Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
There's ground water - quite a bit on the Taos side of the rio grande. There's a ditch dumping probably 100 gallons a minute onto an open pasture near my house. That's mostly soaking into the ground. I probably don't use 100 gallons a day.
So the earthships are something else... That side of the Rio Grande does not have ground water. It doesn't have city water either. Those people get their water trucked in. The earthship design using water recycling - which is ... uh cool in theory, sometimes faulty in practice.
Northern NM has a pretty good amount of water relative to counterparts in CO or AZ. There's quite a few streams in the area. If you want a headscratcher, look at Colorado Springs. The Rio Grande is huge compared to Fountain creek, which you can walk across and not get wet with waterproof boots haha.
How deep? I see a desert with 4000ft of terrain to a barely flowing river?
They said Santa Fe gets between 4-15inches of rain per year.
It is a desert - how do these people get water for needs with all the habitation?
How does Albuquerque get enough water for all the people?
Wells, not sure of depth. They may occasionally take Rio grande water.
The coop that supplies my water has wells 300-350 feet deep. Some places go further. The village of Placitas still has an acequia system using spring water and runoff.
When I lived outside Detroit, we had a well only about 60 feet deep.
160 years ago this is what they used to get water to their homesteads and crop fields. It's an irrigation ditch next to where I lived for 2 years. Northern New Mexico.
Albuquerque sits on top of an aquifer, and gets its surface water from the Rio Grande. The water-supply is usually a combination of the two, but when the Rio Grande is running high in the spring, the municipal water comes from there, allowing the aquifer to replenish. After a banner year for snowmelt we are back in extreme drought conditions so we're relying on the aquifer. As the largest city in the state we have the most stable water-supply and have not had water restrictions like other cities such as Santa Fe and Las Vegas.
There are various reservoirs around the state which store surface water and supplement the supply.
Still, 80% of New Mexico's water goes to agriculture, the rest goes to municipal systems and other industries. When there are shortages, cuts are made to agricultural users. When you think of "all the people" in Albuquerque, they still use only a drop in the bucket compared to water-intensive agriculture.
160 years ago this is what they used to get water to their homesteads and crop fields. It's an irrigation ditch next to where I lived for 2 years. Northern New Mexico.
Interesting. No way could the wheels in the one in my photo be turned! There were actually 2 on the property but I don't have a photo of it (that I know of!) That one is much bigger than the one in the photo.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
