A warning sign along the shore of the dried O.C. Fisher Lake this summer in San Angelo, Texas.
What was it like to be there for the first drought in Texas? Does the past have anything to tell us about our future? A new timeline of droughts and heat in Texas has some answers.
The list, put together by the Texas Water Resources Institute (TWRI), the state’s water research group at Texas A&M University, takes a thorough look at the history water in the state. It’s been a scarcity since the settlers arrived, and there’s some fascinating material on the early days of water rights, extreme temperatures and the development of our water infrastructure.
“We went and gathered a lot of information from different sources,” says TWRI Communications Manager Kathy Wythe, who created the timeline. Looking at the history, it’s clear that drought and extreme weather are nothing new to Texas. “There’s a lot of talk about the drought of the 1950s,” she says, “but we’ve periodically had them over the last hundred years.” Wythe finds it interesting that the droughts since the 50s have been a lot shorter, however. A severe drought in 2007 ended abruptly in 2008. Continue Reading →
In a large, two story home in a wooded subdivision near where for years the Texas oil industry has drilled for black gold, three women have gathered around the kitchen table.
Dave Fehling/StateImpact Texas
Karen Darcy (left) and Rebecca Kaiser
“No one could believe what was happening,” said Rebecca Kaiser, whose two young children played upstairs.
She’s talking about a day some ten months earlier when she and carloads of her fellow Montgomery County residents angrily left a meeting of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ).
“It’ll be horrible,” Hoagland said of the project, which will inject toxic waste into old oil wells near her town of Conroe. She fears it’ll not only threaten the purity of the well water she drinks but fill the road out in front of her house with tanker trucks bringing the waste in from petrochemical plants outside Houston. Continue Reading →
The Enron Code of Ethics and Conduct of Business Affairs
This week marks the tenth anniversary of the Enron collapse. StateImpact Texas’ local radio partner KUHF is reporting a four-part series on the aftermath, and the Houston Chronicle is taking a look back as well.
But for your own little piece of Enron history, you can head to eBay. The Chronicle’s Dan McGraw found some gifts for the collector in your family. Here’s a shopping list:
You can read about Enron’s self-espoused “Vision and Values,” circa 1998 and 2000, in their Code of Ethics and Conduct of Business Affairs manuals. “Economic activities are better sorted out by markets than they are by governments,” the document says. The company also states that “our success is measured by the success of our customers.” There’s a “buy it now” option for $250. Continue Reading →
A snow-covered police car sits outside the Super Bowl in Dallas on February 4, 2011
It’s hard to believe after survivng the epic summer of 2011, but winter is here. Today saw the first hard freeze of the winter season in Central Texas, where the ground becomes frozen solid and plants die. And folks in Houston (freezing) and Dallas (also freezing) didn’t have it any easier this morning. While you may have just had your AC on last week, chances are you’ve fired your heater by now.
Whether temps are in the 100s or 20s in Texas, there are several things you can do to increase the energy efficiency of your home. There are big-ticket options like energy upgrades or smart thermostats, and some utlilities are encouraging customers to make small DIY improvements that can go a long way towards helping your home stay warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. Continue Reading →
Texas Asks Hunters for Help During Drought:Â The worst single-year drought in Texas history has left deer undernourished and, in some cases, dying in greater numbers than before. But could hunting them actually help?
Another Victim of the Drought, The A&M Student Bonfire: The University of Texas and Texas A&M met for what could be the final time in their historic rivalry. But with a burn ban in effect, a traditional Aggie bonfire went unlit.
A few years ago, when US natural gas production was kicking into high gear, gas promoters like T. Boone Pickens sold it as something close to a panacea. It was a plentiful source of energy that could create jobs at home. It could wean the US off of foreign oil. Perhaps most importantly, it was a âbridge fuelâ — it could serve as a cleaner source of electricity while Americaâs renewable energy industry came into its own.
Itâs hard to conceive just how fast the industry has grown since then. In 2010, the US surpassed Russia as the world leader in gas production on the strength of domestic shale reserves. Estimates show production more than doubling by 2020 to over 40 billion cubic feet of gas produced per day. This success can be viewed as a vindication of early gas investors. But abundant and cheap natural gas has also brought its own set of challenges.
The worst single-year drought in Texas history has left deer undernourished and, in some cases, dying in greater numbers than before. Many of the deer hunters are bringing home are skinnier than normal and the population of fawns surviving through the summer took a nosedive in many parts of the state.
Mose Buchele / StateImpact Texas
This deer may be hungier than usual in the drought.
At McBrides Gunâs in Austin, Thomas Hunt is looking for the perfect rifle to take his son Mathew out hunting. The appropriately-named Hunt has already bagged two deer this year. He says the impact of the drought was noticeable right away.
âThe same deer that we saw last year has had bigger horns last year than they had this year,â he said. âIâve had one that was a very large — probably 14 point — that was a 10 point this year. So weâve seen that much reduction in the horn size.â
Allen Cain, deer program leader with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, said the legacy of the drought could be with us for years. Continue Reading →
Several pipelines run underneath the Dona Park neighborhood in Corpus Christi
The Center for Public Integrity’s iwatch News has put together a “by the numbers” look at toxic air emissions. The data comes from a once-secret EPA âwatch listâ that shows repeated violators of environmental laws in the country, with many of them in Texas. StateImpact Texas, NPR and the Center for Public Integrity reported on the list and people affected by pollution earlier this month.
The list showed that even though many facilities were violating the law, the EPA and state agencies aren’t enforcing those laws in a timely manner. Only twenty percent of air pollution leaks are actually investigated by the EPA, and around one-third of those end up being prosecuted. The EPA publicly released the list on its website earlier this week.
A falling building at the former ASARCO/Encycle plant
Last week StateImpact Texas reported on a former hazardous waste plant that sits at the edge of a residential neighborhood in Corpus Christi. The Encycle facility, which opened as a hazardous waste plant in 1989, was ultimately shut down for pollution violations. Encycle and its parent company ASARCO filed for bankruptcy after agreeing to $1.7 billion in settlements for polluting.
You can now read what an insider at the plant told the EPA about how the facility ran their operations and endangered the local community. The document was released last year by the EPA, and as the waste plant is finally coming down, it makes for relevant reading. Continue Reading →
The town of Groesbeck’s water issues have been making news for over a week now. The town is running out of water, and while estimates vary as to exactly when that will happen, everyone seems to agree it’s a real enough possibility in the near future to be worried.
The town approved a stopgap measure last week to pipe in water from a quarry a few miles away, which should hold them over until March. And on Monday evening, the town got about two inches of much-needed rain.
Now the story is making national news, bringing more attention to the drought in Texas. CBS News aired the report above Tuesday evening.
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