Serving as the “lifeline of the
Southwest,” and one of the most heavily regulated rivers in the
world, the Colorado River provides water to 35 million people and
more than 4 million acres of farmland in a region encompassing
some 246,000 square miles.
From its headwaters northwest of Denver in the Rocky Mountains,
the 1,450-mile long river and its tributaries pass through parts
of seven states: Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico,
Nevada, Utah and Wyoming and is also used by the
Republic of Mexico. Along the way, almost every drop of the
Colorado River is allocated for use.
The Colorado River Basin is also home to a range of habitats and
ecosystems from mountain to desert to ocean.
On August 14, the Bureau of Reclamation will temporarily reduce
water releases from Davis Dam to approximately 2,200 cubic feet
second from 3 a.m. to 3 p.m. MST. River users should exercise
extra caution during these times as lower river flows may
temporarily expose or create hazards such as sandbars and
unstable riverbanks. Floating or submerged debris or other
unfamiliar obstacles may also pose potential hazards until the
river returns to normal flow release levels. The reduced flow
along the river reaches below Davis Dam support a request from
the cities of Laughlin, Nevada, and Bullhead City, Arizona, as
part of an ongoing caddisfly abatement study being conducted to
combat the nuisance species that negatively impacts businesses
and visitors to the area. The experiments are designed to
maximize benefits to Colorado River communities, while taking
into consideration water delivery requirements, impacts to
hydropower production, and local recreation.
In the 1960s, Arizona was facing a crisis. Its aquifers were
depleting and its ground was sinking. That issue prompted a
major infrastructure project that would forever change what was
possible in the state, a 336 mile system of canals that take a
big part of the state’s Colorado River water allocation and
diverts it to Phoenix and Tucson, as well as farmland in
Central Arizona. This week, we look at how the Central Arizona
Project came to be, and what it means to the state. .
Sixteen tons of radioactive uranium tailings once sat near the
banks of the Colorado River, putting the waterway in peril of
contamination on the outskirts of Moab. Removal began in 2009
and was halted for a time due to lack of funding for the U.S.
Department of Energy cleanup project, but work is continuing at
a steady clip — with nearly 15 tons shipped by rail to a
disposal cell about 30 miles away at Crescent Junction. At
this rate, the tailings removal may be completed by next year,
but much work remains to be done afterward for full remediation
of the area in which the uranium mill operated for nearly three
decades.
Water users in Western Colorado are awaiting results of
ramped-up testing efforts to control invasive zebra mussels
after they were found in the Colorado River and an irrigation
canal near Grand Junction. The mussels spread quickly, and can
cause wide-reaching harms such as damage to irrigation
equipment and disruptions to river ecosystems for native fish.
Ongoing testing is aimed at finding the source of the young
zebra mussel larvae and stopping them before they become fully
established. “It’s really kind of looking for a needle in a
haystack,” said Rachel Gonzales, a spokeswoman for Colorado
Parks and Wildlife.
In an effort to prevent smallmouth bass — an invasive,
voracious predator that feasts on native fish, including the
threatened humpback chub — from establishing populations below
Glen Canyon Dam, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in early July
began releasing colder water from Lake Powell via the river
outlet works (which are 100 feet lower in a cooler part of the
water column) in addition to the hydropower penstocks. …
Reclamation chose this option with the goal of keeping water
temperatures below the dam under 15.5 degrees Celsius (60
degrees Fahrenheit), which is too cold for smallmouth bass to
thrive. But a report by a group of scientists at the
Center for Colorado River Studies at Utah State University says
that factors other than temperature should be taken into
consideration when trying to manage the nonnative
species.
Considered the largest Indian Water Rights settlement in U.S.
history, the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights
Settlement Act of 2024 may right historic wrongs. In 1922, when
governments allocated Colorado River waters, tribal nations
were notably excluded from the conversation. After decades of
disputes, this $5 billion act would build the necessary
infrastructure for tribal nations, like the Navajo, to bring
water to their people. … As it stands, nearly a third of
Navajo households lack running water. This bill would fund a
pipeline to divert Colorado River water to these areas in need.
Additionally, until that infrastructure is built, the Navajo
and Hopi tribes would be able to lease their water to
non-tribal entities in Arizona.
Colorado State University researchers are counting greenhouse
gases released from irrigation for the first time, making
top-emitting counties more visible alongside ways to help cut
emissions. Agriculture relies on irrigation, the CSU
researchers said. It’s a vital tool for farmers and ranchers to
water crops when the rain just isn’t there — an increasingly
common problem with over two decades of drought and a changing
climate in Colorado. But the process of pushing water through
pumps, canals and center-pivot sprinklers into soils can add to
greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
The Biden administration will pay farmers in the Western U.S.
to save water as the region contends with historic drought. The
Department of Agriculture announced Thursday that it will
invest up to $400 million in paying farmers in 11 states to
reduce their water consumption while continuing to produce
commodities. The department said the action is expected to
conserve up to 50,000 acre-feet of water — or about 16 billion
gallons. … The water districts preliminarily selected to
be part of the program include parts of Idaho, Utah, Oregon,
California, Washington state, New Mexico, Wyoming, Texas,
Montana, Colorado and Nevada.
Much of the water in the U.S. West is transported across vast
geographical areas by large infrastructure projects known as
interbasin water transfers. Two of these projects in particular
make up 85% of all energy-related greenhouse gas emissions
associated with U.S. interbasin transfer—one in Arizona and the
other in California—according to the new research published
this week in the journal Nature Water. The project in
Arizona is known as the Central Arizona Project, and in
California it’s the State Water Project. “You hear a lot about
these big projects and how much energy they use,” said Avery
Driscoll, a doctoral student in CSU’s Department of Soil and
Crop Sciences and the paper’s lead author. “We were curious how
much of that was actually attributable to agriculture and what
the emissions impact was.”
It’s been a very hot summer, with temperature records falling
almost daily. And that has everyone wondering: Will our water
supply hold up as water is used to keep plants alive and more
water evaporates into the air? Well, so far, Lake Mead and Lake
Powell upstream are doing well. According to reports, they are
37% full — it hasn’t been that high since 2021. That doesn’t’
mean we can breathe easy. But it raises questions. First, why
is it doing even that well? And how close are the seven river
states and tribes to coming up with an agreement on cuts in
water usage? The federal government has said the states need to
agree by 2026.
As crews aggressively fight four Front Range wildfires,
Colorado water officials say water delivery has not been
interrupted even as they keep a close eye on nearby
infrastructure that could be impacted. The Alexander Mountain
fire, the Stone Canyon fire, the Quarry fire and the Lake Shore
fire led to one fatality, forced thousands of people from their
homes, and burned structures as of Wednesday, even as dry and
sweltering conditions are forecast to continue on the Front
Range. Among the resources in the path of danger are
reservoirs, power lines, treatment plants, and miles of canals
and pipes that deliver water to cities, farms and ecosystems
across the Front Range and eastern Colorado.
Leaders from the Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe and Southern San
Juan Paiute Tribe led a unified call for federal support of the
Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Agreement
in Washington last week. Navajo Nation Council Speaker
Crystalyne Curley, Council Delegate Carl Slater and Navajo
Nation President Buu Nygren met with Congressional members and
the U.S. Department of the Interior, and testified at a hearing
July 23 to examine several proposed Indian water rights
settlements in Arizona, New Mexico and Montana which
collectively total more than $12 billion.
“Sometimes the crazy ideas lead to watershed improvements.”
That was a key takeaway from new research conducted by Utah
State University, published in the American Society of Civil
Engineers Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management.
Using online spreadsheets during video calls, 26 Colorado River
Basin managers and experts took on water user roles to discuss
consuming, banking and trading Colorado River water. As Western
states face aridity and reservoir levels depleting, more of the
water available for consumption and conservation comes from
reservoir inflow, not storage. Water banking gives users more
flexibility to respond to variable inflow and declining
storage. Banking contrasts with current river management that
requires California, Arizona, Nevada and Mexico to reduce their
consumption as Lake Mead levels decline.
For decades beginning in the 1920s, farmers in Crowley County,
Colorado, prospered off the abundance of water from the
Colorado River. It fueled a lucrative agricultural industry,
and as nearby cities grew and demand for water surged, farmers
sold shares of their water rights to developers for as much as
$10,000 each. Then came a long period of drought, and farmers
who had bet on natural rainfall to replenish their water supply
watched as thousands of acres of once-fertile land dried up.
… In his new book, On the Move: The Overheating
Earth and the Uprooting of America, Lustgarten revisits Crowley
and other climate-vulnerable locales to explore the
intersection between economics and a warming planet, and how
these forces will shape the massive population shifts expected
in the US in coming decades.
The San Miguel Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) voted on
Wednesday, July 24, to sign onto the Western District (Colorado
Counties) letter to preserve Shoshone water rights. The letter,
addressed to Colorado Senators Michael Bennet and John
Hickenlooper, is in support of the Colorado River Water
Conservation District’s aim to acquire and permanently protect
the Shoshone water rights. The Shoshone Power Plant, off
Interstate 70 near Glenwood Springs, possesses the oldest
senior water rights directly on the Colorado River in Colorado.
The plant generates 15 megawatts of electricity. This flow from
Shoshone is critical in helping avoid low water levels further
down the river.
As water shortages loom in Baja California, the state’s plans
for a desalination plant are back on track after years of
delay. An undeveloped 50-acre plot next to a power plant in
northern Rosarito Beach – envisioned as the site of the
proposed desalination facility – is now in Mexican government
hands. By the end of the year, the state of Baja California
expects to invite prospective developers to submit bids.
Supporters say it’s not a moment too soon. Global warming
threatens to reduce future deliveries from the Colorado River,
the state’s main water supply. Like San Diego, Baja
California’s coastal regions are largely dependent on the
Colorado River for water, and authorities face growing pressure
to find alternate sources.
When the Boulder City Municipal Golf Course opened in 1973, it
was a kind of golden age for golf as a suburban pastime. It was
a time when everyone’s dad had a set of clubs. When Jack
Nicklaus, Lee Trevino and Gary Player were on TV every weekend
and huge, grassy courses were opening up all over the deserted
Southwest. Lake Mead was full, or close to it. Droughts were
something that happened in other places in the world and talk
of changing climate focused on what was described as a coming
Ice Age and the population of Clark County was about 331,000. A
little more than 50 years later, the lake is some 200 feet
below full, more than 2.3 million people call the region home
and plans are being made for a possible future when there will
not even be enough water flowing through the Colorado river to
generate electricity.
Tracking every move of the Colorado River’s biggest reservoirs
has become a routine for water managers across the West. As
runoff season comes to a close, the latest hopeful sign comes
from Lake Powell, the country’s second-biggest
reservoir. Its water level this week was the highest it has
been in more than three years — 3,586 feet. It’s a mark of two
good snowpack years in a row and successful conservation
efforts.That’s a positive change after the reservoir hit an
all-time low in April 2022, especially in light of news
that Glen Canyon Dam’s lower tubes could be damaged.
Some of this success can be attributed to the 2019 Drought
Contingency Plan, where Lower Basin states — Nevada,
California and Arizona — voluntarily took cuts in their river
water and increased conservation, said John Entsminger, general
manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority. … But in
the larger context of what were considered average conditions
between 2000 and 2020, the Colorado River Basin isn’t where it
needs to be to mitigate Western drought that’s only intensified
over the past two decades.
Invasive zebra mussels are causing issues for the Western
Slope’s ecosystem and the situation could create damage to
regional agriculture. The species was discovered in both the
Colorado River and Government Highline Canal in mid-July.
Following the discovery, Colorado Parks and Wildlife initiated
an Invasive Species Rapid Response Plan, which includes
increased testing of the waters. On Friday, Colorado Parks
and Wildlife announced that more zebra mussel veligers, or
larvae, were found in the Colorado River and Government
Highline Canal with the increased testing. With the detections,
both bodies of water are considered positive for zebra mussels.
Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt is warning that
negotiations over how to share a drought-stricken Colorado
River among Western states are moving too slowly — creating a
potential melee over dwindling supplies — and blaming the Biden
administration for failing to aggressively intervene. A series
of existing agreements for management of the Colorado River
will expire at the end of 2026, which prompted officials from
the seven states that share the river to begin formal
negotiations more than a year ago. Those discussions largely
center on how the states will share the pain of a shrinking
water supply. Some estimates suggest the 1,450-mile-long river
contains 20 percent less water than it did in 2000 due to
persistent drought.
There’s a lithium bonanza happening at the Salton Sea. … The
boom started when one of the world’s largest supplies of
lithium was discovered one mile below the dying lake. The metal
is required to produce electric car batteries and is essential
to reducing carbon emissions. Yet lost in the excitement
about the money and new jobs that the mining projects could
bring are the concerns of the people who live there. The
impoverished area — which is more than 80% Latino — already has
a childhood asthma rate that is more than twice the national
average. The asthma cases have been tied to the toxic dust
created as the Salton Sea recedes from lack of water. And some
local residents fear that the number of respiratory cases could
soar even higher as the lithium mining projects drink up more
of the area’s much fought over allocation from the Colorado
River.
… The Imperial Irrigation District — the biggest user of
water from the 1,450-mile (2,334-kilometer) river — has offered
to pay farmers to shut off irrigation to forage crops including
alfalfa for up to 60 days during the peak of the sweltering
summer. While farmers often balk at the idea of letting fields
lie fallow, at least 80% of properties eligible for the new
program have been signed up to participate, said Tina Shields,
the district’s water department manager. “We don’t like to do
fallowing down here,” Shields said. “They’re making business
decisions.” The move comes as farmers of alfalfa and other
crops that feed cattle have seen the price of hay plummet amid
rising supply. For many, that means a summer crop of alfalfa
could bring in less in revenue than the $300 in federal funding
per acre-foot of water that the water district is willing to
fork over if they simply stop watering it, experts said.
House lawmakers should move quickly to adopt nine new water
settlements for Native American tribes across the West, along
with updates to a handful of others, or risk seeing the $12
billion price tag grow even larger, a subcommittee chair warned
Tuesday. The House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water,
Wildlife and Fisheries reviewed a dozen bills that would enact
new agreements or update existing settlements for tribal water
resources across Arizona, California, New Mexico and Montana.
“Few issues in the American West are as pressing or vexing as
the escalating water crisis,” subcommittee Chair Cliff Bentz
(R-Ore.) said. “As the water in the West continues to dry up
and become more and more dear, tribal water issues are becoming
more and more critical.”
Despite decades of evidence, there is still a false binary
choice being hoisted upon Coloradans by municipalities and
water development entities — either we almost completely
dewater our rivers as they flow through lower elevation
communities, decimating river health, river recreation and
local economic opportunities, or we provide municipal water to
rapidly growing suburban cities on the Front Range. Instead,
our state government should help prioritize river restoration
by championing in-channel water delivery projects. Water
should be left in river channels until it reaches the nearest
adjacent diversion point to its delivery location. Hundreds, if
not thousands of ditches, tunnels and pipelines already exist,
and basin-wide assessments of these diversion points were done
under the Colorado Water Plan. —Written by Evan Stafford, communications director for
American Whitewater
A House Natural Resources subcommittee will review a $5 billion
deal to ensure tribal water rights in northeastern Arizona,
including funds for a new pipeline connecting Lake Powell to
tribal reservation in the Colorado River Basin. In the Senate,
the Indian Affairs Committee will also take up water rights
legislation, along with tribal forest management legislation.
The House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Water, Wildlife and
Fisheries will hold a hearing Tuesday to review the
“Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act of
2024,” along with nearly a dozen other measures addressing
Native American water rights.
Leaders of the Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe and San Juan Southern
Paiute Tribe gathered Wednesday to sign off on a $5 billion
water rights settlement that has taken decades. “Today
marks a very historic day for the three tribes that
we have here,” said Craig Andrews, vice chairman of the Hopi
Tribal Council, at the signing ceremony. “This is not
just an Indian water settlement; it is an Arizona water
settlement,” he added. The agreement stems from the
recently introduced Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights
Settlement Act of 2024, which would authorize the $5
billion to finance critical water infrastructure
projects.
The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has begun water releases from
Glen Canyon Dam to cool the temperature of the Colorado River
and slow the reproduction of an unwanted fish. The exotic and
predatory smallmouth bass poses a threat to native species like
the threatened humpback chub. KNAU’s Melissa Sevigny spoke with
Reclamation’s Bill Stewart about the experimental program. So
how often do you anticipate having to do these cool water
releases? We’re in the really early phases of the
implementation…and we anticipate intermittently continuing
flows are needed to maintain that daily average water
temperature below that target of 15.5 degrees Celsius. We’re
doing this at locations where we know or suspect smallmouth
bass to reside below the dam.
Water managers in the upper Colorado River basin took another
step this week toward a more formal water conservation program
that they say will benefit the upper basin states.
Representatives from Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico
unanimously passed a motion Wednesday at a meeting of the Upper
Colorado River Commission to explore creating a way to track,
measure and store conserved water in Lake Powell and other
upper basin reservoirs. The motion directed staff and state
advisers to prepare a proposal that lays out criteria for
conservation projects and creates a mechanism for generating
credit for those projects.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife announced Tuesday that it has
discovered zebra mussels in the Colorado River and the
Government Highline Canal, nearly two years after the invasive
species was first detected in the state. The small,
freshwater mussels are native to lakes in Russia and Ukraine,
but they are known globally for their rapid reproduction rate.
Wildlife officials say the species poses an extreme risk to
local ecosystems because zebra mussels kill off native plankton
that native species rely on for food. Infestations can also
devastate water infrastructure because the mussels attach
themselves to surfaces in large clusters, clogging waterways
and drainage systems. CPW said they discovered the newly
confirmed zebra mussel population through routine plankton
samples taken in early July.
Four states in the drought-stricken Colorado River Basin,
including Colorado, want credit for conserving water, but water
users and officials have big questions about how to make it
happen. … Cutting back on water use is a big topic of
conversation in the Colorado River Basin, which supplies water
to 40 million people and is enduring warmer temperatures and a
two-decade megadrought. Officials from each of the seven
states in the basin are weighing who might have to cut their
use and how to manage the basin’s reservoirs in high-stakes
negotiations over the river’s future after the current rules
expire in 2026.
The second-largest reservoir in the country hit its peak for
the year this week. Lake Powell, which straddles Utah’s shared
state line with Arizona, reached its fullest point for 2024 on
Wednesday. The reservoir reached an elevation of 3,587.17 feet
above sea level, or 42% full, according to the federal Bureau
of Reclamation. As snowpack has melted on mountains across the
West this summer, the water has fed rivers and streams —
including the Colorado River, which flows into Lake Powell. The
reservoir will begin to fall over the rest of the calendar year
as spring runoff slows. In March, hydrologists predicted
that Lake Powell’s capacity would peak at 37% this year, which
the reservoir has now exceeded. Lake Powell reached a maximum
capacity of 38% in 2023, following a record-breaking winter in
Utah and across the West. The year before that, the reservoir
suffered a record low, falling to a dire 22% of full capacity.
Erosion is happening before our eyes. I took
pictures on June 21 to remember this moment that is now
commonplace worldwide, people meeting extreme weather at home —
in our case, Castle Valley, Utah. Add other pictures of most of
Grand County flooding, including downtown Moab and you have a
more complete picture of the week we had two flash floods
within days of each other. Highway 124, locally known as
the “River Road,” looked like the first day of creation as
dozens and dozens of pink sediment-laden waterfalls were
cascading off red rock cliffs reaching the Colorado River in
seconds. I didn’t know there could be that much free falling
water in the desert in times of drought. San Juan
County also experienced violent flash floods that
reshaped and redistributed sand and land within the Valley of
the Gods that no god of flesh or stone could control.
— By Terry Tempest Williams, writer-in-residence at the
Harvard Divinity School. She divides her time between Utah and
Massachusetts
Colorado Parks and Wildlife is investigating an outbreak of
sores on rainbow trout in Eagle County waterways, with bacteria
and stress the primary suspects. The rainbow trout have been
reported by anglers and guiding companies in recent days, and
CPW has engaged with those parties to collect samples of the
affected fish, which were sent to the state’s Aquatic
Animal Health Lab in Brush. While the results are not yet
in, CPW aquatic biologist Kendall Bakich said she has seen
similar lesions on fish in the Eagle River in the past, as well
as other nearby water bodies. A case in Steamboat Lake showed a
similar pathology in rainbow trout, Bakich said, occurring
directly after the spawning season during warmer water
temperatures.
For 31 straight days last summer, temperatures in Phoenix hit
or topped 110 degrees, the longest such streak ever. That
searing Arizona heat dehydrates crops and evaporates water the
state needs to conserve. Creating shade is one way to combat
the problem. By using solar panels, farmers can simultaneously
protect their plants, save water and lower their energy bills –
and some are doing just that with help from federal programs
designed to encourage this sustainable method of growing.
Photovoltaic panels are placed above the crops, harnessing the
sun’s energy while providing valuable shade.
This spring, the Bureau of Reclamation revealed damage to
the river outlet works system of Glen Canyon Dam. While there
is no structural risk to the huge dam on the Colorado River,
the incident drew attention to the dam’s antiquated
infrastructure and brought into question its ability to sustain
water releases from Lake Powell at lower elevations. At risk
are both the lower Colorado River Basin’s ecosystems—including
the Grand Canyon—and the 30 million people who rely on the
Colorado’s water. The damage was caused by a High Flow
Experiment Release in April, 2023, by cavitation, a process
that happens when water passing through pipes at high velocity
creates air bubbles that cause erosion. During the 2023
release, 3,500 CFS (cubic feet per second) of water was
released through the outlet works pipes for 72 hours.
The aim was to distribute sediment throughout the Grand
Canyon to maintain healthy beaches and riparian habitats.
Tucked between an interstate and a mountainside in the base of
a steep canyon in western Colorado, a small hydropower station
has long staked an outsize claim on the Colorado River. That’s
because the 115-year-old Shoshone Generating Station in
Glenwood Springs owns something unique in the parched West: 1
million acre-feet of water rights, some of the oldest and
largest in the state. Turning on the tap at the power facility
can change how water flows on both sides of the Continental
Divide: boosting flows west to farmers, ranchers and rural
communities all the way to the Utah border, or curbing
facilities that funnel it east to the Front Range and
population centers like Denver and its suburbs. All of that
influence means that as the aging facility approaches a likely
retirement in coming years, who controls those flows is
significant in a state often split between its rural West and
urban East, demarcated by the Rocky Mountains.
Lawmakers from both parties have introduced legislation in
Congress after three Arizona tribal nations came together to
successfully negotiate a sweeping Indian water settlement. …
The settlement will resolve the most significant outstanding
water claims in Arizona and bring water to residents of the
Navajo, Hopi and Southern San Juan Paiute tribes, among many
other benefits. Leaders say it’s critical to move the
legislation forward, not only because of the political
situation, but because talks are underway to reduce water use
on the Colorado River. … The legislation will
authorize $5 billion in federal funding for water
infrastructure on the sovereign territories of the Navajo
Nation, the Hopi Tribe, and the San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe,
the largest water project for an Indian settlement.
A private company supported by global investors bought nearly
500 acres of land in a tiny Arizona town and sold its water
rights to a Phoenix suburb for a $14 million
profit. … Greenstone Resource Partners LLC
bought agricultural land in Cibola, Arizona (population around
200), and sold the water rights to suburban Queen Creek, known
for lush golf courses and resort pools. Water previously used
to irrigate Cibola farms now flows through a canal to provide
water to master-planned communities over 200 miles
away. … Greenstone bought farmland about a decade ago,
but it was actually part of an investment plan to divert water
from the area for profit. … “I’m afraid we’ve opened
Pandora’s box,” Holly Irwin, a local county supervisor, said
about the Greenstone deal, per the Guardian. Companies like
Greenstone, tied to real estate developers and big banks, now
have a precedent to falsely pose as farms and take water away
from people living on the land.
Farmers who grow hay in the Imperial Valley will soon be
eligible to receive cash payments in exchange for temporarily
shutting off water to their fields for up to two months this
year. Under a program approved by the board of the Imperial
Irrigation District, farmers can now apply for federal funds to
compensate them for harvesting less hay as part of an effort to
ease strains on the Colorado River. Paying growers to
leave fields dry and fallow for part of the year represents a
major new step by the district to help boost the levels of the
river’s reservoirs, which have been depleted by chronic
overuse, years of drought and higher temperatures caused
by climate change. The Imperial Irrigation District delivers
the single largest share of the Colorado River’s water to
farmlands that produce hay for cattle as well as many of the
country’s vegetables. District officials … say the approach
is aimed at avoiding longer-term fallowing of crops that would
take farmland out of production and bring a heavier blow to
food production and the area’s economy.
The issue of water — who gets it, how much they get and what
happens when Mother Nature doesn’t provide enough — is not a
new conflict in the Intermountain West. Lake Powell in Glen
Canyon National Park is the link in the multistate system that
feeds the Colorado River from the upper basin states to its
lower basin counterparts. In its trip, the Colorado River
water, mainly provided by snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains,
travels through the upper basin states comprising Colorado,
Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico. It then flows through Lake Powell
down to Lake Mead, feeding the lower basin states: Nevada,
Arizona and California. … In their post-2026 operations
proposal, the lower basin states said they would cut water use
by 1.5 million acre-feet per year as long as Lake Powell and
Lake Mead’s combined storage remains at a certain level.
The Bureau of Reclamation today finalized its process to
protect the humpback chub and other federally protected fish
species with the signing of the Supplemental Environmental
Impact Statement for the 2016 Long-Term Experimental and
Management Plan Final Environmental Impact Statement Record of
Decision. Reclamation initiated the environmental review
process in response to the increasing numbers of smallmouth
bass in the Colorado River below Glen Canyon Dam. As Lake
Powell’s elevation has declined and water released from Glen
Canyon Dam has warmed in recent years, warmwater invasive fish
such as smallmouth bass residing in the upper layer of Lake
Powell can pass through the dam and successfully spawn
downstream in the Grand Canyon. These warmwater predatory fish
can prey on Federally protected native fish species in the
Grand Canyon. With the completion of the environmental process,
Reclamation can now use water releases from the dam to disrupt
smallmouth bass spawning.
Farmers could be paid not to make hay while the sun shines, per
a new Imperial Irrigation District payment schedule and other
actions authorized Tuesday aimed at shoring up the Colorado
River’s dwindling reservoirs and coping with low forage prices.
If all goes as planned, growers and owners of farm fields could
be paid $300 per acre-foot for not irrigating alfalfa and other
perennial feed crops for between 45 and 60 days. The plants
would be stressed but would survive, and substantial water
supply would instead be left in drought-depleted Lake Mead,
which provides water for millions of people and millions of
acres of farmland in California, Arizona and Nevada.
… El Vado has been out of commission for the past three
summers, its structure bulging and disfigured after decades in
operation — and the government doesn’t have a plan to fix
it. The failure of the dam has shaken up the water supply
for the entire region surrounding Albuquerque, forcing the city
and many of the farmers nearby to rely on finite groundwater
and threatening an endangered fish species along the river.
It’s a surprising twist of fate for a region that in recent
years emerged as a model for sustainable water management in
the West. … Los Angeles has lost water from both the Colorado
River and from a series of reservoirs in Northern California,
and Phoenix has seen declines not only from the Colorado but
also from the groundwater aquifers that fuel the state’s cotton
and alfalfa farming. Now, as Albuquerque’s decrepit El Vado dam
goes out of commission, the city is trying to balance multiple
fragile resources.
For 31 straight days last summer, temperatures in Phoenix hit
or topped 110 degrees, the longest such streak ever. That
searing Arizona heat dehydrates crops and evaporates water the
state needs to conserve. Creating shade is one way to combat
the problem. By using solar panels, farmers can simultaneously
protect their plants, save water and lower their energy bills –
and some are doing just that with help from federal programs
designed to encourage this sustainable method of growing.
Photovoltaic panels are placed above the crops, harnessing the
sun’s energy while providing valuable shade. … Three-fourths
of Arizona’s water supply goes to agricultural irrigation,
according to the Arizona Department of Water Resources.
The Colorado River Basin is in a Tier 1 water shortage,
requiring restrictions for agricultural users. As drought
continues, farmers are searching for new sustainable methods of
growing.
State water management officials must work more closely with
local agencies to properly prepare California for the effects
of climate change, water scientists say. Golden State
officials said in the newly revised California Water
Plan that as the nation’s most populous state, California
is too diverse and complex for a singular approach to manage a
vast water network. On Monday, they recommended expanding the
work to better manage the state’s precious water resources —
including building better partnerships with communities most at
risk during extreme drought and floods and improving critical
infrastructure for water storage, treatment and distribution
among different regions and watersheds.
Six tribes in the Upper Colorado River Basin, including two in
Colorado, have gained long-awaited access to discussions about
the basin’s water issues — talks that were formerly
limited to states and the federal government. Under an
agreement finalized this month, the tribes will meet every two
months to discuss Colorado River issues with an interstate
water policy commission, the Upper Colorado River Commission,
or UCRC. It’s the first time in the commission’s 76-year
history that tribes have been formally included, and the timing
is key as negotiations about the river’s future intensify.
… Most immediately, the commission wants a key number:
How much water goes unused by tribes and flows down to the
Lower Basin?
Sustaining the American Southwest is the Colorado River. But
demand, damming, diversion, and drought are draining this vital
water resource at alarming rates. The future of water in the
region – particularly from the Colorado River – was top of mind
at the 10th Annual Eccles Family Rural West Conference, an
event organized by the Bill Lane Center for the American West
that brings together policymakers, practitioners, and scholars
to discuss solutions to urgent problems facing rural Western
regions.
Learn the history and challenges facing the West’s most dramatic
and developed river.
The Layperson’s Guide to the Colorado River Basin introduces the
1,450-mile river that sustains 40 million people and millions of
acres of farmland spanning seven states and parts of northern
Mexico.
The 28-page primer explains how the river’s water is shared and
managed as the Southwest transitions to a hotter and drier
climate.
A much-anticipated water bill brought by one of the most
powerful lawmakers on Capitol Hill became public Thursday.
Senate President Stuart Adams’s SB 211, titled “Generational
Water Infrastructure Amendments,” seeks to secure a water
supply for decades to come. It forms a new council comprised of
leadership from the state’s biggest water districts that will
figure out Utah’s water needs for the next 50 to 75 years. It
also creates a new governor-appointed “Utah Water Agent” with a
$1 million annual budget that will “coordinate with the council
to ensure Utah’s generational water needs are met,” according
to a news release. But combing through the text of the bill
reveals the water agent’s main job will be finding an
out-of-state water supply. … The bill also notes the
water agent won’t meddle with existing water compacts with
other states on the Bear and Colorado rivers.
Moab is a growing town of 5,300 that up to 5 million people
visit each year to hike nearby Arches and Canyonlands national
parks, ride mountain bikes and all-terrain vehicles, or raft
the Colorado River. Like any western resort town, it
desperately needs affordable housing. What locals say it
doesn’t need is a high-end development on a sandbar projecting
into the Colorado River, where groves of cottonwoods, willows
and hackberries flourish. “Delusional,” shameful” or
“outrageous” is what many locals call this Kane Creek
Preservation and Development project. - Written by Mary Moran, a contributor to Writers on
the Range
The attention is on Southern California right now, but an
atmospheric river’s path will extend inland with potential
flooding — and possible drought relief. If you’re watching the
weather, it’s still a little early to tell whether these storms
will go where they can hope Las Vegas the most. That’s anywhere
in the Upper Colorado River Basin, where there’s a chance they
could produce snow to help the river that supplies 90% of the
water used in Southern Nevada. … The paths of this
year’s atmospheric rivers are unlike the ones that slammed
the Sierras last year. Those storms carried snow straight
east through Northern Nevada and Utah, feeding the Rocky
Mountains with snowpack levels that reached 160% of normal by
the end of winter.
Water regulation in Arizona has devolved into a game of
chicken. The governor and farmers are rivals revving their
engines, hoping their opponent will flinch first. Caught
in the middle is Gila Bend, a groundwater basin south of
Buckeye, where the state could decide to impose its most
stringent form of regulation, whether folks like it or not.
Both sides are using Gila Bend as a bargaining chip to win
support for competing legislative proposals. But to what
end? - Written by Joanna Allhands, Arizona Republic digital
opinions editor
Colorado legislators in 2022 passed a bill that delivered $2
million to programs across the state for removal of turf in
urban areas classified as nonfunctional. By that, legislators
mean Kentucky bluegrass and other thirsty-grass species that
were meant to be seen but rarely, if ever, otherwise
used. Now, they are taking the next step. The Colorado
Senate on Tuesday, Jan. 30 voted in favor of a
bill, Senate Bill 24-005, that would prevent thirsty turf
species from being planted in certain places that rarely, if
ever, get foot traffic, except perhaps to be mowed.
The U.S. Senate Indian Affairs Committee is holding an
important hearing Thursday on S. 2385, a bill to
refine the tools needed to help Tribal communities gain access
to something that most non-Indian communities in the western
United States have long taken for granted: federally subsidized
systems to deliver safe, clean drinking water to our homes.
… This is the sort of bill (there’s a companion on the
House side) that makes a huge amount of sense, but could easily
get sidetracked in the chaos of Congress. The ideal path is for
the crucial vetting to happen in a process such as Thursday’s
hearing, and then to attach it to one of those omnibus things
that Congress uses these days to get non-controversial stuff
done. Clean water for Native communities should pretty clearly
be non-controversial.
For as long as he can remember, Rob Sowby has heard people call
Utah the second-driest state in the nation. Over the years,
that claim has become nearly inescapable, echoed by everyone
from state departments, city governments and water conservancy
districts to national news outlets without a clear citation for
what data it’s based on. … Now a Brigham Young
University civil engineering assistant professor focused on
sustainable water supplies, he decided to get to the bottom of
it. Using precipitation data, he found that Utah is actually
the nation’s third-driest state, behind Nevada and
Arizona.
The Topock Marsh has seen a significant drop in water levels
recently, with dry patches visible and locals concerned about
the effects on wildlife. The 4,000-acre Bureau of Reclamation
marsh is adjacent to the Colorado River in the Havasu National
Wildlife Refuge. Managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,
it serves as a recreation area and wildlife habitat for the
Tri-state.
Apply for our 2024 Colorado River Water
Leaders program to deepen your knowledge
of the inconic Southwest river, build leadership
skills and develop policy ideas with a cohort to improve
management of the region’s most crucial natural resource.
Our biennial Water Leaders program, part of our Colorado River Project,
selects rising stars from the seven states that rely on
the river – Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada,
Utah and Wyoming.
Get an overview of the program and tips on applying by watching
this virtual Q&A
session. Applications are due Jan. 22,
2024 and you can find
application materials here along with mandatory
program dates.
“I highly recommend the program to emerging water leaders.
The program’s immersive experience, relationship building and
mentorship opportunities cultivate leadership and collaborative
skills crucial for addressing complex challenges faced by all
those who rely upon the Colorado River now and into the
future.”
– JB Hamby, Class of ‘22 and Chair of the
Colorado River Board of California
After more than two decades of
drought, water utilities serving the largest urban regions in the
arid Southwest are embracing a drought-proof source of drinking
water long considered a supply of last resort: purified sewage.
Water supplies have tightened to the point that Phoenix and the
water supplier for 19 million Southern California residents are
racing to adopt an expensive technology called “direct potable
reuse” or “advanced purification” to reduce their reliance on
imported water from the dwindling Colorado River.
Join a
virtual Q&A session Dec. 7 to learn more about
applying for our 2024 Colorado River Water
Leaders cohort.
The biennial
program, which will run from March to September next
year, selects about a dozen rising stars from the
seven states that rely on the river – California, Nevada,
Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico.
The climate-driven shrinking of the
Colorado River is expanding the influence of Native American
tribes over how the river’s flows are divided among cities, farms
and reservations across the Southwest.
The tribes are seeing the value of their largely unused river
water entitlements rise as the Colorado dwindles, and they are
gaining seats they’ve never had at the water bargaining table as
government agencies try to redress a legacy of exclusion.
The application window is now open
for our Colorado River Water
Leaders program, which will run from March to
September next year.
Our biennial program, part of our Colorado River Project,
is patterned after our highly successful California Water Leaders
programand selects rising stars
from the seven states that rely on the river -
California, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New
Mexico – to take part in a cohort.
During the seven-month program designed for working
professionals, the cohort members explore issues surrounding the
iconic Southwest river, deepen their water knowledge and build
leadership skills.
“I highly recommend the program to emerging water leaders.
The program’s immersive experience, relationship building and
mentorship opportunities cultivate leadership and collaborative
skills crucial for addressing complex challenges faced by all
those who rely upon the Colorado River now and into the
future.”
– JB Hamby, Class of ‘22 & Chair of the Colorado River
Board of California
The states of the Lower Colorado
River Basin have traditionally played an oversized role in
tapping the lifeline that supplies 40 million people in the West.
California, Nevada and Arizona were quicker to build major canals
and dams and negotiated a landmark deal that requires the Upper
Basin to send predictable flows through the Grand Canyon, even
during dry years.
But with the federal government threatening unprecedented water
cuts amid decades of drought and declining reservoirs, the Upper
Basin states of Wyoming, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico are
muscling up to protect their shares of an overallocated river
whose average flows in the Upper Basin have already dropped
20 percent over the last century.
They have formed new agencies to better monitor their interests,
moved influential Colorado River veterans into top negotiating
posts and improved their relationships with Native American
tribes that also hold substantial claims to the river.
This tour explored the lower Colorado River firsthand where virtually every drop of the river is allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to some 40 million people in the Southwest across seven states, 30 tribal nations and Mexico. How the Lower Basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial needs was the focus of this tour.
Hilton Garden Inn Las Vegas Strip South
7830 S Las Vegas Blvd
Las Vegas, NV 89123
This special Foundation water tour journeyed along the Eastern Sierra from the Truckee River to Mono Lake, through the Owens Valley and into the Mojave Desert to explore a major source of water for Southern California, this year’s snowpack and challenges for towns, farms and the environment.
When the Colorado River Compact was
signed 100 years ago, the negotiators for seven Western states
bet that the river they were dividing would have ample water to
meet everyone’s needs – even those not seated around the table.
A century later, it’s clear the water they bet on is not there.
More than two decades of drought, lake evaporation and overuse of
water have nearly drained the river’s two anchor reservoirs, Lake
Powell on the Arizona-Utah border and Lake Mead near Las Vegas.
Climate change is rendering the basin drier, shrinking spring
runoff that’s vital for river flows, farms, tribes and cities
across the basin – and essential for refilling reservoirs.
The states that endorsed the Colorado River Compact in 1922 – and
the tribes and nation of Mexico that were excluded from the table
– are now straining to find, and perhaps more importantly accept,
solutions on a river that may offer just half of the water that
the Compact assumed would be available. And not only are
solutions not coming easily, the relationships essential for
compromise are getting more frayed.
With 25 years of experience working
on the Colorado River, Chuck Cullom is used to responding to
myriad challenges that arise on the vital lifeline that seven
states, more than two dozen tribes and the country of Mexico
depend on for water. But this summer problems on the
drought-stressed river are piling up at a dizzying pace:
Reservoirs plummeting to record low levels, whether Hoover Dam
and Glen Canyon Dam can continue to release water and produce
hydropower, unprecedented water cuts and predatory smallmouth
bass threatening native fish species in the Grand Canyon.
“Holy buckets, Batman!,” said Cullom, executive director of the
Upper Colorado River Commission. “I mean, it’s just on and on and
on.”
As water interests in the Colorado
River Basin prepare to negotiate a new set of operating
guidelines for the drought-stressed river, Amelia Flores wants
her Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) to be involved in the
discussion. And she wants CRIT seated at the negotiating table
with something invaluable to offer on a river facing steep cuts
in use: its surplus water.
CRIT, whose reservation lands in California and Arizona are
bisected by the Colorado River, has some of the most senior water
rights on the river. But a federal law enacted in the late 1700s,
decades before any southwestern state was established, prevents
most tribes from sending any of its water off its reservation.
The restrictions mean CRIT, which holds the rights to nearly a
quarter of the entire state of Arizona’s yearly allotment of
river water, is missing out on financial gain and the chance to
help its river partners.
Momentum is building for a unique
interstate deal that aims to transform wastewater from Southern
California homes and business into relief for the stressed
Colorado River. The collaborative effort to add resiliency to a
river suffering from overuse, drought and climate change is being
shaped across state lines by some of the West’s largest water
agencies.
This tour explored the lower Colorado River firsthand where virtually every drop of the river is allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to some 40 million people in the Southwest across seven states, 30 tribal nations and Mexico. How the Lower Basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial needs was the focus of this tour.
Hyatt Place Las Vegas At Silverton Village
8380 Dean Martin Drive
Las Vegas, NV 89139
There is just about a week left to
apply for our inaugural Colorado River Water Leaders
program in 2022, which marks the 100th anniversary
of the Colorado River Compact.
The biennial program is modeled after our highly successful
Water Leaders
program in California, now 25 years strong.
Our Colorado River program will select rising stars from the
seven U.S. states and tribal nations that rely on the river -
California, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New
Mexico – to participate in the seven-month class designed for
working professionals. Class members will explore issues
surrounding the iconic Southwest river, deepen their water
knowledge and build leadership skills.
Climate scientist Brad Udall calls
himself the skunk in the room when it comes to the Colorado
River. Armed with a deck of PowerPoint slides and charts that
highlight the Colorado River’s worsening math, the Colorado State
University scientist offers a grim assessment of the river’s
future: Runoff from the river’s headwaters is declining, less
water is flowing into Lake Powell – the key reservoir near the
Arizona-Utah border – and at the same time, more water is being
released from the reservoir than it can sustainably provide.
The lower Colorado River has virtually every drop allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to 40 million people in the Southwest across seven states, 30 tribal nations and Mexico. How the Lower Basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial needs was the focus of this tour.
Hyatt Place Las Vegas At Silverton Village
8380 Dean Martin Drive
Las Vegas, NV 89139
For more than 20 years, Tanya
Trujillo has been immersed in the many challenges of the Colorado
River, the drought-stressed lifeline for 40 million people from
Denver to Los Angeles and the source of irrigation water for more
than 5 million acres of winter lettuce, supermarket melons and
other crops.
Trujillo has experience working in both the Upper and Lower
Basins of the Colorado River, basins that split the river’s water
evenly but are sometimes at odds with each other. She was a
lawyer for the state of New Mexico, one of four states in the
Upper Colorado River Basin, when key operating guidelines for
sharing shortages on the river were negotiated in 2007. She later
worked as executive director for the Colorado River Board of
California, exposing her to the different perspectives and
challenges facing California and the other states in the river’s
Lower Basin.
Known for our popular Water Leaders
program in California – about to mark its 25th anniversary – we
are now launching a Colorado
River Water Leaders program in 2022, the 100th
anniversary of the Colorado River Compact.
The biennial program will select rising stars from the seven
U.S. states that rely on the river – California, Nevada, Arizona,
Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico – to participate in the
seven-month class designed for working professionals. Class
members will explore issues surrounding the iconic Southwest
river, deepen their water knowledge and build leadership
skills.
Water is flowing once again
to the Colorado River’s delta in Mexico, a vast region that
was once a natural splendor before the iconic Western river was
dammed and diverted at the turn of the last century, essentially
turning the delta into a desert.
In 2012, the idea emerged that water could be intentionally sent
down the river to inundate the delta floodplain and regenerate
native cottonwood and willow trees, even in an overallocated
river system. Ultimately, dedicated flows of river water were
brokered under cooperative
efforts by the U.S. and Mexican governments.
Las Vegas, known for its searing summertime heat and glitzy casino fountains, is projected to get even hotter in the coming years as climate change intensifies. As temperatures rise, possibly as much as 10 degrees by end of the century, according to some models, water demand for the desert community is expected to spike. That is not good news in a fast-growing region that depends largely on a limited supply of water from an already drought-stressed Colorado River.
When you oversee the largest
supplier of treated water in the United States, you tend to think
big.
Jeff Kightlinger, general manager of the Metropolitan Water
District of Southern California for the last 15 years, has
focused on diversifying his agency’s water supply and building
security through investment. That means looking beyond MWD’s
borders to ensure the reliable delivery of water to two-thirds of
California’s population.
Twenty years ago, the Colorado River
Basin’s hydrology began tumbling into a historically bad stretch.
The weather turned persistently dry. Water levels in the system’s
anchor reservoirs of Lake Powell and Lake Mead plummeted. A river
system relied upon by nearly 40 million people, farms and
ecosystems across the West was in trouble. And there was no guide
on how to respond.
Managing water resources in the Colorado River Basin is not for the timid or those unaccustomed to big challenges. Careers are devoted to responding to all the demands put upon the river: water supply, hydropower, recreation and environmental protection.
All of this while the Basin endures a seemingly endless drought and forecasts of increasing dryness in the future.
Practically every drop of water that flows through the meadows, canyons and plains of the Colorado River Basin has reams of science attached to it. Snowpack, streamflow and tree ring data all influence the crucial decisions that guide water management of the iconic Western river every day.
Dizzying in its scope, detail and complexity, the scientific information on the Basin’s climate and hydrology has been largely scattered in hundreds of studies and reports. Some studies may conflict with others, or at least appear to. That’s problematic for a river that’s a lifeline for 40 million people and more than 4 million acres of irrigated farmland.
The Colorado River Compact of 1922
marked the first time in U.S. history that more than three states
negotiated an agreement among themselves to apportion the waters
of a stream or river.
The compact is the cornerstone of the “Law of the River” – a
complex set of interstate compacts, federal laws, court decisions
and decrees, contracts and federal actions that regulate use of
the Colorado River.
Out of sight and out of mind to most
people, the Salton Sea in California’s far southeast corner has
challenged policymakers and local agencies alike to save the
desert lake from becoming a fetid, hyper-saline water body
inhospitable to wildlife and surrounded by clouds of choking
dust.
The sea’s problems stretch beyond its boundaries in Imperial and
Riverside counties and threaten to undermine multistate
management of the Colorado River. A 2019 Drought Contingency Plan for the
Lower Colorado River Basin was briefly stalled when the Imperial
Irrigation District, holding the river’s largest water
allocation, balked at participating in the plan because, the
district said, it ignored the problems of the Salton Sea.
Colorado is home to the headwaters
of the Colorado River and the water policy decisions made in the
Centennial State reverberate throughout the river’s sprawling
basin that stretches south to Mexico. The stakes are huge in a
basin that serves 40 million people, and responding to the water
needs of the economy, productive agriculture, a robust
recreational industry and environmental protection takes
expertise, leadership and a steady hand.
Sprawled across a desert expanse
along the Utah-Arizona border, Lake Powell’s nearly 100-foot high
bathtub ring etched on its sandstone walls belie the challenges
of a major Colorado River reservoir at less than half-full. How
those challenges play out as demand grows for the river’s water
amid a changing climate is fueling simmering questions about
Powell’s future.
This event explored the lower Colorado River where virtually every drop of the river is allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to 40 million people in the Southwest across seven states and Mexico. How the Lower Basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial needs was the focus of this tour.
Innovative efforts to accelerate
restoration of headwater forests and to improve a river for the
benefit of both farmers and fish. Hard-earned lessons for water
agencies from a string of devastating California wildfires.
Efforts to drought-proof a chronically water-short region of
California. And a broad debate surrounding how best to address
persistent challenges facing the Colorado River.
These were among the issues Western Water explored in
2019, and are still worth taking a look at in case you missed
them.
The Colorado River is arguably one
of the hardest working rivers on the planet, supplying water to
40 million people and a large agricultural economy in the West.
But it’s under duress from two decades of drought and decisions
made about its management will have exceptional ramifications for
the future, especially as impacts from climate change are felt.
Every other year we hold an
invitation-only Colorado River Symposium attended by various
stakeholders from across the seven Western states and Mexico that
rely on the iconic river. We host this three-day event in Santa
Fe, N.M., where the 1922 Colorado River Compact was signed, as
part of our mission to catalyze critical conversations to build
bridges and inform collaborative decision-making.
The Colorado River Basin’s 20 years
of drought and the dramatic decline in water levels at the
river’s key reservoirs have pressed water managers to adapt to
challenging conditions. But even more extreme — albeit rare —
droughts or floods that could overwhelm water managers may lie
ahead in the Basin as the effects of climate change take hold,
say a group of scientists. They argue that stakeholders who are
preparing to rewrite the operating rules of the river should plan
now for how to handle these so-called “black swan” events so
they’re not blindsided.
Dates are now set for two key
Foundation events to kick off 2020 — our popular Water 101
Workshop, scheduled for Feb. 20 at McGeorge School of Law in
Sacramento, and our Lower Colorado River Tour, which will run
from March 11-13.
In addition, applications will be available by the first week of
October for our 2020 class of Water Leaders, our competitive
yearlong program for early to mid-career up-and-coming water
professionals. To learn more about the program, check out our
Water Leaders program
page.
High in the headwaters of the Colorado River, around the hamlet of Kremmling, Colorado, generations of families have made ranching and farming a way of life, their hay fields and cattle sustained by the river’s flow. But as more water was pulled from the river and sent over the Continental Divide to meet the needs of Denver and other cities on the Front Range, less was left behind to meet the needs of ranchers and fish.
“What used to be a very large river that inundated the land has really become a trickle,” said Mely Whiting, Colorado counsel for Trout Unlimited. “We estimate that 70 percent of the flow on an annual average goes across the Continental Divide and never comes back.”
Summer is a good time to take a
break, relax and enjoy some of the great beaches, waterways and
watersheds around California and the West. We hope you’re getting
a chance to do plenty of that this July.
But in the weekly sprint through work, it’s easy to miss
some interesting nuggets you might want to read. So while we’re
taking a publishing break to work on other water articles planned
for later this year, we want to help you catch up on
Western Water stories from the first half of this year
that you might have missed.
We have an unknown distance yet to run, an unknown river to explore. What falls there are, we know not; what rocks beset the channel, we know not; what walls ride over the river, we know not. Ah, well! We may conjecture many things.
~John Wesley Powell
Powell scrawled those words in his journal as he and his expedition paddled their way into the deep walls of the Grand Canyon on a stretch of the Colorado River in August 1869. Three months earlier, the 10-man group had set out on their exploration of the iconic Southwest river by hauling their wooden boats into a major tributary of the Colorado, the Green River in Wyoming, for their trip into the “great unknown,” as Powell described it.
Even as stakeholders in the Colorado River Basin celebrate the recent completion of an unprecedented drought plan intended to stave off a crashing Lake Mead, there is little time to rest. An even larger hurdle lies ahead as they prepare to hammer out the next set of rules that could vastly reshape the river’s future.
Set to expire in 2026, the current guidelines for water deliveries and shortage sharing, launched in 2007 amid a multiyear drought, were designed to prevent disputes that could provoke conflict.
Bruce Babbitt, the former Arizona
governor and secretary of the Interior, has been a thoughtful,
provocative and sometimes forceful voice in some of the most
high-profile water conflicts over the last 40 years, including
groundwater management in Arizona and the reduction of
California’s take of the Colorado River. In 2016, former
California Gov. Jerry Brown named Babbitt as a special adviser to
work on matters relating to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and
the Delta tunnels plan.
For the bulk of her career, Jayne
Harkins has devoted her energy to issues associated with the
management of the Colorado River, both with the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and with the Colorado River Commission of Nevada.
Now her career is taking a different direction. Harkins, 58, was
appointed by President Trump last August to take the helm of the
United States section of the U.S.-Mexico agency that oversees
myriad water matters between the two countries as they seek to
sustainably manage the supply and water quality of the Colorado
River, including its once-thriving Delta in Mexico, and other
rivers the two countries share. She is the first woman to be
named the U.S. Commissioner of the International Boundary and
Water Commission for either the United States or Mexico in the
commission’s 129-year history.
This tour explored the lower Colorado River where virtually every drop of the river is allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to 40 million people in the Southwest across seven states and Mexico. How the Lower Basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial needs is the focus of this tour.
Silverton Hotel
3333 Blue Diamond Road
Las Vegas, NV 89139
Imported water from the Sierra
Nevada and the Colorado River built Southern California. Yet as
drought, climate change and environmental concerns render those
supplies increasingly at risk, the Southland’s cities have ramped
up their efforts to rely more on local sources and less on
imported water.
Far and away the most ambitious goal has been set by the city of
Santa Monica, which in 2014 embarked on a course to be virtually
water independent through local sources by 2023. In the 1990s,
Santa Monica was completely dependent on imported water. Now, it
derives more than 70 percent of its water locally.
The growing leadership of women in water. The Colorado River’s persistent drought and efforts to sign off on a plan to avert worse shortfalls of water from the river. And in California’s Central Valley, promising solutions to vexing water resource challenges.
These were among the topics that Western Water news explored in 2018.
We’re already planning a full slate of stories for 2019. You can sign up here to be alerted when new stories are published. In the meantime, take a look at what we dove into in 2018:
As stakeholders labor to nail down
effective and durable drought contingency plans for the Colorado
River Basin, they face a stark reality: Scientific research is
increasingly pointing to even drier, more challenging times
ahead.
The latest sobering assessment landed the day after Thanksgiving,
when U.S. Global Change Research Program’s Fourth National Climate
Assessment concluded that Earth’s climate is changing rapidly
compared to the pace of natural variations that have occurred
throughout its history, with greenhouse gas emissions largely the
cause.
As the Colorado River Basin becomes
drier and shortage conditions loom, one great variable remains:
How much of the river’s water belongs to Native American tribes?
Native Americans already use water from the Colorado River and
its tributaries for a variety of purposes, including leasing it
to non-Indian users. But some tribes aren’t using their full
federal Indian reserved water right and others have water rights
claims that have yet to be resolved. Combined, tribes have rights
to more water than some states in the Colorado River Basin.
The Colorado River Basin is more
than likely headed to unprecedented shortage in 2020 that could
force supply cuts to some states, but work is “furiously”
underway to reduce the risk and avert a crisis, Bureau of
Reclamation Commissioner Brenda Burman told an audience of
California water industry people.
During a keynote address at the Water Education Foundation’s
Sept. 20 Water Summit in Sacramento, Burman said there is
opportunity for Colorado River Basin states to control their
destiny, but acknowledged that in water, there are no guarantees
that agreement can be reached.
Water means life for all the Grand Canyon’s inhabitants, including the many varieties of insects that are a foundation of the ecosystem’s food web. But hydropower operations upstream on the Colorado River at Glen Canyon Dam, in Northern Arizona near the Utah border, disrupt the natural pace of insect reproduction as the river rises and falls, sometimes dramatically. Eggs deposited at the river’s edge are often left high and dry and their loss directly affects available food for endangered fish such as the humpback chub.
Amy Haas recently became the first non-engineer and the first woman to serve as executive director of the Upper Colorado River Commission in its 70-year history, putting her smack in the center of a host of daunting challenges facing the Upper Colorado River Basin.
Yet those challenges will be quite familiar to Haas, an attorney who for the past year has served as deputy director and general counsel of the commission. (She replaced longtime Executive Director Don Ostler). She has a long history of working within interstate Colorado River governance, including representing New Mexico as its Upper Colorado River commissioner and playing a central role in the negotiation of the recently signed U.S.-Mexico agreement known as Minute 323.
Nowhere is the domino effect in
Western water policy played out more than on the Colorado River,
and specifically when it involves the Lower Basin states of
California, Nevada and Arizona. We are seeing that play out now
as the three states strive to forge a Drought Contingency Plan.
Yet that plan can’t be finalized until Arizona finds a unifying
voice between its major water players, an effort you can read
more about in the latest in-depth article of Western Water.
Even then, there are some issues to resolve just within
California.
It’s high-stakes time in Arizona. The state that depends on the
Colorado River to help supply its cities and farms — and is
first in line to absorb a shortage — is seeking a unified plan
for water supply management to join its Lower Basin neighbors,
California and Nevada, in a coordinated plan to preserve water
levels in Lake Mead before
they run too low.
If the lake’s elevation falls below 1,075 feet above sea level,
the secretary of the Interior would declare a shortage and
Arizona’s deliveries of Colorado River water would be reduced by
320,000 acre-feet. Arizona says that’s enough to serve about 1
million households in one year.
As California embarks on its unprecedented mission to harness groundwater pumping, the Arizona desert may provide one guide that local managers can look to as they seek to arrest years of overdraft.
Groundwater is stressed by a demand that often outpaces natural and artificial recharge. In California, awareness of groundwater’s importance resulted in the landmark Sustainable Groundwater Management Act in 2014 that aims to have the most severely depleted basins in a state of balance in about 20 years.
We explored the lower Colorado River where virtually every drop
of the river is allocated, yet demand is growing from myriad
sources — increasing population, declining habitat, drought and
climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to 40 million people in
the Southwest across seven states and Mexico. How the Lower Basin
states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this
water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial
needs was the focus of this tour.
Hampton Inn Tropicana
4975 Dean Martin Drive, Las Vegas, NV 89118
Dramatic swings in weather patterns
over the past few years in California are stark reminders of
climate variability and regional vulnerability. Alternating years
of drought and intense rain events make long-term planning for
storing and distributing water a challenging task.
Current weather forecasting capabilities provide details for
short time horizons. Attend the Paleo Drought
Workshop in San Pedro on April 19 to learn more about
research efforts to improve sub-seasonal to seasonal
precipitation forecasting, known as S2S, and how those models
could provide more useful weather scenarios for resource
managers.
A drought has lingered in the
Colorado River Basin since 2000, causing reservoir storage to
decline from nearly full to about half of capacity. So far this
year, a meager snowpack in the Rocky Mountains hasn’t helped
much.
In fact, forecasters say this winter will likely go down as the
sixth-driest on record for the river system that supplies water
to seven states, including California, and Mexico.
On our Lower
Colorado River Tour, April 11-13, you will meet with water
managers from the three Lower Basin states: Nevada, Arizona and
California. The three states are working to finalize a Drought
Contingency Plan to take voluntary cuts to keep Lake Mead, the
nation’s largest reservoir, from hitting critical levels and
causing a shortage declaration.
California’s 2012-2016 drought
revealed vulnerabilities for water users throughout the state,
and the long-term record suggests more challenges may lie ahead.
An April 19
workshop in San Pedro will highlight new information about
drought durations in Southern California watersheds dating
back centuries.
Most people see the Grand Canyon from the rim, thousands of feet above where the Colorado River winds through it for almost 300 miles.
But to travel it afloat a raft is to experience the wondrous majesty of the canyon and the river itself while gaining perspective about geology, natural beauty and the passage of time.
Beginning at Lees Ferry, some 30,000 people each year launch downriver on commercial or private trips. Before leaving, they are dutifully briefed by a National Park Service ranger who explains to them about the unique environment that awaits them, how to keep it protected and, most importantly, how to protect themselves.
They also are told about the pair of ravens that will inevitably follow them through the canyon, seizing every opportunity to scrounge food.
Tickets are now on sale for the Water Education Foundation’s April 11-13 tour of the Lower Colorado River.
Don’t miss this opportunity to visit key sites along one of the nation’s most famous rivers, including a private tour of Hoover Dam, Central Arizona Project’s Mark Wilmer pumping plant and the Havasu National Wildlife Refuge. The tour also visits the Salton Sea, Slab City, the All-American Canal and farming regions in the Imperial and Coachella valleys.
Drought and climate change are having a noticeable impact on the
Colorado River Basin, and that is posing potential challenges to
those in the Southwestern United States and Mexico who rely on
the river.
In the just-released Winter 2017-18 edition of River
Report, writer Gary Pitzer examines what scientists
project will be the impact of climate change on the Colorado
River Basin, and how water managers are preparing for a future of
increasing scarcity.
Rising temperatures from climate change are having a noticeable
effect on how much water is flowing down the Colorado River. Read
the latest River Report to learn more about what’s
happening, and how water managers are responding.
This issue of Western Water discusses the challenges
facing the Colorado River Basin resulting from persistent
drought, climate change and an overallocated river, and how water
managers and others are trying to face the future.
This three-day, two-night tour explored the lower Colorado River
where virtually every drop of the river is allocated, yet demand
is growing from myriad sources — increasing population,
declining habitat, drought and climate change.
The 1,450-mile river is a lifeline to 40 million people in
the Southwest across seven states and Mexico. How the Lower Basin
states – Arizona, California and Nevada – use and manage this
water to meet agricultural, urban, environmental and industrial
needs is the focus of this tour.
Best Western McCarran Inn
4970 Paradise Road
Las Vegas, NV 89119
The Colorado River Delta once spanned nearly 2 million acres and
stretched from the northern tip of the Gulf of California in
Mexico to Southern California’s Salton Sea. Today it’s one-tenth
that size, yet still an important estuary, wildlife habitat and
farming region even though Colorado River flows rarely reach the
sea.
Since 2000, the Colorado River Basin has experienced an historic,
extended drought causing reservoir storage in the Colorado River
system to decline from nearly full to about half of capacity. For
the Lower Basin, a key point has been to maintain the level of
Lake Mead to prevent a shortage declaration.
A healthy snowfall in the Rockies has reduced the odds of a
shortage this year, but the basin states still must come to terms
with a static supply and growing demands, as well as future
impacts from climate change.
On our Lower
Colorado River Tour, April 5-7, you will meet with water
managers from the three Lower Basin states: Nevada, Arizona and
California. Federal, state and local agencies will update you on
the latest hydrologic conditions and how recent storms might
change plans for water supply and storage.
A troublesome invasive species is
the quagga mussel, a tiny freshwater mollusk that attaches itself
to water utility infrastructure and reproduces at a rapid rate,
causing damage to pipes and pumps.
First found in the Great Lakes in 1988 (dumped with ballast water
from overseas ships), the quagga mussel along with the zebra
mussel are native to the rivers and lakes of eastern Europe and
western Asia, including the Black, Caspian and Azov Seas and the
Dneiper River drainage of Ukraine and Ponto-Caspian
Sea.
This issue of Western Water examines the ongoing effort
between the United States and Mexico to develop a
new agreement to the 1944 Treaty that will continue the
binational cooperation on constructing Colorado River
infrastructure, storing water in Lake Mead and providing instream
flows for the Colorado River Delta.
As vital as the Colorado River is to the United States and
Mexico, so is the ongoing process by which the two countries
develop unique agreements to better manage the river and balance
future competing needs.
The prospect is challenging. The river is over allocated as urban
areas and farmers seek to stretch every drop of their respective
supplies. Since a historic treaty between the two countries was
signed in 1944, the United States and Mexico have periodically
added a series of arrangements to the treaty called minutes that
aim to strengthen the binational ties while addressing important
water supply, water quality and environmental concerns.
Lake Havasu is a reservoir on the Colorado River that supplies
water to the Colorado River
Aqueduct and Central Arizona Project. It is located at
the California/Arizona border, approximately 150 miles southeast
of Las Vegas, Nevada and 30 miles southeast of Needles,
California.
Situated in southwest Riverside County near the Santa Ana
Mountains – about 60 miles southeast of Los Angeles – Lake
Mathews is a
major reservoir in Southern California.
As one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world,
the Imperial Valley
receives its water from the Colorado River via the
All-American Canal. Rainfall is scarce in the desert region at
less than three inches per year and groundwater is of little
value.
This issue looks at the historic drought that has gripped the
Colorado River Basin since 2000 and discusses the lessons
learned, the continuing challenges and what the future might
hold.
The dramatic decline in water levels in Lake Mead and Lake Powell
is perhaps the most visible sign of the historic drought that has
gripped the Colorado River Basin for the past 16 years. In 2000,
the reservoirs stood at nearly 100 percent capacity; today, Lake
Powell is at 49 percent capacity while Lake Mead has dropped to
38 percent. Before the late season runoff of Miracle May, it
looked as if Mead might drop low enough to trigger the first-ever
Lower Basin shortage determination in 2016.
Read the excerpt below from the Sept./Oct. 2015 issue along
with the editor’s note. Click here to subscribe to Western
Water and get full access.
This issue looks at the dilemma of the shrinking Salton Sea. The
shallow, briny inland lake at the southeastern edge of California
is slowly evaporating and becoming more saline – threatening the
habitat for fish and birds and worsening air quality as dust from
the dry lakebed is whipped by the constant winds.
The shallow, briny inland lake at the southeastern edge of
California is slowly evaporating and becoming more saline –
threatening the habitat for fish and birds and worsening air
quality as dust from the dry lakebed is whipped by the constant
winds.
(Read this excerpt from the May/June 2015 issue along with
the editor’s note. Click here to
subscribe to Western Water and get full access.)
After much time, study and investment, the task of identifying
solutions to ensure the long-term sustainability of the Colorado
River is underway. People from the Upper and Lower basins
representing all interest groups are preparing to put their
signatures to documents aimed at ensuring the river’s vitality
for the next 50 years and beyond.
This 3-day, 2-night tour followed the course of the
lower Colorado River through Nevada, Arizona and California, and
included a private tour of Hoover Dam.
This issue updates progress on crafting and implementing
California’s 4.4 plan to reduce its use of Colorado River water
by 800,000 acre-feet. The state has used as much as 5.2 million
acre-feet of Colorado River water annually, but under pressure
from Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and the other six states
that share this resource, California’s Colorado River parties
have been trying to close the gap between demand and supply. The
article – delayed to include the latest information from
Babbitt’s Dec.
This issue updates progress on California’s Colorado River Water
Use Plan (commonly called the 4.4 Plan ), with a special focus on
the Salton Sea restoration/water transfer dilemma. It also
includes information on the proposed MWD-Palo Verde Irrigation
District deal, the Colorado River Delta, and the legislative
debate in the national and state capitals.
With passage of the original Dec. 31, 2002, deadline to have a
Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA) in place for the
Colorado River, California suffered a cutback in the surplus
Colorado River flows it had relied upon by years. Further
negotiations followed in an attempt to bring the California
parties to an agreement. This issue examines the history leading
to the QSA, the state of affairs of the so-called 4.4 Plan as of
early March, and gives readers a clearer crystal ball with which
to speculate about California’s water future on the Colorado
River.
This issue of Western Water provides the latest information on
some of the philosophical, political and practical ideas being
discussed on the river. Some of these issues were discussed at
the Water Education Foundation’s Colorado River Symposium, “The
Ties that Bind: Policy and the Evolving Law of the Colorado
River,” held last fall at The Bishop’s Lodge in Santa Fe, New
Mexico – site of negotiations on the 1922 Colorado River Compact.
This issue of Western Water explores the issues
surrounding and the components of the Colorado River Basin
seven-state proposed agreement released Feb. 3 regarding sharing
shortages on the river, and new plans to improve the river’s
management. The article includes excerpts from the Foundation’s
September 2005 Colorado River Symposium held in Santa Fe, New
Mexico.
This issue of Western Water marks the 85th anniversary of the
Colorado River Compact and considers its role in the past and
present on key issues such as federal funding for water projects
and international issues. Much of the content for this magazine
came from the Foundation’s September Colorado River Symposium,
The Colorado River Compact at 85 and Changes on the River.
This card includes information about the Colorado River, who uses
the river, how the river’s water is divided and other pertinent
facts about this vital resource for the Southwest. Beautifully
illustrated with color photographs.
In 1997, the Foundation sponsored a three-day, invitation-only
symposium at Bishop’s Lodge, New Mexico, site of the 1922
Colorado River Compact signing, to discuss the historical
implications of that agreement, current Colorado River issues and
future challenges. The 204-page proceedings features the panel
discussions and presentations on such issues as the Law of the
River, water marketing and environmental restoration.
30-minute DVD that traces the history of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and its role in the development of the West. Includes
extensive historic footage of farming and the construction of
dams and other water projects, and discusses historic and modern
day issues.
Redesigned in 2017, this beautiful map depicts the seven
Western states that share the Colorado River with Mexico. The
Colorado River supplies water to nearly 40 million people in
Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming
and Mexico. Text on this beautiful, 24×36-inch map, which is
suitable for framing, explains the river’s apportionment, history
and the need to adapt its management for urban growth and
expected climate change impacts.
This 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, illustrates the
water resources available for Nevada cities, agriculture and the
environment. It features natural and manmade water resources
throughout the state, including the Truckee and Carson rivers,
Lake Tahoe, Pyramid Lake and the course of the Colorado River
that forms the state’s eastern boundary.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to Water Rights Law, recognized as
the most thorough explanation of California water rights law
available to non-lawyers, traces the authority for water flowing
in a stream or reservoir, from a faucet or into an irrigation
ditch through the complex web of California water rights.
The 20-page Layperson’s Guide to Water Marketing provides
background information on water rights, types of transfers and
critical policy issues surrounding this topic. First published in
1996, the 2005 version offers expanded information on
groundwater banking and conjunctive use, Colorado River
transfers and the role of private companies in California’s
developing water market.
Order in bulk (25 or more copies of the same guide) for a reduced
fee. Contact the Foundation, 916-444-6240, for details.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to California Water provides an
excellent overview of the history of water development and use in
California. It includes sections on flood management; the state,
federal and Colorado River delivery systems; Delta issues; water
rights; environmental issues; water quality; and options for
stretching the water supply such as water marketing and
conjunctive use. New in this 10th edition of the guide is a
section on the human need for water.
A new look for our most popular product! And it’s the perfect
gift for the water wonk in your life.
Our 24×36-inch California Water Map is widely known for being the
definitive poster that shows the integral role water plays in the
state. On this updated version, it is easier to see California’s
natural waterways and man-made reservoirs and aqueducts
– including federally, state and locally funded
projects – the wild and scenic rivers system, and
natural lakes. The map features beautiful photos of
California’s natural environment, rivers, water projects,
wildlife, and urban and agricultural uses and the
text focuses on key issues: water supply, water use, water
projects, the Delta, wild and scenic rivers and the Colorado
River.
This 3-day, 2-night tour follows the course of the lower Colorado River through Nevada, Arizona and California, and includes a private tour of Hoover Dam.
As part of the historic Colorado
River Delta, the Salton Sea regularly filled and dried for
thousands of years due to its elevation of 237 feet below
sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
The Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA), signed in 2003,
defined the rights to a portion of Colorado River water for San
Diego County Water Authority, Coachella Valley Water District,
Imperial Irrigation District and the Metropolitan Water District
of Southern California.
The Mexican Water Treaty of 1944 committed the U.S. to deliver
1.5 million acre-feet of water to Mexico on an annual basis, plus
an additional 200,000 acre-feet under surplus conditions. The
treaty is overseen by the International Boundary and Water
Commission.
Colorado River water is delivered to Mexico at Morelos Dam,
located 1.1 miles downstream from where the California-Baja
California land boundary intersects the river between the town of
Los Algodones in northwestern Mexico and Yuma County, Ariz.
The Colorado River Delta is located
at the natural terminus of the Colorado River at the Gulf of
California, just south of the U.S.-Mexico border. The desert
ecosystem was formed by silt flushed downstream from the Colorado
and fresh and brackish water mixing at the Gulf.
The Colorado River Delta once covered 9,650 square miles but has
shrunk to less than 1 percent of its original size due to
human-made water diversions.
The Lower Colorado River Multi-Species Conservation Program aims
to balance use of Colorado River water resources with the
conservation of native species and their habitat. A key component
of the program is the restoration and enhancement of existing
riparian and marsh habitat along the lower Colorado River.
Lee Ferry on the Arizona-Utah border is a key dividing point
between the Colorado River’s Upper and Lower basins.
This split is important when it comes to determining how much
water will be delivered from the Upper Basin to the Lower Basin
[for a description of the Upper and Lower basins, visit the
Colorado River page].
The construction of Glen Canyon Dam
in 1964 created Lake Powell. Both are located in north-central
Arizona near the Utah border. Lake Powell acts as a holding tank
for outflow from the Colorado River Upper Basin States: Colorado,
New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.
The water stored in Lake Powell is used for recreation, power
generation and delivering water to the Lower Basin states of
California, Arizona, and Nevada.
John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) was historic and heroic for being
first to lead an expedition down the Colorado River in 1869. A major
who lost an arm in the Civil War Battle of Shiloh, he was an
explorer, geologist, geographer and ethnologist.
California’s Colorado River Water Use Plan (known colloquially as
the 4.4 Plan) intends to wean the state from its reliance on the
surplus flows from the river and return California to its annual
4.4 million acre-feet basic apportionment of the river.
In the past, California has also used more than its basic
apportionment. Consequently, the U.S. Department of
Interior urged California to devise a plan to reduce its water
consumption to its basic entitlement.
In 2005, after six years of severe
drought in the Colorado River Basin, federal officials and
representatives of the seven basin states — California, Arizona,
Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Wyoming — began building a
framework to better respond to drought conditions and coordinate
the operations of the basin’s two key reservoirs, Lake Powell and
Lake Mead.
The resulting Interim Guidelines for Lower Basin Shortages and
the Coordinated Operations for Lake Powell and Lake Mead (Interim
Guidelines) identified the conditions for shortage determinations
and details of coordinated reservoir operations. The 2007 Interim
Guidelines remain in effect through Dec. 31, 2025.
The turbulent Colorado River is one
of the most heavily regulated and hardest working rivers in the
world.
Geography
The Colorado falls some 10,000 feet on its way from the Rocky
Mountains to the Gulf of California, helping to sustain a range
of habitats and ecosystems as it weaves through mountains and
deserts.
This printed issue of Western Water examines how the various
stakeholders have begun working together to meet the planning
challenges for the Colorado River Basin, including agreements
with Mexico, increased use of conservation and water marketing,
and the goal of accomplishing binational environmental
restoration and water-sharing programs.
This printed issue of Western Water examines the
Colorado River Basin Water Supply and Demand Study and what its
finding might mean for the future of the lifeblood of the
Southwest.
The Colorado River is one of the most heavily relied upon water
supply sources in the world, serving 35 million people in seven
states and Mexico. The river provides water to large cities,
irrigates fields, powers turbines to generate electricity,
thrills recreational enthusiasts and serves as a home for birds,
fish and wildlife.
This printed issue of Western Water explores the
historic nature of some of the key agreements in recent years,
future challenges, and what leading state representatives
identify as potential “worst-case scenarios.” Much of the content
for this issue of Western Water came from the in-depth
panel discussions at the Colorado River Symposium. The Foundation
will publish the full proceedings of the Symposium in 2012.
This printed issue of Western Water examines the
Colorado River drought, and the ongoing institutional and
operational changes underway to maintain the system and meet the
future challenges in the Colorado River Basin.
This printed issue of Western Water explores some of the major
challenges facing Colorado River stakeholders: preparing for
climate change, forging U.S.-Mexico water supply solutions and
dealing with continued growth in the basins states. Much of the
content for this issue of Western Water came from the in-depth
panel discussions at the September 2009 Colorado River Symposium.
This printed copy of Western Water examines the Colorado River
Delta, its ecological significance and the lengths to which
international, state and local efforts are targeted and achieving
environmental restoration while recognizing the needs of the
entire river’s many users.
This issue of Western Water asks whether a groundwater
compact is needed to manage this shared resource today. In the
water-stressed West, there will need to be a recognition of
sharing water resources or a line will need to be drawn in the
sand against future growth.
“In the West, when you touch water, you touch
everything.” – Rep. Wayne Aspinall, D-Colorado, chair,
House Interior and Insular Affairs Committee, 1959-1973
Rapid population growth and chronic droughts could augur dramatic
changes for communities along the lower Colorado River. In
Arizona, California and Nevada, a robust economy is spurring
communities to find enough water to sustain the steady pace of
growth. Established cities such as Las Vegas and Phoenix continue
their expansion but there is also activity in smaller, rural
areas on Arizona’s northwest fringe where developers envision
hundreds of thousands of new homes in the coming decades.
With interstate discussions of critical Colorado River issues
seemingly headed for stalemate, Secretary of the Interior Gale
Norton stepped in May 2 to defuse, or at least defer, a
potentially divisive debate over water releases from Lake Powell.
With interstate discussions of critical Colorado River issues
seemingly headed for stalemate, Secretary of the Interior Gale
Norton stepped in May 2 to defuse, or at least defer, a
potentially divisive debate over water releases from Lake Powell.
In a letter to governors of the seven Colorado River Basin
states, Norton preserved the status quo of river operations for
five months, giving states and stakeholders a chance to move back
from the edge before positions had hardened on two key issues:
(1) shortage guidelines for the Lower Basin and (2) Upper Basin/
Lower Basin reservoir operations, particularly at Lake Powell.
But Norton served notice that she wants discussions on those two
issues to continue, possibly outside of the annual operation plan
(AOP) consultation process, which at least one observer described
as unwieldy.
Drawn from a special Colorado River stakeholder symposium held in
January 2002 at The Bishop’s Lodge in Santa Fe, New Mexico, this
article provides an overview of several Colorado River issues
that may or may not be resolved through consensus. Some of these
issues include providing water for the Colorado River Delta,
endangered species, dam re-operation and potential future trends
around the basin as they relate to the California 4.4 Plan,
drought and governance.
The situation is true anywhere: when resources are stretched,
tensions rise. In the arid Southwestern United States, this
resource is water and tensions over it have been ever present
since the westward migration in the 18th Century. Nowhere in this
region has the competition for water been fiercer than in the
Colorado River Basin. Whether it is more water for agriculture,
more water for cities, more water for American Indian tribes or
more water for the environment – there is a continuous quest by
parties to obtain additional supplies of this “liquid gold” from
the Colorado River. Sometimes the avenue chosen to acquire this
desert wealth is the court system, as exemplified by the landmark
Arizona v. California dispute that stretched for over 30 years.
Drawn from a special stakeholder symposium held in September 1999
in Keystone, Colorado, this issue explores how we got to where we
are today on the Colorado River; an era in which the traditional
water development of the past has given way to a more
collaborative approach that tries to protect the environment
while stretching available water supplies. Specific topics
addressed include the role of the Interior secretary in the
basin, California’s 4.4 plan, water marketing and future
challenges identified by participants.
Drawn from a special stakeholder symposium held in September 1999
in Keystone, Colorado, this issue explores how we got to where we
are today on the Colorado River; an era in which the traditional
water development of the past has given way to a more
collaborative approach that tries to protect the environment
while stretching available water supplies.