All quotes delayed a minimum of 15 minutes. Lake Powell in Big Water, Utah. But on top of that, theres a problem with the rules, Cohen said. A water conservation deal is in the works. Biden should not let Venezuelas regime run out the clock on democracy, Floridas surgeon general played loose with facts about vaccine risk, in negotiations with the seven states affected. (Photos: U.S. Geological Survey/Willie Taylor) Lake Mead is now projected to rise 33 feet higher than expected this year . They inherited the legal right to use that water, but they're now under pressure to give up some of it. But from the perspective of other states even those cuts wouldnt be nearly enough. Among conference topic titles are Messaging in a More Water-Challenged world and The Next 100 Years Begins Now.. U.S. cities that receive river water include Denver, Salt Lake City, Albuquerque, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Diego. Half of those acres lie within the Imperial Irrigation District. All rights reserved. The negotiations have the potential to redefine rules that for the last century have governed one of the most valuable economic resources in the United States. After heavy rains in 1905, the raging Colorado burst out of its normal channel, into the unfinished construction project, and carved a new, uncontrolled path into the Imperial Valley, creating an enormous lake called the Salton Sea. Beef cattle are the top agricultural product of Imperial County. The State of Colorado could actually buy the water from them, Mr. Libecap said. The tribal reservation in western Arizona includes more than 110 miles (177 kilometers) of Colorado River shoreline. And with the worst drought in 1,500 years parching the region, water anxiety is at an all-time high. Feb. 11, 2023 Updated: Feb. 11, 2023 10:50 a.m. It may feel like California is flush with water at the moment, after a winter of historic storms that replenished drought-starved lakes and left the . Cardenas said the prospect of a 10 percent cut to the regions $5 billion agricultural economy would mean serious economic pain for a community that already suffers from high unemployment. Once criticized for being a profligate user of water, fast-growing Phoenix has taken some major steps including banking water in underground reservoirs, slashing per-capita use, and recycling wastewater in anticipation of the day when the flow from the Colorado River ends. Andy Mueller, general manager of the Colorado River District, at the river in Glenwood Springs, Colo. Marc Catlin, a Colorado state representative, noted the financial incentives for farmers. Geography was the key. Could A Boulder Company Solve The Takeout Food Container Trash Conundrum? Australia has also seen the advent of a market in complex financial products, such as derivatives, based on water. There is a myth about water in the Western United States, which is that there is not enough of it. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)John Locher. Farmers also could reduce the amount of land planted in crops, especially alfalfa and grasses, which get baled into hay to feed cattle or horses. A Denver-based insulated drinkware company ranked the highest of the 151 Colorado companies on Inc. magazine's 2020 list of the fastest-growing private companies in America. The ultimate goal of this high-flow experiment is to move sand and sediment along the Colorado River. Construction of the original canal was marked by epic engineering failure. We stand behind the priority system on the river, and we also understand that theres painful cuts that people need to make. Bureau officials use the image of pouring tea from one cup to another to describe how water from Rocky Mountain snowmelt is captured in Lake Powell, then released downriver through the Grand Canyon to Lake Mead. When you have pistachio and almond farmers willing to pay 10 times the average price, people sit up and say, How can I own some of this? he said. Many see the compact as a safeguard isolating the river from the market. A few of the fields are shrouded by showers of water delivered from long lines of sprinklers. In the winter, 90% of vegetables consumed in both the US and Canada are grown with Colorado River water. A report in the journal Nature last year found 2000-2021 to be the driest 22-year period for southwestern North America in at least 1,200 years. "There's been a bad crop in northern California. According to water-policy professionals I spoke to, investors are already lobbying for it. But here there was nothing to see: just an empty field of ankle-high weeds and crimson splotches of peat. Mr. Eklund secured an account in Lake Powell. ", The All-American Canal carries water from the Imperial Dam, on the Colorado River near Yuma, Ariz., to a series of smaller distribution canals in the Imperial Valley. Many call conservation crucial. "I think people would like to believe that we can somehow figure out a way to keep these economic activities, keep our kind of economies and livelihoods, going," Megdal said. One, moving very rapidly, is climate change. Ultimately, we argued against it, he said. He also pointed out that unlike the private investors who quietly, quickly and pseudonymously bought up valuable property in the Wests notorious land grabs like the acquisition of the Owens River rights by the City of Los Angeles WAM has purchased water rights in its own name. The Biden administration is pushing to cut 2 to 4 million acre-feet in water usage, and is in negotiations with the seven states affected. If we can get water users within places like the San Juan Basin to agree to shortage sharing agreements, then theres no need for strict priority administration, he said. 24, 2023 at 11:45 PM PDT. Updated: Apr 26, 2023 / 01:55 PM PDT. Nevada, Arizona and Mexico will all receive less water from the Colorado River next year because of rapidly-declining reservoirs, the Interior Department announced on Aug. 16. A prolonged 21-year warming and drying trend is pushing the . ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) Colorado River tributaries in New Mexico bring water to the alfalfa fields in the Four Corners and the forested hills of the Gila wilderness in the southwestern part of the state. In fact, it's 5 feet. WAM has become one of the largest landholders in the Grand Valley, a high-mountain desert on the Western Slope of the Rockies, 250 miles west of Denver. Sprinklers deliver vital Colorado River water to a field of celery in California's Imperial Valley. But Mr. Eklund denies that the firm is flipping water rights. In 2001, Pueblo West, a planned community 100 miles away, came calling. The last time the feds utilized the high-flow experiment was back in 2018. Beginning Monday . Water has to travel surprisingly far to reach your faucet. Where water investors have historically gotten involved in markets is through agriculture, with mixed results. To proponents of open markets, water is underpriced and consequently overused. Just kind of a nightmare, Mr. Five things you can do for the Colorado River: 1. Traders could exploit volatility, whether due to drought, failing infrastructure or government restrictions. Officials fear complete doomsday scenario for drought-stricken Colorado River. Transferring water from agricultural communities to cities, though often contentious, is not a new practice. Half is in its natural state, a bone-dry desert. The rain and snowstorms that battered California in January raised reservoir levels in the state and coated the Sierra Nevada mountains in snowpack that is 210 percent above normal for this time of year. Camille Touton, bureau commissioner, tempered a warning during the water webinars about federal intervention she called it moving forward on the initiation of administrative actions with a vow to find a collective solution to the challenges that we face today.. Investor interest in the river could redefine century-old rules for who controls one of the most valuable economic resources in the United States. It will be baled into hay and fed to cattle such as those in the feedlot at the far end of the field. It took two years to redirect the river back into its original channel. The markets have become a paradise for arbitrage. He compared the dynamic to California in the 1990s, where fires and outages were beneficial for traders because of price spikes and you saw Enron traders cheering on fires.. According to the site below, 1.. Its a more acceptable solution, generally.. By the end of May, Lake Mead will reach 1,051 feet. Farmers could buy new, more water-efficient irrigation equipment. Near its headwaters, in the farming community of Nathrop, Colo., I met up with Greg Felt, a county commissioner. However, over time, as the West has grown in population, constraints on water supplies have emerged, leaving a system that was originally designed around the needs of farms to support the growth of vast cities like Las Vegas and Phoenix. An earlier version of this story stated that the Imperial Irrigation District's allotment of Colorado River water is enough to cover all of its irrigated land with 5 inches of water. The Western model is a sort of comprehensive, consensus-based public discussion, and its worked very well, said Bruce Babbitt, a former governor of Arizona and secretary of the interior during the Clinton administration. The industry leader for online information for tax, accounting and finance professionals. The Colorado River Compact was signed in 1922, just 10 years after New Mexico became a state. But once you know how to recognize them, they can seem to be everywhere. In the last few years, Colorado has been debating a water policy approach that has further piqued the interest of private investors: paying farmers not to use the river at all. Agriculture all over the West required the development of irrigation infrastructure, such as dams and ditches, Mr. Libecap said. Rio Grande flows in Albuquerque are closely tied to the Colorado via the San Juan-Chama Drinking Water Project. Touton said the states need to conserve an additional 2 to 4 million acre-feet of water next year to protect levels at Lake Powell in Arizona and Utah and Lake Mead in Nevada and Arizona. WAM, based in New York and San Francisco, invests broadly in water-related ventures, and one of its core businesses is collecting water rights in arid states like Arizona and Colorado. Mr. Catlin, the state representative, said: We need to think about the true value of water. The platform is designed to engage citizens and government leaders in a discussion about what needs improvement across the country. Copyright 2022 TheAssociated Press. The giant reservoirs of Lake Mead and Lake Powell are shrinking fast, and the federal government is calling on all users of the river's water, which include farmers and cities such as Phoenix and Las Vegas, to come up with a plan to cut their water use. REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs. The proposal begins with a 400,000 acre-foot cut, as previously offered, and continues with additional reductions as the reservoir declines toward levels where power generation would be threatened. . The Colorado River provides water for one out of every eight Americans for residential, indus-trial, mining, agricultural, and recreational needs. What top five states have rivers? Sandbar at river mile 45 before (LEFT) & after (RIGHT), the 2012 high-flow. In the West, few issues carry the political charge of water. Most of the water in the 1,450-mile-long river comes from Colorado, and as that state's top water official from 2013 to 2017, James Eklund directed the creation of a comprehensive. The proposal by the six states Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming aims to protect the major reservoirs in Lake Powell and Lake Mead from falling below critical levels, such as when the dams would no longer be able to generate electricity or at dead pool, when water would effectively be blocked from flowing out of these lakes. Thats exactly what we were hoping that our use of surface water would allow the aquifer to do, Morris said. The Colorado River Compact was signed in 1922 just 10 years after New Mexico became a state. Home to about 300 people, depending on what time of year youre counting, the town sits on the California border, in a stretch of the Sonoran Desert encircled by fanglike mountains and seemingly dead rocky terrain. Lake Powell's drop last March to historically low water levels raised worries about losing the ability perhaps within the next few months to produce hydropower that today serves about 5 million customers in seven states. The interested players range from financial firms to university endowments to investor groups, including at least two in Colorado led by former governors. Demand management, as the policy is known, is an attempt to solve the so-called wrong places problem and free up water from agriculture and reroute it to urban uses and conservation. In an online presentation last spring outlining WAMs long-term strategy, Marc Robert, the chief operating officer, professed his belief that U.S. consumers would be compelled to use more wisely in coming years. Flows during the past 23-year period are the lowest in the past 120 years and (among) the lowest in more than 1,200 years, Bunk told the webinar audience. In 2006, Pueblo West agreed to irrigate and revive the land. It wasnt just the drought: Californias crops had shifted from low-value seasonal vegetables like lettuce and bell peppers to permanent non-staples, like almonds, that were so valuable that it was no longer economical for farmers to sell water to cities, even as prices spiked. But over the last two decades, the actual flow has dwindled to 12.5 million acre-feet on average, leaving state water managers with more rights on paper than existing supply. It's now more salty than the ocean, heavily contaminated with agricultural runoff, and shrinking. Editing by Nick Macfie, Trump accuser defends rape claim after judge rejects Trump's mistrial request, Biden calls for meeting as US to run short of cash June 1, Biden urges Republicans take debt default off table, warns interest rates would jump, American Airlines pilots authorize a strike mandate, Donald Trump arrives in Scotland for short golfing trip, UK inflation expectations ease as BoE considers next rate hike, ACLU sues Montana House Speaker for silencing transgender legislator, Kuwait again dissolves reinstated parliament by decree, Bolsonaro steals show at Brazil's biggest farm fair. SEATTLE, Wash., Feb 1 (Reuters) - The Colorado River, which provides drinking water to 40 million people in seven U.S. states, is drying up, straining a water distribution pact amid the worst drought in 12 centuries, exacerbated by climate change. Want to know how your actions can help make a difference for our planet? Mr. Mueller believes that the demand management pilot program triggered a land rush in rural western Colorado, with investors snapping up farms and flipping their water rights. Nor is it official policy yet. As a result, water has turned into a financialized product like what happened to energy in the late 1990s, he said. Hamby says the district is looking to make a deal. It would never reach the canal that supplies Imperial Valley. Felt said. One of the things I think weve learned over time is that a resource like water is best allocated through kind of a combination of market forces and regulatory oversight., He added, The market would say water is far more valuable serving urban populations.. It powers agricultural land and urban areas, serving roughly 1 in 10 Americans. Dan Charles for NPR The situation has been compared to the energy markets of the late 1990s, in which firms like Enron made money from shortages (some of which, it turned out, traders engineered themselves). In 2003, under pressure from the federal government, IID agreed to transfer about 10 percent of its total allotment of water each year to San Diego and another neighboring water district. Other fields are covered with alfalfa or grass that will become feed for cattle. FILE - A buoy sits high and dry on cracked earth previously under the waters of Lake Mead at the Lake Mead . A field of alfalfa, freshly cut, dries in the sun. Going by established law, Leimgruber says, those latecomers would be cut off from Colorado River water completely before the Imperial Irrigation District gives up any of the water to which it's entitled. What is new is for private investors in this case an investment fund in Phoenix, with owners on the East Coast to exert that power. That is about 1 million acre-feet less than the three states are entitled to use under a legal compact that divides the Colorado River's waters. Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the worlds largest multimedia news provider, reaching billions of people worldwide every day. The Grand Valley Ditch, running through Grand Junction, Colo., diverts water from the Colorado River to irrigate farms. Bunk said the two largest reservoirs on the river Lake Mead behind Hoover Dam on the Nevada-Arizona state line and Lake Powell formed by the Glen Canyon Dam on the Arizona-Utah line are at unprecedented low levels. Subsequently, the governments antitrust department started an inquiry. At which point, if private entities like WAM had stores of water in Lake Powell ready to sell, they would suddenly be worth quite a bit more. Lake Mead was at 100% capacity in mid-1999. KGNUs Alexis Kenyon spoke with Dr. Jack Schmidt the director of the Center of . The Colorado River basin has experienced three D4 droughts in the past 20 years, including the current one. Tickets start at around $89 for the former and $149 for the latter. In theory, water saved by demand management could flow to the account, often called a pool within the pool, and be drawn upon if the current drought continues to realize worst-case scenarios. Felt said, The water came off the land and it dried up, a common process known as buy and dry. Pueblo West, which was supposed to revegetate with native shortgrass, instead subdivided it into 40-acre parcels. My fear is that the speculators are going to break it. All rights reserved. They believe that the West has an outdated and overregulated system governing access to water, which has encouraged the cultivation of crops in the desert. Reclamation is in the process of an environmental review of how to operate Glen Canyon and Hoover dams at low-water scenarios. Florida Power & Light, a part of NextEra Energy. Water markets have been called a paradise for arbitrage, an approach in which professionals use trading speed and access to information for profit. California receives the largest allotment, 80% of which is consumed by its $50-billion agricultural industry. Top 5 US Consumers California is the largest consumer of water in the US. In the last 20 years, tensions over increasingly scarce Colorado River water supplies have been rising in step with climate change and global temperatures. Agricultural water use makes up nearly 80% of total water consumption in the Colorado River basin, with roughly half of that going toward the production of alfalfa hay, according to a 2020. Dan Charles for NPR "Six of the seven basin states are playing catch-up to reduce water use from the Colorado River, which is absolutely critically needed after 20 years of drought and the impacts of climate change," Moran told Reuters. Scientists attribute extended drought to warmer and drier weather in the West to long-term, human-caused climate change. That would be a disaster. And it had to be a pretty good process, because it lasted 100 years.. As negotiations have progressed in recent months, the Imperial Irrigation District has offered to cut its usage by 250,000 acre-feet or about 10 percent. It certainly seems that we have to reset our expectations for what we might be trying to get out of the river, said Lpez, a former Reclamation commissioner. Colorado River tributaries serve relatively small portions of northwest and southwest New Mexico. "The river has a gun to everybody's heads, and it's in everybody's interest to try to work out this thing," says JB Hamby, a member of the irrigation district's board of directors. Her life changes forever when she meets Wilson Moon, a young drifter, displaced from his tribal land in the Four Corners region. 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