This is very unpredictable and these are going to be difficult conversations in the coming years.. This cookie is installed by Google Universal Analytics to restrain request rate and thus limit the collection of data on high traffic sites. "The federal government generally prefers to let the stakeholders work things through, Sorensen said. Reservoir storage is the best single number that captures two things: how much water nature provides and how much water humans are consuming out of that provision, Fleck said. Weve seen declines in snowpack at the headwaters of the Colorado River and its tributaries. 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. The reality is that it's probably too little, too late.. This drought will only be exacerbated by climate change, as the increased global temperatures are expected to increase the severity of drought weather and frequencies of wildfires, as well as influencing a vast range of other extreme weather events. 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. The story has been updated to reflect this information. It sucks up moisture from forests, backyard gardens and crop fields with greater intensity. Lake Powell's feeble condition is part of a climate reckoning in the West that links water, ecosystems, food production, and energy generation. Because of the record dry soils and lagging snowpack, theyrelikely headed to their lowest levelssince they were filled decades ago. Below 3,490 feet of elevation, Lake Powell dips into a zone where the generation of hydropower by water flowing through the Glen Canyon Dam becomes unreliable. "Its hard to overstate how important the Colorado River is to the entire American southwest.. The April-July forecast for Colorado River runoff into Lake Powell is 74 percent of average. Climate scientists call it D4. The loss of generation from the lake would deprive the grid of about a quarter million households worth of power. Water management requires planning for the future. For context, on the scale of no drought to worst drought, theres no category that captures conditions more dry than exceptional. Why is Lake Mead drying up? A years worth of rain and snow is missing from Utahs ground. 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. In the second stage of Fill Mead First, the reservoir's level would near 3,374 feet, near the river outlet works. 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. LUKE RUNYON: Yeah, so this is something that is harder for us to visualize, because were so used to looking at reservoirs and rivers. Work on the dam that created Lake Powell began in 1956 and was finished in 1966. The test_cookie is set by doubleclick.net and is used to determine if the user's browser supports cookies. LUKE RUNYON: Well, Arizona is in the line for the steepest cuts from the Colorado River. "It would kill 50 to 60% of the businesses in town," said Franz. works with the radio team to create our weekly show, and is helping to build our State of Science Reporting Network. Lake powell has an electrical generation station there. This is the highest percentage of land in the rivers Upper Basin since 2002, which stands as the regions driest year on record. Arizona, which receives 36 percent of its water supply from the river, according to the Arizona Department of Water Resources, has been hit hardest by the cuts. The Colorado River systems reservoirs combined arecurrently less than half full. Its not just like, you get a miracle year and youre out of it. Ultimately, experts said the future of the lake must be addressed in a way that creates the certainty it was intended to provide. It takes sustained changes in order for these systems to recover. He says such measures can help, for sure. In the short term, yes. With the reservoirs approaching their lowest levels in modern history, that brings us to our final number: 2026. 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. 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. At full pool, Powell's water line lies 3,700 feet above sea level, and at 3,370 feet, it will reach deadpool levels. "Climate change makes these extreme weather events both more frequent and more severe, '' Matthew Casale, Environment Campaigns Director at non-profit advocacy group PIRG, previously told Newsweek. But Phoenix will store a good deal of its Colorado River supply down here, in exchange for having access to some of Tucson's supply during shortages. Experts think that eventually, Lake Powell might dry up altogether, in the face of the droughts plaguing the Western U.S. Over two thirds of the entire country is now in some degree of drought conditions, with the area of state borderland where Lake Powell is situated being classified as in "Extreme Drought," according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Lake Mead's level is 1,047 feet above sea level. You cant go into a drought like that today if its half full. California broke from six other Western states in proposal to cut Colorado River use as water levels reach historic lows. Lakes Mead and Powell. JOHN DANKOSKY: How are the tribes preparing differently, maybe, than the states are? Asthe latest round of federal forecastsfor the rivers flow shows, its plausible, maybe even likely, that the situation could get much worse this year. If the reservoirs reach dead-pool levels, more than a million people using the electricity could be required to find new power sources. LinkedIn sets this cookie to remember a user's language setting. An acre-foot is the amount of water needed to fill one acre of land to a height of one foot. The TiPMix cookie is set by Azure to determine which web server the users must be directed to. Just as water demand is going up, the supply is going down. Overall, the river's flowis down 20% in this century relative to the 20th century. New York, NY 10004. The water level at Lake Mead is sitting at just 39%, while Lake Powell is at 36%. So the upper watershed, you have the headwater states. Every year, it stores water that flows downstream from the four Upper Basin states. Drought Conditions Affect Two-Thirds of the U.S. Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. But while Lake Mead . If the lakes levels drop below 3,490, Hawes added, the Bureau of Reclamation will have to run water through a series of river outlet tubes, the lowest delivery mechanism in the lake, for the first time since the 1980s, and bureau officials dont actually know if they can handle that much water, she said. Because of that, the spring and early summer will bring a temporary boost to water levels while snow runs into rivers and eventually flows into Lake Powell. Together, these reservoirs, fed by the mighty Colorado River, provide the water 40million Americans depend on. The big question is how water managers will divvy up a shrinking supply to feed a growing region. But the last time it was anywhere close to that level was 1999. The southwestern states have been gripped by drought for over 22 years, experts say. Credit: Alex Hager. In an average year, Lake Powell gets enough water that it can release a bit more 8.23 million acre-feet a year. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Creosote is one I personally like to call it the cockroach of the vegetation world because pretty much nothing kills creosote. And really, what were seeing in the basin is that warming of just a couple degrees has the potential to completely upend how the water cycle functions in the Southwest. As of Thursday, Lake Mead was at 1,045.79 feet. We are still facing a nearly 1 in 4 chance of Lake Powell returning to "minimum power pool" by 2024 - a risk that remains steady through 2026, the latest year for which Reclamation has forecast. Federal and state officials have committed to a more inclusive process that integrates the needs of tribes, environmental and recreation groups, and Mexico. And thats because some of these past agreements have put that state in the most vulnerable position for cutbacks. Lake Mead and Lake Powell rise and fall together, said Chuck Cullom, the Central Arizona Projects Colorado River programs manager. At this stage a significant amount of Glen Canyon . The U.S. Department of the Interior is considering a plan to keep extra water in Lake Powell. It also helps in fraud preventions. 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. ET: The dead pool level of Lake Powell has been corrected. Falling water levels at Lake Mead and Lake Powell have been concerning for several years. That year is the deadline for water users to negotiate a new set of managing guidelines for the Colorado River. 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. LUKE RUNYON: Sure, so much of the attention in the basin goes towards the rivers largest reservoirs, which also happen to be the biggest reservoirs in the entire United States. The JSESSIONID cookie is used by New Relic to store a session identifier so that New Relic can monitor session counts for an application. You have permission to edit this article. What to know about the West's ongoing water crisis: Lake Powell is the nation's second-largestreservoir. The Bureau's projections show a 3% chance that Lake Powell's water levels fall below the minimum level necessary for the lake's Glen Canyon Dam to generate hydroelectricity next year. Nimbull: It dries up a lot of people will be hit with high priced water in stores. The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional". Correction: A previous version of this story indicated that 3,490 feet is Lake Powell's "dead pool" level. According to the National Park Service, contaminants from the newly exposed shorelines are reentering warm, shallow areas and becoming more concentrated. In addition, the river itself experiences more evaporation. Secondly, Phoenix does not get it's water from Lake Powell. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Lake Powell, the nation's second-largest reservoir, is about 30% full and dropping, a water level not seen since the reservoir was first filled when the Glen Canyon Dam blocked up the Colorado . At full capacity, Lake Powell holds enough water to flood the entire state of Kentucky a foot deep. This is very unpredictable and these are going to be difficult conversations in the coming years., THE HILL 1625 K STREET, NW SUITE 900 WASHINGTON DC 20006 | 202-628-8500 TEL | 202-628-8503 FAX. And that sponge is very dry right now, and its sucking up all of that water before it can be used as water supply. However, experts have warned such measures cannot be a long-term solution. This cookie is used for storing country code selected from country selector. which could funnel up to 300,000 acre-feet from Powell.One of those projects, Utah's Lake Powell pipeline to St. George, would . Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. Lake Oroville, a key component of California's water supply, also benefited from the early-winter storms, as . Before that, he covered the worlds largest sockeye salmon fishery for KDLG in Dillingham, Alaska. Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better experience for the visitors. The cookie is a session cookies and is deleted when all the browser windows are closed. Mead was created when the Hoover Dam was completed in 1935. What states, what tribal nations, does this cut through? Copyright 2021 Science Friday Initiative. 84% Of Upper Basin In Extreme To Exceptional Drought This is the highest percentage of land in the river's Upper Basin since 2002, which stands as the region's driest year on record. Fidelity to the original aired/published audio or video file might vary, and text might be updated or amended in the future. And thats a word that youre hearing a lot more, is megadrought, not just this temporary state of drought. If its done intentionally, the drawbacks of losing the reservoir could be minimized and the benefits could be maximized, Balken told The Hill. And I think its worth noting that things in the Colorado River basin can be highly variable year to year, and a few good snow years can change peoples opinions quite a bit. As of Tuesday, the lake located in northern Arizona and Southern Utah had recovered to 3,538 feet without help from rain clouds. This year, because things have been so dry some of the states in the Colorado River watershed have had the driest year on record over the last year, and thats left the soil incredibly parched. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". We don't know if we can release water to meet downstream requirements. Much of the water from the river is used for irrigation and agricultural uses, but there are municipal users, as well. Lake Powell (credit: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation) The power pool mark is 3,490 feet of elevation. Complicating matters are the ongoing talks on allocation between the seven states on the Colorado River, the source of the lakes waters. If decision makers do nothing and take no action and just let the reservoir crash without structurally modifying the dam, there will be a lot of really big problems.. As Lake Mead outside Las Vegas and Lake Powell in Utah decline, certain policies are triggered into action. In addition, Mankin said, interventions like the Flaming Gorge release treat the western U.S.s 20-year drought as a localized phenomenon rather than a regional one. At that point, Upper Basin states would start delivering water from their other reservoirs to Powell. 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. That includes releases of water upstream of Lake Powell, and voluntary cuts in Powells downstream neighbor, Lake Mead. Theyre roughly 25% full now, saidBrad Udall, a water and climate scientist at Colorado State University. NID cookie, set by Google, is used for advertising purposes; to limit the number of times the user sees an ad, to mute unwanted ads, and to measure the effectiveness of ads. The lake that once covered 400 square miles has shrunk 90 percent, leaving behind oxygen-deprived, highly salinized water with a rotten-egg odor that permeates the surrounding area. So Im guessing over the next several years, as policies are negotiated, youre going to hear a lot more about how tribes are being involved in that process. Whether the six-year cycle of 2000-05 repeats itself is anybodys guess, said Pat Tyrrell, Wyoming state engineer who has been involved in the Upper Basin water talks. The second-largest man-made reservoir in the country has dropped to unthinkable lows amid the West's climate change-driven megadrought. Skip Navigation. This cookie, set by YouTube, registers a unique ID to store data on what videos from YouTube the user has seen. Water levels at . Given todays changing climate, led by continued warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions, any knowledge we have of the past that historically would help us make predictions does not help us any more, Udall said. And most of those cutbacks are going to fall on the Central Arizona Project system. A variation of the _gat cookie set by Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager to allow website owners to track visitor behaviour and measure site performance. This segment is part of the The State Of Science spotlight. Glen Canyon Dam, Colorado River, Arizona. 1998 - 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. | All Rights Reserved. Alex is KUNC's reporter covering the Colorado River Basin. What about the idea of a water shortage? This story is part of ongoing coverage of water in the West, produced by KUNC in Colorado and supported by the Walton Family Foundation. Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features. House Republican eyeing legislation to prevent Santos from profiting off Murdoch: Hannity was privately disgusted with Trump after 2020 election, Trumps polling strength causes heartburn for Senate GOP, Top takeaways from student loan forgiveness arguments at the Supreme Court, Student loan forgiveness: Key statements from each justice. The Lower Basin states have already agreed on two short-term programs to reduce their take of water from Mead. It stores water as part of the Colorado River Compact and produceselectricity through the hydroelectric turbines in Glen Canyon dam. In parts of the Colorado River basin, Bolinger said climate change has caused conditions on the ground to bump up against the designated drought categories. Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. Are experts looking at this saying, its just going to get worse in the Colorado River basin? As the drought continues and global warming evaporates water supplying the reservoirs, each reservoir isn't far from dead pool, which is when the water level is too low to flow downstream or power the turbines that provide hydroelectric power. She compares the current drought conditions to 2018, another record-breaking hot and dry year just a couple years ago. Lake Powell is in crisis. For the Upper Basin states, the reservoir storage has ensured theyll be able to meet their legal requirement under the 1922 Colorado River Compact to deliver 75 million acre feet to the Lower Basin every 10 years. Lake Powell is the town's lifeline. And thats left Lake Powell at 34% of its capacity. But after more than two decades of drought it is now less than 1,050 feet the lowest since the lake was filled, and falling about a foot a week. VigLink sets this cookie to show users relevant advertisements and also limit the number of adverts that are shown to them. As of Thursday, Lake Mead was at 1,045.79 feet. The dam stopped up the Colorado River, creating Lake Mead, the biggest reservoir in the United States. And what does that mean for the users on the river? These ICS uses, at the high end, amount to two and a half feet of elevation in Lake Mead. This cookie is native to PHP applications. Newsweek reached out to the Central Arizona Project for comment. 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