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Problematic history for promoting a vision of apocalypse 2010-01-14

Reviewer: John H. Peck

The book is a well written and a very interesting view of the western water wars that hatched the Bureau of Reclamation. BuRec as we fondly call these bureauocrats were instrumental in providing free water to people who should have been able to pay for their own water supplies. The historical scenarios in the book are slanted toward making the protagonists seem like evil charlatans doing all they can to thwart the good intentions of the general public. It really didn't happen that way.

Global warming is touted in the book as the disaster that will damn the Colorado to be a stagnant series of uneffective ponds. No real data are provided to justify this conclusion. Looking at the chart of water levels included in the book, the author's conclusion that the river averages 13 million acre feet of water over historical measurements is false. The data show that the average over the period of measurement is that the flow is more likely 15 to 16 million acre feet of water per year. Even so, the allocation of river water to users in the lower basin is still negative over the long term.

What to do? Mr. Powell is seemingly just content to contemplate disaster. The real solution to the river allocation problem and the lower basin shortfall in the next few decades is to plan to provide a new supply. I would suggest that the Pacific Ocean is a ready source for alleviating the problems of a less than robust Colorado River flow. Desalination is a proven technology. Mr. Powell does not provide relief scenarios. He just complains. Global warming alarmists need to look toward mitigation.

Comprehensive Great Read 2009-05-31

Reviewer: James Kay

It's been 20 years now since Marc Reisner wrote Cadillac Desert. If you enjoyed it as much as I did, Dead Pool is a must read. With all that has changed regarding western water issues since 1989, Dr. Powell does an excellent job of updating the topic and adding historical perspective to those go-go years of dam building by the Bureau of Reclamation during the 50's and 60s. While Reisner could not have imagined the effects of climate change on the overused waters of the Colorado River, Dead Pool also provides eye-opening documentation on how global warming may well be the straw that breaks the camel's back. With Lake Mead at historic lows and Lake Powell little more than half full, Dead Pool is mandatory reading for anyone concerned about the future of the West.

The Water Letter 2009-04-13

Reviewer: Milton N. Burgess

Well written, and fully referenced. I will be using quotes out of it for some work I am writing and of course will provide the proper attributions.

Dead Pool or Mirror Pool? 2009-01-14

Reviewer: Wayne Lusvardi

The apocalyptic book Dead Pool tells us that there is a 50% chance of Lake Powell and the whole Colorado River dam system ending up as a "dead pool" by 2017 to 2021, OR SOONER, due to global warming (p. 184). Dead pool is defined as a permanent condition when the water level behind a dam is too low to spill water or generate hydroelectric power.

Powell extols early Colorado River explorer and anti-urban founder of the U.S. Geological Survey, John Wesley Powell, which Lake Powell is named after. But author James Powell never tells us if he is related.
Powell is a master story teller and educator. His book will teach the average reader much about the water system in the Southwest. He starts his book with an apocalyptic story of near dam collapse of the Glen Canyon Dam due to too much water in 1983; and ends his book with the story of how civilization in the Southwestern U.S., like the Indians in Chaco Canyon in the 12th century, will end soon due to too little water due to global warming resulting in dead and over-silted dams.

For proof positive Powell has a graphic photo on the cover of his book showing the present-day bathtub ring on Lake Powell; way, way above the water line. How could he be wrong? Look at the picture. Run the numbers and look at the data as Powell has done.
But the gnawing question after reading Powell's apocalyptic book remains: is he right; and if so, how right?

One of the centerpieces of Powell's argument is a bar graph on page 164 which shows the 10-Year Average Annual Flow at the northerly point of the Colorado River dam system from 1896 to 2007 measured in acre feet (an acre foot of water is one foot high of water spread over an acre of land; able to support about two urban families for a year).

A cursory look at the graph doesn't support Powell's apocalyptic claims. The graph shows fourteen years when the water flow in the Colorado River exceeded 20 million acre feet; and fourteen years when it fell below ten million acre feet. The average was 13.6 million acre feet (MAF). Two other times (in 1934 and 1977) the water flow in the River has fallen as low, or lower, than it was in 2001 (about 12.5 MAF). In 1979 the flow dropped to a low of 6 MAF. In 1984 the flow reached an all-time recorded high just over 25 MAF. What makes Powell convinced this is any different now and that water flows won't rebound, FOREVER?

Powell is certain that global warming will defy the statistical Law of Regression or gravitation toward the mean average because he is convinced that global warming is permanent. This is the problem I have with both global warming advocates and denialists. There is data that can show global warming or no global warming, whichever you choose. Powell looks into the mirror pool and chooses data to prove permanent warming. But this isn't science because in science you try to refute or falsify your own hypothesis.
Another assertion of Powell's book is that dams result in less water because impounding water behind dams results in higher evaporation. But Powell ignores the obvious: dams bring new water to former dry places; namely cities and farms. Neither does Powell mention the benefits of dams and regional water hydraulic systems: such as eliminating disease by sanitation systems; or saving forests by reducing the burning of wood for fuel by providing water for people to move off farms to cities. Instead, Powell advocates a return to the vision of explorer John Wesley Powell to live self-sufficiently on a 160-acre tract of land (p. 44-45; 245).

Powell frames his dam drama in religious language. Powell's antagonists, pro-dam politicians and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, are not just flawed or bureaucratic, they are portrayed as evil. Like John Wesley Powell, James Lawrence Powell is fond of Mormon theological socialism and irrigation systems (p. 35). Wesley Powell was opposed to the "theology" of Floyd Dominy, who is portrayed as an archetypical evil commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (p. 136). The Colorado River Compact Commissioners were driven by a religious "Manifest Destiny." And anti-capitalist and anti-modernist Wesley Powell is quoted as saying he was "more interested in the home and the cradle than in the bank counter."
Dead Pool is bound to be cited as secular scripture in the anti-dam movement like the story of Noah and the Ark in the Book of Genesis in the Judeo-Christian Bible; only the story is that of a drought instead of a flood. And like Noah, for all we know, Powell could be right. But what is the order of magnitude of probability for his anti-dam apocalyptic to justify his radical prescriptions?

Powell is a certaintist. Like all fundamentalists, he is convinced he is right. I have come to learn to be skeptical of certaintists, whether religious or secular. Powell's book takes you on a long mule ride in time down the Colorado River and Lake Powell. But is the imminent demise of Lake Powell a mirror pool of his own making?

Buy the book. It is a great read no matter what your take on it.