Tag Archives: Las Vegas

Water News Roundup – July 13, 2010

13 Jul

Las Vegas SunVegas water agency halts ‘third straw’ tunnel work – Work has stopped on a tunnel for a new drinking water intake pipeline between Las Vegas and Lake Mead after a cavern that took two years to excavate unexpectedly filled with water.

ASCE NewsbriefSeattle’s price tag for clean water: $500 million – Keeping the water around Seattle clean is going to cost the city half a billion dollars over the next fifteen years.  Seattle Public Utilities will soon begin a federally-mandated, $500 million city-wide infrastructure improvement program designed to reduce storm and wastewater pollution. This will mean higher sewer and drainage bills for people, beginning next year, and for years afterwards.

KSLSalt Lake water ranked highly despite number of breaks – Salt Lake City’s water infrastructure suffers hundreds of breaks every year, in spite of a heavy investment from taxpayers. But a recent study shows the city is doing pretty well, by comparison.

Water News Roundup – June 14, 2010

14 Jun

Back from vacation and very well rested.  Moab was awesome and St. George even more beautiful than I remember.  So, what’s with all the boil orders of late?  There are so many short articles on boil orders that I’ve left them out of the roundup…  Here’s the rest.  Enjoy!

KSL:

LDS Church protests Snake Valley plan – The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has joined hundreds to file a protest with the state of Nevada over a proposal to pump and pipe groundwater from the Snake Valley and surrounding areas to Las Vegas.

Morgan County officials watching Weber River closely – It certainly is a sight to see: an 18-wheeler crossing a small bridge with rushing water high enough to touch the bottom of the bridge.  Morgan County workers, though, say it’s not a problem.

2 dams on ‘Level 1 alert’ due to extremely full reservoirs – Utah’s reservoirs are suddenly bulging with water, and this week officials declared what’s called a Level One Alert for two dams on the Utah-Wyoming border.

Provo Daily Herald: Official: Oil spill hasn’t reach the Great Salt Lake yet – Emergency workers believe they have stopped a 21,000-gallon oil leak from reaching the environmentally sensitive Great Salt Lake, one of the West’s most important inland water bodies for migratory birds that use it as a place to rest, eat and breed.

Deseret News:

Mussel causes restrictions at Sand Hollow Reservoir – In an emergency action taken Thursday, the state wildlife board extended its lasso of boater-related restrictions over Sand Hollow Reservoir in order to control the infestation of invasive mussels.

Mormon church among protesters of Las Vegas water plan – Opponents of a controversial pipeline that would tap water from a shared Nevada/Utah aquifer and convey it to Las Vegas say more than 2,300 protests have been filed against the plan, including objections mounted by the Mormon church.

Rep. Jim Matheson and Mayor Ralph Becker testify in D.C. to expand watershed protection – While clean drinking water became a priority this week for Oakley and Lindon residents as they boiled water contaminated by floods, it’s always on the mind of Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah

Salt Lake Tribune:

Lake Powell Pipeline to water Las Vegas? – Second Congressional District challenger Claudia Wright this week raised the specter of a Las Vegas water grab via Utah’s own proposed Lake Powell pipeline, a puzzling possibility that she said residents of Utah’s Dixie have warned her about.

Lake is the only source of sulfate of potash – Lately there has been a lot of discussion about Great Salt Lake Minerals’ plans to expand our solar evaporation ponds in order to produce more sulfate of potash (SOP), an all-natural crop nutrient. But there is confusion about what SOP is, as well as what the expansion would provide.

Oil shale and the future“The task is great. So is the need. And there is no time to lose.” – Exxon’s 1980 “White Paper”

Those stirring words concluded a 10-page document released in the early summer 30 years ago outlining Exxon’s grand plan to help solve the nation’s energy crisis of the 1970s.

SLC residents angry, sad over oil-fouled yards and waterways – [Resident’s] backyard serenity was destroyed this weekend when an underground Chevron pipeline ruptured just south of Red Butte Gardens, near the Bonneville Shoreline Trail, and leaked an estimated 21,000 gallons of oil into Red Butte Creek, that flowed to Liberty Park pond and the Jordan River.

Containment the goal of initial oil spill cleanup – Chevron is expected to unveil a cleanup plan this morning, after a day in which the company focused on containing an oil leak that fouled Red Butte Creek and Liberty Park pond, in hopes of keeping the toxic spill from reaching the Great Salt Lake.

KCPW: Becker says city investigation of oil spill underway – Now, the hope is that oil won’t reach the Great Salt Lake.  What’s being done to prevent that from happening, and who will hold Chevron’s feet to the fire to make sure the cleanup is fully completed and paid for?  KCPW’s Jeff Robinson spoke with Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker.

Water News Roundup – April 21, 2010

21 Apr

Salt Lake Tribune:

Analyst: Utah Lake Bridge will lose money – Environmentalists have attacked the proposed Utah Lake Bridge as harmful to Utah Lake’s environment and a potential enabler of urban sprawl on the lake’s west shore.  Now, the Sierra Club and other environmental groups say studies show the bridge will not be cost-effective.

Colorado River water policy faces an age of shortage – Change comes hard to Western water policy. The Prior Appropriation Doctrine, interstate compacts, groundwater law, the “law of the river” — all of these seem set in stone in the minds of the region’s policymakers.

Utah water dubbed world’s best – It’s sweet and has a perfect PH balance — water from southern Utah’s Tushar mountain range.  The spring water was judged the world’s best for bottlers in a prestigious contest.

Opinion: Mulroy’s Addiction – The recent hot-headed ranting and raving about Utah and Salt Lake City by Pat Mulroy, director of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, reminds me of a deranged crack addict who can’t support her habit any more and whose whole world is about to collapse.