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How green are the greens?
Article by Adam Thomas
Photos courtesy of Mehrnaz Haghdadi
April 21, 2026
UD doctoral students study the impact of golf courses on water scarcity in the Colorado River Basin
In 2023, University of Delaware doctoral candidate Mehrnaz Haghdadi and doctoral student Nora Lucas headed to the Colorado River Basin to conduct fieldwork for Haghdadi’s research focused on indigenous water sovereignty.
As they drove through the desert, they kept seeing patches of green rising from the arid landscape. Haghdadi, who is from Iran and had never seen a golf course in her home country, had absolutely no idea what she was looking at.
“I'd never seen this much green in the desert before; it was something strange,” said Haghdadi, who, along with Lucas, studies in the
Department of Geography and Spatial Sciences
. “I couldn't understand that the light green covered landscapes we kept seeing were golf courses in the middle of the desert. So, all the unique curiosities came after that, and I was wondering about where they get the water from.”
Those unique curiosities turned into a paper, “
Golf (dis)courses: A political ecology analysis of water usage in an arid area
,” published in the journal
Environment and Planning: Nature and Space
The research focused on the water use of 12 golf courses in St. George, Utah, an arid, rapidly growing city in the Colorado River Basin. The Colorado River Basin provides water to seven states and more than 40 million people, but is facing an escalating water crisis as the two largest reservoirs in the United States fall to historically low levels due to a 20-year drought and rising demand.
Drawing on spatial analysis of the golf courses, city water-use records and policy documents, they found that the golf courses consume more water than both local residential use and regional averages.
Maintaining lush, green landscapes in these climates requires extensive irrigation, which strains local water resources and can exacerbate drought conditions. In addition, the construction and maintenance of golf courses increase water demand, impacting local surface water and aquifers, which can, in turn, create tensions among interest groups and exacerbate water insecurity.
From 2018 to 2022, golf courses in St. George withdrew an average of 1.99 billion gallons of water per year, equivalent to the water use of 32,900 residents and accounting for 38% of the county’s secondary water use (untreated water primarily used for irrigation).
In addition to examining the water use of these golf courses, Haghdadi and Lucas also focused on the discourse surrounding golf courses in the area — namely, how golf courses continue to operate with minimal restrictions despite being large water users in the Colorado River Basin.
The Colorado River Basin provides water to seven states and more than 40 million people, but is facing an escalating water crisis as the two largest reservoirs in the United States fall to historically low levels due to a 20-year drought and rising demand. Haghdadi and Lucas’ research was inspired by a trip the two took together to the Colorado River Basin in 2023.
Consumption over conservation
Lucas said the golf industry tends to overemphasize economic contributions and downplay water consumption as a strategy of continued water extraction.
“We discuss how the golf courses in the region are being marketed, and the discourse that the golf industry is talking about is centered on the tourism industry,” Lucas said. “They tend to say, ‘Yes, golf courses use a lot of water, but we provide so much economic benefit to the local community.’ We're finding they, in fact, use a very big chunk of water, downplay the environmental impact, and then overestimate the amount of money that's being brought in by tourism.”
The discourse on water use in the Colorado River Basin, amid competing interests in the political sphere, tends to overemphasize how the golf industry generates perceived financial revenue and benefits. When it comes to water, though, the golf industry points to agriculture as the biggest culprit to evade its own environmental responsibility. Although agriculture is a huge sector statewide, golf uses a lot of water locally in St. George.
Tourism development policies incentivize the reallocation of water into larger golf courses, which can negatively impact residents and their access to water. In this way, golf development projects not only increase demand for water resources but also reshape how water and wealth are distributed at the local scale.
“In these ways, they usually do not talk about golf courses,” said Mehrnaz. “The conversations are mostly centered on the water being used in the agricultural sector.”
While agriculture does indeed use a lot of water, it also provides essential food production, whereas golf tourism tends to benefit only an elite subset of society. That is especially true of privately owned golf courses.
The researchers note that golf tourism primarily benefits an elite segment of society. Private golf courses often have high income requirements, membership fees, dress code policies, and are built in coordination with sprawling, luxury rental developments.
While public golf courses charge an entrance fee and are open to the public, a private golf course is usually open only to members and wealthy visitors invited to closed tournaments.
The researchers found that private courses used more water than public ones. In fact, while the total annual water consumption used by golf courses from 2018 to 2022 decreased by an average of 3.9%, all four of the privately owned golf courses increased their water usage. The biggest culprit was the privately owned Sand Hollow Resort, which used the most water per year, at an average of 341 million gallons, twice the average of the other golf courses.
“I'm from Kansas City, and I used to work at a golf club when I was in college, so I had a lot of experience knowing how a private golf course operates and how much money people are spending to be part of this very exclusive social club,” Lucas said. “You had to make at least $250,000 to even qualify to be a part of the Country Club that I worked at. That has a big impact on who can benefit from these places. There's a lot of resources, a lot of money and a lot of water being invested into these spaces, and they're a bit exclusionary.”
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