Word: aridness
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Another frequently voiced concern was the environment. Rafik Nishanov, the Uzbekistan party chief, complained bitterly about a disastrous drop in the water level of the inland Aral Sea, which has been depleted over the years by efforts to irrigate the arid republics of Central Asia. The chief of a new environmental protection committee, Fyodor Morgun, blamed the "ill-considered drive to build gigantic plants" for a Pandora's box of ecological problems, including air and water pollution...
...Gulf," said Gilman. That was caused by a split in the jet stream, which usually carries storms across California into the Midwest, sucking moisture up from the Gulf. But this year its larger current swung north to Hudson Bay, its lesser branch south to Mexico, leaving the midlands arid and hot. Now, after nearly three months of deprivation, the great Missouri-Mississippi watershed has fused into a giant arc of aching thirst. The heartland bower of James Whitcomb Riley and Edgar Lee Masters, of Indiana and Illinois, has received less than half the normal spring rainfall. The soft night lawns...
...things seem more placid today, that is only because the hired guns are lawyers and lobbyists camouflaged in pinstripes. High-stakes hydrobattles are brewing throughout the West as it runs out of new water sources. This arid region -- stretching from the 100th meridian to the Pacific -- now finds itself unable to accommodate both its rapid urban growth and a powerful agribusiness that guzzles 85% of all water at heavily subsidized prices that offer little incentive for conservation...
Tebuthiuron, better known by the trade name Spike, is a herbicide used to get rid of mesquite from rangeland and brush from along utility power lines in the arid American Southwest. Made only by Eli Lilly, the giant Indianapolis chemical company, Spike attacks woody plants for up to three years. After searching for several years, the U.S. Department of Agriculture discovered that Spike not only kills weeds but may be the first effective herbicide against the hardy coca plant, the source of cocaine...
...recent Friday night, a score or more of folks took to dancing in the street anyway. Scuffed cowboy boots and battered sneakers kicked up dust and occasionally sent crushed aluminum beer / cans skittering across the gravel surface. The excited yelps of dancers wafted off into the desert toward arid mountain ranges swathed in the pale light of a distant moon, keeping silent watch over the U.S.-Mexican border...