Vicious circle: Crops across America's heartland rely heavily on irrigation that is drawing down the Ogallala Aquifer, jeopardizing
agriculture's long-term future.
Image: NASA
In Brief
- If spread across the U.S. the aquifer would cover all 50 states with 1.5 feet of water
- If drained, it would take more than 6,000 years to refill naturally
- More than 90 percent of the water pumped is used to irrigate crops
- $20 billion a year in foodand fiber depend on the aquifer
On America’s high plains, crops in early summer stretch to the horizon: field after verdant field of corn, sorghum, soybeans, wheat and cotton. Framed by immense skies now blue, now scarlet-streaked, this 800-mile expanse of agriculture looks like it could go on forever.
It can’t.
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33 Comments
Add CommentSo why are we exporting so much food? It seems to me we can conserve the aquifer by simply growing food for domestic use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy irrigate at all when other crops are available? If people cared about their descendants they wouldn't hesitate. Yet another example of how short-term profit will mean the death of many.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Ogallala is a designated ground water basin. It is designated by LAW to be non-tributary to surface streams and has been also determined to be non-rechargeable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Ogallala is mined knowing that it has a predetermined life of a hundred years. Withdrawals from the Ogallala are allowed based on the number of acres owned overlying the aquifer. A calculation is deliberately made using the total number of acres, volume in the Ogallala and dividing by 100 to get the amount allowed per acre above the Ogallala to be withdrawn/allowed each year.
When the Ogallala is gone, & its gone & and those who have depended upon it will be high and dry & hard to believe that those affected have not known this for years ( and they do) & their permitting process spells out the calculations and credits & for as long as the water lasts.
Before everyone gets all leveraged about it, this concept is no different than oil, gold, natural gas or any other commodity throughout the world.
Maybe someday, California & Nevada in particular will come to realize the significance of a non-tributary Source of fresh water that can yield a million acre feet of water EACH YEAR which cannot be depleted ! They too will destroy their groundwater aquifers rather than seek a reliable permanent water Source which can be developed without damage to the environment or the water rights of others and can be delivered/distributed without outside power.
Ray Walker (Retired Water Rights Analyst) waterrdw@yahoo.com
If we can drill wells and pump water out, can't we pump water back in? How about all the Midwestern flood waters such as are happening in North Dakota. Couldn't we drill a bunch of ditches and deep wells to give all that excess water a place to go right back into the aquifers?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo, you can't just drill into the Ogallala and pump in water. It is not rechargeable ! Aquifers are not underground voids...they are spaces between rock, sand and clay. There is no way to force water into many of them except with high pressure steam for solution mining. Steam is forced into the aquifer and it dissolves the chemical you are after and then the solution is pumped back up to the surface of the ground where the chemical is extracted.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhat's wrong here is that this states the dollar amount of the food lost...who the heck cares!!! what's the tonnage of food lost! what's the number of people that will have to starve! our financial worth is made up fiction anyway....tell us the real deal...i thought this was scientific american, not economist daily
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would certainly suggest we all use less water, not just the ag industry. The average American household uses half of their water to flush toilets. If everyone used a composting toilet instead of a flush toilet, we would use half as much water and get useful compost out of it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt seems neccessary to divert water from somewhere rich in water to the plain, just like the South-to-North Diversion Project in China, a major project to channel water from the Yangtze River in the southern part of China to the north through three canals.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWatersource may be educated expert ; but in a number of places in California aquifiers have been succesfully recharged by use of recharge basins and charging wells, if a supply can be obtained and stored for this use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisT.Boone Pickens plans to use his ranch to supply a million acre feet of Ogallala water to Texas cities as well as electricity from wind and solar all he needs now is eminent domain to obtain right of ways for pipe and power lines. He will make $Billions and screw the local farmers out of their water and Pelosi is one of his business partners.
An expert is a former drip under pressure.
Watersource may be educated expert ; but in a number of places in California aquifiers have been succesfully recharged by use of recharge basins and charging wells, if a supply can be obtained and stored for this use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisT.Boone Pickens plans to use his ranch to supply a million acre feet of Ogallala water to Texas cities as well as electricity from wind and solar all he needs now is eminent domain to obtain right of ways for pipe and power lines. He will make $Billions and screw the local farmers out of their water and Pelosi is one of his business partners.
An expert is a former drip under pressure.
I agree that recharging the reservoir is an engineering problem. Source waters are available on their way to the Mississippi every spring. They need to be contained and generously connected to the aquifer through a porous bed, speeding up the natural recharge mechanism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy does no one address the real problem? Overpopulation is destroying the world and we keep breeding like rabbits. Regardless of the fact that our socio-economic system is dependent on perpetual economic and, by extension, population growth the planet cannot support this unlimited growth. We had it beat for a brief time in the 70's and early 80's but that was bad for business so the movement was defeated by the media. The rich will stuff their pockets until it kills us all.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe latest National Geographic has a good article on precipitation changes world wide which complements
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisthis article
Wayne in Ottawa
This is why we need a national sewer system. We pump all the nations biodegradable sewage to a place in the desert just east of the Rockies where we use it to grow tree farms cypress trees in a swamp environment.this will in turn cause more percipatation. less green house gas ect.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think we need to establish a national sewer system. In order to pump water out to the desert just east of the Rockies . It could be in the form of a covered canal. A large arched plastic cover , so that water drips down a la Solar still . evaporating in the day and condensing at night. since it is flowing it could also be used as a west bound transportation route, for mini robotic barges. Pig farm run off could also be used. the thing would end at an artificial cypress tree farm. and wetland ecosystem. In the mean time even more efficient irrigation systems can be established. Its a win win plan as lots of oil would be used in creating the pipe for the project not to mention the plastic covering.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNobody seems to have mentioned the other obvious way of reducing our water needs: Get people to stop breeding like rabbits! If we start limiting the size of families now, we might have a chance to save ourselves from disastrous water shortages and the collapse of the food supply.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisbreeding like rabits is fun!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWatersource makes a good point re using up the aquifer. At some point in the future, the resource is used up, but meanwhile generations can benefit. It is like mining gold. After it is gone people do something else. Maybe by then there will be crop varieties that thrive on the dry ground. Maybe they will need to go with dry farming. Maybe it can be converted back to grassland. There are lots of good options. And we can be almost certain that the techniques and technolgies available in the next generation will be better than those we have today. Our children will do just fine in this case.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is not something that can be sustained. It can only be used slower, but at some point it will indeed be gone.
The fossil water there is not a renewable resource, but it is an available resource that should be wisely used. There is no particular point in leaving that water in the ground under the arid plains. We cannot be like misers who save just for the sake of saving more. Preservation just doesnt need to be a priority in this particular case, since the alternatives following depletion are pretty much the same ones you get if you dont use it at all.
When are we going to pipe water from the excess water resources around Pittsburgh to fill the Ogallala Aquifer?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAmericans must learn hard lessons from their greed and disregard for the environment, many millions of Americans will pay a very high price for letting short term gains prevail over common sense environmental respect. Excesses of US capitalism including greedy farming practices will eventually destroy the US economy, environment and the people as well.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf we can pump oil across vast areas of land elevated above ground " WHY" can't we start to Desalinate Sea Water now by building enough plants to take care of the problem before it becomes a problem... Run the water across country fill up the aquifiers & cure the problem...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf we can afford to " give" Trillions of dollars away to those that should be allowed to go bankrupt & find their own way out of the woods, don't you think we should be able to do something really important for our Grand Children before they run out of water ?
Back in 1958 we had a NASA represenative come to our Junior High School & tell us: SOLAR ENERGY would be here very shortly & we'd all be using it...before the year 2000... We're still trying to get this off the ground ...
Were still the greatest Country in the world : Let's start acting like it...
We have a planet we call Earth. We have oceans of water that are salty. The oceans naturally desalinate the water by evaporation into the atmosphere. Some of that water is deposited on land as fresh water. Most of the fresh water drains back into the oceans unused.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe melting of the polar ice caps threatens to raise sea levels of salt water endangering coastal cities. And the fresh water in the polar ice caps is likely to change both the salinity and the temperature of the oceans.
I don't know much about economics. I do know that I used to buy a candy bar for 5 cents and it costs $1.00 now. I smoked a pack of cigarettes that cost me 9 cents and it would cost me about $7.00 if I still smoked. I filled my gas tank with gasoline that cost me 10.9 cents a gallon and today I pay $2.00 a gallon. It seems that money doesn't have an actual value.
So, why can't the global warming people, the estuary preservation people, the oil and gas pipe people, the dam builders, the water suppliers, and the agricultural industry get together to build a model of not just sustainable water supply, but water supply designed to provide the needs of growing populations?
If we can't do that then we have the examples of the Roman empire and other prior civilizations that indicate a severe drop in human population to lessen demand. Just drowning all of the people in coastal cities and starving to death a few billion people in other areas would put the Earth back into balance and might even permit the polar ice caps to recover.
A recovery might be too late to save the polar bear. Darwinian evolution predicts that some life form will evolve to fill the ecological niche left empty by the demise of the polar bear.
There is a lot of discussion about an engineering solution to recharging the Ogallala aquifer. But why engineer a solution when a natural recharging mechanism already exists? The playa lakes in the great plains region naturally recharge the Ogallala aquifer (Gurdak and Roe in press).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlaya lakes are depressional wetlands that collect water runoff during rainfall events. Recharge to the aquifer happens through cracks in the clay lining of the playa floor and at the edges of playa basin.
Despite this natural recharge mechanisms, the Ogallala is still being depleted. Conservation of the Ogallala requires two things 1) a conscious effort at more responsible water use (e.g. through new sustainable farming techniques) and 2) conservation of the playas. Conservation of playas can occur through farm bill programs (e.g. using CRP to create buffers around the playas), reducing sedimentation into the playas, and removing playas from agricultural production.
More information can be found here www.pljv.org and here http://www.pljv.org/cms/playa-film and here (Gurdak, J.J. and Roe, C.D. Recharge rates and chemistry beneath playas of the high plains aquifer - a literature review and synthesis. USGS circular In Press)
You write "Today the Ogallala Aquifer is being depleted at an annual volume equivalent to 18 Colorado Rivers." But that is an incorrect reading of the facts as published by the USGS. They note that the TOTAL depletion to date is 253 million acre feet, a number that matches 18 times the annual flow of the Colorado river as measured early in this century (an average of 22000 cubic feet/sec) before modern diversions:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://geology.com/usgs/high-plains-aquifer.shtml
The annual Ogallala depletion rate is about 2/3 of the historic flow of the Colorado river, not 18 times.
Hmm - it seems that the source for my own assertion about the current withdrawal rate was also wrong. That same USGS page says it has been on the order of 20 million acre feet per year (28,000 cubic feet/sec) since 1974, which would be more like 1.2 times the historic flow of the Colorado river.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIndividuals, cities and agri business claim ownership of the aquifer underlying their property. This is ridiculous. There should exist an agency that manages the entire aquifer setting flow rates, spacing and testing for contamination. Presently states, counties, farmers and cities manage the resource for their own benefit without regard for others. No other water resource in the United States is managed without a central agency providing guidance for equitable distribution, pollution standards and conservation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo one seems to mention the fact that this aquifer could be jeopordized by a waste facility in Adrews Texas. Rather than worrying the use and terms of the water, what if they build a waste site dumping highly radio active waste which would leach into the aquifer? Well with enough loop holes in place this could happen as soon as the end of summer. Please contact Gov. Perry.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn terms of a water constrained future, there are new farming techniques being developed by Valcent that use 5% of the water necessary for traditional farming. It's a vertical growing technique that yields more food, in less space, with less water. There's a lot of good info at the Valcent blog. http://blog.valcent.net/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHello
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes the water can be conserved check out www.harvestingrainwater.com and www.permaculture.org.au with water harvesting and food forest techniques not only can we make the water last we can recharge it
cheers
Johnny
http://www.localbiketrader.com
Hello
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes the water can be conserved check out www.harvestingrainwater.com and www.permaculture.org.au with water harvesting and food forest techniques not only can we make the water last we can recharge it
cheers
Johnny
http://www.localbiketrader.com
Has anyone considered what the water is being used for? Most grains are used to feed livestock. It costs roughly 2500 gallons of water to grow a pound of beef. Compare that with a pound of carrots (33 gallons) or a pound of potatoes (24 gallons). Effectively, by cutting down on meat consumption, you will be able to save more water than turning off the faucet when you brush or take a shower. Think about that. Using the aquifer to grow beef is irresponsible and not sustainable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have a suggestion. Why not develop solar distillation plants along the west coast, using passive design, and split the proceeds with half going east to recharge groundwater (can use some type of stirling engine design to power pumps along the way) and half benefitting the locals to recharge _their_ groundwater. It should be a federal project, of course.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAre we possibly rich beyond imagining? Perhaps simplistic, but the thought of shunting winter floods into the aquifer seems nice. OR desalinating the oceans and refilling our reserves from long aqueducts. Desalinated water would, of course, relief the oceans of their recently acquired waters, which must cause imbalances to all the life they support. Wave energy could be created from at the inflow point to the desalination plants and trains could be used in donjunction with the aqueducts. A scientific blob, CP
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