NM’s water picture is grim

Has New Mexico passed “peak water”? Water for household use peaked in 1995 and has been declining ever since, according to state data. Farm irrigation, which makes up the bulk of the state’s water use, has been declining since the 1970s. For domestic water use, both from municipal water systems and domestic wells, conservation has so far been able to pick up most of the slack, with total water use dropping over the last 15 years even as the state’s population has continued to grow. But farmers have had a tougher time of it, according to state data, responding with a combination of water efficiency and simply taking land out of irrigation. Consider Curry County, on New Mexico’s eastern plains, where farmers are using less water because they have no choice. They have taken land out of production and switched to sorghum, which is less thirsty than corn, according to county extension agent Luther Dunlap. They depend on water from the Ogallala aquifer, the great underground reservoir that fuels agriculture on the High Plains, and the Ogallala is dwindling. “It’s been dropping significantly,” said Dunlap. “That’s our main source of water.” According to a Journal analysis of new and historical data from the New Mexico Office of the State Engineer, water use in Curry County has dropped 29 percent since the mid-1990s. And Dunlap’s farmers are not alone. The state’s latest water use report, completed last month, suggests the same thing is happening across New Mexico. Total water use in the state, including all farms, businesses and cities, has dropped 14 percent from its peak in the mid-1990s, even as New Mexico’s population has grown by 22 percent. While the success in reducing water use may look like a water conservation success story, the reasons behind it are not encouraging. Groundwater across the entire state, especially on New Mexico’s east side, is dwindling, according to research by the University of California’s Jay Famiglietti, who uses satellites to measure changes in the aquifer, the fresh water underground that is pumped up for use on farms and in cities. “The trend is pretty significant,” Famiglietti said. Meanwhile, drought and warming temperatures have sapped the amount of surface water in the state’s rivers since the late 1990s...more