Water gurus converge to slake thirst of exploding Colorado population

Water experts are meeting en masse in Denver today and Wednesday to try to figure out how to plan for an expected doubling of Colorado’s population to 10 million people by 2050, according the Durango Herald.

State water officials, in conjunction with the Western States Water Council, are trying to sort out conflicts between growing residential development, agriculture, recreation and the thirsty industrial sectors such as energy production, the Herald reported Tuesday.

Gov. Bill Ritter was scheduled to speak Tuesday, but Colorado Department of Natural Resources director Harris Sherman, who prompted the water confab, was unable to attend because he’s prepping for his U.S. Senate confirmation hearing for an undersecretary of agriculture post that would have him overseeing the U.S. Forest Service for the Obama administration.

“He’s the one who kind of got us – how do I put this nicely? He kicked us in the butt and told us to get these conversations going,” Jennifer Gimbel, director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, told the Herald.
Conspicuously absent Monday, however, were representatives of the residential development and planning sectors, the paper noted.

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