Drying-up Rio Grande basin threatens water security on both sides of border
By SUSAN MONTOYA
Associated Presss
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — One of North America’s longest rivers, the Rio Grande — or Rio Bravo as it’s called in Mexico — has a history as deep as it is long. Indigenous people have tapped it for countless generations, and it was a key artery for Spanish conquistadors centuries ago.
Today, the Rio Grande-Bravo water basin is in crisis.
Research published Thursday, Nov. 20, says the situation arguably is worse than challenges facing the Colorado River, another vital lifeline for western U.S. states that have yet to chart a course for how best to manage that dwindling resource.
Without rapid and large-scale action on both sides of the border, the researchers warn that unsustainable use threatens water security for millions of people who rely on the binational basin. They say more prevalent drying along the Rio Grande and persistent shortages could have catastrophic consequences for farmers, cities and ecosystems.
The study done by World Wildlife Fund, Sustainable Waters and a team of university researchers provides a full accounting of the consumptive uses as well as evaporation and other losses within the Rio Grande-Bravo basin. It helps to paint the most complete — and most alarming — picture yet of why the river system is in trouble.
Unsustainable
The basin provides drinking water to 15 million people in the U.S. and Mexico and irrigates nearly 2 million acres of cropland in the two countries.
The research shows only 48 percent of the water consumed directly or indirectly within the basin is replenished naturally. The other 52 percent is unsustainable, meaning reservoirs, aquifers and the river itself will be overdrawn.
“That’s a pretty daunting, challenging reality when half of our water isn’t necessarily going to be reliable for the future,” said Brian Richter, president of Sustainable Waters and a senior fellow with the World Wildlife Fund. “So we have to really address that.”
By breaking down the balance sheet, the researchers are hopeful policymakers and regulators can determine where water use can be reduced and how to balance supply with demand.
Warnings of what was to come first cropped up in the late 19th century when irrigation in Colorado’s San Luis Valley began to dry the snowmelt-fed river, resulting in diminished flows as far south as El Paso, Texas. Now, some stretches of the river run dry for months at a time. The Big Bend area and even Albuquerque have seen dry cracked mud replace the river more often in recent years.
Irrigating crops by far is the largest direct use of water in the basin at 87 percent, according to the study. Meanwhile, losses to evaporation and uptake by vegetation along the river account for more than half of overall consumption in the basin, a factor that can’t be dismissed as reservoir storage shrinks.
The irrigation season has become shorter, with canals drying up as early as June in some cases, despite a growing season in the U.S. and Mexico that typically lasts through October.
In central New Mexico, farmers got a boost with summer rains. However, farmers along the Texas portion of the Pecos River and in the Rio Conchos basin of Mexico — both tributaries within the basin — did not receive any surface water supplies.
“A key part of this is really connecting the urban populations to what’s going on out on these farms. These farmers are really struggling. A lot of them are on the brink of bankruptcy,” Richter said, linking water shortages to shrinking farms, smaller profits and less ability to afford labor and equipment.
The analysis found that between 2000-2019, water shortages contributed to the loss of 18 percent of farmland in the headwaters in Colorado, 36 percent along the Rio Grande in New Mexico and 49 percent in the Pecos River tributary in New Mexico and Texas.
With fewer farms, less water went to irrigation in the U.S. However, researchers said irrigation in the Mexican portion of the basin has increased greatly.
The World Wildlife Fund and Sustainable Waters are working with researchers at the University of New Mexico to survey farmers on solutions to the water crisis.
Jason Casuga, the chief engineer and CEO of the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, said he is not surprised by the findings and was particularly interested in the data on how much water is lost to riparian areas along the river. He talked about his crews clearing thick walls of thirsty invasive salt cedar trees, describing it as an unnatural ecosystem that stemmed from human efforts to manage the river with levees and reservoirs.
While cities and farmers try to conserve, Casuga said there are few rules placed on consumption by riparian areas.
“We’re willing to accept hundreds and hundreds of acres of invasive species choking out native species. And I’m hoping a study like this will cause people to think and ask those kinds of questions because I think our bosque is worth fighting for. As a culture in New Mexico, agriculture is worth fighting for,” he said.
A raft of solutions
The responses to overuse and depletion are as varied as the jurisdictions through which the river flows, said Enrique Prunes, a co-author of the study and the manager of the World Wildlife Fund’s Rio Grande Program.
He pointed to Colorado, where water managers have threatened to shut off groundwater wells if the aquifer that supports irrigated farms cannot be stabilized. There, farmers who pump groundwater pay fees that are used to incentivize other farmers to fallow their fields.
New Mexico’s fallowing program is voluntary, but changes could be in store if the U.S. Supreme Court signs off on proposed settlements stemming from a long-running dispute with Texas and the federal government over management of the Rio Grande and groundwater use. New Mexico has acknowledged it will have to curb groundwater pumping.
New Mexico is behind in its water deliveries to Texas under an interstate compact, while Mexico owes water to the U.S. under a 1944 binational treaty. Researchers said meeting those obligations won’t get easier.
Prunes said policymakers must also consider the environment when crafting solutions.
“Rebalancing the system also means maintaining those basic functions that the river and the aquifers and the groundwater-dependent ecosystems have,” he said. “And that’s the indicator of resilience to a future of less water.”
Indigenous people protest Brazil railway project
By MAURICIO SAVARESE
Associated Press
SAO PAULO — As Brazil seeks to boost its environmental credentials by hosting the United Nations’ climate summit, a proposal to build a railway through the Amazon has threatened to tarnish that image amid protests by Indigenous groups and environmentalists.
The Ferrograo railway project would transport commodities including corn and soybeans nearly 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) from a city on the southern edge of the rainforest to a port along a major tributary of the Amazon River. From there, commodities would be ferried to a larger port near Belem, the host city of the COP30 conference, for export to China and other trading partners.
The Brazilian government hopes to move forward with the railway once the country’s Supreme Court rules on the legality of changing a national park’s borders to allow construction and a congressional watchdog approves the plans. Protesters, including potentially affected Indigenous populations, took to streets and rivers in the Amazon this month to oppose it.
Currently, trucks carrying soybeans and corn through the rainforest must drive on roads that are unpaved in places, spilling grain that’s pushed to the side of the road each day. The proposed railway would follow a similar route from the city of Sinop to the port of Miritituba on the Tapajos River, a major tributary of the Amazon River.
As of July 2023 — months after President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva returned to office — local officials estimated the rail project would cost about 20 billion Brazilian reais ($3.8 billion). Independent analysts estimate the price tag will be one-third higher than that.
Asked about Ferrograo and other projects in Northern Brazil, where most of the country’s Amazon lies, Transport Minister Renan Filho said: “You cannot become one of the world’s biggest exporters without an infrastructure.”
Speaking on TV Band, Filho added: “Today, differently from the past, central Brazil has a lot of heavy cargo and that needs to be transported.”
New projections are expected next year when Brazil’s Transportation Ministry hands in studies to the congressional watchdog. The government estimates that a single 170-car train could replace 422 trucks, reducing carbon emissions in the region, according to local media reports. On the other hand, any cutting of forests, no matter what for, often leads to more development. That happened across the Amazon as Brazil undertook major highway projects in the 1970s.
Since returning to office, Lula has made curbing deforestation in the Amazon a central part of his agenda — and has made significant progress. That effort seems to be at odds with a major train project.
Indigenous groups speak out
Experts say about 15 Indigenous groups are scattered through the Ferrograo pathway and the waterways leading to Barcarena, the port near Belem where the grain is loaded on ships for export.
“The cumulative impacts (from Ferrograo), that’s deforestation, monoculture and toxics, show that comparing emissions is not enough,” Alessandra Munduruku, leader of an Indigenous population that could be affected by the railway, said in a statement. She and other activists claim anyone living in the basins of the Xingo and the Tapajos rivers could lose their homes to farms if the railway increases shipping and makes agriculture more lucrative.
Mariel Nakane, an analyst on Ferrograo at the non-profit Socio-Environmental Institute, told The Associated Press that Lula’s administration has done little to consult with Indigenous groups.
“This administration said they would reach out to the Indigenous, but they just didn’t,” Nakane said, adding that there was also “zero dialogue” with Lula’s predecessor, former President Jair Bolsonaro.
Government estimates show that the railway could carry up to 40 million metric tons (44 million tons) of soybeans and corn every year, doubling the current capacity through the road — with a potential of reaching 70 million metric tons (77 million tons). But the damage to rivers and their shores could push Indigenous peoples away, further increasing the potential for farming and deforestation, according to the Socio-Environmental Institute.
Chief Raoni Metuktire, 93, whose Kayapo people would be among those most affected by the construction of the railway, joined more than 300 Indigenous people and activists who took part in a flotilla of boats that traveled to Belem to protest the railway as the COP30 summit was getting underway. The conference is scheduled to end on Friday.
“I spoke to Lula and (French President, Emmanuel) Macron so they don’t drill oil around her and do not allow Ferrograo,” Metuktire told journalists in Belem last week.
Local populations near Miritruba say that soybean shipments are already contaminating the water and causing restrictions on fishing — effects that could worsen if a new railway increases shipping.
Ongoing court battles
Melillo Dinis, a lawyer at the non-profit Kabu Institute who represents Indigenous groups, said opponents of Ferrograo are committed to fighting it in court and through administrative actions for as long as it takes. His organization is behind a class action suit against the Brazilian government seeking 1.7 billion Brazilian reais ($320 million).
“We will litigate this, we will have civil actions, we will take this to the government watchdogs, and we will also fight if we have to if there’s an environmental licensing phase,” Dinis told the AP.
Dinis says Indigenous protection groups wisely chose to walk out of government discussions on Ferrograo last year, as they understood their recommendations were not taken seriously by authorities.
“Dialogue with the Indigenous takes place in the villages, within the cultural model of each of those peoples. They thought a meeting in the capital, Brasilia, should sort this out,” Dinis said. “We were there for almost eight months. We offered them 100 pages with suggestions. They totally ignored them.”
