Graph of the Day: Potential US Water Supply Conflicts by 2025
Many locations in the United States are already undergoing water stress. The Great Lakes states are establishing an interstate compact to protect against reductions in lake levels and potential water exports. Georgia, Alabama, and Florida are in a dispute over water for drinking, recreation, farming, environmental purposes, and hydropower in the Apalachicola–Chattahoochee–Flint River system. The State Water Project in California is facing a variety of problems in the Sacramento Delta, including endangered species, saltwater intrusion, and potential loss of islands due to flood- or earthquake-caused levee failures. A dispute over endangered fish in the Rio Grande has been ongoing for many years. The Klamath River in Oregon and California has been the location of a multi-year disagreement over native fish, hydropower, and farming. The Colorado River has been the site of numerous interstate quarrels over the last century. Large, unquantified Native American water rights challenge existing uses in the West (see Southwest region). By changing the existing patterns of precipitation and runoff, climate change will add another stress to existing problems.
