Drought in Texas
By: Zac Zeigler, Layton Fowler, Dillon Harris
Evidence
Summary 1
There has been a bad drought in the state of Texas since the 1950’s. There have been several ideas to fix them, but most were expected to fail. One idea was to build dams all across Texas water reservoirs. They tried this plan and in ten years they built 2,700 dams. These dams account for about 40 percent of all dams now in Texas. Another idea was to channel water from Louisiana. They have yet to do this because everyone thought it was destined to fail. The drought has not affected the population growth which means more people will continue to move in which means less water. For the first time ever Texans will get to vote on this matter, they will decide to use 2 billion dollars from the Rainy Day Fund to go towards the latest water plan. We need the money so we can prevent more droughts in Texas.
I thought the article was very interesting; it kind of persuaded you to vote towards getting the money for the project. I liked how they started from the beginning and talked about how the drought kind of came about. It goes back into the past and talked about some of the ideas that were proposed when the drought first came about. Then it transferred into the present and talked about the drought now and the upcoming vote that can act as a solution to this ongoing problem. I liked how this article compared what we have done in the past, to what we can do now.
Summary 2
In the 2011 drought the Texas government literally prayed that it would get better, that’s how bad it was. And it was almost as bad as Texas’s world record. And in the article it says “In addition to prayers, the drought of record — as the 1950s drought is known — also spurred Texas officials to write the first State Water Plan, forecasting Texas’ water needs in the coming decades. In November, Texans will decide whether to put $2 billion from the state’s rainy day fund to a contemporary version of that plan. So now may be a good time to look back the history of the water plan, its successes and failures, before making that choice.” So the state was literally going to spend more than a billion dollars, that’s how serious it was.
Proposal
Texas has been in a bad drought since about the 1950’s which was one of the worst times for people to live in Texas. There have been many solutions over the years like building dams or running the water from the Mississippi River across Texas. Most of the solutions were never carried out, only worked temporarily or failed. We can’t go much longer like this; we need to act now; that’s why we are here, to solve this menacing problem of water. If you want to be able to get what you need in the future you are going to have to plan now. During our research we have come up with long and short term goals which can only be carried out with your help. Our long term goal is to have a “water farm” in each of the five regions, which will store all of the water from our various sources in that region. Our short term goal is to provide people a way to be able to pay fewer taxes if they use less water. If you are someone who wants to know what they can do then please continue reading.
For our long term goal we need to build our newly invented “Water Farms” these will help to preserve water better. If carried out properly this solution should work for as long as we need it to. The farms will consist of a glass bowl layer where the water will be stored, just outside of it will be a metal layer to protect the glass from natural disasters. Each farm will be located underground with a mechanical hatch covering it. There are several ways we will get water to the farms, one being that we will find none owned low populated bodies of water across the state and extract the water; then we will get rid of all of the waste and toxic chemicals and then send it to the nearest farm. Another source of water will be simply, rain water. When it rains we will open the mechanical hatch and let in as much water as we can, once the rain stops we will close the hatch to prevent any of the water from evaporating. We will get this water to everyone in Texas by either pipe or truck. We are unsure of the cost of the water farms, but we know we have to start somewhere so we have developed a fund called, “Drought Awareness,” that goes toward this solution which you can donate to now. Until the water farms are built we have also created a temporary solution which could last for a while which is paying less taxes for the less water that you use. You can do this by paying attention to the local weather to see if it will rain so you won’t have to use hose water to water your plants or simply turning off the sink when you are brushing your teeth. The MORE water you conserve the LESS you will pay.
You may be reading this and have the thought of, what is so important about water and what will it do to benefit me if I conserve it? If you have ever traveled to another area besides Texas and thought to yourself how beautiful and nurtured the nature was there, and how you wished that it was that way where you lived then let me tell you something: Trees, grass, flowers, almost anything beautiful in nature has to be fed and have energy to live; Texas has the sun which provides energy but it doesn’t have enough water to feed. If you are someone who wants to make your kids, grand kids, great grandkids lives easier then you are going to have to act now to be sure of this. I know I don’t want people a decade from now dying of dehydration from the lack of water in their home state. Or even if you are someone who wants to save money and get something off your shoulders then these solutions will benefit you. If you want to see this in the law of Texas then please donate to our fund, whether it be 10 dollars or 100k every cent helps.
Thank you, Zac Zeigler, Dillon Harris, and Layton Fowler