drought

[Utes 69]

Agree or Disagree !

with the drought upon us and the Governer wanting us all to pray for rain.

should we first look at limiting building permits, and stop building apartments to the sky.

or am I missing something here?

I am all for praying, but we should take matters into our own hands.

I posted this on UteHub because KSL will not allow such post to go thru. 

[Duhwayne]

Farmers and ranchers use 85 percent of Utah’s water. Are they still moving sprinkler pipe during the day? This is a water management crisis, not a water crisis. What is the point of asking city residents to pray and sacrifice their lawns if ag does nothing different. It’s even worse in California. Rice in the desert? Gtfo.

[Stone]

California is a mess. Agreed. 

[Central Coast Ute]

Reopening the California Aqueduct would do wonders for California’s farms in the Central Valley.

[Stone]

If the idea is to conserve water, apartments to the sky are better than houses with big yards. People need to live somewhere.

As an aside, I can accept those that say “no more growth” in their communities – so long as they recognize that they are effectively taking the same argument as “build the wall.” Both positions have pros and cons. I am not making a comment on that. I just want consistency. What irks me is the hypocrisy of limosine liberals I see in rich parts of California (and elsewhere) that enact no growth policies under “environmental pretenses” (effectively building a “wall” around their rich enclaves), while decrying the idea of getting a handle on USA immigration. 

[Dwight89]

We need to be better at conserving water, without a doubt. The question is, how and what are the most effective ways to do that? Like you said, only 15% of Utah’s water is used by residents. Seems to be the big, low hanging fruit is agriculture. 

One easy solution I’ve heard floated around is to let farmers sell excess water back into the system. Under the current rules, farmers operate under  “use it or lose it” water rights. So, they make sure to use up all their rights unnecessarily. If, however, they were incentivized to conserve water because all the excess could then be sold back into the system, it would motivate farmers to manage their water better.

That’s the direction I’d like to see us head. 

[Ute Dub]

If its the farmers I know they would NEVER give anything back to th state EVER!!!! It’s a slippery slope of doom.

[Utesbyfive]

Sell, not give.

[Ute Dub]

Nah. it opens the door for the state to require the sell of unused and then set quotas as then take.

[Utebeam]

I like the idea but wonder how it would be executed. At what point does the farmer say I have excess water? And if they do then how do they deliver it to the person who purchased it. Especially if they are up stream.

[dystopiamembrane]

I think prayer will do the trick. You’ll have to rip my cold, dead hand from the sprinkler nozzle before I sacrifice my lawn to the farmers and those tall buildings.