Golf courses in cooler climates and high rainfall can use less that 1 acre-foot of water per acre each year. (One acre-foot of water is the amount of water covering a one-acre area - roughly one football field - to a depth of one foot, which is equal to 325,851 gallons.)
It’s not uncommon for Vegas golf courses to pay $1 million or more a year just for water. Next to labor, water’s the most expensive item in a course’s maintenance budget.
With all the golf courses in the area, what is their impact on water usage—especially in the summer? Las Vegas is the driest city of the 280 largest cities in the U.S. In an average year, it receives all of 4.5 inches of rain. (Phoenix gets twice as much.)
Lake Las Vegas in Henderson used 1,216,092,000 (1.2 billion) gallons in 2020. And through June this year, they've already used 417,334,000 gallons. For perspective, it takes 1,320,000 gallons to fill two Olympic-sized swimming pools. Henderson officials tell us raw water is taken directly from Lake Mead to replenish Lake Las Vegas.
In California, an average 18-hole golf course sprawls over 110 to 115 acres and conservatively uses almost 90 million gallons of water per year, enough to fill 136 Olympic-size swimming pools, said Mike Huck, a water management consultant who works with golf courses statewide.
Using water use data nationally, an 18-hole golf course uses an average of 152.5 acre-feet of water per year to irrigate 80.7 acres of turfgrass.
The Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA), working with local golf courses, successfully achieved this goal for the Las Vegas, Nevada region. Although Nevada uses less than two percent of the water appropriated on the Colorado River, it relies on the river for 90 percent of its water supply.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. golf courses consume more than 2 billion gallons of water per day, and since one in every 17 of U.S. courses is located in arid and semi-arid California, our 921 courses consume a sizable chunk of that total daily.
An average 18-hole golf facility in the Southwest region uses an average of 4 acre-feet of water per irrigated acre per year.
The records show 219 golf courses across Arizona used a total of 119,478 acre-feet of water in 2019. The average amount of water used per course was 504 acre-feet during the year, or about 450,000 gallons a day.
Why is Las Vegas so thirsty? Las Vegas is famous for dazzling fountains but the sprawling city that has been developed in the arid desert of Nevada, USA, is experiencing water shortages as its population grows in one of the fastest growing regions in the USA.
Golf courses use a variety of water sources for turfgrass irrigation including groundwater, surface water (lakes, rivers and reservoirs), recycled water, and municipal potable water supplies.
April 30, 2022, at 3:58 p.m. LAS VEGAS (AP) — A massive drought-starved reservoir on the Colorado River has become so depleted that Las Vegas now is pumping water from deeper within Lake Mead where other states downstream don't have access.
Audubon International estimates that the average American course uses 312,000 gallons per day. In a place like Palm Springs, where 57 golf courses challenge the desert, each course eats up a million gallons a day.
Fact: A single, 18-hole round of golf at a typical Las Vegas golf course requires 2,507 gallons of water.
It's better to water “deeply and infrequently,” Cutler says. About a third of an inch every two to three days is a good goal.
Fact: A single, 18-hole round of golf at a typical Las Vegas golf course requires 2,507 gallons of water . That’s not “virtual water,” it’s the actual amount of water that has to be sprinklered onto the golf course to get it ready, each night, for each golfer.
Golf is, somewhat oddly, one of the attractions of Las Vegas. Las Vegas has 61 golf courses. That’s three times the number of golf courses that Orlando has–and Orlando gets one-third more visitors. More to the point, Las Vegas is literally the driest city of the 280 largest cities in the U.S.–it gets just 4.5 inches of rain a year.
What the means is that, every time a golfer steps to a tee in Las Vegas, that one hole required 139 gallons of water to prepare, just for that one golfer that day. That means that a foursome in Las Vegas, playing 18 holes, will use as much water as typical family in the U.S. uses in a month.
Virtually all of Las Vegas’ water comes from Lake Mead, and Las Vegas is strictly limited by federal rules as to how much water it can take each year. While the city has tripled in size, it hasn’t added any new sources of water. Indeed, Lake Mead, in the midst of a years-long dry spell, is more than half empty.
And a determined recycling effort has produced pioneering results: the Las Vegas metro area now collects, cleans, and recycles to Lake Mead 94 percent of all water that hits a drain anywhere in the city. Essentially, the only water that isn’t directly recycled back to the source is the water used outdoors.
Every golf course in Las Vegas now functions under a mandatory water budget strictly limiting the amount of water they are allowed to use. The numbers above come from a progressively managed public course named Angel Park, ...
It is illegal to let your sprinkler spray water on a sidewalk or street, and Las Vegas specifies the kind of hose nozzle you can use to wash your car (trigger style, so it doesn’t simply pour water out when you’re not using it).
Depending on the location of the golf course and the climate, an 18-hole course can use on average 2.08 billion gallons of water per day. Depending on the amount of water needed, a typical golf course can spend between $7,000 and $108,000 per year. However, many courses use various methods to water their turfgrass spaces to help limit their need ...
As well as trying to reduce pollution, rising temperatures have seen more demand on water supplies that has to be managed to ensure there is always fresh water available. Over the past few years, more countries have had to impose water restrictions and spend more money on their infrastructure to ensure no water is lost.
This grass also needs irrigation , but that increases the demand for water. To counteract this, some courses have removed the areas of grass that are not needed and replaced it with cacti can desert-loving plants. These need little irrigation, and they are also a good contrast to the green fairways and greens.
Many countries have now imposed water restrictions on all of the businesses and farms that use water and limited the amount they can use in a year. Golf courses have a two-fold use for water. The first and greatest use is on the maintained turfgrass.
However, research has been going on into alternatives that not only need less water but can also handle more salt. Poor quality water often has a higher salt content, which can be bad for the grasses. By increasing their tolerance, water from more sources can be used.
Along with this, they will often have other facilities such as clubhouses, conference facilities, and other areas that may also need to use water. The restrictions placed on golf courses has meant that they have had to implement strategies to monitor and save water where possible.
This is the home of the "desert rule," because many courses don't want you hunting down golf balls out there (more on that later), so you simply play wayward shots as lateral hazards.
Still, the no. 1 rule in desert golf is to stay on the grass, whether it's fairway or rough, although many desert courses don't have much in the way of desert golf. Courses can play longer than their posted yardage because you may not want to hit as many drivers on some of the more narrow holes.
Summertime golf in the northwest's "high desert". This may come as a surprise, but there's desert golf in western Colorado, the Pacific Northwest and even Canada. Yep, that's right; there's desert golf in British Columbia, Canada (Okanagan-Thompson Plateau).
But if you're looking for a bargain desert golf destination that might be under the radar, consider one that I haven't mentioned earlier: the El Paso, Texas-Southern New Mexico region , which sits around 4,500 feet of elevation. El Paso has a couple of outstanding public courses – 27-hole Painted Dunes and Butterfield Trail. Painted Dunes was designed by Ken Dye and Jeffrey Brauer. Well-maintained, the rack rates for daily play is between $25 and $35.
Tucson, Arizona: Just 90 minutes south of Scottsdale, Tucson certainly has a different feel. While there are certainly high end facilities like Marana's The Golf Club at Dove Mountain, overall it's less expensive to play in Tucson. The area has several resort courses such the Notah Begay-designed Sewailo Golf Club at Casino Del Sol. Opened in 2013, Sewailo is another course with lots of turf and water, so you really have to be offline to hit it in the desert. Other top quality resort courses include Ventana Canyon, Westin La Paloma, Starr Pass, Omni Tucson National Resort & Spa and Arizona National Golf Club, the home course for the University of Arizona Golf Club. The city also has a solid municipal system of courses, and the area is also home to Tubac Resort, where much of the movie "Tin Cup" was filmed.
Most of the year in the Southwest, desert golf is usually played in pretty hot conditions, sometimes well over triple digits as the day heats up. The desert, of course, is very dry. Temperatures in the 90s might not feel that hot because of the lack of humidity, but the danger here is on several levels.
And speaking of cold, it can be very cold in the desert , especially in the winter during early morning and evening. Frost delays in the winter and early spring in Las Vegas and Arizona are certainly not uncommon.
Playing golf in Las Vegas doesn’t need to break the bank, and there are plenty of fantastic courses located within easy reach of the Las Vegas Strip that cater to the more budget-conscious golfer.
Las Vegas is a perfect choice for those looking for some affordable yet luxurious golf courses, with many mid-tier priced courses offering outstanding service and amenities alongside immaculately groomed fairways and greens. Here’s my pick of the best mid-level priced courses in and around Las Vegas.
With three courses featuring in the top 100 golf courses in the world, Las Vegas is a fantastic place if you’re looking for the ultimate golfing experience! With stunning palm-lined courses designed by leading course professionals, these courses are sure to please with their luscious grounds, impeccable fairways, and silky-smooth greens.
Whether you’re a seasoned pro looking to tick off a world-famous course from your bucket list or you’re looking for some affordable golf courses while you’re on vacation, Las Vegas offers an exciting and incredibly diverse range of golfing for all budgets and skill levels.