Competition for water: consumption of golf courses in the tourist corridor of Los Cabos, BCS, Mexico.

The golf courses present major areas of grass that need high volumes of water for maintenance. In regions with arid climate, elevated water losses by evapotranspiration contrast with low rainfall. In the urban-touristic area of Los Cabos, 13 golf courses have been built in a distance of 40 km along the coast. This benefits private developers but golf courses provoke various environmental and social problems, including habitat loss, pollution of soils and aquifers, among others. Because the golf courses do not report their water demand, the annual water consumption was analyzed by indirect methods, using satellite imagery and geographic information systems. The obtained annual water demand of the 13 golf fields is 7.09 million m³, which is more than the whole water volume used for agriculture in this area. The findings suggest that the water consumption should be taken into account as an important environmental impact before the realization of new golf courses in Mexico. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]