Hoover Dam Is Headed for Trouble Under New Emergency Colorado River Plan

Federal water managers are putting the nation’s largest dam in a precarious position as they try to balance out the Colorado River system in a year of record low snowpack.

Toward the bottom of the Bureau of Reclamation’s marquee announcement last week was a paragraph that said lower flows out of Lake Powell could reduce Hoover Dam’s hydroelectric power generation by about 40 percent as soon as this fall. According to projections, Lake Mead could fall nearly 30 feet in the next two years, more than 8 feet past the 2022 record low.