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2/7/2002
Conference aims to improve water quality, supply
Participants say cooperation between groups needed
By By Katherine Pace (Daily Texan Staff)
G. Daniel Lopez/Daily Texan Staff
David Eaton, an LBJ School of Public Affairs professor, converses with International Boundary and Water Commission Commissioner Carlos M. Ramirez and Planning Division Chief Jim Setfanov at the end of the water resources conference Wednesday.
[Click to enlarge]
Government officials and scientists from Texas and Mexico discussed issues Wednesday related to water quality and supply along the Texas--Mexico border, focusing on the Rio Grande River.
Jay Banner, the director of the Environ-mental Science Institute, said the goal of the conference, held at the Bass Lecture Hall, was to promote interdisciplinary cooperation to find solutions for water management problems.
"We're trying to get around the boundaries imposed by interdisciplinary programs," Banner said. "It became clear that there are so many people of different disciplines working on this, that we saw a need for bringing them all together to meet and interact. We hope to engender future collaboration and research."
David Eaton, professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, said there is a need for such work.
"One of the goals of the meeting is to get people to know each other and to encourage future research," Eaton said.
The Environmental Science Institute created the Texas--Mexico Borderlands and Latin America Working Group last year to foster this interdisciplinary work through collaborative research on borderland water issues, Banner said.
The working group began with members of the University but expanded to include state and Mexican agencies, including the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission and the International Boundary and Water Commission.
The conference addressed water shortages caused by a drought that is affecting the state and Mexico, whose population is expected to grow to three times its current size in the next generation, increasing demands for water by agriculture and industry, Banner said.
"If we continue to use water at the rate we're using it, we're going to have more problems," he said.
The conference also featured a computer-- assisted simulation of the Rio Grande River by the Hydrologics Company.
The event simulated potential water situations based on geographical data and information about the area's water demands.
Banner said the LBJ School will meet in two to three months to continue testing the simulation program. He added that such simulations could be applicable worldwide in any area dealing with water scarcity.
The conference was sponsored by the UT Environmental Science Institute, the College of Natural Sciences, the College of Liberal Arts, the LBJ School of Public Affairs and the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies.
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