How The West Was Wrung Dry

Aviva Shen explains how water management plans in the Western states are backfiring:

Increasingly severe droughts and record low rainfall have forced farmers to rely more heavily on groundwater supplies. But without changing current farming practices, these reserves will run out rapidly. Climate change will make droughts longer and hotter, while rain will only come in harsh storms that will flood crops and erode valuable topsoil without much of it making it down to the groundwater.

The conservation subsidy under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) was meant to help farmers employ more environmentally friendly practices. However, research shows the program prompted many farmers to expand their acreage using the water that was supposed to be conserved. Two recent studies discovered that farmers receiving conservation payments in Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico used some of their water savings to expand irrigation or grow thirstier crops, effectively defeating the purpose. The new efficient irrigation equipment has actually shrunk groundwater supplies at an even faster pace, researchers found.