New Mexico Mercury

Wastewater recycling: How open minds save closed systems

Singapore, Los Angeles, Windhoek (the capital of Namibia in Africa) and the tiny town of Cloudcroft, New Mexico are doing it. Astronauts do it – NASA considers it a high priority – and doing it in the desert can help to diminish the environmental impact of any town whose water needs surpass the sustainable local supply.  This would probably include every community in New Mexico.  And yet this remarkable marriage of space-age technology and Spaceship Earth ethics, which uses chemistry to create alchemy by making something pure and nourishing from something gross and stinky, spends a lot of time languishing in literal and figurative holding tanks.

What’s happened to ABQ?  Part 2: Think tank city

Albuquerque’s economy has fallen into a big hole.  It’s lost sight of itself. It’s floundering in the dark. The l950s don’t work anymore. The city needs new perspectives to help it find its way. Wouldn’t it be useful if this year’s mayoral race gave voters an arena in which to ponder and assess new economic models and plans, ones designed to rescue us from these doldrums?

What’s happened to Albuquerque? Part 1: Growth uninhibited by water supply

Should Albuquerque be allowed to grow in size and population without tying its growth directly to its projected water supply over the next 50 to 100 years?

Should any big city in New Mexico permit sprawl development on the basis of “dedications,” which means, in the world of water, mere promises to find water after the developments have been built and populated?

We have it all

En Route with Margaret Randall - In spite of ancient hindsight and modern science, we trod a perilous road.

Struggles on New Mexico’s Other Borders

At an honoring of his life and work, longtime Native American activist, writer and scholar John Redhouse reflects on the roots of his resistance and adds perspective to Native struggles.

Avoiding priority calls for the right and wrong reasons

Carlsbad Irrigation District (CIB) has issued a priority call on the Pecos River against the Pecos Valley Artesian Conservancy District (PVACD) and we’re going to witness a legal process that won’t be as messy as if city wells were being threatened but will provide plenty of action.

Dry times on the Rio Grande: Minnow numbers hit historic lows

To understand what endangered fish in the Rio Grande may be facing in 2013, it's helpful to understand what was happening in late 2012.

Insight New Mexico - Laura Paskus

This week V.B. Price talks with independent environmental journalist Laura Paskus about New Mexico's water situation.

Housebreaking fossil fuels

While Heather Wilson was losing her Senate bid to Martin Heinrich last year, her campaign team must have been drunk on PR from the Fossil Fuel lobby. The rhetoric tipped them off the bar stool.

She accused then Rep. Heinrich of being supported by not only “radical environmental groups,” but also by “the radical environmental industry” with their “extremist agenda.”

I wonder what a “radical environmental industry” might be. Does it sell camping gear and sleeping bags or manufacture trail mix? Does it produce energy without polluting ground water and without using taxpayer dollars to clean up its excreta? Does it actually believe in free enterprise without a governmental crutch?

A systems approach to understanding water in New Mexico

Because everything is connected to everything else, water crises have a cascading affect all along a water system, even one as huge as that of the Southwest and Mountain West United States.