

Soaking the Rich to Fight a Water Shortage - positr0n
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/07/business/energy-environment/water-pricing-in-two-thirsty-cities.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=photo-spot-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

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dalke
I lived in Santa Fe. I got one of my toilets swapped out for free under the
program mentioned in the article, or rather, paid for by those wanting to
build a new residence in the city.

The article points out that "Santa Fe has the most expensive water out of 30
American cities surveyed by Circle of Blue ... and the city’s residents are
among the thriftiest when it comes to turning on the tap."

One of the reasons is that Santa Fe has very little in the way of watershed.
It's under 200K acres (map
[http://www.santafenm.gov/upper_watershed](http://www.santafenm.gov/upper_watershed)
). That supplies about 1/2 of the drinking water during non-drought years.

Much of the remaining water come from groundwater. The Buckman well field
drills down about 1,000 feet to get to the groundwater. Once at the surface,
it's pumped up over 1,000 ft to get to the city, which is about 15 miles away.
(See
[http://academic.emporia.edu/schulmem/hydro/TERM%20PROJECTS/W...](http://academic.emporia.edu/schulmem/hydro/TERM%20PROJECTS/Ware/571%20TermPaper.htm)
). Over-pumping has damaged the aquifer.

Instead the city and county acquired water rights for the Rio Grande and build
the Buckman Direct Diversion. It still needs to pump that water up 1,000+
feet. (See [http://www.water-technology.net/projects/buckman-direct-
dive...](http://www.water-technology.net/projects/buckman-direct-diversion-
bdd-santa-fe-new-mexico-us/) .)

Necessity helps change behavior.

