{"id":31935,"date":"2023-09-04T19:05:30","date_gmt":"2023-09-05T01:05:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/several-parts-of-mountain-west-experience-extreme-water-stress-each-year\/"},"modified":"2023-09-05T01:05:30","modified_gmt":"2023-09-05T01:05:30","slug":"several-parts-of-mountain-west-experience-extreme-water-stress-each-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/several-parts-of-mountain-west-experience-extreme-water-stress-each-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Several parts of Mountain West experience \u2018extreme water stress\u2019 each year"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=16387d07-e073-5e07-a01b-1b28c0a3d8b0&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" alt=\"A ring of light minerals show the high water mark on the shore of Lake Mead along the border of Nevada and Arizona, on March 6 near Boulder City, Nevada. John Locher\/The Associated Press\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">A ring of light minerals show the high water mark on the shore of Lake Mead along the border of Nevada and Arizona, on March 6 near Boulder City, Nevada. John Locher\/The Associated Press<\/span><span class=\"credit\">John Locher<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>New research shows that in much of the world, water supplies for drinking, bathing and farming are being threatened. That includes sections of the Mountain West.<\/p>\n<p>The World Resources Institute calls it \u201cextreme water stress\u201d \u2013 meaning at least 80% of the available supply is being used each year.<\/p>\n<p>The research group\u2019s updated Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas shows that happening across several basins in the Mountain West. That includes both the Great Basin and Colorado River Basin in Nevada and Utah; the Mississippi-Missouri Basin in Wyoming and Colorado; the Rio Grande Basin in Colorado and New Mexico; and the Columbia Basin in Idaho.<\/p>\n<p>Water shortages in these basins and in other water-stressed regions could grow even more intense with climate change, said Newsha Ajami, chief development officer for research at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory\u2019s Earth and Environmental Sciences Area.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe may end up with longer dry periods, hotter temperatures, lower snowpack,\u201d Ajami said. \u201cAs we\u2019re thinking about what kind of infrastructure do we need to build resilience in the West, we have to keep this transition in mind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ajami called for more investments to reuse water \u2013 like recycling wastewater into drinking water \u2013 and to store more water underground. She noted that the amount of water stored by dams each year is unreliable due to climate change.<\/p>\n<p>Currently, about 50% of the world\u2019s population \u2013 4 billion people \u2013 are exposed to water stress for at least one month a year, according to the institute. The group says by 2050 that number could be closer to 60%.<\/p>\n<p><em id=\"emphasis-18a959917327cccb3ee6e83da93755c2\">This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureaud, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Colorado and KANW in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>80% of the available supply in areas is being used each year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[138],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-31935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-new-mexico"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31935"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=31935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}