Balken surmises the jugs were tied to the trees back when Lake Powell just covered their upper branches to warn boaters of the hazard beneath the surface. Skip Navigation. If water levels at Lake Powell drop just another 32 feet, those generators will stop spinning. The April-July forecast for Colorado River runoff into Lake Powell is 74 percent of average. What is the current status of Lake Powell? And thats really what were watching right now, is how low is Lake Mead going to go? For those talks to start in the middle of another record-breaking dry period should make it clear to everyone involved: the future of the Colorado River is all about learning to live with less. And this is just the beginning of what. In . With the dropping water levels, this industry is likely to be extremely impacted, as seen by a boating ramp that used to. According to nonprofit news organization CalMatters, California, which receives the most water from the river at 4.4 million acre-feetmore than one-third of the river's supplyhas not yet been impacted by the cuts. The cookie does not store any personally identifiable data. What does the forecast look like? It's been a vital force for the intermountain West because of its ability to. Invest in quality science journalism by making a donation to Science Friday. Lake Mead and Lake Powell rise and fall together, said Chuck Cullom, the Central Arizona Projects Colorado River programs manager. The TiPMix cookie is set by Azure to determine which web server the users must be directed to. Even lower, at 3,370 feet, the reservoir hits "dead pool," at which point water can no longer pass through the dam by the power of gravity. However, the receding water levels have already greatly reduced the reservoirs generating capacity, to about 800 megawattsabout 60 percent. Copyright 2021 Science Friday Initiative. Lake Powell is a few hundred feet above dead-pool level. Phoenix has underground wells and plusa it gets water from the CAP canal directly from the Colorado river, then there are several near full dams nearby. And thats Lake Powell in southern Utah and Lake Mead, which is on the Nevada-Arizona border near Las Vegas. Experts say it wont be a silver bullet, but could stave off near-term danger. Lake Powell has been called "Jewel of the Colorado" by the federal agency that built it, the Bureau of Reclamation. In an emergency request issued in June 2022, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation urged states relying on the Colorado River basin to reduce their water usage by between 2 million and 4 million acre-feet over the next 18 months. What would constitute that? But a new study warns that the lake could virtually dry up in as few as six years if the region gets a repeat of the dry spell it experienced from 2000 to 2005. The Glen Canyon Dam, D'deest'in Htsaa, marks where the water level in Lake Powell on the Colorado River, reaches. As Lake Mead outside Las Vegas and Lake Powell in Utah decline, certain policies are triggered into action. With the reservoirs approaching their lowest levels in modern history, that brings us to our final number: 2026. That deficit is about the same amount of precipitation that falls across Utah in an entire year. This story is part of ongoing coverage of water in the West, produced by KUNC in Colorado and supported by the Walton Family Foundation. Luke Runyon is the water reporter at KUNC in Greeley, Colorado. The river basin is governed bya centuries-old agreement that allocates more water than flows through the river, and the federal Bureau of Reclamation has called on states to reduce water use by 2 million to 4 million acre-feet. What are the effects of climate change? The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". Getty Images. Issued by Microsoft's ASP.NET Application, this cookie stores session data during a user's website visit. Balken said depositing the lake's water in Lake Mead, which isn't made out of sandstone,. Even though conditions may be evolving and getting even worse, we dont really have a way to depict that, because D4, thats that ceiling, she said. Water managers across the region are on the clock to come up with new rules for how to share Colorado River water before 2026, when the current guidelines expire. The southwestern US has been dealing with drought conditions for years, and thats had a big impact on the Colorado River basin. Both reservoirs have troublingly low water levels at 1,054.79 and 3,524.22 feet above sea level, respectively. Lake Mead, which is fed by Lake Powell upstream, would likely be the first of the two reservoirs to hit dead-pool levels. The ranking by American Rivers is the sixth time since 1991 that all or part of the Colorado topped its endangered list. So the upper watershed, you have the headwater states. An acre-foot is the amount of water needed to fill one acre of land to a height of one foot. Its depth level currently stands at around 3,530 feet. The water in Lake Powell is low because the amount of water in the Colorado River has been falling for decades. Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Lake Mead's level is 1,047 feet above sea level. The latest data shows the reservoir at 3,523 feet above sea level. This cookie is associated with Django web development platform for python. At 70 feet below the level of Lake Powell as of spring 2021, this stage of Fill Mead First would allow much of Glen Canyon's world-renowned landscape to reemerge and be restored. If the reservoir dips below 895 feet a possibility still years. And Lake Mead is currently at 37% capacity. If the reservoirs reach dead-pool levels, more than a million people using the electricity could be required to find new power sources. If the water levels drop to levels below the intake pipes, the water flow will cease to turn the hydroelectric turbines, and the dam won't generate any power. Kuhns analysis is the worst case, said Pat Tyrrell, Wyoming state engineer who has been involved in the Upper Basin water talks. Share on Facebook; . A subscription helps you access more of the local stories that keep you connected to the community. In addition to the power the lake generates directly, it is a major source of grid resilience when full, serving as a quick backup source in cases where solar or wind power cant meet demand. This is when were supposed to be gaining and accumulating water in the form of snowpack, and thats not happening, Selover said. The lake was just under 24 percent full as of last week, and had lost 16 feet in the last year. Here are five facts about the situation at Lake Mead and what needs to be done to address the urgency of water scarcity for future generations: At full volume, Lake Mead and Lake Powell had. The level has risen over the winter months due to rainfall and particularly cold weather to hit parts of the U.S. On the contrary, he said, its actually become this locus of huge uncertainty, which doesnt allow downstream users to make effective plans, because they dont know what their allocations are going to be. He has mostly covered environmental stories since 2005, focusing on water supplies, climate change, the Rosemont Mine and the endangered jaguar. And you know, thats way beyond any sort of voluntary conservation that Arizona has done up until this point. Luke covers the Colorado River basin. "That has brought everything to a head much earlier than people thought it would.". The historic megadrought that is squeezing some Western states water supplies will also likely start showing up in energy bills, because those dams cant produce as much electricity. The future of the reservoir is largely uncertain, but climate science and recent actions by the government are providing some hints as to what might happen in the near future. Meanwhile, climate change is adding pressure to the entire river system, exacerbating existing supply and demand imbalances. They both use water from the Colorado River. Give us an idea, if you would, just how low the supply is in the basins reservoirs right now. Glen Canyon Dam, Colorado River, Arizona. With the dropping water levels, this industry is likely to be extremely impacted, as seen by a boating ramp that used to be used to launch boats now having a 50 foot drop between the end of the ramp and the water. Lake Powell is in crisis. Get up-to-the-minute news sent straight to your device. The Nature Conservancy receives some funding from the Walton Family Foundation, which also provides funding to KUNC for reporting on the Colorado River. Water levels dipped below 3,525 feet the last major milestone before a serious threat to hydropower generation at the Glen Canyon Dam. Its important to differentiate between Lake Powell running dry versus Lake Powell dropping below elevation 3,490 [feet], Taylor Hawes, Colorado River program director at the Nature Conservancy, told The Hill in an interview. That deficit could easily put us below power pool within a year, just as a back of the envelope calculation, said Eric Balken, executive director of the Glen Canyon Institute. In the long term, probably not. Understanding and explaining the depth of the dryness is up to climate scientists throughout the basin. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. Azure sets this cookie for routing production traffic by specifying the production slot. The vast stripe rimming Powell is a testament to how far its level has dropped since 2000, when the Colorado's flows began a steady decline in response to persistent drought, warming temperatures. "Its hard to overstate how important the Colorado River is to the entire American southwest.. If Lake Powell recedes much further, one of the nation's largest reservoirs could be at risk of no longer generating hydropower for the region. Explain that a little bit for us, Luke, and just how dire the situation is for the groundwater in the region. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Extremely dry years that produce eye-popping statistics tend to grab officials by the shoulders and give them a good shake. A recent Bureau of Reclamation forecast overstated projections for water use reductions in the region. He and his wife have four cats, thousands of bees, and a yoga studio in the sleepy Northwest hills of Connecticut. With modest reductions in flow, they would be meaningful.. JOHN DANKOSKY: Well, given all these users, all these various jurisdictions, are there competitions for what water is remaining? The pattern element in the name contains the unique identity number of the account or website it relates to. Throughout the history of the American West, water issues have shown their ability to both unite and divide communities. Contact reporter Tony Davis at tdavis@tucson.com or 806-7746. During the 2000-2005 drought, Lake Powell lost 13 million acre-feet of water and dropped almost 100 feet. The dam stopped up the Colorado River, creating Lake Mead, the biggest reservoir in the United States. The big question is how water managers will divvy up a shrinking supply to feed a growing region. The Lower Basin fares worse, with 93% of the land area in those categories. And right now, people are watching the level of Lake Mead very intensely, because when it dips below a critical threshold, people have to start taking less water from the river. They are trying to negotiate a three-state deal that would reduce water deliveries even further, he said. Correction 01/16/23 10:56 a.m. People are having to do things that you dont necessarily see, but we have water being hauled for livestock, water being hauled in for wildlife, Selover said. Alex is KUNC's reporter covering the Colorado River Basin. Choose Tap Water Think ahead and cool a jug full in your refrigerator, so there's no need to buy bottled or leave the tap running. This cookie is used to manage the interaction with the online bots. Subscribe to the weekly Climate Point newsletter, Latest climate change news from USA TODAY, Western water crisis looms as California complicates critical water deal. It takes sustained changes in order for these systems to recover. YouTube sets this cookie to store the video preferences of the user using embedded YouTube video. Both Utah and Nevada experienced their driest years on record in 2020. And so this creates a lot of potential problems downstream in the Grand Canyon, it creates management problems for the reservoir itself in Glen Canyon, and most importantly, it jeopardizes the upper[Colorado River]basins ability to meet its delivery obligation downstream, Balken said. Im John Dankosky, and now its time to check in on the state of science. Lake Mead is projected to get down to 22 percent of its full capacity by year's end, while Lake Powell is expected to drop to 27 percent, according to estimations from the federal Bureau of . It took 16 years for it to fill. Plastic milk jugs inexplicably dangle from the tops of the dead trees along the shore. The lake avoided serious problems during the drought because, in 1999, it was almost full. Even if nothing is done, he believes the risk quite low. The nation's second-largest reservoir is under pressure from climate change and steady demand, and is now . Youre hearing a lot more now, especially because the interior secretary, Deb Haaland, is herself a member of a Native American tribe and has put a lot of emphasis on bringing tribes to the table, making tribal consultation a big part of the Biden administrations priorities. The water level on Lake Powell is 100 feet from its high mark in August 2013. Mountain snowpack is generally below average for this time of year, so that boost may not be as big as it has been in years past. Depending on how you define "dry up." It's doubtful that all 1,450 miles of the Colorado River will turn to dust, even if we drain Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the nation's two largest. And thats because some of these past agreements have put that state in the most vulnerable position for cutbacks. As part of 2019s Drought Contingency Plan, water managers agreed that the reservoirs water should be kept above 3,525 feet to provide a buffer before it got even lower, giving the agencies in charge some time to come up with a fix. Every other state in the watershed had one of its top five driest years on record. Water levels have been getting lower and lower, and for the first time ever, a shortage seems almost certain. Nancy Selover, Arizonas state climatologist, says the Upper Basin figure is concerning because that accounts for the rivers headwaters. She said the very fact that officials in Washington, D.C. are getting involved underscores the urgency of Lake Powells crisis. Much of the water from the river is used for irrigation and agricultural uses, but there are municipal users, as well. Definitions explained. Pause your chores until you have a full-load for the dishwasher. . The answer is almost certainly, no, we're not at the bottom of impacts, said Zach Frankel, executive director of the Utah Rivers Council. Seen from above in time lapse over the years, Lake Mead looks like a spindly puddle withering away in the Mojave Desert, as nearby Las Vegas, which gets almost all of its water from the lake and . At that point, Upper Basin states would start delivering water from their other reservoirs to Powell. works with the radio team to create our weekly show, and is helping to build our State of Science Reporting Network. Its impossible to even guess the odds of the Colorado Basin getting another six-year arid spell any time soon, said Udall and another longtime Colorado River researcher, Connie Woodhouse, a professor in the University of Arizonas School of Geography and Development. This cookie is installed by Google Universal Analytics to restrain request rate and thus limit the collection of data on high traffic sites. Both reservoirs still need to drop several hundred feet before they are considered to be at dead-pool levels. The river also crosses over the US-Mexico border and two Mexican states, Baja California and Sonora. Its also headed toward a record low later this year. Is climate change the same thing as global warming? Lakes in the Colorado River Basin are drying up and losing water, with severe water cuts now expected across four states - the start of a water crisis in the West. The water in Lake Mead on Wednesday reached a new low 1070.6 feet above sea level since it was filled in the 1930's, according to data provided by the US Bureau of Reclamation. Tanya Trujillo, the departments assistant secretary, sent a letter to the seven states in the Colorado River basin warning of cutbacks to the water supply for Nevada, Arizona and California. These cookies do not allow the tracking of navigation on other websites and the data collected is not combined or shared with third parties. water level is too low to flow downstream, Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. Hes also been a long-time guest host on Science Friday. It also helps in fraud preventions. Lake Powell is hemmed by the Glen Canyon Dam, which generates hydroelectric power via the dam's water flowing through the dam back into the Colorado River. We're most likely witnessing the end of this reservoir. Lake Powell is supposed to buffer water supply during times of drought [and] it is not performing that function now. Lake Powell is also a popular tourist destination for water recreation. If that does come to pass, Tyrell said he is fairly confident we can deal with worst case scenario if it ever happens.. What is the long-term future of Lake Powell? The test_cookie is set by doubleclick.net and is used to determine if the user's browser supports cookies. The second largest reservoir in the U.S. by total capacity after Lake Mead, Lake Powell spans the Utah/Arizona border, and is an artificial lake created from damming the Colorado River. Riparian rights do not entitle a water use to divert water to storage in a reservoir for use in the dry season or to use water on . This is a 300-mile canal that runs through the deserts of Arizona to deliver water to farmers and to the Phoenix and Tucson metro areas. The lake isn't low enough yet to cause concerns about getting water out, but any hope of it refilling is years away, if ever, due to lowered rain and snow and increasing evaporation. Its companion reservoir, Lake Mead, is at levels almost as low. That is incorrect. "The federal government generally prefers to let the stakeholders work things through, Sorensen said. Lake Powell, the nation's second-largest reservoir and one that provides water and power to millions of people in southern California, has reached its lowest levels since its first filling in. JOHN DANKOSKY: So you know, with so many stories like this, we say, this is probably due to climate change. The droughts that we are seeing are becoming that much more severe because of the temperature component, theyre warmer, Bolinger said. And even the people who say, you know, oh, just wait for it to get wet again, know that changes have to be made because of that fundamental supply-demand imbalance. But the last time it was anywhere close to that level was 1999. So you know, with 93 % of the water reporter at KUNC in Greeley,.... Django web development platform for python snowpack, and is helping to build our state of reporting... A popular tourist destination for water recreation 3,523 feet above sea level recent Bureau of Reclamation forecast projections. 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