Month: October 2022

NM WRRI Hosts Hybrid 67^th Annual New Mexico Water Conference

by Mark Sheely, NM WRRI Program Specialist, & Jeanette Torres, NM WRRI Program Coordinator

The New Mexico Water Resources Research Institute hosted its 67^th Annual New Mexico Water Conference last week in a hybrid format at the Las Cruces Convention Center on October 26-27, 2022. With the theme this year, Our Interconnected Communities—and Interconnected Waters, this hybrid Annual New Mexico Water Conference addressed water issues facing New Mexico communities. Over the course of a day and a half, water experts discussed a host of important and timely topics, such as connecting diverse communities, conservation programs, management strategies, and water budgets. Just over 320 total registrants and 27 speakers participated in the conference.

The day before the conference, on Tuesday, October 25, James Narvaez and Patrick Lopez of the Elephant Butte Irrigation District graciously hosted more than 20 conference participants on a field trip to numerous irrigation and stormwater management sites around the district, beginning at the Leasburg Dam near Radium Springs, New Mexico, and ending at Mesilla Dam.

The first day of the conference on Wednesday, October 26, featured recorded opening keynote remarks given by Melanie Stansbury from New Mexico’s 1^st Congressional District, followed by an update from Mike Hamman, the New Mexico State Engineer. Presentations throughout the rest of the morning centered around groundwater in the determining decade, collaboration needs to address intense flooding challenges, and research efforts to inform and enable management strategies for a secure water future. Wednesday’s luncheon featured a lecture titled Lessons and Visions, by Laura Paskus, Journalist and Correspondent for Our Land: New Mexico’s Environmental Past, Present, and Future on NMPBS. Lunch was followed by presentations on agricultural and managed aquifer recharge projects, water conservation in the Middle and Lower Rio Grande, and a collaboration between the New Mexico Water Data Initiative and the Pecos Valley Artesian Conservancy District.

The second day of the conference began with a presentation by Blane Sanchez, 2^nd Lieutenant Governor of the Pueblo of Isleta, highlighting the Pueblo’s perspectives on their water resources, including water rights settlement agreements and restoration plans. To highlight the importance of binational collaboration in water resources research and management, a well-rounded panel shared presentations concerning recharge in the Mesilla/Conejos-Médanos aquifer and potential management approaches for transboundary aquifers.

After this first slate of morning presentations, attendees had the opportunity to converse with water researchers at the in-person poster session in which 37 presenters from across New Mexico showcased their water research projects. Collaborators from over 20 universities, agencies, and private entities were represented during this session. Accepted abstracts and all submitted posters are currently available to conference registrants here. To wrap up the last day of the conference, two presentations related to the Draft New Mexico 50-Year Water Plan were given, followed by a panel detailing the community resilience conversations project led by NM WRRI to contribute to the 50-Year Water Plan, as well as ongoing efforts from this project to implement  research pilot projects for future water resilience across several New Mexico communities.

Conference video recordings and presentation slides will be available online for the general public in the coming week.

Meet the Researcher, Kate Leary, Assistant Professor, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology

by Jeanette Torres, NM WRRI Program Coordinator

Kate Leary is an assistant professor of hydrology for the Earth and Environmental Sciences Department at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology (NMT). She teaches several classes a year, including Fluvial Geomorphology and Environmental Justice. Leary has been in her position since 2020 and identifies that one of the most important aspects of her job is to educate the next generation of geoscientists through traditional classes, mentoring, and research. To help achieve this outcome, she is currently mentoring two master’s students and one PhD student.

The New Mexico Water Resources Research Institute (NM WRRI) recently awarded Leary a 104b faculty research grant for her proposal titled, Morphology of the Rio Grande will evolve with climate change; will we be ready? This research will investigate the future planform geomorphology of the Rio Grande through numerical modeling as it adjusts to future climate change. In addition to performing her work associated with this grant, Leary mentions she is “excited to continue collaborating with NM WRRI on projects related to rivers in the southwest United States.”

As a fluvial geomorphologist, Leary’s research focuses on bedform kinematics in modern and ancient river systems. Using methods such as analogue modeling and numerical computations, she can analyze and explore precise details of Earth’s surface processes, which are generally not observable on a field scale. According to Leary, some of her ongoing research projects include 1) sub-bedform scale transport dynamics over bedforms, 2) the effect of delta geomorphology on onshore saltwater sequestration, and 3) the paleo-hydrologic history of the paleo-Rio Grande during its transition from aggradation to incision.

Leary recognizes one of the most significant issues within fluvial geomorphology is how rivers will adapt to climate change, thus her most recent proposal with NM WRRI. Whether this response leads to increased flooding or riverbeds drying up, river flow changes can direly impact the environment and societies worldwide. To better prepare for either of these outcomes, Leary suggests learning from past climate changes (e.g., the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum) to assist us in planning our current climate change trajectory and how to analyze our current predicament.

Leary double majored with her BA degrees in Geology and Religion from Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington.  Guided by her interest in learning more about river processes in the field of geosciences, she pursued a career in higher education, earning an internship at the Cascade Volcano Observatory (CVO) after college. While at the CVO, Leary worked closely with experimental debris flow flume, further advancing her passion for geoscience.  Leary states it was during this experience that she became convinced that applying to graduate school for geoscience was the right path for her. Leary then earned her PhD in Geology from the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona.

Leary states she has found great fulfillment in her research career and would like to continue investigating transport processes in river systems as they pertain to changing climate conditions in the past, present, and future. Our interview ended with Leary quoting Steven Grace, author of Dam Nation, “When you explore water, you explore everything.”