Oddly Enough, Despite Drought, Albuquerque's Aquifer Is Beginning To Rise

The shift away from ground water to Rio Grande water is progressing well enough that some improvement in the aquifer level is noticeable.

And hopefully in time too:

Albuquerque's long-overdue wake-up call came in August 1993 when the U.S. Geological Survey released a report showing that Albuquerque was pumping out its groundwater nearly three times faster than it could be replenished.


Tests showed the underground water basin had dropped by as much as 40 feet between 1989 and 1992 and nearly 140 feet in some places over the past three decades. More important, the report shot down once and for all the notion that Albuquerque had a limitless source of water.


The Rio Grande, according to the USGS report, was not replenishing (or recharging) the city's aquifer at anything approaching a steady state. In 1993 the Albuquerque area pumped about 160,000 acre-feet of water from the aquifer, while the aquifer is being replenished by rainfall and mountain snowmelt at close to 65,000 acre-feet a year.