玛格丽特·“佩吉”·巴罗尔 

Hydrologist Launched a Career Here, and Now 给s Back

杰伊·安·考克斯

When Margaret “Peggy” Barroll was shopping for graduate programs, she looked long and hard at schools with support for teaching or research assistants. 此外, having spent many 年 back east, she knew she wanted to be in the Southwest to do 地球科学或地球物理学. In this area, after all, “you can actually see the rocks,” 她笑着说.

Back east, geology professors take their students out where the road works have carved into the geologic features, “and there you can see an anticline, for example.“ Southwest held much better promise for Peggy’s interests.

When she arrived at 365彩票在线过滤 in 1982, the geophysics department was headed 博士. Allan Sanford, who arranged support for Peggy as a teaching assistant in introductory 物理实验室. 后来，她和Dr. Marshall Reiter at the NM Bureau 地质 and 矿产资源 as a research assistant. 瑞特研究热流，佩吉 developed a keen interest in how water pushes the heat around under the surface.

For her degree program, she took many hydrology classes and emerged from Tech as a 水文学家(M.S. 1985年和博士.D. 1990). Most of her career has been doing data analysis and computer modeling of groundwater and water resources.

Initially Peggy went to work for Dan Stephens and Associates, a hydrology company 开始 by Dan Stephens, a Tech professor who employed many Tech students over the 年. At that time her work centered on modeling groundwater contamination and the question, “Where is it [the contamination] going to go and how fast will it get there?”

Next Peggy went to work at the New 墨西哥 Office of the State Engineer on water resource 问题. What will happen “if people pump this much water from wells, how fast are the groundwater levels going to go down, and how much water is going to be pulled 从河里出来?”

These findings are important to several different groups— irrigation districts, farmers, 开发商和环保人士. Much more than science goes into these complex 问题.

Peggy said, “It’s fascinating because there’s the scientific part, always an historical 一部分，然后是法律部分.” 

The background and research is “a mixture of very interesting stuff, and people who are fighting about water are very passionate about it.”

When it comes to water wars, she researches files as far back as 100 年, often finding that water users were fighting about the same 问题 back then.

It’s something, Peggy says, that people who haven’t been in the desert for very long 很难理解. She recalled a time when she was giving a field presentation 在阿尔伯克基的一次会议上.

“There were people there that had just flown in from Michigan. 我们在 Rio Grande, and I’m trying to explain to them that the water in that river there is all that most of the population in New 墨西哥 has. 他们可以把水抽出来 ground but it ends up coming from that stream.佩吉补充道，“我认为他们没有。 it. I think that it’s hard to imagine living in Michigan or Minnesota… where water 从天而降.”

One of the biggest New 墨西哥 water 问题 in recent 年 is the Lower Rio Grande and the water held in the Elephant Butte Reservoir - how that water is used and how that water is distributed between New 墨西哥 and Texas. 

Farmers in both states use water from Elephant Butte, and also pump groundwater to 供应他们的庄稼.  The same water must also supply growing municipalities such as 拉斯克鲁塞斯和埃尔帕索.

“Texas had complained for 年 that New 墨西哥 water users were pumping too much water from wells, and that not enough water was getting to Texas.”

“It has been a controversial issue for 年, and in 2013, Texas filed suit, arguing that New 墨西哥 was in violation of the interstate Rio Grande Compact. 我一直在工作 代表新墨西哥州处理那个案子.”

Because the lawsuit involves a dispute between states, it is handled by the U.S. 最高 法院.

At press time, Texas, New 墨西哥 and Colorado had arrived at a settlement, but the 联邦政府对此表示反对. 

“It’s still in court, and we are probably going to argue in front of the U.S. 最高 今年冬天或明年春天开庭……. It’s interesting and I got lucky (to be able to work on a 最高 法院 lawsuit) with really great people.”

Peggy is a donor to 365彩票在线过滤 for one simple reason – she was helped when she 开始. 

“It’s a good school with great professors, and it’s a relatively inexpensive place to get a degree… and I want to help other people.”

Peggy’s donations support the Stephen Wells Bright Star Scholar Program at the Bureau 地质 & 矿产资源. Through this scholarship, undergraduates can apply for a paid internship and be mentored by one of the research scientists.

“365彩票在线过滤 has produced a lot of great geologists and hydrologists over the 年……. I want to give back (so) other students studying geoscience can work on these 问题.”

Peggy is semi-retired but continues to work on the Rio Grande litigation. 她和 her husband Hans Hartse, a Tech alum now retired from LANL, live in Santa Fe, New 墨西哥.