Blog — Colorado Trout Unlimited

Waterless Urinals Saving Thousands of Gallons of Water

From KKTV.com Reporter: Rosie Barresi

The owners say they'll be saving 40,000 gallons of water a year with the waterless urinals, but they cost more than $4,000 compared to just a few hundred dollars for a regular urinal.

One of the owners of the Trinity Brewing Company, Jason Yester, says it's people, planet then profit. "Planet we think is extremely important," said Yester.

http://www.kktv.com/home/headlines/34936119.html

GarCo gas drilling contaminating water supply, geology expert says

Grand Junction Sentinel -

SILT — A geological consultant says increased methane in domestic wells near natural gas development in Garfield County is part of a much larger problem of drilling-related water contamination that’s just starting to come to light.

“The tip of the iceberg is emerging,” Geoffrey Thyne told residents at a meeting in Silt on Thursday night.

http://www.gjsentinel.com/hp/content/news/stories/2008/11/20/112108_3a_methane.html

City board OKs long-range water plan

Greeley Tribune Online

Officials say the plan helps ensure that Greeley will have a healthy and sufficient water supply in the future and continues the city’s 100-year history of water conservation. It outlines current programs that will save more than 3,000 acre-feet of water by 2030 through ongoing rebates, water-wise landscaping ordinances, system leakage reduction and regulatory measures, said Jon Monson, director of the water and sewer department.

http://www.greeleytribune.com/article/20081121/NEWS/811219965/1002/NONE&parentprofile=1001&title=City%20board%20OKs%20long-range%20water%20plan

EPA view heartens foes of water plan

The EPA said the Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP) "will have substantial and unacceptable impacts to aquatic resources of national importance."

http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_11037046

CRWCD board rep warns of water 'call'

Ouray County Newspapers November 21, 2008 Samantha Tisdel Wright

It's not just the cities downstream in the Colorado River watershed that have cast a larcenous eye upon the pristine water of the San Juans. Sprawling Front Range Colorado communities are equally thirsty and greedy, often exhibiting what Mueller called a "buy it and dry it" mentality when it come to water rights.

http://www.ouraynews.com/Articles-i-2008-11-21-187926.112113_CRWCD_board_rep_warns_of_water_call.html

Desperate measures

With water shortages a constant, Westerners are looking at wacky (and not so wacky) ways to squeeze more water out of the sky and land. High Country News - by Jonathan Thompson

(This is idea 10 - click on the link below for the others; ed) Modern-day cloud seeding may have its roots in the mysterious craft of Charles Mallory Hatfield. Back in the early 1900s, Hatfield built a tower in the San Gabriels from which he disseminated his secret concoction of 23 chemicals into the air in order to create rain. After a storm came, local ranchers paid him $1,000 for his "moisture acceleration" talents. Later, the city of San Diego hired him. A few days after he set up his tower, a deluge struck, breaking a dam and wreaking havoc. The city never paid him.

http://www.hcn.org/issues/40.21/desperate-measures

The Sober Science of Migrating Rubber Duckies

Wall St. Journal Online An Armada of Tub Toys Sets Sail in New Research Discipline, 'Flotsam Science,' and Helps Unravel Enduring Planetary Mysteries

Consequently, Dr. Behar and his colleagues at the University of Colorado this past August released 90 yellow rubber ducks into the melt water flowing down a chasm in the largest of Greenland's 200 glaciers -- the Jakobshavn Isbrae -- which has been thinning rapidly since 1997...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122660041840925005.html

Is West's water supply at risk?

Editorial - By The Denver Post

Congress should revisit whether a controversial natural gas drilling method pollutes groundwater in Colo. and elsewhere....

Specifically, Congress ought to repeal the exemption that allows hydraulic fracturing to escape regulation by the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_11015962

Trout habitat improved by altering river's flow

By TRACY HARMONTHE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN

Thanks to three local Trout Unlimited Chapters, the Canon City Recreation and Park District and the Colorado Division of Wildlife, the $20,000 trout habitat improvement project should be done by Wednesday.

http://www.chieftain.com/articles/2008/11/16/news/region/doc491fbde45d97b128839957.txt

Can the Forest Service get back on track?

Chris Wood is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Çountry News (hcn.org). He is a former Forest Service staffer who's now the chief operating officer of Trout Unlimited. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Since 2001, stopping fire has grown from about 15 percent of the agency's budget to nearly 50 percent today. Without forward-thinking leadership, the Forest Service agenda will continue to focus primarily on this one reactionary activity. Yet there is enormous potential for the agency and its 35,000 employees who manage public lands that exceed the size of Texas. Agency staffers could be turned loose to do good work on the ground.

http://www.denverpost.com/writersontherange/ci_10897698