Agua is Vida - Water is Life

Since the begining of time water has been the life blood which sustains the environment and humanity as we know it today. Water conflicts, most often derived due to lack of this precious liquid, can be observed globally in areas such as the Aral Sea in Central Asia, the Nile River in Egypt and the Colorado River in the US. The Colorado River stretches 2,330 km (Wikipedia) and is vital to the lives of 25 million Americans (According to MSNBC). Colorado River water is shared by seven states, the upper basin states - Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming and the lower basin states -Arizona, California and Nevada. As population in this region continues to increase, the water demand also increases and so does the battle over resources. Increasing drought conditions and the decline of precipitation also intensifies the situation. The problem at hand could have detrimental effects if this issue is not addressed appriopriately.

The above Reference Modes illustrate the total population per county of the southwestern states. The Behavior over time illustrates an increase in population over a seventy year period, beginning in 1920 (right) and ending in 1990(left). Intersting to note, the 1920s map is a snap shot of population only two years prior to the signing of the Colorado River Compact. (Credit for maps: USGS).

The policy of concern, the Colorado River Compact was signed in 1922 and became what is known today as the Law of the River. The Compact was designed to allocate equal water distributions. Based on historical precipitation trends, each basin would be allotted 75 million acre-feet (maf) per year, (Sharing Colorado River Water), leaving the basins to allocate water according to each state according to neccessity. The Compact was also designed to alleviate current or future conflict pertaining to the distribution of water resources. Moreover, its purpose was to secure the growth of agriculture and industry dependent upon the Colorado River.

The issues regarding this policy is the lack of foresight in the allocation of water resources. Several crucial factors were overlooked during the design of the policy, including population growth, and climate change which effects precipitation and drought. The policy also does not address water conservation technique, nor does it address environmental concerns in regards to pollution or degradation of water quality.

In hindsight it is easy to realize all of the mistakes or improvements that can be made to design a better policy. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to develop a model that will help policy makers look at the components of a system and understand how they interact with one another. Understanding the complexity of these systems will not necessarily relieve the policy from creating unintended consequences; however, it will allow raise awareness of the issues to the policy makers.

Questions of concerns:

How will climate change or changes in precipitation impact the available water resources?

What impact will energy demand have on the Colorado River?

What is the relationship between population, energy and water?

How does pollution and water quality degredation effect they system?

What if states were given incentives to decrease water consumption?

Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

Most children grow up listening to stories such as Little Red Riding Hood or The Three Little Pigs where the wolf is often portrayed as the bad guy. Unfortunately, this misperception doesn’t change with age, even adults associate wolves to be wild, dangerous and unruly. Fair enough, wolves are dangerous, but they are also key players in balancing nature’s delicate ecosystems. In fact, it wasn’t until cottonwood trees disappeared (unanticipated consequence) that the folks managing Yellowstone National Park realized the true importance of wolves.

Here is the short story. Once upon time there were many gray wolf packs living in Yellowstone National Park. Living nearby were ranchers raising cattle. Every once in a while the wolves would leave the Park and help themselves to locally grown, grass-fed, free range, USDA beef. Well, the ranchers didn’t like this one bit and started complaining, a lot. They complained so much that the US Government sponsored the Predator Control Program (intended consequence) in effort to remove/eliminate the wolves from the Park. Needless to say, that was the end of free lunch for the wolves. One by one the wolves were eliminated from the Park and all the ranchers lived happily ever after. Well it was a happy ending for ranchers, but it was a sad day when Park management looked at an aerial photo of the Park and realized all the cottonwood trees had vanished. But how did all the cottonwoods disappear? Logging was not allowed and there was not a forest fire that could have destroyed them.

After some research it became clear that the removal of wolves was directly correlated to the disappearance of the cottonwood trees. When the wolves were taken out of the eco-system it allowed the elk to graze in areas they normally wouldn’t due to predation. The elk started grazing in areas such as meadows and areas near streams and they ate cottonwood trees, saplings and seeds, which increased the stress of the cottonwood population and decreased the quality of the ecosystem. This caused an effort to re-introduce wolves into the Park and thus an increase in the wolf population. This is an example of nature responding to critical changes in the eco-system which could have been accounted for if the policy makers would have looked at the system as a whole.

No One Wants to be a Drug Addict

How many people do you know wake up and say, "I think I will be a drug addict." My point exactly, no one! Rio Arriba County, the county directly bordering the county I live in, has the most heroin overdoses per capita in the world. Yup, in the world. Growing up in this environment never phased me, I was oblivious to drugs or drug problems. It wasn't until my home was the target of a drug robbery. What does that mean, it means that they broke into my home, took what they needed and sold the items to buy drugs. That was my first experience, the next came several years later when my once close friends and family members became part of the vicious cycle of drug addiction. The problem finally captured my attention, what was going, what was the problem? After doing some research, mostly asking questions, I found out that heroin addiction was triggered often times by an accident that caused "chronic pain." Doctors prescribe a pharmaceutical pain reliever such as Percocet or some other opiate derivative. The patient would take the prescription as directed, 1-3 times daily for the next month. A month doesn't seem like a long time, but the human body gains immunity quickly. The next time the patient visits the doctor, the patient will complain that the pain is still acute and the doctor will prescribe something stronger, such as a stronger version of Percocet or even OxyContin. OxyContin is a synthetic version of heroin, often times only prescribed for the most acute type of cancer patients.

As you can see, the patient continues using the prescription drug and the body continues to build immunity to the drug. By the time the doctor cuts the patient off or decreases the supply, the patient is now addicted. This is when it gets really bad, the patient switches to intravenous use of the drug to speed up the process and often switches to a more effective version of the drug, heroin. To satisy the addiction the patient will look to the street pharmacists to satiate the addiction.

Although there are various other reasons how addictions are formed, for this specific case I will focus on a feedback loop I know to be true.

In this situation the variable I would track over time would be the prescription of narcotics such as the ones mentioned above.

Hard elements:
Drug over-doses
Narcotics prescribed and duration
Doctors earn money for prescribing medication

Soft elements:
Lack of incentive for doctors to value patient health.
Social acceptance for drug users

Tent Rocks

Tent Rocks is one of the many beautiful sights to see in New Mexico. The history preserved in these extraordinary structures is phenomenal. You can see the different layers some of which were placed by volcanic erruptions and others through aeolian deposit (wind blown).

Maybe one day you can visit Tent Rocks or some of the other interesting NM geologic sites.