Water Issues

As can be seen in Figure 14 (Clark et al., 2019), Missouri is the largest withdrawer of aquifer water, with 91% being used for agriculture, livestock, domestic and community water supplies. As mentioned in the geology section, mining is a large industrial user of water, but this information is not reported in these data sources. The principal withdrawal layers (87%) are those within the Salem Plateau (and are confined in the Springfield Plateau). In Figure 13 (Hays et al., 2016) it is obvious that both consumers and demand is increasing for withdrawal which raises the question of who is in charge.