I’ve been thinking about the central communication challenge as we face down yet another dry year amid the continued drumbeat of Upper Basin talk about finding new ways to take more water out of the Colorado River. It goes back to something I wrote in my book: Within the network of state and water-agency representatives …
Continue reading ‘The central challenge on the Colorado River’ »
For today’s #tbt (Throwback Thursday), a return to the remarkable era of Steve Reynolds in New Mexico water management, and that time Reynolds tried to give New Mexico an effective veto over the Central Arizona Project. Students in this year’s UNM Water Resources Program spring class are doing a case study this year on New …
Continue reading ‘#tbt to that time New Mexico tried to demand a Gila River Compact’ »
I’ll be yammering in public Thursday in Albuquerque, y’all should come! What Did We Know and When Did We Know It: How Much Water Does the Colorado River Really Have? In retrospect, it is clear that the 1922 Colorado River Compact was negotiated during a historically wet period, and that as a result the agreement …
With an underwhelming snowpack right now, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s initial 2018 forecast (pdf here) projects combined storage in Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two primary reservoirs on the Colorado River, will drop to 21.7 million acre feet by the end of 2018. That would be the lowest Mead/Powell combined year end storage …
Continue reading ‘Initial forecast: Lakes Mead and Powell headed for record low in 2018’ »
It finally rained yesterday morning in Albuquerque, a bit after 8 a.m., ending a 96-day dry streak. The water in the bottom of my gauge looked like strong tea as the rain washed out three months’ dust, and the relief was not measurable, but large. I ended up with 0.09 inch (2.3 mm) at my …
At yesterday’s monthly Colorado Basin River Forecast Center briefing, Greg Smith noted, by way of analogy, the winter of 1976-77. Smith explained that he wasn’t forecasting – the fact that the evolution of this year’s forecast is similar to 1976-77 doesn’t mean that the rest of this year will be like that year, or that …
Continue reading ‘What happened in the Colorado River Basin in the winter of 1976-77?’ »
Yesterday I pointed out how much water is being stashed in Lake Mead as an example of how folks on the Colorado River are overcoming the old “use it or lose it” problem in western water. Here’s another example, this time with water taken off of the river and stored underground, in this case excess water …
Continue reading ‘Overcoming “use it or lose it” on the Colorado – an example’ »
The “use it or lose it” problem in western water happens when water users who conserve are penalized by having the saved water simply go to another user. A series of policy innovations over the last decade to overcome this problem are showing up right now in a big way in Lake Mead. In all, …
Continue reading ‘Overcoming “use it or lose it” on the Colorado River’ »
As I mentioned, this is the driest start to a water year in a century in Albuquerque. The preliminary Jan. 1 runoff forecast from the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service bears this out. The forecast, based on snow measurements, is stark. NRCS has 40 years of snow records, and for many sites, this is the …
The last time we had any measurable precipitation at Albuquerque’s airport weather station, where we keep the records, was Oct. 4. That’s 90 days, the driest start to a water year since 1917-18.