States in the Colorado River basin propose a sharp reduction in water use from the river next year in response to a federal request for immediate and drastic efforts to prevent the river’s major reservoirs from becoming extremely low. I’m struggling to try. level.
The demand comes with the Southwest being in a severe 20-year drought grip that has yet to show signs of giving up. And it’s a previous, less desperate effort to maintain more water in two reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, including last year’s first declaration of a shortage to reduce water to Arizona farmers. It will be done in addition.
2023 is the only call to save up to 4 million acre-foot of water, about one-third of Colorado’s current annual flow. But the long-term outlook for Colorado is bleak as a climate. Changes continue to affect river runoff, reducing the likelihood of a series of rainy years that could end the drought.
The reduction request further revealed fault lines between the upper reaches of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Wyoming with the lower reaches of California, Arizona, and Nevada. .. Upstream states do not use all of their allocated water, and the most important reductions need to come from downstream states that use more than their allotted share. Please note.
Aside from the imminent crisis on the two reservoirs, Western water experts, who wrote in the journal Science on Thursday, said that significant policy changes could stabilize the river in the long run, even if the drought continues. It states that there is. But “may not be considered at this time” concessions must be implemented immediately, they wrote.
Water managers such as states, irrigation districts, and indigenous peoples are discussing proposals for rapid reductions in 2023 and will need to submit them to the Development Department next month. Reductions are expected to be the largest in agriculture, which uses about three-quarters of Colorado’s water, and in lower basin states.
Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Use Policy in Arizona, said: University. “And now we suddenly have an unprecedented demand to leave more water in the system.”
When calling for cuts at a Senate hearing last month, Pioneer Secretary Camille C. Toon warned that the government could act unilaterally if negotiations fail. “We protect the system,” she said.
“The challenges we see today are different from what we see in our history,” said Tuton.
The water levels in both reservoirs are at historically low levels. This is a result of reduced flow and increased water intake from rivers that supply 40 million people and more than 5.5 million acres of farmland. The main concern is that Lake Powell behind the Glen Canyon Dam near the Arizona-Utah border will be very low next year, making hydropower impossible, passing through the dam and downstream of the Grand Canyon and Lake Mead. It can flow. It may be affected.
Water Manager of Tina Shields, Imperial irrigation district Southern California, which has rights to its largest user, 3.1 million acre-foot of Colorado water, said it was in talks “to determine opportunities to participate in voluntary programs and the challenges needed to move forward.” rice field.
The need to submit a proposal by next month “doesn’t make it easy,” she said.
Little details of the region-wide talks have been published, but some agricultural users are proposing fallow land in return for monetary compensation. Indemnity can reach billions of dollars, depending on fallow land and the amount of water saved. It is not clear where the money comes from.
Chuck Kalom, secretary-general of the Upper Colorado River Upstream Commission, which allocates water to Upper Basin, said there was a fundamental difference between the two Basin. Almost all upstream users get water directly from the river and its tributaries, so their supply is affected by annual hydrology, or currents. Low basin users receive almost all of the water stored in Lake Mead. And most of Lake Mead’s water, in turn, comes from Lake Powell.
“Their water usage patterns are out of sync with hydrology because they rely on storage,” Collum said, referring to users in lower basins.
Colon wrote a letter to the Pioneer Department this week outlining the Commission’s proposed actions to save an unspecified amount of additional water. But he said, “Our water users are already suffering from chronic shortages in the current situation.” “Additional efforts to protect the elevation of important reservoirs include Lake Powell. Must include important actions focused on the downstream of the lake. “
Maintaining or increasing storage is the strategic goal proposed in the Science Paper. Researchers said their management approach considers Mead and Powell storage together, rather than the current practice in which only Lake Mead water levels are used to cause downstream reductions.
Kevin Wheeler, lead author of the study and senior researcher at the Institute for Environmental Change at the University of Oxford, UK, said that treating river storage as a whole “opens up more possibilities for better planning.” “.
Researchers used simulations incorporating river flow data over the last two decades to see how the combination of lower basin reductions and upper basin water usage reductions affects reservoirs. ..
It has been found that by severely limiting growth in the upper basin and reducing use in the lower basin by about 20%, storage levels can be maintained until the middle of the century, as long as countermeasures are implemented immediately.
Researchers pointed out that long-term reductions, as well as growth limits in the upper basin with plans for projects that use more water, would be difficult for users in the lower basin to accept.
“These concessions from both basins may not be possible at this time, but will be necessary if the recent situation continues,” the researchers write.