Carlsbad, New Mexico in the context of U.S. Route 285 in New Mexico

The Southwestern United States, also known as the American Southwest or simply the Southwest, is a geographic and cultural region of the United States that includes Arizona and New Mexico, along with adjacent portions of California, Colorado, Nevada, Oklahoma, Texas, and Utah. The largest cities by metropolitan area are Phoenix, Las Vegas, El Paso, Albuquerque, and Tucson. Before 1848, in the historical region of Santa Fe de Nuevo México as well as parts of Alta California and Coahuila y Tejas, settlement was almost non-existent outside of New Mexico's pueblos and Spanish or Mexican municipalities. Much of the area had been a part of New Spain and Mexico until the United States acquired the area through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 and the smaller Gadsden Purchase in 1854.

While the region's boundaries are not officially defined, there have been attempts to do so. One such definition is from the Mojave Desert in California in the west (117° west longitude) to Carlsbad, New Mexico, in the east (104° west longitude); another says that it extends from the Mexico–United States border in the south to the southern areas of Colorado, Utah, and Nevada in the north (39° north latitude). In another definition, the core Southwestern U.S. includes only the states of Arizona and New Mexico; others focus on the land within the old Spanish and Mexican borders of the Nuevo México Province or the later American New Mexico Territory.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park is a national park of the United States in the Guadalupe Mountains of southeastern New Mexico. The primary attraction of the park is the show cave Carlsbad Cavern. Visitors can hike in on their own via the natural entrance or take an elevator from the visitor center.

The park entrance is located on US Highway 62/180, approximately 18 miles (29 km) southwest of Carlsbad, New Mexico. The park has two entries on the National Register of Historic Places: The Caverns Historic District and the Rattlesnake Springs Historic District. Approximately two-thirds of the park has been set aside as a wilderness area, helping to ensure that no future changes will be made to the habitat.

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, in New Mexico, US, is a deep geological repository licensed to store transuranic radioactive waste for 10,000 years. The storage rooms at the WIPP are 2,150 feet (660 m) underground in a salt formation of the Delaware Basin. The waste is from the research and production of United States nuclear weapons only. The plant started operation in 1999, and the project is estimated to cost $19 billion in total. It is the world's third such facility, after Germany's Morsleben radioactive waste repository and the Schacht Asse II salt mine.

WIPP is located approximately 26 miles (42 km) east of Carlsbad, in eastern Eddy County, in an area known as the southeastern New Mexico nuclear corridor, which also includes the National Enrichment Facility near Eunice, New Mexico, the Waste Control Specialists low-level waste disposal facility just over the state line near Andrews, Texas, and the International Isotopes, Incorporated facility to be built near Eunice.

Eddy County is a county located in the U.S. state of New Mexico. As of the 2020 census, the population was 62,314. Its county seat and largest city is Carlsbad. The county was created in 1891 and later organized in 1892. It is north of the Texas state line.

Eddy County comprises the Carlsbad-Artesia, NM Micropolitan Statistical Area.

Guadalupe Mountains National Park is a national park of the United States in the Guadalupe Mountains, east of El Paso, Texas. The mountain range includes Guadalupe Peak, the highest point in Texas at 8,751 feet (2,667 m), and El Capitan used as a landmark by travelers on the route later followed by the Butterfield Overland Mail stagecoach line. The ruins of a stagecoach station stand near the Pine Springs visitor center. The restored Frijole Ranch contains a small museum of local history and is the trailhead for Smith Spring. The park covers 86,367 acres (134.9 sq mi; 349.5 km) in the same mountain range as Carlsbad Caverns National Park, about 25 miles (40 km) to the north in New Mexico. The Guadalupe Peak Trail winds through pinyon pine and Douglas-fir forests as it ascends over 3,000 feet (910 m) to the summit of Guadalupe Peak, with views of El Capitan and the Chihuahuan Desert.

The McKittrick Canyon trail leads to a stone cabin built in the early 1930s as the vacation home of Wallace Pratt, a petroleum geologist who donated the land. Dog Canyon, on the northern park boundary at the Texas-New Mexico State line, is accessed via Carlsbad, New Mexico or Dell City, Texas. Camping is available at the Pine Springs campground and at Dog Canyon. A public corral for livestock is available by reservation. The park observes Mountain Time.