Such is the electric opulence of Las Vegas, my erstwhile home, that one can forget how vast quantities of power and water are required to keep the city in its customary orgasmic brilliance.
Enter the Colorado River–which kisses the southern edge of the Silver State and keeps Las Vegas alive.
Of course, long ago, when the southwestern states divvied up river resources, little did they imagine that a city of 2 million high-maintenance souls would emerge in the pitiless Desert cauldron of the Las Vegas Valley.
But emerge that city did, replete with mod cons and then some. And then along came Global Warming in the shape of an ongoing drought.
Add to that trenchant opposition to water extraction from rural counties…and you end up with the present situation: a regional water system under severe stress, as evidenced by the dramatic “bath ring” in Lake Mead pictured above.
You can read an article I just wrote for the NRDC’s Smarter Cities website on this topic, as well as listen to a portion of an interview I conducted with Pat Mulroy, the Las Vegan charged with meeting the city’s water needs, by clicking the link below:
Keegan – Ring of Dust (NRDC Smarter Cities)
Thanks to Pat Mulroy, Dr Robert Fielden, Robert Glennon, and Paul McRandle for their help on this article. Flick image by loop_oh.