Snowpack, runoff, reservoirs In the comments, Nick from Australia is on “team Powell 3600”. Last month Reclamation was on “team Powell 3569.93“, meaning the projected elevation of Lake Powell above sea level at the end of the water year, and the CBRFC’s forecast for runoff into Powell is up two million acre feet since those …
Continue reading ‘Deadpool diaries: Bonkers snowpack, open thread’ »
The ditches were flowing across Albuquerque’s valley floor yesterday as I criss-crossed them on a long, aimless bike ride, the first day it really felt like spring. The cycling challenge at this winter<->spring pivot point is clothing – layers for a morning start hovering just above freezing, with a pannier stuffed with the layers by …
Continue reading ‘Deadpool Diaries: In March, the Rio Grande/Colorado River snowpack went bonkers’ »
With more wet in the forecast, the latest numbers from the Colorado Basin River Forecast Center look very good right now: The active weather pattern that began around mid-February continued through mid-March across the region. Precipitation was above to well above normal across most of the region during the first half of March. March 1-16 …
With the March 24-month study out, a status report on the Colorado River Basin’s critical numbers. I’ve added the “minimum probable” forecast this time to help better understand the risk profile. In brief, water users continue to take more water out of Lake Mead than is flowing in. Most Probable Lake Mead million acre feet …
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A Colorado River report card Lake Mead Water Year 2023, based on the most recent Bureau of Reclamation 24-month study Lake Mead million acre feet percent full Start of WY2023 7.328 28.08% End of WY2023 6.508 24.93% gain(loss) (0.820) -3.14% Current forecast U.S. Lower Basin water use state projected use in maf percent of …
Continue reading ‘Deadpool Diaries: A report card on our response to inconvenient science’ »
Today’s ENSO outlook (El Niño Southern Oscillation) suggests a consensus among “the models” that the odds are tipping toward an El Niño for the coming summer and fall. The humans in the loop are more bearish: The most recent IRI plume favors ENSO-neutral to continue through the spring, with El Niño forming during summer 2023 …
With a solid snowpack in all of my rivers, we’ve got a pair of solid March 1 forecasts for 2023 runoff. Rio Grande 102 percent at Otowi, the main forecast point for water entering New Mexico’s Middle Rio Grande Valley. Implications: While we don’t have a formal Annual Operating Plan for the Albuquerque Bernalillo County …
Apologies, no tl;dr is possible. To borrow from Blaise Pascal, I would have written a shorter blog post, but I did not have the time. On a bike ride a week ago I took a favorite “long cut” (the slow ways are mostly better, best to not be in a hurry) through downtown …
Seven years ago, as I was finishing my book Water is For Fighting Over, I wrote this kicker: In the end, we need an honest reckoning with the basic problem: there is not enough water for everyone to do everything they want with it, or to use every drop to which they feel legally entitled. …
Continue reading ‘Deadpool Diaries: Defining the “Crisis”’ »
First the bad news from the Colorado Basin River Forecast Center’s mid-February forecast – this year’s runoff into Flaming Gorge, which is at record low thanks to Drought Response Operations Agreement releases to prop up Lake Powell, is forecast to be below average this year, at 86 percent of average. At some point we’ve gotta …
Continue reading ‘Deadpool Diaries: The chance of deadpool declines’ »