The pandemic seems to have sucked the issue air out of the room, a harsh reality that is totally understandable. Until we can return to much normal life, focusing on other priorities, regardless of importance, naturally slips down the focus continuum. Even global climate change, which is not an issue that can sustain deferred attention. President Biden seems to recognize that reality, even as congressional resistance to any relevant regulation on business remains significant. The subtext of climate change issues seems to fall particularly into the world of fresh water access.
Treaties and agreements with private landowners and even between and among states that deal with water allocation and water rights were mostly made long before the major symptoms and effect of climate change were even being discussed. The water rights to aquifers and rivers, notoriously including the agreements between California and other states over the Colorado River, are examples. If you have ever seen the 1974 motion picture Chinatown, a drama that was inspired by the avaricious actions of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) secretly to buy up water rights in the Owens Valley, you get the story. A 233-mile early version of the California Aqueduct was up and running by 1913, and a fairly arid San Fernando Valley sucked up so much of that liquid gold and turned into a luscious green farming community, ultimately into one of the biggest suburban tracts in Los Angeles.
As dependence on fossil fuel continues to fall, based on improved efficiencies, the growth of alternative energy and simple popular demand – even General Motors announced that by 2035 its entire automotive output will be all electric – the focus on natural resources will of necessity reprioritize the value of water even over oil. What is happening in California, discussed below, is simply a microcosm of what we can expect the world over. Insect migration, heat, storms, fires, floods and coastal erosion have garnered most of the climate change headlines. Drought has been there too, but the subtext of drought is the fact that access to water is basic to life.
60% of our average body weight is water. “According to H.H. Mitchell, Journal of Biological Chemistry 158, the brain and heart are composed of 73% water, and the lungs are about 83% water. The skin contains 64% water, muscles and kidneys are 79%, and even the bones are watery: 31%.
“Each day humans must consume a certain amount of water to survive. Of course, this varies according to age and gender, and also by where someone lives. Generally, an adult male needs about 3 liters (3.2 quarts) per day while an adult female needs about 2.2 liters (2.3 quarts) per day. All of the water a person needs does not have to come from drinking liquids, as some of this water is contained in the food we eat.” USGS.gov (water science school). Fresh water is equally essential for food crops, livestock, cleanliness and waste control. In short: Life.
The Mammoth Lakes area of Mono and nearby Inyo Counties, east of famed Yosemite National Park (in California’s Mariposa County), is home to that infamous Owens River and its incredible ecosystem of surrounding creeks and smaller lakes. The LADWP is now asserting its water rights well beyond their initial claims. After all, they bought more water rights than they used. Battle lines are being set. Writing for the January 31st Los Angeles Times, Louis Sahagún writes: “Since the early 1920s, the Long Valley plains east of Yosemite have inspired comparison to a rustic Western paradise — an idyllic frontier where sparkling creeks meander through lush pastures, waters teem with feisty trout and sage grouse make ostentatious displays of romance.
“Much of this great, green expansiveness, however, is dependent on the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, which aggressively purchased land and water rights here more than a century ago. The department’s routine annual deliveries of free surplus water to its tenants have helped sustain ranching operations and habitat for many decades… But that relationship is now at risk of ending and could carry dire consequences for one of California’s most striking and violently formed landscapes [home to a volcanic caldera].
“Citing the impacts of climate change and decreased snowpack — as well as the demands of 4 million ratepayers about 300 miles to the south — the DWP has told ranchers they should no longer expect free water for irrigation uses. The planned water cutbacks, which were first announced in 2018, would affect some 6,400 acres of land near Crowley Lake — an area that was shaped by an immense volcanic eruption 760,000 years ago. [Pictured above]
“The move to end water giveaways has not only angered ranchers, but it has also stunned local officials and environmentalists, who say dewatered pastures will increase the risk of wildfire and reduce sage grouse habitat, among other things… In a joint lawsuit filed by Mono County and the Sierra Club, plaintiffs charge that the DWP failed to properly consider the environmental consequences of its decision.
“For seven decades, the DWP has provided several lessees in the area about 5 acre-feet of water per acre, per year, which made their pastures nutritious through summer and added luster to the area’s biking, hiking and angling hot spots. (An acre-foot of water equals about 326,000 gallons, more than enough to supply two households for a year.)…
“The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has also entered the fray on behalf of Mono County, out of concern for the survival of one of the most legally contested birds in America, a genetically distinct clan of sage grouse unique to the California-Nevada border… In court documents, state wildlife officials argue that the DWP should have conducted an environmental review before warning ranchers to prepare for ‘dry leases’ on pasturelands that overlap sage grouse strongholds.
“The DWP has promised to continue providing water needed to ‘reasonably support’ the sage grouse in southern Mono County’s Long Valley. But state wildlife officials dismiss that strategy as ‘stabs in the dark’ because it is not supported by a scientific study to determine how much water is needed to sustain the sage grouse and its habitat.
“The DWP has said the water giveaways have become an extravagance due to changes in the climate — specifically, less snowpack, shorter rainy seasons and periods of prolonged drought… The agency said in 2018 it would have to spend about $18 million to replace the water requested annually by local ranchers and to make up for the lost hydropower it could generate — an unacceptable burden for L.A. ratepayers of about $30 per family per year… In addition, the DWP points out that water was never a guarantee, tied to 20-year leases held by about a dozen ranchers in the area. They pay an average of $10 to $15 per acre, per year to graze on DWP property.”
As anyone who has lifted a bucket of water knows, water is heavy and expensive to transport. Desalinization is exceptionally expensive, uses lots of electric power, produces lots of toxic salt that has its own disposal issues, and is really a commercial alternative available only to coastal communities. Moving water from where it is and making it potable are a massive challenge, to put it mildly.
All of this digs deeply into the political polarization tearing this nation apart, that profound rural vs urban divide. Just looking at the fact that representatives from rural states (30% of the population) control about 70% of the US Senate tells you how the entire nation was constructed. Back in 1789, 94% of our country was rural and agricultural. We are well north of 85% urban today. Rural folks have always been suspicious of “city slickers,” whom they believe have drifted far away from basic American (read: “rural”) values. The water wars are not going to make this any better… as climate change places an equal demand from farmers for more water.
I’m Peter Dekom, and the reasons for the red-blue political divide might very well be exacerbated over the fight for access to fresh water.
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