Last Call at the Oasis by Participant Media

Author:Participant Media
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 2012-04-11T00:00:00+00:00

SNOW, RAIN, AND THE DESIGN LOGIC OF THE ARID WEST: PROBLEMS AND OPPORTUNITIES

Water and energy. To recover a logic of drylands design, one first would need to contend with the ill logic of some current systems. Hard-path engineering has constructed a western surface—from the dams, reservoirs, and aqueducts of the Great Basin and the Sierra Nevada to the pitched roofs, gutters, curbs, and storm drains of paved Los Angeles, Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas, San Diego, and Denver—designed to do two things: deliver us snowmelt and rid us of storm water.

Dependence on long-distance imported water (snowmelt) and rapid discarding of local water (storm water) is the fundamental condition of the West’s single-grade, single-use water logic. Its working is predicated on access to cheap, plentiful energy. If there is one thing to “get” about the contemporary condition of western water, its hard-path logic, and the working of the contemporary western economy, it is simply this equation:West = Water + Energy

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