was harvested, not all of it could be salvaged…

    In western Colorado, the irrigated crops in a four-county area served by the Colorado State University Extension Tri-River Area are doing well, despite being in severe to extreme drought, said Susan Carter, horticulture and natural resources agent for that office. The exception is that an April frost reduced fruit production, such as peaches.

    The concern moving forward is, without additional rain, irrigation water could potentially be limited, especially in counties not as close to the rivers. It’s up to everyone to conserve water, she said, so there’s enough water for agriculture and residential uses.

    Drought is also putting native trees under stress, leaving them vulnerable to attack by multiple types of insects. Without enough water, more trees are dying from these attacks. “Which adds to our fire risk,” she said.

    In Baca County, the furthest southeast county of Colorado, Kevin Larson, superintendent and research scientist at Plainsman Research Center, said things are actually looking better. In early July the whole southeastern corner of the state was in extreme drought, now part of that has been upgraded to severe drought thanks to July rains. It’s definitely improving,” he said.

    Some of the acres of prevented plant corn were planted with grain sorghum in late June. Although those crops have come up, whether there will be a good harvest depends on if there’s an early or late frost, he said. And if moisture continues to build up farmers will be able to put in winter wheat in September. Still, it’s an improvement over earlier in the summer when virtually nothing was growing.

    US Drought Monitor one week change map ending August 4, 2020.

    Monument Trustees approve continued development of water projects, site plans — The Pikes Peak Tribune

    Denver Basin Aquifer System graphic credit USGS.

    From The Pikes Peak Tribune (Ben Farrell):

    At the Monument Board of Trustees meeting Aug. 3, 2020…approved two resolutions to continue water projects which have been on hiatus.

    Trustees reviewed a resolution to award a project agreement to Forsgren Associates Inc. for the continued design and development of a new two-gallon [two million gallon] water storage tank and associated pipeline into the town’s water system. Public works director Tom Tharnish said a lot of preliminary work had already been done by Forsgren Associates and continuing the project with the firm would quicken the project’s timeline.

    The agreement would allow the majority of the engineering for the project, which involved a change in the size of the tank from 1.2 million gallons. The town is already $60,000 into the project, Tharnish said. When originally developing a 1.2 million gallon tank, the additional capacity required for the upcoming reuse pipeline wasn’t considered…

    Another resolution was presented to the board to award a contract to Lytle Water Solutions LLC for the design and development of a new water well at the Water Treatment Plant.

    Given recent emergency repairs to Wells No. 3 and No. 8, Tharnish said the department’s senior water technicians approached him with concerns for the same incident occurring later this year…

    The idea is to drill a new well on the Well No. 4-5 site and build a short pipe to the existing treatment plant. Since this would create additional flow to an existing plant, the plans for the well have to be approved by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

    Tharnish said the new well, which would draw from the Arapahoe basin, would produce 190-200 gallons per minute. Presently, Wells No. 4 and 5 produces 100 and 60 gallons per minute, respectively, which is the way the state has permitted them, he said. Trustees approved the resolution 6-0.

    Town Manager Mike Foreman said the town is getting ready to sell revenue bonds prior to November to help fund the water projects planned for the next five years and a workshop with the board to review all future water projects would be forthcoming. Foreman said the town has the opportunity to sell $15-20 million in bonds over the next five years.

    Tharnish noted Well No. 3 is repaired and operational, producing 25 gallons per minute more than it did previous to experiencing a failure July 5.

    Goose Pasture Tarn Dam Rehabilitation Project will begin May 2021 — The Summit Daily

    Goose Pasture Tarn. Photo credit: City of Breckenridge

    From The Summit Daily (Taylor Sienkiewicz):

    The Goose Pasture Tarn Dam Rehabilitation Project was discussed at a virtual town hall hosted by the town of Breckenridge, as the town had previously postponed the project until 2021. Greg Monley, project design engineer, said that the construction schedule is about the same as the one that was originally set for 2020, but has been pushed back by one year and is now scheduled to begin in May 2021.

    The project is expected to take three years with two winter shutdowns of the project where the reservoir — the Goose Pasture Tarn — will be allowed to refill and operate as before. The first two phases of construction include the initial excavation and work on the west side of the spillways, which will take place from May to August of 2021, and work on the upstream slope, which will take place from August to September of 2021 and require draining the reservoir.

    Phase II will take place from May to September of 2022. Work during this phase will include reconstructing the spillway and lowering the reservoir’s water level about 18 feet. In September, dam outlet work will require draining the reservoir again.

    Construction will be completed from June to September of 2023 in Phase III.

    The town will offer water assistance on a case-by-case basis to people with domestic wells who experience interruptions caused by dam work as the reservoir is lowered and drained. Town officials can be reached through the contact information listed on http://TownOfBreckenridgeGPTD.com.

    For residences that need or request water assistance, the town is looking at locating water tanks at individual homes and connecting them to the home water line. Some residents near the reservoir have already received letters from the town…

    The preliminary traffic control plan is to have truck traffic that comes onto Lakeshore Loop travel in a one-way direction from Lakeshore Loop down to the water treatment plant, into the project area. Trucks will exit via Wagon Road onto Colorado Highway 9. The plan also proposed a one-way direction for residential traffic along Lakeshore Loop where cars can follow a one-way exit onto Highway 9 while construction occurs…

    Town hall participants asked about recreation and wildlife. Blue River Town Manager Michelle Eddy said the tarn will be closed to recreation during construction. Phelps said that as a result of draining down the tarn’s fish will not be saved and the tarn will no longer contain fish. He said the tarn may be restocked with fish after the project is complete.

    Goose Pasture Tarn Dam. Photo credit: NextDoor.com

    How to use ventilation and air filtration to prevent the spread of coronavirus indoors — The Conversation


    Open windows are the simplest way to increase air flow in a room.
    Justin Paget / Digital Vision via Getty Images

    Shelly Miller, University of Colorado Boulder

    The vast majority of SARS-CoV-2 transmission occurs indoors, most of it from the inhalation of airborne particles that contain the coronavirus. The best way to prevent the virus from spreading in a home or business would be to simply keep infected people away. But this is hard to do when an estimated 40% of cases are asymptomatic and asymptomatic people can still spread the coronavirus to others.

    Masks do a decent job at keeping the virus from spreading into the environment, but if an infected person is inside a building, inevitably some virus will escape into the air.

    I am a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder. Much of my work has focused on how to control the transmission of airborne infectious diseases indoors, and I’ve been asked by my own university, my kids’ schools and even the Alaska State Legislature for advice on how to make indoor spaces safe during this pandemic.

    Once the virus escapes into the air inside a building, you have two options: bring in fresh air from outside or remove the virus from the air inside the building.

    A drawing showing an air conditioning unit blowing air into a building and a fan blowing air out of an open window.
    All of the air in a room should be replaced with fresh, outside air at least six times per hour if there are a few people inside.
    Pico/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

    It’s all about fresh, outside air

    The safest indoor space is one that constantly has lots of outside air replacing the stale air inside.

    In commercial buildings, outside air is usually pumped in through heating, ventilating and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems. In homes, outside air gets in through open windows and doors, in addition to seeping in through various nooks and crannies.

    Simply put, the more fresh, outside air inside a building, the better. Bringing in this air dilutes any contaminant in a building, whether a virus or a something else, and reduces the exposure of anyone inside. Environmental engineers like me quantify how much outside air is getting into a building using a measure called the air exchange rate. This number quantifies the number of times the air inside a building gets replaced with air from outside in an hour.

    While the exact rate depends on the number of people and size of the room, most experts consider roughly six air changes an hour to be good for a 10-foot-by-10-foot room with three to four people in it. In a pandemic this should be higher, with one study from 2016 suggesting that an exchange rate of nine times per hour reduced the spread of SARS, MERS and H1N1 in a Hong Kong hospital.

    Many buildings in the U.S., especially schools, do not meet recommended ventilation rates. Thankfully, it can be pretty easy to get more outside air into a building. Keeping windows and doors open is a good start. Putting a box fan in a window blowing out can greatly increase air exchange too. In buildings that don’t have operable windows, you can change the mechanical ventilation system to increase how much air it is pumping. But in any room, the more people inside, the faster the air should be replaced.

    A carbon dioxide meter mounted on a white wall showing a reading of 300 parts per million.
    CO2 levels can be used to estimate whether the air in a room is stale and potentially full of particles containing the coronavirus.
    Vudhikul Ocharoen/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

    Using CO2 to measure air circulation

    So how do you know if the room you’re in has enough air exchange? It’s actually a pretty hard number to calculate. But there’s an easy-to-measure proxy that can help. Every time you exhale, you release CO2 into the air. Since the coronavirus is most often spread by breathing, coughing or talking, you can use CO2 levels to see if the room is filling up with potentially infectious exhalations. The CO2 level lets you estimate if enough fresh outside air is getting in.

    Outdoors, CO2 levels are just above 400 parts per million (ppm). A well ventilated room will have around 800 ppm of CO2. Any higher than that and it is a sign the room might need more ventilation.

    Last year, researchers in Taiwan reported on the effect of ventilation on a tuberculosis outbreak at Taipei University. Many of the rooms in the school were underventilated and had CO2 levels above 3,000 ppm. When engineers improved air circulation and got CO2 levels under 600 ppm, the outbreak completely stopped. According to the research, the increase in ventilation was responsible for 97% of the decrease in transmission.

    Since the coronavirus is spread through the air, higher CO2 levels in a room likely mean there is a higher chance of transmission if an infected person is inside. Based on the study above, I recommend trying to keep the CO2 levels below 600 ppm. You can buy good CO2 meters for around $100 online; just make sure that they are accurate to within 50 ppm.

    Air cleaners

    If you are in a room that can’t get enough outside air for dilution, consider an air cleaner, also commonly called air purifiers. These machines remove particles from the air, usually using a filter made of tightly woven fibers. They can capture particles containing bacteria and viruses and can help reduce disease transmission.

    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says that air cleaners can do this for the coronavirus, but not all air cleaners are equal. Before you go out and buy one, there are few things to keep in mind.

    A stock image of an upright air cleaner.
    If a room doesn’t have good ventilation, an air cleaner or air purifier with a good filter can remove particles that may contain the coronavirus.
    EHStock/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

    The first thing to consider is how effective an air cleaner’s filter is. Your best option is a cleaner that uses a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter, as these remove more than 99.97% of all particle sizes.

    The second thing to consider is how powerful the cleaner is. The bigger the room – or the more people in it – the more air needs to be cleaned. I worked with some colleagues at Harvard to put together a tool to help teachers and schools determine how powerful of an air cleaner you need for different classroom sizes.

    The last thing to consider is the validity of the claims made by the company producing the air cleaner.

    The Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers certifies air cleaners, so the AHAM verified seal is a good place to start. Additionally, the California Air Resources Board has a list of air cleaners that are certified as safe and effective, though not all of them use HEPA filters.

    Keep air fresh or get outside

    Both the World Health Organization and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that poor ventilation increases the risk of transmitting the coronavirus.

    If you are in control of your indoor environment, make sure you are getting enough fresh air from outside circulating into the building. A CO2 monitor can help give you a clue if there is enough ventilation, and if CO2 levels start going up, open some windows and take a break outside. If you can’t get enough fresh air into a room, an air cleaner might be a good idea. If you do get an air cleaner, be aware that they don’t remove CO2, so even though the air might be safer, CO2 levels could still be high in the room.

    If you walk into a building and it feels hot, stuffy and crowded, chances are that there is not enough ventilation. Turn around and leave.

    By paying attention to air circulation and filtration, improving them where you can and staying away from places where you can’t, you can add another powerful tool to your anti-coronavirus toolkit.

    [Understand new developments in science, health and technology, each week. Subscribe to The Conversation’s science newsletter.]The Conversation

    Shelly Miller, Professor of Mechanical Engineering, University of Colorado Boulder

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

    Navajo Dam operations update: Releases to be increased to 800 CFS on August 11, 2020 #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    The San Juan River, below Navajo Reservoir. Photo: Brent Gardner-Smith/Aspen Journalism

    From email from Reclamation (Susan Behery):

    In response to decreasing flows and a dry forecast weather pattern in the San Juan River Basin, the Bureau of Reclamation has scheduled an increase in the release from Navajo Dam from 700 cubic feet per second (cfs) to 800 cfs on Tuesday, August 11th, starting at 4:00 AM. Releases are made for the authorized purposes of the Navajo Unit, and to attempt to maintain a target base flow through the endangered fish critical habitat reach of the San Juan River (Farmington to Lake Powell).

    The San Juan River Basin Recovery Implementation Program has recommended base flows as close to 500 cfs as possible for the summer of 2020. This is within their normal recommended range of 500 to 1,000 cfs. The target base flow is calculated as the weekly average of gaged flows throughout the critical habitat area from Farmington to Lake Powell.

    Stocking greenback cutthroat trout into the Poudre River tributary system — @COParksWildlife

    Covid-Mask-wearing Black Bear. Credit: Colorado Parks & Wildlife

    From Colorado Parks & Wildlife (Jason Clay)

    A multi-agency effort to restore the federally threatened greenback cutthroat trout into its native river basin took a giant hike upwards last week when an army of Colorado Trout Unlimited volunteers led by Colorado Parks and Wildlife and U.S. Forest Service staff stocked the Colorado state fish into a new body of water.

    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife
    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife
    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife
    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife
    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife
    Cache la Poudre tributaries cutthroat stocking event August 2020. Photo credit: Jason Clay via Colorado Parks and Wildlife

    Around 10 staffers and 40 volunteers from Colorado Trout Unlimited each hiked between 12-15 greenback cutthroat trout in backpacks into a Poudre River tributary stream. This introduction marks just the fifth body of water in the state the greenbacks now can call home, with four of those five within the South Platte River basin that the greenbacks are native to.

    “Today is one of those exciting instances of getting a new population established,” said Kyle Battige, Aquatic Biologist with CPW. “We are trying to replicate and perpetuate this resource across the landscape, by getting greenbacks into more water bodies within the South Platte River basin.”

    A total of 711 greenbacks were stocked on Tuesday, July 28. They came from the Mt. Shavano Hatchery out of Salida. It took the hatchery one year to take the fertilized eggs, hatch and raise the fish to five inches in length, primed for release into the wild.

    “Colorado Trout Unlimited is a proud partner in the campaign to protect and restore our native trout,” said Dan Omasta, Grassroots Coordinator for Colorado Trout Unlimited. “This stocking project is another great example of how anglers and local communities can work together to save a threatened species. We had over 40 volunteers that traveled from as far as Eagle, Colo., and Wyoming to carry fish over nine miles into the backcountry on a rainy afternoon. The passion and dedication of our community is what drives an optimistic future for the greenback cutthroat trout.”

    U.S. Forest Service personnel located the fishless stream in the Poudre River basin a couple years ago and the agencies did their due diligence to make Tuesday’s stocking become a reality. Aquatic biologists conducted stream sampling with backpack electrofishing units and took eDNA samples to confirm it was indeed a fishless location. Habitat suitability work also took place to ensure the fish would survive once stocked. Everything checked out and the greenbacks were stocked into a fifth body of water in Colorado.

    “We’re excited and proud to be partnering with CPW on this important effort reintroducing greenback cutthroat trout and restoring part of Colorado’s natural heritage,” said Christopher Carrol, Fisheries Biologist and Watershed Crew Lead with the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland. “We especially want to thank Colorado Trout Unlimited and Rocky Mountain Flycasters Chapter of Trout Unlimited for organizing so many passionate volunteers and helping collect data that informed our decision for making the reintroduction. Shared stewardship and working together pays dividends for native species.

    An important characteristic when looking to identify a reintroduction site is that the stream must be fishless. It must also have protection from invasion of non-native trout that will outcompete and overrun the greenbacks.

    “This location is protected by a series of natural waterfall barriers, upwards of 20-feet, that ensures the reach we stocked will not be invaded by non-native fish downstream,” Battige said.

    Cutthroat trout historic range via Western Trout

    The greenbacks have previously been stocked into Herman Gulch, Dry Gulch, and Zimmerman Lake – all within the South Platte River drainage. These rare fish, twice believed to be extinct, are descendants of the last wild population of native greenback cutthroat trout found in Bear Creek outside of Colorado Springs in 2012. Bear Creek is the fifth body of water in Colorado where the fish currently reside.

    “This project could not have been completed without the hard work and dedication of today’s volunteers. The hikes that they did range from four miles roundtrip up to nine miles and covered 1,200 to 2,400 vertical feet of elevation, so it was a pretty substantial undertaking,” Battige said.

    The fish were loaded onto the hatchery truck at 3:30 a.m. and driven roughly 240 miles to the trailhead where they got loaded into bags with 1-2 gallons of water and pumped full of oxygen. The fish were put in ice water before leaving the hatchery, so they can handle the conditions better during their long journey.

    “Lowering the temperature helps the fish travel well, ensures that their metabolism slows down and decreases the overall stress on the fish,” Battige said.

    The water temperature in the stream was 51 degrees, so before getting stocked the volunteers tempered their fish, meaning they took time to slowly acclimate the fish to the temperature in the creek over a 10-15 minute time period.

    Crews will stock additional greenbacks into the same location each summer for the next two years as they look to establish the population. They will follow up with surveys to see how the fish are doing and aquatic biologists will look for signs of natural reproduction and new greenbacks hatching in the stream in 3-4 years.

    Upper #ColoradoRiver will not be ‘Wild and Scenic,’ but conservationists still satisfied with new plan — The Vail Daily #COriver #aridification

    A view of the popular Pumphouse campground, boat put-in and the upper Colorado River. The BLM and Forest Service recently approved an alternative management plan that acts as a workaround to a federal Wild & Scenic designation. Photo credit: Brent Gardner-Smith/Aspen Journalism

    From The Vail Daily (John LaConte):

    The Catamount gauge on the Colorado River is a result of a big collaboration, and for now, it has gone a long way in quelling the concern of conservationists in the Upper Colorado River Wild and Scenic Stakeholder Group.

    Couple that with a few good-faith efforts from Front Range diverters to get more water into the river, and most everyone seems to be convinced that collaboration has been a lot better than the courtroom in this case.

    The stakeholder group was formed in 2008, and its mission was overt — convince the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service not to write a report stating that the Upper Colorado River is suitable for a Wild and Scenic Designation from the federal government…

    But while it takes an act of Congress to welcome a new river into the Wild and Scenic Rivers System, a report from the Bureau of Land Management or U.S. Forest Service saying a river is suitable for wild and scenic designation can trigger a change in management for the river…

    [Rob] Buirgy said the Colorado Water Conservation Board supported the stakeholder group using the state’s Wild and Scenic Rivers Fund for scientific studies, recreational surveys, and stakeholder group coordination and facilitation. The stakeholder group also recommended that the board appropriate three in-stream flow water rights to preserve the natural environment on the river from the confluence with the Blue River to the area just above the confluence with the Eagle River. The Colorado Water Conservation Board appropriated and the water court decreed those water rights in 2013.

    Colorado Parks and Wildlife is expected to help install biological metric tracking tools along the river in the coming months, and a few years ago a new USGS temperature and flow monitoring gauge was installed at the Catamount Boat Launch, near Bombardier’s house, which will measure temperature and serve as a resource guide.

    While resource guides do not mandate management action based on their readings, good-faith management efforts have been undertaken based on the Catamount gauge’s readings during the collaborative process. Bombardier says the readings have been crucial for that stretch of the river, which is prone to warm temperatures…

    [Ken] Neubecker said after spending more than a decade working toward Wild and Scenic designation on the Upper Colorado River, he feels the collaborative group’s plan represents the best effort conservationists could have expended toward maintaining the Upper Colorado River’s “outstandingly remarkable values,” or ORVs.

    “It got all of the people who would have been opposed to actual designation to sit down at the table and work out a plan that — if everybody plays along — will have the best shot we’ve got at protecting those ORVs,” Neubecker said.

    The agreement was formerly accepted by the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service in July. Participating groups include: American Rivers, American Whitewater, Aurora Water, Blue Valley Ranch, Colorado River Outfitters Association, Colorado River Water Conservation District, Colorado Springs Utilities, Colorado Whitewater, Confluence Casting, Conservation Colorado, Denver Water, Eagle County, Eagle Park Reservoir Company, Eagle River Watershed Council, Eagle River Water and Sanitation District, Grand County, Middle Park Water Conservancy District, Municipal Subdistrict of the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District, Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District, Northwest Colorado Council of Governments, Summit County, Upper Colorado Commercial Boaters Association, Upper Colorado River Private Boaters Association, Upper Eagle Regional Water Authority, Vail Associates, Inc., and Yust Ranch.

    #SanJuanRiver report: Streamflow = 40.6 CFS, median for day = 137 CFS #ColoradoRiver #COriver #aridification

    From The Pagosa Springs Sun (Chris Mannara):

    River report

    As of Wednesday, the San Juan River had a reported flow of 43.5 cfs. This is below the average for Aug. 5 of 214 cfs, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

    The highest flow for Aug, 5 came in 1999 when the San Juan River had a flow of 1,050 cfs. The lowest came in 2002 when the San Juan had a flow of 18.2 cfs.

    #Boulder reservoir to be drained starting sept. 1 for required maintenance work

    Here’s the release from the City of Boulder (Jeff Stahla, Denise White, Samantha Glavin):

    Beginning Sept. 1, 2020, until March 2021, access to Boulder Reservoir will be limited while the reservoir is drained to allow Northern Water, in coordination with the City of Boulder, to perform necessary maintenance on the reservoir and its dams.

    Boulder Reservoir. Photo credit: The City of Boulder

    This work will ensure visitor safety and effective water delivery to municipal and agricultural water users. Reservoir water levels will be significantly lower than normal during this time. This is routine, required maintenance work that will take place every 5-10 years.

    The reservoir basin will be closed to all water-based activities, including boating, watercraft, fishing, swimming, wading and other on-water recreation once the reservoir drawdown begins Sept. 1. Passive recreation opportunities (e.g., walking, cycling and running) will still be available during this time. The main trail along on the North Shore will remain open, but access to the shoreline will be restricted. Trails in the vicinity of the north and south dams may be periodically impacted during periods of construction in those areas. A map of affected areas is available on the project website at bouldercolorado.gov/water/boulder-reservoir-maintenance#.

    Performing the maintenance work this year when some recreation activities such as swimming and special events are already restricted due to COVID-19 will ensure that additional impacts will be avoided, and recreation can return to full service once the pandemic subsides. However, the city recognizes that this limitation on Boulder Reservoir use may be disappointing to impacted recreationists. The city is providing reservoir permit and pass holders with a partial refund or credit on their purchase, available through Aug. 23. Current permit and pass holders have been contacted directly with information on how to access this offer.

    Additionally, Boulder Reservoir has received approval to remain open on Friday, Aug. 7, which is designated as an unpaid city closure day to address financial challenges related to the coronavirus pandemic, and offer extended hours of operation from 7-9 p.m. on Aug. 10-16. The city is able to offer these additional hours due to cost savings as a result of the draining project’s impact in shortening the fall recreation season.

    The reservoir will be drained to remove sediment from the area around the reservoir outlet, which naturally builds up over time. Maintenance will also occur on dam outlet structures, and the on the land between the north and south dams known as Fisherman’s Point. Construction equipment access and activity will be in the vicinity of the north dam and Fisherman’s Point. 

    Northern Water is coordinating with Colorado Parks and Wildlife and city staff to mitigate environmental impacts of the project. The reservoir will be drained outside of nesting season, limiting effects on nesting and migrating species during the most critical point in their life cycle. The reservoir will be refilled prior to spring migration and nesting seasons. While there are currently no plans to relocate the fish in the reservoir as the water level is expected to support the fish, Northern Water will monitor their environment daily. If conditions appear problematic, fish relocation may be arranged. 

    The Boulder Reservoir is a key part of the city’s drinking water supply and provides water to other municipal and agricultural users. Water is delivered to the reservoir and its water treatment plant via the Southern Water Supply Project, completed in 2020, and the Boulder Feeder Canal. The City of Boulder owns Boulder Reservoir, but operations and maintenance related to water storage and dam safety are primarily managed by the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District (Northern Water). 

    Additional information is available on the project webpage at https://bouldercolorado.gov/water/boulder-reservoir-maintenance#. General project questions can be directed to Water Resources Manager Kim Hutton at 303-441-3115 or huttonk@bouldercolorado.gov. For questions regarding recreation impacts, contact Boulder Reservoir Facilities Supervisor Stacy Cole at 303-441-3469 or coles@bouldercolorado.gov.

    To understand the backlash against the women in the running for vice president, watch more TV — The Conversation


    President Allison Taylor of ‘24’ ends up being exposed as Machiavellian.
    20th Century Fox

    Karrin Vasby Anderson, Colorado State University

    Joe Biden’s promise to name a woman running mate has prompted familiar debates about gender and power.

    Are these potential vice presidents supposed to be presidential lackeys or understudies to the leader of the free world? Should they actively seek the position, or be reluctant nominees bound by duty?

    After Senator Kamala Harris’s name emerged as a short-list favorite, CNBC reported that some Biden allies and donors “initiated a campaign against Harris,” arguing that she was “too ambitious” and would be “solely focused on eventually becoming president.”

    Claiming that people who want to be president make bad vice presidents might seem ill-conceived if your audience is Vice President Joe Biden. And pundits and journalists quickly pointed out that the argument was racist and sexist – like, really, really sexist.

    So why were Democratic party insiders spouting it?

    One clue can be found in the way we tell stories about women politicians. In our book, “Woman President: Confronting Postfeminist Political Culture,” communication scholar Kristina Horn Sheeler and I examine how fictional and actual women presidential figures are framed in news coverage, political satire, memes, television and film. Our close reading of these diverse texts reveals a persistent backlash that takes many forms: satirical cartoons that deploy sexist stereotypes; the pornification of women candidates in memes; and news framing that includes misogynistic metaphors, to name a few.

    But in our chapter on fictional women presidents on screen, we found something particularly relevant to the coverage of the Democratic Party “veepstakes.” Women who are politically ambitious are presented as less trustworthy than those who don’t actively seek the presidency.

    Senator Kamala Harris peers out of a window at Veterans Village in Las Vegas.
    Senator Kamala Harris is being attacked for trying to climb too high.
    AP Photo/John Locher

    There have been six series on U.S. television that follow a woman president for at least one full season: ABC’s “Commander in Chief”; the Sci-Fi Channel’s “Battlestar Galactica”; Fox’s “24”; CBS’s “Madam Secretary”; Fox 21’s “Homeland”; and HBO’s “Veep.”

    It may seem like a small point, but when showrunners want to create a “likeable” woman president, they go out of their way to demonstrate that pursuing the presidency isn’t her life’s goal.

    The women presidents in “Commander in Chief” and “Battlestar Galactica” didn’t campaign for the office. They ascended to the presidency as a result of tragedy. In the former, the president dies of a brain aneurism; in the latter, a nuclear attack takes out the first 42 people in the presidential line of succession, leaving the secretary of education to fill the role. (To be fair, this did seem like a woman’s likeliest path to presidential power in 2004.) Each character is portrayed as an ethical and effective leader – not perfect, but plausibly presidential.

    Conversely, series like “24” and “Homeland” feature women candidates who aggressively seek the presidency. In both cases, the women start out as principled politicians, but their true nature is revealed as weak and duplicitous. Their presidential tenures end up being ruinous for the nation, and order is restored by a white male – “24’s” Jack Bauer and the male vice president in “Homeland.” HBO’s “Veep” takes the premise of a craven woman politician to an absurd extreme, with actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus winning six consecutive Emmy Awards for her burlesque send-up of the familiar female trope.

    Interestingly, both “24” and “Homeland” have important connections to real-world presidential politics. Both series portray the first woman U.S. president as a veteran politician and middle-aged white woman. They bear strong resemblances to the only woman who has been a major-party presidential nominee: Hillary Clinton. Appearing in 2008 and 2017, respectively, the storylines were clearly planned to coincide with what could have been Clinton’s first term as U.S. president.

    Yet “24’s” and “Homeland’s” depictions of fictional women presidents align with communication scholar Shawn J. Parry-Giles’ findings that the media framed Clinton as inauthentic, Machiavellian and, ultimately, dangerous.

    President Elizabeth Keane, played by actress Elizabeth Marvel, stands at a podium in an episode of 'Homeland.'
    President Elizabeth Keane of ‘Homeland’ is a craven politician who has a ruinous tenure in office.
    Showtime

    That brings us back to our current veepstakes.

    Criticisms of women vice presidential prospects echo cultural scripts that insist women who want to be president shouldn’t be trusted. Understanding the resistance to Harris – and Elizabeth Warren, Stacey Abrams and others who announce their eagerness to serve – requires recognizing the diverse forms that backlash against women’s political ambitions can take, which span from calling a congresswoman a “f—— b—-” on the steps of the U.S. capitol to portraying women presidents as Machiavellian on television dramas.

    Did pop culture cause those Biden funders to try to undermine Harris?

    No. But the stories we tell ourselves on screen have taught us that women who actually want to be president can’t be trusted. That might be why people like Ambassador Susan Rice, who’s never run for office, and Congresswoman Karen Bass, who said she doesn’t want to run for president, landed on Biden’s short list to favorable coverage.

    “At every step in her political career,” The New York Times wrote of Bass, “the California congresswoman had to be coaxed to run for a higher office. Now she’s a top contender to be Joe Biden’s running mate.”

    Men who run for president typically have to demonstrate the requisite desire – the so-called “fire in the belly.”

    Bizarrely, women are supposed to act like they don’t even want it.The Conversation

    Karrin Vasby Anderson, Professor of Communication Studies, Colorado State University

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

    Fort Collins City Council votes to oppose #NISP, changing previous stance — The Fort Collins Coloradoan

    From The Fort Collins Coloradoan (Jacy Marmaduke):

    Fort Collins City Council voted [August 4, 2020] to oppose the Northern Integrated Supply Project, a departure from the city’s previous neutral stance on the controversial plan to siphon Poudre River water into two new reservoirs.

    Council members also endorsed city staff comments expressing reservations with Northern Water’s proposed Poudre intake pipeline upstream of the Mulberry Water Reclamation Facility. They adopted their position in a 5-1 vote on Tuesday, with council member Ken Summers voting “no” and Mayor pro-tem Kristin Stephens absent.

    The vote was the current council’s first opportunity to take a position on NISP. The city’s position on the project has vacillated over the years, wavering between opposition and a more neutral “can’t support” position. Council included in its opposition statement a note directing staff to continue working with Northern Water to address the city’s concerns about NISP and develop “a sustainable, long-term approach” to avoid, manage and mitigate the project’s impacts.

    Council’s job on Tuesday was to decide whether to endorse staff’s comments on the pipeline, which were submitted to Larimer County, and choose between four stances on NISP ranging from the most neutral “can’t support this variant of NISP” to the most outspoken “oppose (this version of NISP) and oppose the use of city natural areas.” They chose the latter.

    Poudre River whitewater park. Photo credit: Rocky Mountain Collegian

    At issue Tuesday was whether the city could take that stance on the project while maintaining a foothold in negotiations with Northern Water, the organizer of the plan to supply water to 15 small-but-growing Colorado municipalities and water districts. While the city itself isn’t among the participants, which include Fort Collins-Loveland Water District (covering the city’s southern reaches) and Windsor, the project would degrade springtime river flows through Fort Collins and the Poudre intake pipeline would affect several city natural areas…

    The intake pipeline is part of a concession Northern Water made to lessen NISP’s impacts on the Poudre through Fort Collins: Rather than drawing all the water off the river upstream of Fort Collins, Northern Water plans to run some of it through a 12-mile stretch of the river roughly between the Poudre Canyon mouth and Mulberry Street from fall to early spring.

    The “conveyance refinement” plan would run 18-25 cubic feet per second’s worth of water through the river, increasing the volume of water to eliminate some dry spots, lower the river’s temperature and reduce harm to fish [living] in the river. The intake pipeline near the reclamation plant is where Northern Water plans to take the water back out of the river…

    The influx of water will make “a very significant difference for fish” and offers clear environmental benefits for the river’s base flows, city watershed planner Jennifer Shanahan told council. But the structures involved with the intake pipeline will have temporary and permanent impacts to the Homestead, Kingfisher Point, Riverbend Ponds and Williams natural areas. Construction will have temporary impacts on traffic and visitors to those areas, including trail and parking lot closures, and more lasting impacts, including possible damage to sensitive wetlands, soil, wildlife and native vegetation and the sale of some land at Kingfisher Point Natural Area.

    The city submitted its comments on the pipeline to Larimer County as part of the 1041 permitting process. Staff recommended that Northern Water work with the city to refine the pipeline plan in several ways, such as shrinking the pump station and settling ponds proposed at Kingfisher Point, moving the pipeline further from the river at Kingfisher Point and creating a more ecologically sound river diversion at Homestead Natural Area…

    Council members agreed with the staff comments, but several of them offered broader criticism of NISP. Northern Water has been working for years on a broad plan to mitigate NISP’s impacts to the river, wildlife and riparian habitat, but environmental advocates say no mitigation plan can undo the irreparable damage of diverting so much water from a river that is already stretched thin. Fort Collins gets about half of its own water supply from the Poudre…

    Mayor Wade Troxell, who has the longest tenure on City Council, said he’s watched the city make progress in negotiations with Northern Water over the last 13 years. He discouraged his fellow council members from making “sweeping opposition statements that don’t get us where we need to go.”

    […]

    NISP is approaching a county decision on the 1041 permit that would allow construction of Glade Reservoir and four pipelines associated with the project. The Army Corps of Engineers is expected to issue its record of decision on the project as a whole this year, and if the project is approved, construction could begin as soon as 2023.