How will Nevada vote when Lake Mead ceases to exist?

[Sumner 1868]

?

[Agonized-Statism]

Depends on what kinds of people the desalination industry attracts. Vegas would shrink either way, so probably more Republican.

[Flyersfan232]

Depends on what kinds of people the desalination industry attracts. Vegas would shrink either way, so probably more Republican.

vegas will never shrink and die.

[jamestroll]

No US city will literally run out of water. Lake Mead running dry would not just impact Nevada, but it would devastate the economies of Arizona and most of the southwest as well. Legally speaking the entire water allotment of Arizona must be revoked before California can be cut back at all. This was in exchange for the federal government building the Central Arizona Project which pumps water uphill and hundreds of miles into Phoenix and Tucson.

Much of the southwest is counter intuitive. The major city further away from Lake Mead has a statistically impossible chance of running out of water. That is because Phoenix’s water supply comes from two water basins. Colorado River into Lake Mead into the Central Arizona into Phoenix and the Salt River Project which collects water from winter snows and summer monsoons. Right now, the former is slightly below average, and the latter is doing very well. As Phoenix obtains water from two different basins and one basin being refilled twice a year it is safe. It is the extreme heat from the urban heat island effect that could doom it. Even a full cut back from the Central Arizona Project would probably not doom Phoenix water wise but it would be tight. Growth would be stunted, and the Arizona economy would fall into a deep recession as their economy is based on growth.
Las Vegas depends on 90% of its water from Lake Mead and is limited to only 300,000-acre feet a year. A cut back would not wipe out its entire allotment, but it would hurt. Las Vegas has no other water source that could make up for it. In this case only the very poor would probably remain in Las Vegas as they would have no where to go. I would say the population would be heavily Hispanic and thus Democratic leaning.

I am not worried so much of Lake Mead literally running dry, but I am more worried of it hitting the point in which it would be able to produce hydroelectric power.

Right now, the snowpack is around 95% of average above Lake Mead. I am holding out hope that we have a very second half the snow season and an excellent 2019/2020 winter snow pack to avoid a shortage declaration in 2020. The optics of it for the Southwest would be horrible.

What is my solution? I have a solution that makes so much sense that it would be considered. Instead of building a wall we should use that money to fund and build desalination plants in California and have the interior western states help pay a portion of it. In exchange, California would slowly give up its allotment of the Colorado River to the interior western states. Imagine the large amounts of food we could produce!