May 30th, 2023
Courtesy of The Land Desk, commentary on the watergy impacts of the Lower Basin states’ Colorado River deal: 2. The second point Ann made was that moving water from the Colorado River to fields and cities takes a lot of energy, including the power generated by the dams on the Colorado River. So when irrigators […]
Read more »Colorado Frackers Doubled Freshwater Use During Megadrought
May 23rd, 2023
Via Inside Climate News, a report on how oil and gas operators dramatically increased their reliance on high-quality water for fracking even though they produced enough wastewater to supply their operations: In the middle of the longest-running drought in more than a thousand years, Colorado energy companies diverted rising volumes of the state’s freshwater resources […]
Read more »May 14th, 2023
Via Big Pivots, a look at Colorado’s exploration of the pairing of solar panels with canals and reservoirs to see if integrating solar into agriculture may help solve the San Luis Valley’s water woes: Agrivoltaics—the marriage of solar photovoltaics and agriculture production— has been filtering into public consciousness, if still more as an abstraction than as […]
Read more »Why Is Water Critical For Energy Production?
April 27th, 2023
Via SIWI, an article on the watergy nexus: Water plays a critical but often overlooked role in energy production. In a webinar on 16 February, SIWI will explain how a focus on water can help us build more resilient and climate smart energy systems. Here SIWI’s Josh Weinberg presents a background. In a series of […]
Read more »April 21st, 2023
Via Yale’s e360, an article on how sscalating construction costs, the rise of solar and wind power, and mounting public opposition have led to a precipitous decrease in massive new hydropower projects: The end of the big dam era is approaching. Numerous recently published reports reflect this planet-altering fact. One study, conducted by scholars at […]
Read more »Awash in Toxic Wastewater From Fracking for Natural Gas, Pennsylvania Faces a Disposal Reckoning
April 16th, 2023
Courtesy of Inside Climate News, a report on how a grand jury and the EPA have cited potential disposal problems, and activists are fighting new injection wells. Yet the gas industry claims fracking is essential for the state’s economic health and that most of its wastewater is safely recycled: Gillian Graber considers herself an “accidental activist,” […]
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