At Arizona State University, experts in the field recently gathered for the second International Atmospheric Water Harvesting Summit hosted in collaboration with the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering, Global Center for Water Technology, Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory, Arizona Water Innovation Initiative and Southwest Sustainability Engine. ASU News spoke with Paul Westerhoff, a Regents Professor in the School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment, who chaired the summit.

Reclamation is “not only the manager of the Colorado system, but they’re functionally the technical experts for the seven states and water users as we try to figure out what the new management guidelines should look like,” said Sarah Porter, the Kyl Center water expert. But western water users see new Interior Sec. Burgum as someone who “brings an understanding of western natural resources and roll up his sleeves,” Porter noted.

“Getting the legislation through and signed is really the last of the very hard steps that have to be taken,” said Kyl Center for Water Policy Director Sarah Porter. “They need to know how much water they have a right to. They need the infrastructure to use the water, and once that’s settled it allows the tribes to do all kinds of other things.”

The Kyl Center for Water Policy recently released a study on tap water affordability in Arizona. The study assessed the rates of 659 water providers across the state against two metrics of affordability. Grant Heminger, Policy and Research Analyst at the Kyl Center, joined Horizon to discuss.

Outside urban areas such as Phoenix and Tucson, groundwater use isn't regulated, but companies such as Deluge wouldn't be allowed to transport purified brackish groundwater outside most rural groundwater basins, said Sarah Porter, director of ASU's Kyl Center for Water Policy.

Stanton credited ASU for its work in researching the water crisis, and one of the university’s top experts, Dave White, director of the ASU Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation, told the crowd about the Arizona Water Innovation Initiative. “Our goal is to deliver actionable solutions and immediate impact that strengthen water resilience and economic competitiveness,” White said.

“The risk of damaging post-fire debris flows is increasing as the climate changes, because we are seeing stronger storms, in between more intense dry times, that can lead to instability in previously burned areas,” says Faith Kearns, a water and wildfire expert at Arizona State University. “At the same time, wildfires themselves are also burning more intensely, leaving behind fire-affected soils that can repel water and little vegetation to keep slopes intact.”

“I grew up in hurricane culture and I experienced major storms like Hurricane Andrew,” said Wutich, an Arizona State University President's Professor and director of ASU’s Center for Global Health. “And because I lived in a neighborhood where we had very strong social support networks, I felt that social infrastructure was a very visible way to survive,” said the 2023 MacArthur Fellow. Today, Wutich, is a world-renowned expert on water insecurity. And her dedication to the field has earned her the title of ASU Regents Professor for 2025, the highest faculty honor awarded at ASU.

Groundwater, though, is a finite resource: once it is drained, it cannot quickly be replaced. “The groundwater down there is very old, tens of thousands of years old,” said Kathryn Sorensen, a professor at the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University. “If you pump it out too quickly, it’s just gone.”