The latest news about the Colorado River is dire. Since 2000, the river’s flow has shrunk about 20%. An extremely warm winter has brought very little snow in the Rocky Mountains. Reservoirs are declining to critically low levels. And the leaders of seven states are still at loggerheads over the water cutbacks each should accept to prevent reservoirs from falling further.
Here are six things to know about the current crisis:
A mammoth solar farm is moving forward in the heart of California. If built, which seems increasingly likely, it would cover 200 square miles of land and generate 21,000 megawatts of electricity, enough to power entire cities. Huge batteries will store some of that power until it’s needed most.
Farmers are among the project’s backers. They don’t have enough water to grow crops on big chunks of their land, and they’re looking for new uses for it.
A “strong atmospheric river” has started dumping rain in Northern California, according to the Center for Western Weather and Water Extremes.
The rain was predicted to start hitting Northern California late Monday, Feb. 23, and is expected to move into Central California throughout the day Tuesday, Feb. 24, the center said.
The history of Southern California has always been inextricably intertwined with the story of its water supply. Southern California has a dry, Mediterranean climate with limited rainfall. While Southern California is more temperate than the hotter desert climes of Las Vegas and Phoenix, its relatively dry climate cannot sustain a large urban population base.
In the late 1800s as Los Angeles and the surrounding region began to grow, the population relied primarily on the limited rainfall which fed the intermittent flows of the Los Angeles River and replenished the local groundwater basins. By the late 1890s, the discovery of oil reserves in Southern California led to an economic boom and a growing population. It became clear to everyone that Southern California would need to supplement its local water supplies if growth were to continue.
Little more than two months ago, on an unusually rainy November evening, the Queen Creek Town Council staked claim to the city’s future.
Queen Creek, located in central Arizona southeast of Phoenix, was founded in 1989 but is already home to some 88,000 people. In a unanimous vote, the council approved a $244 million deal to acquire 12,000 acre-feet of water annually for the next century from the Harquahala groundwater basin, some 90 miles away. (An acre-foot is enough water for about three households per year.)
A long-awaited Bay-Delta Plan is on track to be ready for adoption this year, with possible refinements still under review — but with no signs of major changes to the proposal as released in December.
Eric Oppenheimer, executive director of the State Water Board, on Friday told The Sacramento Bee that the board’s staff is reviewing thousands of public comments, evaluating whether any updates to the proposed plan and supporting environmental analysis are needed before bringing it to the board for a final decision.
Much of the discourse on how to handle the Colorado River’s viability as the West’s biggest water source is focused on water conservation measures. In reality, those sorts of interventions might be missing the forest for the trees.
Vox’s Kenny Torrella reported on the Colorado River Compact’s struggles to reach a deal for the next two decades. The seven states in the compact — California, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, and Wyoming — missed a Feb. 14 deadline to seal a new agreement amid a snow drought that is adding even more tension.
The seven Western states that rely on the Colorado River for water supply have yet to reach an agreement on how to share the shrinking resource.
States failed the meet a deadline earlier this month to establish a plan to confront what experts have said is the result of climate change.
Ever since California was pummeled by a series of storms in fall and early winter, experts have said the state’s water supply is looking strong for this year.
Those storms — with a potential bump from the ones hitting much of the state this week — have helped refill reservoirs and eased immediate drought worries in many parts of the state.
A letter from California Governor Gavin Newsom to his fellow governors in states along the Colorado River is offering support for a multi-state solution to managing the water supply for 40 million people.
A letter from California Governor Gavin Newsom to his fellow governors in states along the Colorado River is offering support for a multi-state solution to managing the water supply for 40 million people.
