Groundwater is the only source of water for the city of Ridgecrest, the U.S. Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, and the farms and businesses located throughout the Indian Wells Valley. At current pumping rates, this basin will likely run out of water within 40 years. That may seem like an issue for future leaders. Yet the longer the problem is ignored, the more difficult it will be to solve. And this problem has been ignored for decades. This situation is not exclusive to the Valley — aquifers around the world, in places ranging from Spain and Chile to Iran and China, are among those experiencing rapidly dropping groundwater levels. But according to recent research published in the science journal Nature, the Indian Wells Valley Basin is one of a handful of California regions experiencing some of the world’s most rapidly declining aquifers.