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The American Dream (Water Not Included)
February 7th, 2025
Via The Lever, a look at how real estate developers are running a dark-money campaign to overturn new housing rules — and ignore basic laws of nature: For most of human history, a simple axiom for survival seemed to prevail: Don’t build houses where there is too little water. Amid dangerous droughts, Arizona officials recently […]
Read more »At Phoenix’s Far Edge, a Housing Boom Grasps for Water
January 31st, 2025
Via Circle of Blue, a report on how more than 1 million people could pour into western Maricopa County, Arizona in the coming decades – if housing developers can secure the water: Buckeye, Arizona, has plans to become one of the Southwest’s largest cities in the next decades. Photo © Brett Walton/Circle of Blue Beneath […]
Read more »Trump Says He’s Sending Water To LA. It’s Actually Going to Megafarms.
January 29th, 2025
Via Grist, a report on how the president’s executive orders on California water will help irrigate Central Valley farms. They won’t do anything to fight wildfires. While President Donald Trump has issued a flurry of far-reaching decrees during his first week in office, one relatively niche issue has received a disproportionate share of the president’s […]
Read more »Water, Water Everywhere…?
January 29th, 2025
Via The Land Desk, commentary on the recent USGS water assessment as well as data center water usage: In the closing days of the Biden administration, the U.S. Geologic Survey released its National Water Availability Assessment Report, which is a whopper of a study not only on how much water Americans use and for what, but […]
Read more »Close to 30 Million Americans Face Limited Water Supplies
January 24th, 2025
Via The Lede, a report that close to 30M Americans face limited water supplies: Nearly 30 million people are living in areas of the US with limited water supplies as the country faces growing concerns over both water availability and quality, according to a new assessment by government scientists. The US Geological Survey (USGS), which is part […]
Read more »The U.S. Water Supply, Visualized
January 17th, 2025
Via Western Water Notes, a report on a new USGS assessment highlighting water availability: The U.S. Geological Survey released a water assessment on Thursday that found about 27 million people in the United States live in areas with high to severe levels of water scarcity. Although the agency has studied water quantity and quality in […]
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