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U.S. Raises Threat of Steep Water Cuts in Lower Colorado River Basin
August 4th, 2026
Courtesy of New York Times, a report on a federal plan would impose drastic water cuts on Arizona, California and Nevada in dry years over the next decade. A legal battle could follow. Communities and farms across Arizona, Nevada and California face potentially drastic cuts in the water they can use from the Colorado River […]
Read more »A U.S. Desert Town May Run Out of Water. Others Could Face Same Fate.
July 27th, 2026
Via The Washington Post, a look at an Arizona community nearly dried up and imposed strict limits, and its crisis may be a glimpse of the West’s future. Mayor Curtis Stacy starts every morning checking two websites that tell him how much he needs to worry about water. One site tells him about the reservoir […]
Read more »How Water Is Becoming Pakistan’s Nuclear Threshold
July 26th, 2026
Via The Diplomat, a look at how the real danger lies not in the immediate scarcity of Indus water flowing from India into Pakistan but in the widening gap between how they interpret the same facts. In a speech at the Stockholm Water Symposium in August 1995, World Bank Vice President Ismail Serageldin warned that […]
Read more »Pakistan Ups the Ante on Indus Water Dispute With India
July 7th, 2026
Via The Diplomat, a look at how there is growing eagerness in Pakistan to involve China, the other upper riparian country, more directly in the issue: The Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) of 1960, which the World Bank brokered between India and Pakistan, was a notable achievement in South Asian diplomacy. The treaty divided the six […]
Read more »Indus Waters Treaty Crisis: Why South Asia’s Power Balance Is Shifting
July 4th, 2026
Via Modern Diplomacy, a look at how – last month – Pakistan formally objected to India’s Bhakara Dam expansion. This was the third major dispute filed under the Indus Waters Treaty in eighteen months. Last month, Pakistan formally objected to India’s Bhakara Dam expansion. This was the third major dispute filed under the Indus Waters […]
Read more »The Colorado River States are Deadlocked and the River is Crashing. Will a ‘Grand Bargain’ Finally Get its Day?
June 26th, 2026
Via Water Education Foundation, commentary on a ‘wild idea’ to defuse the Colorado River Compact’s legal time bomb that has been kept alive by seasoned observers who believe it could still save the river: For the past 20 years, the Colorado River has been operated under a set of guidelines negotiated between the seven states […]
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