Water Authority: New Report of $7.3 Billion Pipeline Cost is a Worst-Case AnalysisThought I'd contribute this for any aspiring engineers, Vegas residents or people just interested in this sort of thing. Essentially, the state of Nevada wants to pipe water from the northern part of the state to the southern part. The upside is that it helps prevent droughts for Clark County (where Las Vegas is located). However, there are quite a few downsides, like taking water away from agricultural projects in the northstate, and because of the high cost, customers will have to pay for it dearly.
As an aspiring civil engineer, I feel this is definitely not the right approach. I say this with pride because the same water rights battles go on in California. I live in Northern California, and Southern California tries consistently to garner rights to our water distribution (since we have, you know, most of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Lake Tahoe, and so on).
When it gets right down to it, Las Vegas is a metropolis on the outskirts of the Mojave Desert. As such, it's a known fact that fresh water is by all means a "cash crop." That said, the race is on to find a cheap, yet highly profitable, solution before Lake Mead (the primary source of water for Clark County) is dried up. Liberal estimates give us about a decade to solve this problem (if you've ever watched "Earth: 2100," a pseudo-documentary that aired on ABC).
If you have any comments relating to advocacy or criticism of the idea, or if you have your own alternatives to suggest, feel free to do so here. I have my own ideas, but I am choosing to keep them to myself for the time being.
