Irrigated Farmland, Lubbock County March 2012
Studies published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in May 2012
conclude that key farming regions in the US are drawing water from underground sources at unsustainable rates,
with the southern Great Plains of Texas at risk of depleting all of its sources within the next 30 years.
About 4% of the land area above the Ogallala Aquifer, which falls in parts of Texas, is responsible for about 30% of its water losses. In the central and southern high plains, groundwater losses have been most pronounced.
The Ogallala Aquifer represents “fossil” water from the melting of the continent's glaciers at the end of the last Ice Age.
Once this water is gone, it will take about 70,000 years to replace it.