Food versus Energy (Part II): The view from Colorado
Gunnison River, where water is diverted via tunnel to irrigate the Uncompahgre Valley, Colorado I wrote this post a few weeks ago about the conflicts between ag interests and natural gas extraction in Australia. The New York Times reports today on similar conflicts in the United States. Kirk Johnson's story focuses on the competition for water between farmers on the one hand and oil and gas interests on the other. His dateline is Greeley, Colorado, and the headline is "For Farms in the West, Oil Wells are Thirsty Rivals." Johnson reports that oil and gas interests in Colorado are paying record high prices for excess water that they buy or lease from cities. While farmers have tended to pay between $30 and $100 for an acre foot of water (about 326,000 gallons), depending on scarcity, oil and gas companies are now paying as much as $1K to $2K for that amount of treated water purchased from cities. Farmers say they can't match those bids. Peter Anders...