River Of Life Channel Of Death

"As hip and breathless as William Gibson, but spiced with dark humor and the horrible realisation that Noon knows of what he writes....Vurtis passionate, distinctive, demanding and enthralling--first-time novelist Noon has started with a bang."--The London Times.

India is killing the Ganges, and the Ganges in turn is killing India. The waterway that has nourished more people than any on earth for three millennia is now so polluted with sewage and toxic waste that it has become a menace to human and animal health. Victor Mallet traces the holy river from source to mouth, and from ancient times to the present day, to find that the battle to rescue what is arguably the world's most important river is far from lost. As one Hindu sage told the author in Rishikesh on the banks of the upper Ganges (known to Hindus as the goddess Ganga) - 'If Ganga dies, India dies. If Ganga thrives, India thrives. The lives of 500 million people is no small thing.' Drawing on four years of first-hand reporting and detailed historical and scientific research, Mallet delves into the religious, historical, and biological mysteries of the Ganges, and explains how Hindus can simultaneously revere and abuse their national river. Starting at the Himalayan glacier where the Ganges emerges pure and cold from an icy cave known as the Cow's Mouth and ending in the tiger-infested mangrove swamps of the Bay of Bengal, Mallet encounters everyone from the naked holy men who worship the river, to the engineers who divert its waters for irrigation, the scientists who study its bacteria, and Narendra Modi, the Hindu nationalist prime minister, who says he wants to save India's mother-river for posterity. Can they succeed in saving the river from catastrophe — or is it too late?

Post-World War II Oregon was a place of optimism and growth, a spectacular natural region from ocean to high desert that seemingly provided opportunity in abundance. With the passing of time, however, Oregon’s citizens — rural and urban — would find themselves entangled in issues that they had little experience in resolving. The same trees that provided income to timber corporations, small mill owners, loggers, and many small towns in Oregon, also provided a dramatic landscape and a home to creatures at risk. The rivers whose harnessing created power for industries that helped sustain Oregon’s growth — and were dumping grounds for municipal and industrial wastes — also provided passageways to spawning grounds for fish, domestic water sources, and recreational space for everyday Oregonians. The story of Oregon’s accommodation to these divergent interests is a divisive story between those interested in economic growth and perceived stability and citizens concerned with exercising good stewardship towards the state’s natural resources and preserving the state’s livability. In his second volume of Oregon’s environmental history, William Robbins addresses efforts by individuals and groups within and outside the state to resolve these conflicts. Among the people who have had roles in this process, journalists and politicians Richard Neuberger and Tom McCall left substantial legacies and demonstrated the ambiguities inherent in the issues they confronted.

Water—or the lack of it—has shaped the contours of the American West and continues to dominate the region's development. From the incursions of the Spanish conquistadores to the dams of the New Deal era, humans have sought water in these arid lands as the key to survival and success. And as the West becomes more urbanized, water is an issue as never before. This book sets contemporary and often bitter debates over water in their historical contexts by examining some of the most contentious issues that have confronted the region over five centuries. Seventeen contributors—representing history, geography, ethnography, political science, law, and urban studies—provide an interdisciplinary perspective on the many dimensions of water in the West: Spanish colonial water law, Native American water rights, agricultural concerns, and dam building. A concluding essay looks toward the future by examining the impact of cities on water and of water marketing on the western economy. As farmers and ranchers from Kansas to California compete for water with powerful urban economies, the West will continue to be reshaped by this scarce and precious resource. Fluid Arguments clearly shows that many of the current disputes over water take place without a real appreciation for the long history of the debate. By shedding new light on how water allocation is established—and who controls it—this book makes a vital contribution to our understanding of water and growth in the region. CONTENTS Divining the Past: An Introduction / Char Miller Part 1. Land and Water on New Spain’s Frontiers 1. "Only Fit for Raising Stock": Spanish and Mexican Land and Water Rights in the Tamaulipan Cession / Jesús F. de la Teja 2. Water, the Gila River Pimas, and the Arrival of the Spanish / Shelly C. Dudley 3. "Between This River and That": Establishing Water Rights in the Chama Basin of New Mexico / Sandra K. Mathews-Lamb Part 2. The Native American Struggle for Water 4. Maggot Creek and Other Tales: Kiowa Identity and Water, 1870-1920 / Bonnie Lynn-Sherow 5. The Dilemmas of Indian Water Policy, 1887-1928 / Donald J. Pisani 6. First in Time: Tribal Reserved Water Rights and General Adjudications in New Mexico / Alan S. Newell 7. Winters Comes Home to Roost / Daniel McCool Part 3. Agricultural Conundrums 8. Water, Sun, and Cattle: The Chisholm Trail as an Ephemeral Ecosystem / James E. Sherow 9. Private Irrigation in Colorado’s Grand Valley / Brad F. Raley 10. A Rio Grande "Brew": Agriculture, Industry, and Water Quality in the Lower Rio Grande Valley / John P. Tiefenbacher 11. Specialization and Diversification in the Agricultural System of Southwestern Kansas, 1887-1980 / Thomas C. Schafer 12. John Wesley Powell Was Right: Resizing the Ogallala High Plains / John Opie Part 4. Dam those Waters! 13. Private Initiative, Public Works: Ed Fletcher, the Santa Fe Railway, and Phoenix’s Cave Creek Flood Control Dam / Donald C. Jackson 14. The Changing Fortunes of the Big Dam Era in the American West / Mark Harvey 15. Building Dams and Damning People in the Texas-Mexico Border Region: Mexico’s El Cuchillo Dam Project / Raúl M. Sánchez Part 5. The Coming Fight 16. Water and the Western Service Economy: A New Challenge / Hal K. Rothman

In the Pacific Northwest, the river of dominance is the Columbia, and in ways both profound and mundane its history is the history of the region. In Great River of the West historians and anthropologists consider a range of topics about the river, from Indian rock art, Chinook Jargon, and ethnobotany on the Columbia to literary and family history, the creation of an engineered river, and the inherent mythic power of place. Since first contact between Euro-Americans and Native peoples during the late 18th century, the river's history has been characterized by dramatic demographic, social, and economic changes. The remarkable set of essays in Great River of the West investigate these changes by highlighting important episodes in the history of the river. Readers meet mariners who challenge the Columbia River bar, a family torn by insanity, Native people who preserve fishing traditions, and dam-builders who radically change the Columbia.

In the Pacific Northwest, the Snake River and its wilderness tributaries were—as recently as a half century ago—some of the world’s greatest salmon rivers. Now, due to four federal dams, the salmon population has dropped close to extinction. Steven Hawley, journalist and self-proclaimed “river rat,” argues that the best hope for the Snake River lies in dam removal, a solution that pits the power companies and federal authorities against a collection of Indian tribes, farmers, fishermen, and river recreationists. The river’s health, as he demonstrates, is closely connected to local economies, freshwater rights, and energy independence. Challenging the notion of hydropower as a cheap, green source of energy, Hawley depicts the efforts being made on behalf of salmon by a growing army of river warriors. Their message, persistent but disarmingly simple, is that all salmon need is water in their rivers and a clear way home.

Return to the River will describe a new ecosystem-based approach to the restoration of salmon and steelhead populations in the Columbia River, once one of the most productive river basins for anadromous salmonids on the west coast of North America. The approach of this work has broad applicability to all recovery efforts throughout the northern hemisphere and general applicability to fisheries and aquatic restoration efforts throughout the world. The Pacific Northwest is now embroiled in a major public policy debate over the management and restoration of Pacific salmon. The outcome of the debate has the potential to affect major segments of the region's economy - river transportation, hydroelectric production, irrigated agriculture, urban growth, commercial and sport fisheries, etc. This debate, centered as it is on the salmon in all the rivers, has created a huge demand for information. The book will be a powerful addition to that debate. A 15 year collaboration by a diverse group of scientists working on the management and recovery of salmon, steelhead trout, and wildlife populations in the Pacific Northwest Includes over 200 figures, with four-color throughout the book Discusses complex issues such as habitat degradation, juvenile survival through the hydrosystem, the role of artificial production, and harvest reform

Report to the Western Water Policy Review Advisory Commission.