Water securityU.S. worsening droughts require alternative ways of protecting urban water supplies
In the American West, unprecedented droughts have caused extreme water shortages. The current drought in California and across the West is entering its fourth year, with precipitation and water storage reaching record low levels. Droughts are ranked second in the United States in terms of national weather-related economic impacts, with annual losses just shy of $9 billion. With water scarcity likely to increase due to advancing climate change, the economic and environmental impacts of drought are also likely to get worse. Alternative models of watershed protection that balance recreational use and land conservation must no longer be ignored to preserve water supplies against the effects of climate change, experts argue.
NOAA map of 2015 U.S.drought conditions // Source: noaa.gov
Alternative models of watershed protection that balance recreational use and land conservation must no longer be ignored to preserve water supplies against the effects of climate change, argues a new study. Researchers claim that the management of Salt Lake City’s Wasatch watershed in Utah provides a valuable example contradicting the dominant view presented in academic literature that informs many current conservation strategies.
Salt Lake City’s preservation of the Wasatch watershed is an important model for protecting urban water sources through land use regulation and conservation, which could have important implications for preserving future water supplies against the effects of climate change in the American West, according to the study. This example is currently absent from academic literature on ecosystem services, meaning that conservation discussions are instead dominated by models that focus on financial, “market-based” incentives to protect watershed areas, which the researchers argue could be inappropriate in many circumstances.
The most prevalent model for water resource preservation is that of New York City’s Catskills/Delaware watershed, which is based on upstream resource users being paid to avoid harmful practices that might affect water flows and water quality, typically by beneficiaries who are downstream. These market-based approaches (also known as Payments for Watershed or Ecosystem Services) have been widely promoted, but risk neglecting alternative approaches that do not always require monetary transactions to improve environmental outcomes.
U Cambridge reports that in contrast, Salt Lake City’s management strategy allows regulated use of the watershed area for public recreation (unlike other forested catchments in the US where public access is prohibited to preserve water resources). In the Wasatch case, this means that the upstream catchment remains accessible, including for high impact uses such as skiing and mountain biking. Researchers argue that it is vital to consider these alternative strategies for solving the increasing water scarcity in the American West.
“While regulatory exclusion is often thought of as the only viable alternative to market-based incentives in managing ecosystem services, the management of the Wasatch watershed provides a third, yet under-recognized, successful conservation strategy for water resources,” says Libby Blanchard, lead author of the study from the University of Cambridge’s Department of Geography.
“The dominance of the Catskills example in discussions of watershed protection provides an unduly limited, and historically incomplete, perspective on interventions to secure water resources, and limits policy discussions about alternative conservation approaches,” she adds.
