Other articles by Tony Davis:

AZ Senate fails to act on gas-storage cavernVote pending on exemptions for underground gas storage Killing lions to save sheep faulted Natural gas threatens water, critics sayAZ wanted a jaguar collared despite 2 deaths in Sonora Ex-Gov. Castro, 93, reflects on AZ issues Audubon: Climate change is shifting bird migration Lawmakers decry US stance that it can't block Rosemont mine Bear, lion track count ends after 20-year run$900M financing sought for mine

Administrative & Professional
Tucson Urban League
CEO/President Sales and Marketing
Everready Glass
Sales Reps Health Care
Sierra Tucson
Eating Disorders Program Coordinator Administrative & Professional
Jorgensen Brooks Group
Counselor Trades/Construction
RANCHO RESORT
MAINTANANCE POSITION Health Care
CENTRAL ARIZONA COLLEGE
DIRECTOR OF HEALTH INFORMATION MANAGEMENT Health Care
Dependable Health Services
Physical Therapists

Another grant, another study of water, growth and climate change in the Southwest?

Not exactly, say University of Arizona researchers who will soon launch a $300,000 study involving water management in numerous, growing "hot spots" within the Arizona-Mexico border region, including Tucson.

Instead of studying how global warming might affect the region's temperatures and rainfall, which has been done, the researchers will try to encourage local water officials to consider global warming and other climate-change issues in making short- and long-term plans and decisions.

Besides Tucson, the researchers will visit five other cities. Arizona cities will be paired off with neighboring or similar-sized cites in Sonora. Tucson will be paired with Hermosillo; Nogales, Ariz., will be paired with Nogales, Sonora; and Sierra Vista will be paired with Cananea, Sonora.

The researchers in the two-year study will evaluate each city's plans to assure their long-term water supplies.

The study will determine their vulnerability, particularly at their urban area's fringe, to changes in water supply and demand, said one of the three researchers involved, Christopher Scott, an assistant professor of water resources policy at the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the UA.

"It's primarily diagnostic," Scott said of the study. "We'd like to be able to offer solutions. It's not going to be a consultant's type of report, that gives us a feasibility study on how to meet water demand, so if we grow in Rocky Point by so many condos per year, what kind of quality water and how much water do they need?"

The researchers will also discuss with the local officials about dealing with weather-related disasters such as cyclones, tropical storms and hurricanes, particularly in southern Sonora and Baja California.

"The big tropical storms come in and lay waste to towns, ports and the fishing fleet," Scott said. "These are the same tropical storms that come in, dump huge amounts of water in the mountains and fill up reservoirs."

Researchers say they don't want to impose particular solutions on local officials. But they also say, in researcher Margaret Wilder's words, "The idea is to not be producing science that is just sitting on the shelf.

"We want to produce really usable science about climate and drought and other related factors that are going to be helpful to decision-makers," said Wilder, an assistant UA professor of Latin American studies and geography and regional development.

The researchers hope to build close relationships with officials who make decisions about water. They want the officials to participate in discussions over these problems and to try to work collaboratively with researchers and others to solve them.

"We want to encourage water managers to think about a longer-term perspective than they are often able to do," Wildder said. "A lot of studies show that water managers don't consult climate science or climate projections because it's just not something they feel compelled to do.

"We're trying to help them do this, especially on the Mexican side," she said.

It's "pretty well projected" with 16 to 19 studies, showing that there will be reduced water flows, reduced snowmelt and higher temperatures that will affect water flows, she said.

The UA researchers will be working with researchers in three Mexican institutions: El Colegio de Sonora and Universidad de Sonora, both in Hermosillo; and the Mexican Institute on Water Technology, in Cuernavaca.