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.
Arizona leaders sent a bipartisan letter to the Trump
administration requesting that it maintain the original 1922
Colorado River Compact as negotiations continue to address the
river’s future water rights. … In the new agreement,
Arizona leaders said they want the Upper Basin States to agree
to use less water and to share the water shortage more evenly.
… Arizona leaders are concerned that these states are
refusing to cut back on water use, which will impact the
state’s water supply. … In the letter, the Arizona
leaders said the state has developed plans with California and
Nevada to conserve 1.5 million acre-feet of water per
year.
Voracious, invasive zebra mussels hopped an upstream ride over
the summer and added 100 miles of Colorado River to their
fast-growing infestation of state waterways, Parks and Wildlife
officials said after a recent multiagency, multicounty
sampling. Previously pegged in the Grand Junction area, the
Oct. 29 sampling and subsequent analysis found adult zebra
mussels upstream in Glenwood Canyon and all the way up to the
Colorado River’s junction with the Eagle River at Dotsero, near
a private lake treated for zebra mussels in August.
When New Mexico water users convinced the federal government to
build the San Juan-Chama Project in 1962, they hoped it would
relieve stress on the Rio Grande. The pipeline from southern
Colorado to Northern New Mexico would bring water from the
Colorado River Basin to the Rio Grande Valley. But in recent
years, as Northern New Mexico has seen historic shortages on
the Rio Grande, water managers say the Colorado River has not
softened the blow. Rather, the two water sources have both
become more unreliable, linked to one another by legal and
natural systems that have turned stretches of wet river into
highways of mud and sand.
When it comes to zebra mussels in the Colorado River system,
Colorado Parks and Wildlife Director Jeff Davis summed it up
this way: “We look, we find.” While Colorado’s first
detection of the highly invasive zebra mussel was in 2022,
Parks and Wildlife, alongside federal and local partners, has
ramped up testing for the species following a growing number of
finds this summer on the Western Slope. … Zebra mussels
are an invasive aquatic species notorious for their prolific
reproduction and destruction of ecosystems and
infrastructure.
The seven Colorado River basin states, including
Wyoming, missed a Tuesday federal deadline to reach a
preliminary agreement on managing the river’s dwindling water
supply. Even so, there could be one last chance. In June, when
the Nov. 11 deadline was set for a preliminary agreement, the
Department of Interior also demanded a final agreement by
mid-February 2026. So, now representatives from the states and
federal officials are placing their bets on a consensus being
reached by then. If not, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum might
be forced to decree a new set of operating plans for the river,
regardless of what the states want.
The application window is now open
for our 2026 Colorado
River Water Leaders program, which will run
from March through September next year.
Our biennial program 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 – as well as tribal nations and Mexico to take part in
the 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.
Acceptance to the program is highly competitive. Get a
program overview and tips on applying by attending our
virtual Q&A session on Dec. 10at 12:30
p.m. (Mountain Time) / 11:30 a.m. (Pacific Time).
Applications
are due by Jan. 26, 2026, no later
than5 p.m. (Pacific Time).
“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
In mountain regions like the Rockies, headwater streams make up
more than 70% of the river network and support the downstream
waterways and communities. … While these sources are crucial,
very few are monitored, and aspects of their hydrology are not
well understood. A team of researchers, including UConn
Department of Earth Sciences assistant professor Lijing Wang,
are working to determine what influences how and when water
moves through these streams, and what hidden source sustains
them long after the rush of snowmelt. Their findings are
published in Water Resources Research.
Northern Water will further delay an initial partial filling of
its new Chimney Hollow reservoir into next year to allow time
for expanded groundwater tests in the area to make sure
unexpected uranium leaching inside the planned pool would not
migrate to other supplies. … Filling of a small portion
of the reservoir had been planned for this month, but now is
“expected in early 2026,” according to the agency. … The
project was meant to “firm” or store water rights Northern
Water owns in the Windy Gap project near Granby, which collects
and pumps Colorado River water into the Adams Tunnel for Front
Range buyers.
U.S. Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, Republicans from Texas,
have filed a bill to hold Mexico accountable for failing to
provide water to south Texas in accordance with a 1944-era
treaty. The Ensuring Predictable and Reliable Water
Deliveries Act of 2025 would strengthen enforcement of the 1944
Treaty of Utilization of Waters, which governs water usage
between the U.S. and Mexico. … The bill would impose
restrictions and measures against Mexico if it does not meet
its average annualized obligation. It requires the secretary of
State to report to Congress on Mexico’s status of meeting its
treaty obligations. If the secretary finds that Mexico hasn’t
met its obligations, the bill directs the president to deny all
non-treaty requests from the Mexican government.
Nevada and six other Colorado River states failed to reach a
broad agreement Tuesday on how to share the river’s dwindling
water supply, missing a federally-imposed deadline after days
of intense closed-door negotiations. Despite missing the
deadline, the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of
Reclamation indicated states would be given additional time to
continue negotiations after making “collective progress.” …
The Bureau of Reclamation – which manages water in the West
under the Interior Department – initially gave states until
Nov. 11 to submit a preliminary agreement for a plan that could
replace the river’s operating guidelines set to expire at the
end of 2026. The initial timeline also called for states to
share a final consensus-based plan by mid-February
2026 in order to reach a final agreement in the summer
of 2026 with implementation of the new guidelines beginning in
October 2026.
The Valley’s two largest water providers will connect their
systems, allowing water from the Salt River Project into the
Central Arizona Project canal system. The project would give
SRP and CAP the flexibility to move water through the Valley.
Combined, the two providers serve the vast majority of
Arizonans. SRP water comes from the Salt and Verde Rivers. CAP
water comes from the Colorado River and is in danger of taking
cuts. SRP and CAP have different service areas. The proposed
SRP-CAP Interconnection Facility (SCIF) would allow water
users, like some central Arizona cities and towns with rights
to SRP water to access it.
The Colorado River states are still divided — so much so that
they could not reach a broad agreement on how to manage the
river by their federal deadline. The Department of the
Interior gave seven Western states, including Colorado, until
Tuesday to indicate whether they can reach any level of accord
on how the water supply for 40 million people
should be managed in the future. The current agreement, which
has governed how key reservoirs store and release water
supplies since 2007, expires Dec. 31. … In a joint
statement Tuesday, the seven states and federal officials said
they recognize the seriousness of the basin’s challenges as
drought and low reservoirs have put pressure on the river’s
water supplies.
The Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) have taken a huge leap
forward in their ongoing efforts to protect and preserve their
namesake. Last week, the tribal council voted to acknowledge
legal personhood status for the body of water. The Nov. 6 vote
follows similar actions other tribes have taken to safeguard
natural resources. However, CRIT has made history as the first
community to ever bestow personhood status on the Colorado
River. The move came in response to overuse of water resources,
according to a Tuesday announcement from the tribes.
… As a legal person, the Colorado River has the right to
be protected under tribal law.
The Colorado River Indian Tribes have formally accorded
personhood status to the Colorado River, creating a powerful
new mechanism to protect the eponymous river that makes life
possible in their arid homelands. The resolution was approved
by the CRIT Tribal Council on Nov. 6 in Parker.
… Granting personhood to natural resources, such as
rivers, allows people or parties to take legal action to
protect them. For example, forum participants said a person
could sue a company or entity that pollutes a river because the
river has the right to be pollution-free.
Negotiators for seven Western states are under mounting
pressure to reach an agreement outlining how they plan to share
the Colorado River’s dwindling water. The Trump administration
gave the states a Tuesday deadline to agree on
the initial terms of a plan for cutting water use to prevent
the river’s reservoirs from declining to dangerously low
levels. Because California uses more Colorado River water
than any other state, it will play a central role in any deal
to take less from the river.
A state legislative committee failed to pass a bill draft last
week that would have placed a 10-year moratorium on all cloud
seeding activities in the state. During the moratorium, the
Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality would have been
tasked with completing a study of cloud seeding impacts
compared to baseline conditions, according to the initial bill
proposal – but University of Wyoming Atmospheric Science
Department Head Jeff French said that plan wouldn’t be
“scientifically sound.” … “The only way I could see us
actually being able to measure the effectiveness of cloud
seeding is by doing a focused study that includes cloud
seeding.”
State officials grilled Water Development Office Director Jason
Mead this week over ballooning costs and uncertainties dogging
three dam projects after he told them one project on the
Colorado border would cost $150 million, nearly double the
original estimate of $80 million. … The proposed
reservoir would release stored water into the Little Snake
River, which flows back and forth across the Colorado border
before leaving Wyoming for good, flowing into the Yampa, Green
and Colorado rivers. The dam and reservoir would allow Wyoming
to use more water from the Colorado River Basin.
Progress appears to be happening in the high-stakes
negotiations over the future of the Colorado River. Ahead of a
Tuesday deadline by the Trump administration for a deal in
principle, the Colorado River Commissioner for Utah said in a
statement to FOX 13 News that they may get there. … “We’re
making steady progress on key issues the federal government has
identified, aiming to reach broad alignment by November 11—even
if the finer details come later,” said Gene Shawcroft.
U.S. Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn want to limit the U.S.’s
engagement with Mexico after the country failed to deliver
water to Texas under a 1944 international water treaty. The
Texas senators filed legislation Thursday that would limit the
U.S. from sending Mexico future deliveries of water and would
allow the U.S. president to stop engaging with Mexico in
certain business sectors that benefit from U.S. water. The
treaty requires the U.S. to deliver 1,500,000 acre-feet of
water from the Colorado River to Mexico every
year.
Utah wildlife officials are again reminding people that it’s
illegal to dump fish into bodies of water after state
biologists discovered an unapproved species had been introduced
at a southeast Utah reservoir. Biologists found smallmouth
bass at Loyds Lake, located within the Colorado River drainage
located southwest of Monticello, while doing routine surveys,
the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources reported on Wednesday.
The reservoir is home to rainbow trout and green sunfish, but
not bass, largely because of its proximity to the Colorado
River and the threat to native fish within it.
Tree rings can tell a story. Wide bands signal a wet period,
while narrow ones show a drought. Whole ecosystems can be
encoded in trees. In Western Colorado, scientists are examining
trees to find out more about the environment’s story in an
effort to protect the river they stand along. … The
Crystal River is one of the few rivers in Colorado that doesn’t
have any major dams; large stretches of it are still pristine.
… At the heart of what Cooper, Brown and Merritt are
trying to do with this study is establish the relationship
between the trees and the Crystal’s natural hydrologic rhythm,
which wouldn’t exist if it were dammed or diverted.
The October floods in southwestern Colorado damaged homes and
upended people’s lives, but there was one silver lining: A lot
of the water also helped replenish reservoirs
in the state. The deluge, caused by tropical storms and
hurricanes in the Pacific Ocean, dumped more than 480 billion
gallons of water on five counties in southwestern Colorado.
… But the water also bumped parts of the region out of
severe and extreme drought. The amount of water stored in
Colorado reservoirs surged or even doubled.
Other weather and water supply news across the West:
… Perhaps no region stands to take larger hits to its
Colorado River water than central Arizona, owing to the low
priority of its water rights. … Unless Arizona’s farmers
and tribes can strike deals to bail out the state’s growing
cities, Arizona’s largest population centers will bear the
brunt of these cuts. Cities like Phoenix, Scottsdale and Tucson
could lose more than 20% of their Colorado River water,
triggering public debates in council chambers and municipal
offices over how to respond, what to sacrifice and what to
prioritize.
… On Nov. 11, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona,
California, Nevada and the Beehive state need to reach a
consensus on how to split up a dwindling river that supplies
water for nearly 40 million people. … Conserving water
in Utah is nothing new. During dry years, there’s often not
enough from rain and snowpack to meet everyone’s water rights,
so some people go without their share. Those cuts typically
happen on a small, localized basis. What makes potential
Colorado River reductions unprecedented … is that they
would happen basinwide. That’s why Utah has prepared for how
that might play out.
Heavy autumn rains brought relief to drought-plagued portions
of the Southwest, but across the Colorado River basin ongoing
water supply concerns still linger amid tense policy
negotiations and near record-low reservoir storage. Even
after accounting for the heavy rain, 57% of the
Colorado River watershed remains in severe drought,
according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. More than 11% of the
basin is in extreme drought. … In response to extremely
low water conditions, it’s possible water from upstream
reservoirs in Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico could be
released to support Powell’s hydropower turbines.
Other weather and water supply news across the West:
The Utah Division of Water Rights is reviewing an application
to repurpose a Green River–basin water right for municipal use
that could draw from the Colorado River near
Cisco, where a new residential community is proposed off
Interstate 70 about an hour from Moab. The San Juan Water
Conservancy District filed the change application July 1,
requesting permission to convert Water Right 91-5233 from power
generation — originally allocated for a nuclear power plant
that was never built — to municipal use.
Over three sunny-but-cool October days, a team of scientists
and volunteers dug up and hauled away the root crowns of trees
along the Crystal River, a first step toward a potential
strategy to protect flows on one of the last
free-flowing rivers in Colorado.
… Environmental and recreation advocates and local
municipalities, as well as many residents of the Crystal River
Valley, have long sought to protect the river from future dams
and diversions — infrastructure projects that have left many
other Western Slope rivers depleted.
With state negotiators in the Colorado River Basin still at
odds ahead of a key deadline, the Trump administration could
soon be tasked with deciding where to cut water use across the
West and appears to be weighing options like draining
reservoirs or curbing senior water rights. … Without a
deal, the Interior Department and its Bureau of Reclamation
have threatened to step in to wield federal authority — a
largely untested power — and potentially tap reservoirs in the
Upper Basin and reduce flows to the Lower Basin.
Misinformation and confusion fueled a recent Wyoming
legislative meeting on how to stop chemtrails, a debunked
conspiracy that claims the government is controlling our health
with airborne chemicals. … Cloud
seeding was also tied up in the Wyoming legislation.
… Wyoming has been doing it for at least two decades, as
it’s considered a “tool in the toolbox” for helping the
drought-stricken Colorado River
system. Last legislative session, lawmakers
banned aerial cloud seeding and defunded the ground operations.
It’s up to Wyoming water groups, municipalities and industry,
as well as other Colorado River states, to foot the bill for
the 2026 season.
Utah and six other states along the Colorado
River are pushing up against a deadline to figure out
as a group how to manage the river and its reservoirs.
… The Upper Basin states have resisted the idea of
mandatory cuts in dry years, saying they typically use much
less than their yearly allocation. Lower Basin states have
said all seven should share water cuts during dry years under
the new plan, warning if they don’t, downstream states could
face cuts that aren’t feasible for them to absorb.
After fretting for a day over claims the government is
poisoning citizens by spraying chemicals in the sky, a Wyoming
legislative committee endorsed a bill banning the release of
“atmospheric contaminants” above the state. … Vapor-like
trails that appear behind jets — also known as contrails and
widely understood to be water vapor from engines — are actually
poisonous sprays intentionally released by the Department of
War to change the climate, witnesses said. … Water users
from Wyoming’s portion of the Colorado River
Basin and others representing ag interests
successfully asked that cloud seeding be
exempt from the proposed geoengineering ban.
Seven states in the Colorado River Basin are days away from a
Nov. 11 deadline to hash out a rough idea of how the water
supply for 40 million people will be managed starting in fall
2026. … The rules that govern how key reservoirs
store and release water supplies expire Dec. 31. They’ll guide
reservoir operations until fall 2026, and federal and state
officials plan to use the winter months to nail down a new set
of replacement rules. But negotiating those new rules raises
questions about everything from when the new agreement will
expire to who has to cut back on water use in the basin’s
driest years.
Just months after the federal government closed on a land
exchange with a billionaire, a proposal to institute a permit
system on the Blue River has ignited a conversation about river
access and fishery health in Colorado. … Blue Valley
Ranch, a more than 2,000-acre property owned by billionaire
Paul Tudor Jones II, and the nonprofit Friends of the Lower
Blue River say a permit system is necessary to manage the
negative impacts of increasing fishing pressure. … As
part of the exchange, the ranch has agreed to cover the costs
of river restoration work for a three-quarter-mile stretch of
the Blue River near its confluence with the Colorado
River. … Anglers who opposed the land swap because
they felt it was tilted toward private interests, said they see
the proposed permit system as the continuation of an effort by
a landowner to restrict public access to the river.
Southern Arizona politicians joined representatives of the
Sierra Club by the banks of the Colorado River on Oct. 27 to
call on Washington to protect the waterway by taking action
against climate change. The officials, including Democratic
U.S. Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, were demanding an end to what
they called major rollbacks in climate protections, most
prominently the Trump administration’s plan to overturn the
endangerment finding that enables the Environmental Protection
Agency to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
… Conflicts between river uses and property owners date back
decades in Colorado, a state that has the murkiest access laws
in the country. Courts have handed down rulings in contentious
lawsuits involving access on the Arkansas River and Colorado
River. Attorneys general have written opinions. Lawmakers have
tried twice to clear the waters around floating and wading
through private lands. And now, there’s even a split in a newly
formed stream access coalition with paddling groups leaving a
not-quite-unified effort to craft legislation that would open
all of Colorado waterways to the public.
Next month, the seven Colorado River Basin states — Arizona,
California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Wyoming —
are set to finalize a new framework for sharing a shrinking
resource. Billed as a modern compact for a hotter, drier
century, it will shape how the West survives in an age of
scarcity. Yet amid debates over drought, equity, and cutbacks,
one rapidly expanding demand remains almost invisible: the
immense water consumption of artificial intelligence and the
data centers that sustain it. –Written by nature photographer Rusty Childress.
The Utah Supreme Court has rejected a project that proposes to
take water from the Colorado River system in Utah, pump it
hundreds of miles across Wyoming into Colorado. In a unanimous
decision, the state’s top court sided with the Utah State
Engineer, who rejected Water Horse Resources application to
take 55,000 acre-feet of water from the Green River, a
tributary of the Colorado River, and pump it to the Fort
Collins, Colo., area. … The ruling hit during a
particularly delicate time for Utah and other states who rely
on the Colorado River.
The Utah Supreme Court ruled on a controversial pipeline
project in Eastern Utah last Friday. In January 2018, Water
Horse Resources, LLC proposed a pipeline project that would
send 55,000 acre-feet of water every year from the Green River
to the state of Colorado. However, on Nov. 7, 2020, the Utah
State Engineer rejected the application. The proposal
sought to pipe water to be used for “beneficial use in
Colorado.” However, a district court found Water Horse failed
to establish evidence that the water can be put to beneficial
use in Colorado. … Water Horse appealed the district
court’s decision, leading to a years-long legal battle. On
Friday, Oct. 17, 2025, the Utah Supreme Court reaffirmed the
initial decision of the state engineer to reject the project.
Colorado is in its first year of responding to a zebra mussel
infestation in a big river, the Colorado River. State staff say
they have what they need to handle the high-priority needs —
they just need their funding to stay off the chopping
block. The fast-reproducing mussels, or their microscopic
stage called veligers, were first detected in Colorado in 2022.
Since then, the state’s Aquatic Nuisance Species team and its
partners have been working to monitor water, decontaminate
boats and educate the public to keep the mussels from
spreading. That effort logged a serious failure this summer
when state staff detected adult zebra mussels in the Colorado
River, where treatment options are limited.
… In an attempt to slow the river’s decline and to
convince the Lower Basin states that the Upper Basin can
voluntarily conserve water as opposed to shouldering mandatory
cuts, Wyoming has been developing a pilot water conservation
program in the Green River Basin. Wednesday’s meeting offered
members of the public and Wyoming’s Colorado River Advisory
Committee an opportunity to give feedback on the draft
legislation. … Wyoming’s pilot conservation program
would allow water users with a proven consumptive water right
in Wyoming’s portion of the Colorado River
basin to apply to the state engineer’s office to implement a
conservation project.
Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the nation’s two largest reservoirs,
are following patterns very similar to 2021, the year the water
shortage was declared by the federal government. There’s one
big difference: Lake Mead is already 10 feet lower than it was
then, despite ongoing conservation efforts. And that’s a
problem for Las Vegas and millions of people who rely on the
Colorado River for water. A report
released on Wednesday shows that Lake Mead is expected to be 5
feet lower a year from now. More concerning is the projection
that shows it will drop an additional 15 feet by September 2027
— so, a total of 20 feet compared to now.
… The [Colorado River] basin, on the whole, is drying. That’s
frightful for the 40 million people and 5 million acres that
the river supplies with water. But it’s also worrisome for
electricity generation. Lakes Mead and Powell, the basin’s two
largest reservoirs, are approaching critical levels in which
hydropower from their dams (Hoover and Glen Canyon,
respectively) would be severely curtailed or altogether cease.
… As the power of flowing water becomes less
reliable, they [utilities] are turning to an energy resource
that is almost always on in the Southwest during the day: the
sun.
Washington Evening Star humorist Philander Chase Johnson
created a great character named Senator Sorghum. A 1902 piece
called “A Delicate Distinction” had one character saying, “That
friend of yours seems to have a clear conscience.” Senator
Sorghum answered, “No, not a clear conscience; merely a
bad memory.” A convenient memory is common in politics. And
current negotiations regarding the Colorado River District’s
attempt to purchase the Shoshone water rights from Excel Energy
provide a perfect example. Water providers up and down the
Front Range, and especially Denver Water, seem to be
conveniently forgetting the agreement made more than a decade
ago – to support the purchase, and even help finance it. –Written by Greg Walcher, former director of the Colorado
Department of Natural Resources.
With rising tensions over a dwindling supply of water from the
Colorado River, Wyoming and six other states have until Nov. 11
to hammer out a deal for water allocation or the federal
government will step in and settle it for them. The main point
of conflict is between the river’s Upper Basin states, Wyoming,
Colorado, Utah and New Mexico – and the Lower Basin states;
Arizona, Nevada and California. In a nutshell, the Upper
Basin states claim that the Lower Basin states are hogging
water, leaving them with too little for their own pressing
needs.
Farmers, ranchers and other water users in four Western states,
including Colorado, are cutting back on water use because of
low flows through the Colorado River Basin. Less than half
the normal amount of water flowed into Lake Powell from the
Upper Basin states — Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming —
this summer. Farmers in the four-state region fallowed fields
and changed their crop plans to adapt to a smaller water
supply. The dry summer conditions coincided with high-stakes
negotiations over how the water supply for 40 million people
will be managed starting in August 2026.
… In Arizona, 76 percent of water use goes toward
agriculture. Mature alfalfa (hay) is largely used to feed
cattle, and in Arizona, alfalfa is a commonly planted thirsty
crop. A 2020 study found 79 percent of Colorado river water
goes to alfalfa. … Outside of certain areas, like
Phoenix, if you own the land, you can drill a well and take as
much water as you want. And many farms are doing just that. In
2015, the Center for Investigative Reporting did a deep-dive
into the Saudi-owned farm drilling deep wells to water alfalfa
that they then harvest and ship to Saudi Arabia. The story
brought light to a situation that, as time has gone on, is
slowly rendering the desert almost unlivable.
Western Slope elected officials, water managers, engineers, and
conservationists met in Grand Junction on Friday, Oct. 3, all
focused on one thing: the uncertain future of the Colorado
River. … While the seminar broached many of the
challenges and opportunities facing those who rely on the
Colorado River, most discussions came back to two looming
decisions that will dictate how the future looks for the 40
million people, seven states, two counties, and 30 tribal
nations that rely on the waterway.
Under a new program developed by Arizona’s water department,
West Valley housing developers have access to a new water
provider. Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs announced that EPCOR is
the first company operating in Arizona to receive an
Alternative Designation of Assured Water Supply, or ADAWS.
ADAWS went into effect in November and serves as a pathway for
providers to prove they have enough water to last an area for
100 years. … Hobbs said the alternative designation
allows water companies to prove they have an adequate supply
from a variety of sources — in EPCOR’s case, a combination of
groundwater and sources like Lake Pleasant and the Colorado
River.
The clock is ticking down on Mexico’s deadline this month to
pay the United States water it owes under a 1944 international
treaty. So far, Mexico has paid less than half what it
owes during this five-year cycle, which ends on Oct. 25.
… Mexico must pay the United States 1.75 million
acre-feet of water every five years. The current cycle ends
Oct. 25 but so far they have only sent 807,980 acre-feet to the
Rio Grande. … Under the treaty, the United
States must send Mexico 1.5 million acre-feet of water annually
via the Colorado River out West.
The Colorado River Indian Tribes may soon become the third
Indigenous government in North America to grant personhood
rights to a river. ‘Aha Kwahwat, or the Colorado River, has
been at the heart of Mojave culture and history for millennia.
The river is also critically important to the other three
cultures that make up the Colorado River Indian Tribes: the
Chemehuevi, whose ancestral lands lie to the northwest of
CRIT’s lands, Navajo and Hopi who moved to the area in the
1940s. … Once the tribal membership has completed weighing in
… the already-drafted resolution will be put before the
tribal council, and once approved, will become part of CRIT’s
law.
After four years of contentious negotiations, the seven states that rely on water from the Colorado River are racing against the clock to reach agreement on a new long-term operating strategy for the river’s dams and reservoirs. They face a Nov. 11 deadline from U.S. Interior Department officials to signal whether they think a deal among them is likely.
Before the construction of Hoover Dam on the lower Colorado River, as well as a slew of smaller sisters downstream, the stretch downriver served as a biological oasis in the middle of the unrelenting Mojave and Sonoran deserts. The marshes and backwaters along the river’s edge provided sheltered areas for fish to spawn and rear their young, and mesquite and cottonwood-willow forests provided important habitat for numerous species of birds and other animals.
A new aquatic invader, the golden mussel, has penetrated California’s ecologically fragile Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, the West Coast’s largest tidal estuary and the hub of the state’s vast water export system. While state officials say they’re working to keep this latest invasive species in check, they concede it may be a nearly impossible task: The golden mussel is in the Golden State to stay – and it is likely to spread.
The 2024 Colorado River Water
Leaders cohort completed its seven-month program
with policy recommendations involving ”augmentation” –
projects that increase the availability and supply of water – as
the Colorado River Basin grows hotter and drier.
The cohort of
12 up-and-coming leaders included engineers,
lawyers, resource specialists and others working for public,
private and non-governmental organizations from across the
river’s basin. The cohort had full editorial control to choose
its recommendations.
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.
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
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 the San
Diego County Water Authority, Coachella Valley Water District,
Imperial Irrigation District and the Metropolitan Water District
of Southern California.
The QSA responded to California consistently using more than its
annual Colorado River entitlement of 4.4 million acre-feet.
Additionally, the water needs of six other Colorado River Basin
states had grown, making the river’s shared use increasingly
crucial.
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.
In 2005, the Interior Department launched a program to recover 27
species in the lower Colorado
River, including seven the federal government has deemed
threatened or endangered or threatened with extinction. The
species include fish, birds, bats, mammals, insects, amphibians,
reptiles, rodents and plants
The Lower Colorado River Multispecies Conservation Program has a
50-year plan to create at least 8,132 acres of new habitat
and restore habitat that has become degraded.
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.
