There will be sixty million dollars given by the US government over the next few years to help the Rio Grande be stronger against climate change. This is the first money from the Inflation Reduction Act to go to an area that isn’t part of the Colorado River System.
Deb Haaland, the secretary of the U.S. Interior, said that the Colorado River systems have been in the news a lot, but that other towns also need help because they are going through drought. Haaland said that in the Albuquerque area, some parts of the river have dried up. “We know that when droughts like this happen, they affect all of us, not just one community,” Haaland said.
Millions of people get their water from the Rio Grande, and thousands of farmers use it to water their fields. Melanie Stansbury, a U.S. Representative, said that making the Rio Grande more sustainable will help bring water through Texas and into Mexico.
The New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation are two of the groups that irrigation districts will work with. They are going to work on things like making the facilities better and collecting more rainwater.
Officials say that collecting rainwater and storing it in more places can help aquifers get back to normal. At the moment, the Rio Grande depends on pumping water from the ground, which has made it less effective and caused animals to die.
The Irrigation District has given officials a number of suggestions for ways to save water and keep towns from flooding. Gary Esslinger and Samantha Barncastle, managers of the Irrigation District, said that their work was like “re-plumbing” the area with systems for watering crops and stopping floods.
“It’s a pretty big vision, but that’s what everyone should be doing—thinking big is the only way to solve the climate crisis,” Barncastle said.
