And it doesnt allow ratepayers who rely on power production from the canyon to be forward-thinking and operate under conditions of certainty., Cities, farmers and fish all need certainty when it comes to water, and this is the opposite of certainty, Hawes said. The dropping water and the reservoirs expanding bathtub rings are also tied to policy. Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. At that point, Upper Basin states would start delivering water from their other reservoirs to Powell. The Lower Basin states have already agreed on two short-term programs to reduce their take of water from Mead. The proposal, negotiated in secret for more than a year, would ship river water to Prescott and Williams on the north to Sierra Vista and Bens, Depending on what assumptions are made in its computer models, the risks of catastrophically low levels at Mead by 2026 have jumped three to s. 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. Because of the record dry soils and lagging snowpack, theyrelikely headed to their lowest levelssince they were filled decades ago. Lake Powell is in crisis. Understanding and explaining the depth of the dryness is up to climate scientists throughout the basin. 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Climate scientists call it D4. Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Homicide. Water management requires planning for the future. And this is just the beginning of what. 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. 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. "The West might look different," said Hasencamp. Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. They werent able to come up with an agreement. The Glen Canyon Dam forms Lake Powell and the Hoover Dam forms Lake Mead. The bureau's report for June, added on to previously scheduled reservoir updates for January, April and August, paints a dire picture. LUKE RUNYON: So in the Colorado River basin, a lot of the management of the river is tied to the level of its two largest reservoirs. For context, on the scale of no drought to worst drought, theres no category that captures conditions more dry than exceptional. John Dankosky works with the radio team to create our weekly show, and is helping to build our State of Science Reporting Network. I would say less than 20 percent, Ostler said. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is a session cookies and is deleted when all the browser windows are closed. Hes a reporter at KUNC, based in Fort Collins, Colorado. Newsweek previously reported that Lake Mead's dead pool level is 895 feet, while Lake Powell's is 3,370. LUKE RUNYON: Yeah, and this is a question that has been of intense interest to climate scientists. The dropping water levels are indicated by white marks on the canyon wall, often likened to a bathtub ring. An acre-foot is the amount of water needed to fill one acre of land to a height of one foot. If the reservoirs reach dead-pool levels, more than a million people using the electricity could be required to find new power sources. That leaves a sizable deficit and little time to turn things around. Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center Economist Lucas Bair previously told Newsweek that hydroelectricity, powered by the water, is a cheaper, cleaner form of energy. The . In the year 2000, the two reservoirs were 95% full. So it just throws the whole system into much greater uncertainty and a bit of chaos.. 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. Lake Powell hasn't been this low since June of 1965, just two years after it began to fill with water. 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 reality is that it's probably too little, too late.. Chef Bun Lai explains how to see this summers cicada swarm as a sustainable snack. 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. 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. Since Lake Powell is primarily sandstone, the lake actually leaks water into the porous rocks. Lake Mead's water level on Wednesday was measured at 1,044.03 feet, its lowest elevation since the lake was filled in the 1930s. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". Those with money will move and those without will suffer and most likely die. Nimbull: It dries up a lot of people will be hit with high priced water in stores. The pattern element in the name contains the unique identity number of the account or website it relates to. Its depth level currently stands at around 3,530 feet. The studys computer models didnt factor in rising temperatures expected in this region due to climate change. During those 25 years, the rivers annual flow averaged 13.2 million acre feet a bit less than what the Bureau of Reclamations studies have predicted it would carry by 2050 thanks to warming weather and other climate changes, Ostler noted. Nancy Selover, Arizonas state climatologist, says the Upper Basin figure is concerning because that accounts for the rivers headwaters. 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. We know that well lose hydropower, and they wont be able to make hydropower below 3,490, she said. Getty Images. With the reservoirs approaching their lowest levels in modern history, that brings us to our final number: 2026. 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. As an imbalance between water supplies and demands grows in the region, KUNC is committed to covering the stories that emerge. ", States that use Colorado River Basin water mandated to cut use. Weve seen evaporation increase from reservoirs and streams at higher temperatures. And thats really what were watching right now, is how low is Lake Mead going to go? Dry conditions are the worst theyve been in almost 20 years across the Colorado River watershed, which acts as the drinking and irrigation water supply for 40 million people in the American Southwest. Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. So when Lake Mead declines, certain policy triggers are put in place. It survives, she said. 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. California broke from six other Western states in proposal to cut Colorado River use as water levels reach historic lows. Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. I havent shown the climate change hydrology because it just scares everybody, Kuhn told his districts governing board in June, according to an account of the meeting published in the Aspen Daily News. 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. Lake Powell has many functions, one of them as a major recreation center for fishermen, houseboaters and other tourists. 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. What would constitute that? But the last time it was anywhere close to that level was 1999. 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. And this is just the beginning of what could happen if the lake keeps drying up. The second would step up cloud-seeding programs to try to boost snowfall in the region. Lake Powell is also a popular tourist destination for water recreation. Lake Powell (credit: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation) The power pool mark is 3,490 feet of elevation. This is very unpredictable and these are going to be difficult conversations in the coming years.. The Santa Cruz River is now a giant bed of dust and sand. We are really in unprecedented territory right now, and its not even close, Meyer said. 2002, 2018 and 2021 are the most intense dry periods on record for the basin. The story has been updated to reflect this information. You would have to go back to April of 1937, also twoyears into its initial filling, to find levels that low. The study was financed by the district, which is based in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, along with the Southwestern Water Conservation District in Durango, and four water groups in Western Colorado that represent various interests. The word unprecedented gets thrown around a lot in discussions about the Colorado River these days, and this is no exception. Lake Powell is a few hundred feet above dead-pool level. It wascreated by blocking the Colorado River atGlen Canyon in southern Utah and northernArizona. That includes releases of water upstream of Lake Powell, and voluntary cuts in Powells downstream neighbor, Lake Mead. Pause your chores until you have a full-load for the dishwasher. JOHN DANKOSKY: So obviously, people are preparing for worse times. In the short term, yes. And it takes several years of good weather in order to bring the system out of drought. Arizona's environmental agency plans to legalize direct treatment of wastewater for drinking as soon as the end of this year. Institute Executive Director Eric Balken said taking such a step would better position stakeholders to address the drought on their own terms rather than simply running out. Future conservation efforts are highly uncertain. The water level on Lake Powell is 100 feet from its high mark in August 2013. All information these cookies collect is aggregated and therefore anonymous. VigLink sets this cookie to show users relevant advertisements and also limit the number of adverts that are shown to them. Hes also been a long-time guest host on Science Friday. However, experts have warned such measures cannot be a long-term solution. "That has brought everything to a head much earlier than people thought it would.". What is the long-term future of Lake Powell? The U.S. Department of the Interior is considering a plan to keep extra water in Lake Powell. Answer (1 of 2): It has been forecast by professionals to be sometime in 2020 when action will have to be taken by the Southern NV Water District (or whatever their exact title is) to enact or enforce water conservation. The droughts that we are seeing are becoming that much more severe because of the temperature component, theyre warmer, Bolinger said. We are likely witnessing the end of Lake Powell as we knew it in the 80s and 90s, Balken said. LinkedIn sets this cookie from LinkedIn share buttons and ad tags to recognize browser ID. The JSESSIONID cookie is used by New Relic to store a session identifier so that New Relic can monitor session counts for an application. 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. In addition, the river itself experiences more evaporation. 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. This story is part of ongoing coverage of the Colorado River, produced by KUNC with financial support from the Walton Family Foundation. He and his wife have four cats, thousands of bees, and a yoga studio in the sleepy Northwest hills of Connecticut. These reservoirs are as empty now as when they started filling Glen Canyon Dam in the 1960s, said John Fleck, director of the University of New Mexicos water resources program. Luke covers the Colorado River basin. This segment is part ofThe State of Science, a series featuring science stories from public radio stations across the United States. 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