Climate-driven water woes spark Colorado rush to conserve..

"And basil," said Altius Farms CEO Sally Herbert, plucking a bright leaf. "Which you really should taste. Because it's magnificent."

The vertical farm is one of many Colorado models for coping with increasing water scarcity in the western United States, as climate change makes droughts more frequent and more severe.

Other projects have Coloradans testing water recycling and building barriers against the wildfire runoff that can taint supplies.

Colorado is hardly alone. A major U.N. climate report published recently notes that half the world's population is already seeing severe water scarcity for at least some part of the year. In the U.S. West, drought and earlier runoff from an increasingly diminished snowpack will increase water scarcity during the summer, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said. read more

While Colorado so far has met the water needs of its 6 million residents, it could face a roughly 30% shortfall by 2050 as the population grows while climate impacts escalate, according to one likely scenario experts prepared for the state's official Water Plan.

Already, the region's worst drought in more than a century has left water levels starkly low in the Lake Mead reservoir supplying Colorado River water to neighboring states.

"It's mind-blowing," Herbert said.

FARMING UPWARD

No one fix will ensure future water quality, quantity and affordability. Approaches such as water recycling have faced regulatory gaps and public resistance.

Vertical farming, meanwhile, won't work at the scale needed for staple crops like corn or wheat. And while Altius uses mostly natural light to grow 25,000 pounds (11,300 kg) of produce each year on its 7,000-square-foot rooftop, others rely on lamps and electricity. That can make the produce grown pricier.

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Photo Courtesy of Agrotonomy

Source: Reuters