Colorado Towns Begin To Learn The Costs Of Climate Inaction As They Face Drought, Fire, Landslides

[hatrack]

EDIT

“Burned watersheds are prone to increased flooding and erosion, which can impair water-supply reservoirs, water quality, and drinking-water treatment processes,” according to the U.S. Geological Service. The 2010 Fourmile Canyon fire, for example, burned just 23% of the watershed near Boulder, still a USGS study found that after severe thunderstorms the water heading to the city’s water treatment plant was laden with mud, nutrients and metals – some at levels four times normal.

After the High Park fire burned more than 87,000 acres in Larimer County in 2012, the Poudre River ran black after heavy rains and choked the intake pipes of Fort Collins’ water treatment plant. The water smelled and tasted like smoke. The city now has sensors in 10 locations in the Upper Poudre to alert the treatment plan if there is a water quality problem and Fort Collins Utilities runs an average of 110 lab tests a day on its water. Fort Collins is now “very concerned” about the Cameron Peak fire, the state’s largest fire ever, burning west of the city, Gretchen Stanford, a utility spokeswoman, said in an email.

The utility’s Horsetooth Reservoir is out of commission for upgrades, leaving it only with Poudre River water. Stanford said processes are in place to deal with any water quality, odor or taste problems. And the effects of these fires can last for years. Five years after the 2002 Hayman Fire, Denver Water was still dealing with water quality problems created by the wildfire, including a $30 million project to remove tons of sediment from the Strontia Springs Reservoir

EDIT

There were avalanches unleashed all over the state that March. In a two-week span 1,000 avalanches were reported, including an unprecedented 87 major ones, closing roads, damaging homes and killing four. The biggest was southwest of Aspen, the Conundrum Valley avalanche, a mile-wide and 3,000 vertical feet. “We’ve never seen an avalanche cycle like this,” said Brian Lazar, deputy director of the Colorado Avalanche Information Center. “Not only was it the historic size of the avalanches, but that they covered most of the mountainous terrain in Colorado. … That hasn’t happened in living memory.”

EDIT

https://coloradosun.com/2020/11/06/high-cost-of-climate-change-colorado-water/

[CrispyQ]

1. That was a fascinating article.

I had no idea about most of this stuff. I wonder how many people do? We go about our lives with little thought or knowledge about everything that goes on behind the scenes to make our modern, convenient life happen.

Also, that was one hell of an avalanche!