Colorado River Groundwater Depleted

This is a Phoenix news story, published by Live Science, that relates primarily to Geophysical Research Letters news.

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Colorado River basin

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much groundwater

Live Science

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Science

Groundwater in the Colorado River basin won’t run out — but eventually we won’t be able to get at it, scientists warn

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78% Informative

Some 40 million people, including those in Phoenix and Las Vegas , depend on the Colorado River for their water needs.

As supplies of this surface water have dried up over the past two decades , more and more people have been pumping groundwater from far below the surface.

The researchers estimate that since 2003 , pumping from wells has drained about 28 million acre feet ( 34 cubic kilometers ) of groundwater since 2003 .

The study was published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters .

Studies imply that the flow of the Colorado River is expected to continue to decline thanks to climate-linked reductions in snowfall and rainfall.

Drilling deeper wells is one solution, but there are problems with that, experts say.

Another option is to reduce water use, by, for example, changing what is farmed, to shift from water-intensive crops like alfalfa.

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