After 2 decades of drought, the Colorado River, which provides for over 40 million people each year across 7 states, is severely depleted. After years of deliberation with no plan, the Biden Administration along with the US Bureau of Reclamation has come up with 3 different scenarios. The plans — which are in draft form and under review for 45 days — aim to cut the use of the river by a maximum of 2.083 million acre-feet by 2026 in order to raise the levels in Lake Powell and Lake Mead. That amount of water could provide 6.2 million families with water for one year.
The 3 Plans:
Action Alternative 1: Would target Arizona and Nevada for the bulk of potential reductions in water allocations.
Action Alternative 2: would share the pain of future shortages proportionally across the three Lower Basin states — Arizona, California, and Nevada — all of which rely on Lake Mead and Lake Powell for their share of river water.
Action Alternative 3: the "no action alternative" would allow the Colorado River system to continue as it is currently run with no changes, which risks both hydropower production and further drops in water storage. Interior is unlikely to adopt that option, as officials have repeatedly said something must be done to address the river’s drought crisis.
Federal officials issued a warning to three states last summer, stating that if they were unable to reach an agreement to decrease water consumption by 2 to 4 million acre-feet per year, the government would implement its own measures. In the beginning of this year, six states collaborated on a plan, with California providing its own proposal. If the multi-state plan had been approved, it would have required California to reduce its water usage by more than a million acre-feet per year, whereas its individual proposal suggested a reduction of 400,000 acre-feet per year, with the Imperial Irrigation District undertaking 250,000 of that reduction.
"Neither of the action alternatives presented today is ideal. Both include significant supply cuts ... There is a better way to manage the river,” says Adel Hagekhalil, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
It is widely accepted that the Colorado River has been excessively allocated, with users diverting more water than the river can sustainably produce. Experts in water supply indicate that unless significant cuts are imposed in the near future, the river's reservoirs could be depleted of water in just a few years.
The draft proposal by the Biden Administration “is a powerful indication of what could come if we don’t reach a consensus,” Adel Hagekhalil, the district’s general manager, said in a statement.
According to Sharon Megdal, director of the University of Arizona’s Water Resources Research Center, “They’re showing that they will tell the states what to do… It will now be up to the states to say, well, we have a better idea — and here it is.”
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