Most people in the West live in cities, and cities can do a lot to change how they use water. We head deep into the glittery, neon heart of Las Vegas. There, under the Bellagio Fountain, we learn that this city of excess is a world leader in water conservation. What is Vegas doing, and how might people who live in other Colorado River cities follow its lead? Part 5 of a 10-part series.
For more CPR News coverage of the Colorado River, visited cpr.org/parched.
Host: Michael Elizabeth Sakas
Written by Michael Elizabeth Sakas
Editors: Erin Jones, Joe Wertz
Production and Mixing: Emily Williams
Additional Production and Editing: Rachel Estabrook
Theme song by Kibwe Cooper. Additional music via Universal Production Music.
Artwork: Maria Juliana Pinzón
Executive Producers: Kevin Dale, Brad Turner
Additional Editorial Support: Alison Borden, Kibwe Cooper, Jo Erickson, Luis Antonio Perez, Andrew Villegas
Thanks also to Sarah Bures, Hart Van Denburg, Jodi Gersh, Kim Nguyen, Clara Shelton, Arielle Wilson.
Parched is a production of the Climate Solutions team of CPR News and Colorado Public Radio’s Audio Innovations Studio — part of the NPR Network.
The Fountains of Bellagio draw nighttime visitors on the Las Vegas Strip, October 2022. The fountains do not use Colorado River water; the Bellagio accesses ground water, which it then recycles over and over, to power the fountains outside and inside the casino and hotel.
Approximately 60 percent of Southern Nevada's water is used outdoors, a lot of it on residential landscaping, and is counted against the state's Colorado River water allowance. The region's water authority patrols neighborhoods looking for properties where sprinklers and irrigation systems violate the law.
Cameron Donnarumma of the Southern Nevada Water Authority’s water waste patrol prepared to pin a fine notice on a Las Vegas home Monday, Oct. 3, 2022, in the Summerlin neighborhood. Approximately 60 percent of Southern Nevada's water is used outdoors, a lot of it on residential landscaping, and is counted against the state's Colorado River water allowance. The region's water authority patrols neighborhoods looking for properties where sprinklers and irrigation systems violate the law.
Jeannie Zei holds two of her puppies while standing on her home’s treasured front-lawn grass Oct. 6, 2022. Both the city and state have enacted stringent new laws designed to sharply reduce the amount of water Las Vegas and its environs use as water levels continue to fall in nearby Lake Mead on the Colorado River, including tearing out decorative grass on front lawns, and forbidding new housing developments from planting any grass at all. She caused some home owners association drama over those laws. Grass is a matter of homeownership pride for her.
A member of a landscape crew waters down a pile of rock that will be used as part of a desert-friendly redesign of a formerly grass-covered boulevard in the Desert Shores community of Las Vegas, Oct. 4, 2022.
A dive crew works daily to maintain the water cannons that power the choreographed fountains at the Belaggio on the Las Vegas Strip, October, 2022. While the display might appear to be a waste of water at a time when the city’s water supply from Lake Mead on the Colorado River is in dire straits, the hotel points out that the fountain’s source is recycled ground water, and that the system actually returns water to Lake Mead.
