Facing a Dry Future

The United States and Mexico enter agreement to reactivate a desalting plant in hope of bringing more water to a drought-laden region.

Along the Colorado River numerous state agencies are planning for the future. Concerns about drought hover in the arid U.S. Southwest, leading agencies that can do so to bank water and particpate in talks that will shape "The Law of the River."

On Oct. 29, California, Nevada, Arizona, and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation signed an agreement to launch a pilot project that will reawaken the Yuma (Ariz.) Desalting Plant, which was completed in the early 1990s by the federal government.