Blue-green algae is native to Colorado’s largest reservoir. Two research projects seek reasons for its toxic bloom at Blue Mesa and how to stop it.
USGS
Posted inClimate, Environment, Growth, Housing, News, Water
Douglas County needs to find new water sources as its population grows by 25 people every day
On an average day, 25 people move to Douglas County. Each one needs to drink, shower, water their lawn and wash their dishes. The full impact of that growth is difficult to see, but it’s easy to understand: More people need more water. And in a county where thousands of homes rely on a limited […]
Posted inBusiness, Climate, Economy, Environment, News, Outdoors, Water
Climate change is eroding work to clean up the Snake River. Is Summit County snowmaking making it worse?
KEYSTONE – The Snake River wends through this resort village, rushing streamside condos, beckoning anglers to cast after rainbow trout and, at some point in the year, funneling into equipment Keystone ski area uses to make snow. But a few miles upstream, the river is a braid of smaller streams that scour a mineral-rich basin […]
Posted inColoradans, Environment, Outdoors
Determining how much water Colorado’s snowpack will yield is an inexact science, but researchers persist
On a sunny April day at the tail end of last winter, Jeff Deems, a researcher at the Boulder-based National Snow and Ice Data Center, and Nathan Elder, the water supply manager for Denver Water, used snowshoes to reach a point high above the Blue River in Summit County. There they dug a pit, which […]
Posted inEnvironment, News, Outdoors, Technology
We know the earth is warming. We know that will stress water in the West. But we don’t know how.
Flavio Lehner was a graduate student working with computer models simulating Earth’s climate at the University of Berne in Switzerland when he had a chance to join a research vessel collecting sea temperatures and measuring ocean currents between Greenland and Svalbard, Norway. “As a lifestyle, field work is very agreeable,” Lehner said. “But for me, […]
Posted inNews, Outdoors, Politics and Government
Bureau of Land Management more likely to relocate to Denver than Grand Junction, Polis says
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis says the Bureau of Land Management is more likely to relocate its headquarters to Denver than Grand Junction, even though his administration is more supportive of the federal agency moving to the Western Slope. Either way, the Democrat said he’s “cautiously optimistic” Colorado will win the bidding war with other Western […]