The Water Wars are Coming
And it’s not just the American West where trouble is brewing.
Myriad stories have been written about the fight over water rights in the West, especially after 20+ years of a megadrought. The Colorado River Compact was written 101 years ago and no longer applies to today’s environmental conditions.
However, there’s a new area where water is running short: the Midwest.
From Minnesota to Missouri and Iowa to Indiana, the market is quickly identifying water as the most precious resource it always has been.
Midwest Drought
We are seeing record low precipitation and unseasonably warm temperatures all across the Midwestern states, with Iowa getting hit particularly hard.
In fact, 50% of the Midwest is technically in a drought, as defined by NOAA.
94% of Iowa is currently in drought, with 24% in extreme drought. Despite decent improvement over the last month, drought is still impacting 68% of Wisconsin and 58% of Minnesota.
Those are some pretty disturbing numbers, but here’s a number that’s even worse: 0%. That’s how much water the small city of Caney, Kansas will have by March 1 without decent rain.
