Wednesday February 1, 2023
Associated Press —
Waves of torrential rainfall drenched California into the new year. Snowpacks in the Sierra Nevada Mountains have swelled to more than 200 percent their normal size, and snowfall across the rest of the Colorado River Basin is trending above average, too.
While the much-needed water has improved conditions in the parched West, experts warn against claiming victory. About 60 percent of the region remains in some form of drought, continuing a decades-long spiral into water scarcity.
“The drought is so critical that this recent rainfall is a little like finding a $20 bill when you’ve lost your job and you’re being evicted from your house,” said Rhett Larson, an Arizona State University professor of water law.
Over the years, a proposed solution has come up again and again: large-scale river diversions, including pumping Mississippi River water to the parched west.
Just this past summer, the idea caused a firestorm of letters to the editor at a California newspaper. But interest spans deeper than that. Most recently, the Arizona state legislature passed a measure in 2021 urging Congress to investigate pumping flood water from the Mississippi River to the Colorado River to bolster its flow.