U.S. Water News Online
HARLINGEN, Texas -- Satellite data show lots of water in reservoirs in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, leading Texas officials to charge the region's claims of drought no longer hold.
Key Rio Grande tributaries are located in Chihuahua, and Texas farmers and irrigation managers allege water promised under a 1944 U.S.-Mexico treaty is being hoarded rather than released to the Rio Grande.
``So we have this argument with Mexico about whether they're in an exceptional drought. We would look at their meteorological statistics and say, 'Well, No,''' said Gordon Wells of the University of Texas' Center for Space Research.
The studies were commissioned by the state Department of Agriculture and are getting wide attention from state and federal officials anxious for Mexico to deliver years' worth of irrigation water to the U.S.
Under the treaty, Mexico is to release 350,000 acre feet a year to the U.S., which in turn sends 1,500,000 acre feet of Colorado River water to Mexico. Treaty conditions are waived under extraordinary drought.
Oct. 2 marked the end of a five-year accounting cycle set by the treaty, the second such cycle that ended with Mexico in arrears. The U.S. arm of the International Boundary and Water Commission, which monitors usage of shared waterways, says Mexico is 1.5 million acre feet in debt. Mexico has claimed extraordinary drought.
The State Department marked the date with a public reminder urging Mexico to make paying the debt a priority.
A prolonged South Texas drought means Rio Grande Valley farmers are dependent on irrigation water pledged under the treaty. State Comptroller Carole Keeton Rylander has estimated undelivered water will cause $73 million in economic damages to the Valley by the end of the year.
While Mexico suffered a dry spring and early summer, the satellite data indicate significant recent rainfall has changed things.
``We have collected and presented indisputable evidence that the state of Chihuahua has more than adequate amounts of water stored in their reservoirs that could be released to South Texas,'' Agriculture Commissioner Susan Combs said.
Albert Szekely, Mexico's point man on the water dispute, was not available for comment.
Wells, meanwhile, has been collecting and analyzing satellite images and says there is clear evidence of water use patterns that has dramatically altered the satellite view of northern Mexico.
``The flood irrigation that goes on there is quite colossal for a desert area,'' he said.
Some fields are being flooded 6 to 8 acre feet per field in an area that gets only 10 to 12 inches of rainfall a year, several times the amount of irrigation water used by Valley farmers.
The pecan groves and alfalfa fields are flood-irrigated to standing water depth, he said.
``So when we look at the satellite imagery it's like we're looking at a lake surface.''
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