The Colorado River has gone nearly dry the way Mike Campbell in “The Sun Also Rises” went bankrupt: gradually, then suddenly. It took decades, countless mistakes and global warming to bring the river to the brink of disaster. It will take doing countless things right to have any hope of solving the problem as the planet continues to warm. Except now we don’t have decades.
The most urgent need is to stop using so much water. The seven US states in the river basin keep failing to agree on a plan to slash annual consumption by up to a quarter. So now we’re waiting for the federal government to step in and impose a solution, after which we will wait for the courts to settle the inevitable lawsuits over that solution. The futures of 40 million people, millions of acres of farms, the Hoover Dam, the Grand Canyon and more hang in the balance.
