Feds plot new plan for the Colorado River’s next 10 years

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released its final environmental impact statement on Friday, July 31 — the next step in the process to set guidelines for the federal government’s operations of the Colorado River basin’s two largest reservoirs. 

The plan charts a course for the basin’s next 10 years that could lead to significant water cuts in the Lower Basin and opens up the door for more frequent negotiations. 

Amid a decades-long drought that has seen Lake Powell and Lake Mead hit record lows this year, the “central tradeoff” of the plan, according to its executive summary, is “balancing the potentially profound impacts of water-delivery reductions with the need to maintain reservoir storage.”

“The basin is experiencing increased aridity due to climate variability, and long-term drought and low-runoff conditions are expected in the future,” wrote the Bureau of Reclamation in the summary. “These conditions will exacerbate the now widely recognized imbalance between water supply and demand in the basin. Robust and flexible guidelines are needed to manage the Colorado River system and its resources under a broad range of potential future hydrologic conditions.”

The Colorado River delivers water to approximately 40 million people across seven states, two counties and 30 tribal nations. While the Upper Basin states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming rely predominantly on snowpack for their water supply, the Lower Basin states of Arizona, California and Nevada rely on releases from Lake Powell and Lake Mead.

The two reservoirs are currently governed by guidelines established in 2007 that are set to expire this year, and many agree the plan has failed to protect the Colorado River system. 

The Bureau of Reclamation was forced to step up and update these guidelines after the seven-basin states failed to reach a consensus on how the reservoirs should be managed beyond 2026. The crux of the disagreement between the upper and lower basins was where cuts should be made.

The final proposal does not provide specifics for how water will be distributed across the basin, with the Bureau of Reclamation describing it as a “framework” that identifies key triggers and ranges for developing future operating guidelines at Lake Powell and Lake Mead.

It sets up a plan to negotiate two-year operating plans for the reservoirs through 2036. 

“This framework provides the flexibility to respond to changing hydrologic conditions while preserving the opportunity for the Basin States to continue working toward durable, consensus-based solutions,” said Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum in a news release. 

The final statement provides a range of alternatives, including the Bureau of Reclamation’s “preferred” option. Each alternative sets guidelines for how it will reduce or increase annual consumptive water use allocations from Lake Mead to the Lower Basin states; store and deliver water saved through conservation efforts; manage and deliver surplus water; manage activities and make cuts above Lake Powell; and more.

DISAGREEMENTS AND UNKNOWNS

While the environmental impact statement for the reservoirs’ operational guidelines is finalized, just how the allocations will shake out remains up in the air as the states await the Bureau of Reclamation’s plan for 2027 and 2028.

In a Friday statement, Becky Mitchell, Colorado’s lead negotiator and water commissioner, said the state was still analyzing the final statement and looking forward to ongoing discussions about the operations. 

“Colorado remains committed to protecting our state’s significant rights and interests in the Colorado River and working collaboratively with the other Basin States, federal government, and Tribal Nations to adapt to supply-based operations,” Mitchell said.

Andy Mueller, general manager for the Colorado River District, said in a statement that the framework “fails to provide the certainty needed by West Slope communities to adequately plan for the future.” 

“Instead, it keeps the basin in a cycle of crisis management by requiring the operating guidelines to be renegotiated every two years while leaving unresolved legal risks that could further destabilize the system,” Mueller said. 

What’s needed, the statement continued, is a clear, long-term path on how the basin will rebuild storage as the reservoirs hit critical lows and improve system resiliency, not continued year-to-year crisis management. 

“This summer has demonstrated the real-world consequences of uncertainty,” Mueller said. The compounding effects of climate change have created exceptional drought conditions, which have forced irrigators, communities and water users across the West Slope to make difficult decisions in a rapidly changing environment.”  

A joint statement from the upper division states said while awaiting the forthcoming Record of Decision and the Bureau of Reclamation’s operating plan for 2027-2028, the states “continue to emphasize that operations at Lake Powell and Lake Mead must move away from a demand-based system and be based on the river’s actual supply.” 

This was a sticking point during the negotiations as the Lower Basin states pushed for mandatory cuts across the basin, and the Upper Basin states argued that the ups and downs of snowpack already force natural water shortages on its users. 

In the 1922 Colorado River Compact, the upper and lower basins were each granted 7.5 million acre-feet of water a year — based on the average inflow of 18 million acre-feet from 1906-1921. In its news release, the Bureau of Reclamation reported that “inflows from 2000 to 2024 have only averaged 12.9 million acre-feet and the unregulated inflow into Lake Powell this year as of July is estimated to be only 3.5 million acre-feet.”

During the same time period, the agency reported that around 13.1 million acre-feet of water were consumed each year, with the Lower Basin consuming approximately 49% of the consumption, the Upper Basin around 29% and Mexico around 11%. Eleven percent is estimated to be lost to evaporation.  

Under the proposal, the Lower Basin states could be called upon to make cuts of up to 3 million acre-feet. 

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs said in a statement Friday that the feds’ plan still contains “unacceptable options” and could force the state — which has some of the most junior water rights on the river — to “take the majority of draconian water cutbacks.” 

Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo similarly decried the feds’ preferred course of action in a statement, arguing that it would ” impose unrealistic reductions on Nevada and our water users.” 

“If carried forward, the plan outlined in the FEIS could have devastating economic and environmental impacts on Nevada,” Lombardo said.  

Hobbs continued to press for the federal government to follow a May proposal from the Lower Basin states, which offered 3.2 million acre-feet of voluntary water use cuts across California, Nevada and Arizona, contingent on additional requests.

In response to this proposal, Chuck Cullom, executive director of the Upper Colorado River Commission, said that while it represented a necessary step toward solutions, it also raised concerns about its long-term efficacy and could have adverse impacts upstream of Lake Mead.

FUTURE NEGOTIATIONS

Despite the federal government moving forward with planning, the Bureau of Reclamation is leaving room for future negotiations. Its preferred alternative in the environmental impact statement leaves flexibility to incorporate future recommendations reached by the seven basin states, according to the summary. 

As recently as April, the Upper Basin states have pushed for the parties to return to mediation in order to deal with the dire hydrological conditions and skirt the threat of litigation over the post 2026 operations, something the Lower Basin states said they were “open to” in May.  

The Upper Basin governors — Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and New Mexico Gov. Lujan Grisham — said water users would be best served by a seven-state agreement in a joint statement Friday.

“We are witnessing the lowest reservoir levels in the Colorado River system’s history and there is no guarantee regarding the future water supply,” they wrote. “Today’s framework does not represent a final solution, but enables the River to be managed in the short-term while the seven states and (the U.S. Department of the Interior) continue to negotiate a consensus solution.”

The governors continued that the “water supply realities” and “severe drought” across the Colorado River basin demonstrate the need for a practical solution. 

“We are committed to continued good-faith discussions with our counterparts,” they concluded.