Annual Conference Kicks off With Talks of Water Doomsday

STATE OF THE ROCKIES REPORT

Annual Conference Kicks off With Talks of Water Doomsday

By Headwaters News, 4-11-07

The 2007 State of the Rockies Conference commenced on Monday in the atrium of Armstrong Hall, on the campus of Colorado College in Colorado Springs, and from the opening remarks onward, the speakers all seemed to want to make a few things clear: this report was primarily written by a talented group of undergraduates and a team of professors; climate change is affecting almost every issue covered in the report; and the future of the Rocky Mountain region is mired in uncertainties surrounding growth.

But Day 1 really began to cook during the first panel on water sustainability. Attendees packed the room and, following panelists’ presentations, the audience threw tough questions at the speakers. At that opening panel, presenters outlined water projects and tactics to provide water for growing cities in the West. Following those presentations, audience members grilled the panelists about growth issues. Toward the end, the discussion touched on what might happen when growth outpaces supplies.

Kay Brothers, deputy general manager for the South Nevada Water Authority, returned to that idea in her keynote later that evening. She also outlined the development of Las Vegas, the city that sprang from the desert and which spurred the creation of the regional water authority.

Headwaters News is offering exclusive coverage of the conference. You can read more about the panel and about Brothers’ keynote. Stay tuned for an interview with James Hubbard, U.S. Forest Service Deputy Chief for State and Private Forestry and coverage of the “New Urbanism” panel and keynote, featuring Peter Calthrope. And look for posts of chapters from the report here on NewWest.net

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By Headwaters News, 4-11-07 | comments (3) | email story | print story

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Comments

By Monty, 4-12-07

The door to a meaningful regional or national discussion about human growth limits will probably first occur in the arena of water limits. To date, politicians will not touch the subject of "eternal human growth" in a finite world as it is Un-American to be viewed as anti-growth or anti-progress. The Chamber of Commerce idea of progress is merely to increase wealth and population as opposed to looking for ways of restoring value to human existance. The Governor of California, in a recent speech at Georgetown University, indicated that this country has reached a "tipping point" in the greening of America in that the anti-environmental folks are now in the minority; they are now the "fringe element". The Governor was wildly optimistic about new green technologies and new attitudes that will save us from global warming & such. However the governor failed--as all other politicans have--to mention the unpopular topic of human limits. Can there ever be a true greening of America until we confront the stark reality of a balance between human numbers & the earth's human carrying capacity? California's current human polulation number is about 36 million, I would love to have an opportunity to ask the governor if he believes that there is an ulitmate downside to allowing California's population to increase to 100 or even 300 million humans? Maybe, just beyond the horizon, we are approaching a tipping point where the majority of American's will agree to have a meaningful discussion about population limits rather than waiting for the train wreak of biological and resource exhaustion controls.

By Frosty Wooldridge, 4-16-07

Without addressing endless human growth, nothing, I repeat, nothing will be solved by any conference. It means you're all talking while your train careens over a cliff. It means you mean well, but nothing you do will mean anything if you don't address stabilizing population. How many people can Colorado hold with sufficient water? What is our carrying capacity? How much gridlock do we want? What happens when the next 6 million people lands in Colorado as predicted by 2050? Who will stand up and speak out for a "Colorado Population Policy"? Without it, any conference is like dancing for rain in death valley, like screaming at Katrina to slow down, like marching up a 14er with bare feet, like swimming up the Colorado River in springtime expecting to reach its source. We either come to terms with our population or nature will do it for us.

By Marion, 4-21-07

It is interesting to see the take that we need to control population because of decreasing habitat(I agree, but have no idea how to do it in a free society), perhaps mandate smaller homes no matter how much money one has. On the other hand various environmental groups feel that we need to have more elephnts, grizzlies and wolves due to declining habitat for them. How can both be right?

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