COMMENTARY: Robbing Mead to pay Powell

The national Bureau of Reclamation precocious announced bonzer actions to shuffle h2o betwixt the Flaming Gorge and Lake Powell reservoirs successful an effort to stabilize the Colorado River system. The effect volition beryllium arsenic if utilizing 1 recognition paper to wage the minimum equilibrium connected different reduces debt.

Instead of juggling a diminishing proviso of water, the Bureau should consolidate the retention of Colorado River h2o successful Lake Mead, which supplies h2o to astir 25 cardinal radical and irrigates millions of acres of farmland, alternatively than continuing to prop up Lake Powell, which straight serves less than 10,000 people. Doing truthful would heighten the reliability and information of h2o supplies and prolong cultivation productivity and hydropower generation, portion not reducing h2o disposable to different states.

Lake Mead is little than one-third full. Its remaining retention capableness tin clasp much than 3 times the measurement of h2o presently stored successful Lake Powell — adjacent to doubly the full measurement of h2o stored successful the main reservoirs of the precocious Colorado River.

Earlier this month, the states of Arizona, California and Nevada requested that the U.S. Department of the Interior implicit a program by the extremity of 2027, which would let much h2o to travel from Lake Powell done oregon astir Glen Canyon Dam, and downstream done the Grand Canyon into Lake Mead. Yet, alternatively of bolstering Lake Mead, the Bureau has chosen to augment Lake Powell with up to 1 cardinal acre-feet of h2o from Flaming Gorge — astir equivalent to the combined yearly municipal h2o request of Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Tucson and Las Vegas — and restrict releases from Lake Powell to astir 1.5 cardinal acre-feet less than immoderate twelvemonth this century.

These actions are intended to support Lake Powell from falling to a level that would jeopardize Glen Canyon Dam’s hydropower accumulation and to support the dam’s structural integrity. But adding h2o to Lake Powell does not summation the proviso disposable to anyone. There is nary applicable mode to retreat important quantities of h2o from the reservoir for municipal, cultivation oregon different uses — the h2o sits determination oregon evaporates until it is released done Glen Canyon Dam.

The intended benefits of boosting Lake Powell to sphere hydropower accumulation from Glen Canyon Dam and support its structural integrity whitethorn not materialize. The agency’s astir caller forecast estimates that, by aboriginal 2028, Lake Powell could driblet debased capable to preclude hydropower production. At that constituent the lone mode to merchandise h2o from the dam is done its outlet tubes located beneath the dam’s turbines. The tubes were ne'er intended for semipermanent usage astatine debased reservoir h2o levels. Just 72 hours of high-capacity usage caused structural harm that took 9 months to repair, and the repairs volition not forestall aboriginal damage.

Based connected that experience, successful 2024 the Bureau adopted guidance not to trust connected the tubes arsenic the sole means for releasing h2o from the dam.

The Bureau volition beryllium robbing Mead to wage Powell. The bureau volition capable Lake Powell, portion Lake Mead volition shrink. This volition trigger important mandatory cuts successful h2o usage successful Arizona and Nevada. And the reservoir’s elevation is expected to stay debased capable that the outgo to run and support Hoover Dam volition transcend the gross gained from hydroelectric sales.

The Bureau’s latest actions volition not forestall protracted and costly litigation astir however to allocate the dwindling h2o resources of the Colorado River.

Some of the largest stakeholders person signaled a willingness to writer the bureau to support their interests. At its May 7 meeting, the Central Arizona Project’s Board of Directors established a $60 cardinal “extraordinary outgo reserve” for Colorado River litigation. And the states of Arizona, California and Nevada warned the Department of the Interior this period that “litigation needfully remains” an enactment successful their connection for operating the Colorado River successful 2026-2028.

Litigation volition not supply solutions quickly, if ever. Arizona and California person squabbled successful the U.S. Supreme Court for decades astir entree to Colorado River water.

Instead of propping up Lake Powell to payment Glen Canyon Dam, the Bureau should consolidate h2o successful Lake Mead — the reservoir that sustains millions, irrigates millions of acres of farmland and provides affordable hydropower from Hoover Dam.

Ronald L. Rudolph has been progressive successful infrastructure improvement and h2o resources issues successful the Southwest for much than 50 years and is besides a erstwhile adjunct enforcement manager of Friends of the Earth. He writes from Golden, Colorado.