Poetry, Air Quality, & NM’s New Strategic Water Supply

For New Mexico Poet Laureate Lauren Camp, poetry is a way to “build empathy.” Last week Camp spoke with me about her new book and a project that brings “epic poetry” to communities across the state. She also talked about why poetry matters, especially during times of crisis, and read from her new book, Worn Smooth Between Devourings.

“I think of this book as very much a love letter to New Mexico….This has poems both about the wonder, the awe, of New Mexico, and witnessing. There’s a lot of environmental attention here, a lot of attention to the biosphere, to the fires, to the intensifying heat, the drought.”

To watch Lauren read two of her poems, visit the Our Land YouTube page, or find us over on Instagram. 

And a huge thank you to those of you who came to Valle de Oro National Wildlife Refuge on Saturday morning to join the conversation with Lauren and me. It was truly a beautiful morning—with the Sandias wearing their massive coat of snow—and I loved meeting so many of you. 

Last night, the Albuquerque City Council overrode Mayor Tim Keller’s vetoes of Councilor Dan Lewis’s bills that abolish the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Joint Air Quality Board and put a moratorium on new air quality regulations. The bills are aimed specifically at halting the creation of a new rule, the Health, Environment and Equity Impacts rule. 

This week, the air quality board has been holding a hearing on that new rule, which South Valley neighborhoods have worked on creating through the governmental process. Now, according to a press release from the City Council last night, “the Administration and the Environmental Health Department cannot spend any City resources on this hearing including personnel, City finances for rental of space, court reporter, and outside counsel. Essentially, the hearing must cease according to the law.”

Keller sent out a brief statement last night, too: 

“We respect the concerns raised and the traditional disagreements between branches of government; and believe that on joint city county matters we should work together. Unfortunately, unless the county follows suit, this action likely throws construction, community and businesses into indefinite limbo, creating broad legal ambiguity that could tie us up in court for years. We stand ready to help the new council working group tasked with resolving these issues.”

It looks like the bills’ supporters succeeded in turning the entire issue into one of economics, rather than public health. And as readers of this newsletter know, protecting peoples’ health is actually the better economic investment.

This morning, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s administration announced the state will spend $500 million on a “new” strategic water supply to “support the nation’s transition to renewable energy by providing resources for water-intensive processes around creating green hydrogen, storing energy produced by wind and solar, and manufacturing electric vehicles, microchips, solar panels, and wind turbines, for example.”

I will absolutely cover this in the coming months, but for now, all I can share is that according to the press release, New Mexico will use that half-billion dollars to “purchase treated brackish and treated produced water to build the strategic water supply.” (Just a reminder that “produced water” is polluted water from oil and gas wells.) The press release also states:

“In early 2024, the New Mexico Environment Department will issue guidance and seek proposals from companies interested in pursuing a contract. This contracting model, used in other industries like healthcare for manufacturing vaccines, is known as an advanced market commitment. Advanced market commitments reduce the risk of private sector investment and spur first movers to build otherwise costly infrastructure. Companies that are awarded an advanced market commitment contract can secure private capital to build and operate water treatment facilities with the assurance the State of New Mexico will purchase the water. Then, the state will make the water available for creating green hydrogen; storing energy produced by wind and solar; manufacturing electric vehicles, microchips, solar panels, and wind turbines; and other uses as treatment and demand allow.”

Now, a broader look at the news, starting with important COP28 coverage:

• “Sandia Pueblo activist calls for total phase out of fossil fuels at COP28” (Alice Fordham, KUNM)

• “Indigenous Leaders Urge COP28 Negotiators to Focus on Preventing Loss and Damage and Drastically Reducing Emissions” (Liza Gross, Inside Climate News)

• “Here are the 4 issues to watch at COP28” (Grist)

• “How a single word could hold up global talks to save the planet” (Maxine Joselow, The Washington Post)

• “COP28 president denies he doesn’t respect climate science” (Gloria Dickie, Reuters)

• “Gore blasts COP28 climate chief and oil companies’ emissions pledges at UN summit” (Seth Borenstein, Associated Press)

• “More Than 100 Countries at COP28 Call For Fossil Fuel Phaseout” (Bob Berwyn, Inside Climate News)

• “Biden Administration Announces Rule to Cut Millions of Tons of Methane Emissions” (Jim Tankersley and Lisa Friedman, The New York Times)

• “EPA proposes new rule to require nationwide replacement of lead pipes” (Emma Klein, Tinbete Ermyas, and Mary Louise Kelly, NPR)

• “Los Lunas Village Council to consider amending agreement with Niagara to increase water use” (Felina Martinez, Valencia County News-Bulletin)

• “BLM to end use of ‘cyanide bomb’ to kill coyotes” (Scott Sonner, Associated Press)

• “Billions of dollars are being dumped into wildfire, and everything is about to change” (The Hotshot Wake Up)

Lastly, I’m excited about a project launching in 2024, and to spend the year delving into a lot of new conversations around the environment, community, and climate change in New Mexico. 

We’ll have an exciting announcement soon and I can’t wait to get to work on our broadcast segments, community events, and some new lesson plans for middle school students. So that I can make sure we’re all ready to go in early 2024, this will probably be the last Our Land Weekly of 2023—and I just want to thank you all for watching Our Land on NMPBS (or on social media) and for reading this newsletter. And to all of you who drop emails or take the time to say hello, thank you for making this work feel worthwhile.

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