Four things to know about the lower #ColoradoRiver basin: Western Slope #water officials tour sites integral to lower basin consumption – @AspenJournlism #COriver #aridification #CRWUA2022
 100vw, 863px” data-lazy-src=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/All-American-canal-imperial-valley-heather-sackett-aspen-journalism.webp?resize=863%2C485&is-pending-load=1#038;ssl=1″ data-srcset=”https://news.google.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://news.google.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7″/>The All-American Canal conveys water from the Colorado River to the Imperial Valley in Southern California. The Imperial Irrigation District is the largest user of Colorado River water. CREDIT: HEATHER SACKETT/ASPEN JOURNALISM</p>
<p>Click the link to read the article on the Aspen Journalism website (Heather Sackett):</p>
<p>Staff and board members from the Glenwood Springs-based Colorado River Water Conservation District, along with other water managers from across western Colorado, this month visited the lower basin states — Nevada, Arizona and California — on what they called a fact-finding trip.</p>
<p>The tour took participants by bus from Las Vegas though the green alfalfa fields of the Fort Mohave Indian Reservation, past the big diversions serving the Central Arizona Project and Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, and to the hot, below-sea-level agricultural expanse of the biggest water user on the river: the Imperial Irrigation District. Among the about 50 participants on the three-day tour were Kathy Chandler-Henry and Steve Beckley, River District board representatives from Eagle and Garfield counties. Pitkin County representative John Ely did not attend.</p>
<p>The River District’s mission is to protect, conserve, use and develop the waters within its 15-county area of western Colorado and to safeguard the water to which the state is entitled.</p>
<p>With the nation’s two largest reservoirs — Lake Powell and Lake Mead, which store Colorado River water — at record-low levels that threaten hydropower production, and calls for conservation coming from the federal government, it’s more important than ever for western Colorado residents to understand how water is used in the lower basin, said River District general manager Andy Mueller.</p>
<p>“We have to be able to understand (lower basin) interests and their needs so that we can find ways to meet their interests while protecting our own,” he said. “There’s a system at risk of collapse, and we are an integral part of that.”</p>
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1. Here’s the latest version of my 4-Panel plot thru Water Year (Oct-Sep) of 2021 of the Colorado River big reservoirs, natural flows, precipitation, and temperature. Data (PRISM) goes back or 1906 (or 1935 for reservoirs.) This updates previous work with @GreatLakesPeck . pic.twitter.com/cUjHQ9BJsg
— Brad Udall (@bradudall) October 17, 2021
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Brad Udall: Here’s the latest version of my 4-Panel plot thru Water Year (Oct-Sep) of 2021 of the Colorado River big reservoirs, natural flows, precipitation, and temperature. Data (PRISM) goes back or 1906 (or 1935 for reservoirs.) This updates previous work with @GreatLakesPeck. Credit: Brad Udall via Twitter
” data-medium-file=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?fit=232%2C300&ssl=1″ data-large-file=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?fit=612%2C792&ssl=1″ decoding=”async” width=”612″ height=”792″ data-src=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?resize=612%2C792&ssl=1″ alt=”” class=”wp-image-130181 jetpack-lazy-image” data-recalc-dims=”1″ data-lazy-srcset=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?w=612&ssl=1 612w, https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?resize=232%2C300&ssl=1 232w, https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?resize=314%2C406&ssl=1 314w” data-lazy-sizes=”(max-width: 612px) 100vw, 612px” data-lazy-src=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/brad-udall-4-panel-plot-thru-water-year-2021-colorado-river-mead-powell-10172021.jpeg?resize=612%2C792&is-pending-load=1#038;ssl=1″ data-srcset=”https://news.google.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://news.google.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7″/>Brad Udall: Here’s the latest version of my 4-Panel plot thru Water Year (Oct-Sep) of 2021 of the Colorado River big reservoirs, natural flows, precipitation, and temperature. Data (PRISM) goes back or 1906 (or 1935 for reservoirs.) This updates previous work with @GreatLakesPeck. Credit: Brad Udall via Twitter
Upper basin water managers like to point out that this isn’t the case in the lower basin. Although western Colorado has thousands of small-scale water users diverting from dwindling rivers, the lower basin has just a handful of large-scale water users who have the benefit of two huge upstream storage buckets that release the water exactly when it’s needed.
“Our farmers in particular live within that hydrology in flux and we have learned how to adapt to climate change,” Mueller said. “In the lower basin, their agriculture and outdoor landscaping are absorbing more water because of the hotter temperatures, so they just call for more from the reservoirs.”
 100vw, 863px” data-lazy-src=”https://i0.wp.com/coyotegulch.blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Las-Vegas-wash-heather-sackett-aspen-journalism.webp?resize=863%2C647&is-pending-load=1#038;ssl=1″ data-srcset=”https://news.google.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://news.google.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7″/>The Las Vegas wash is a 12-mile-long channel that returns the valley’s excess water to Lake Mead. The Southern Nevada Water Authority has recommended that lower basin contractors be charged for evaporative losses, something upper basin water managers have been saying for years.<br />
CREDIT: HEATHER SACKETT/ASPEN JOURNALISM</p>
<h3>Evaporation loss not accounted for in lower basin</h3>
<p>The thing about building giant reservoirs in the desert is that a portion of the water evaporates into the hot, dry air. In the upper basin, these evaporative losses from the reservoirs of the Colorado River Storage Project are accounted for and charged as part of the consumptive use to each state depending on their allocation of water.</p>
<p>For example, as laid out in the 1948 Upper Colorado River Compact, Colorado’s allocation of upper basin water is 51.75%. Therefore, the state takes 51.75% of the evaporative losses for Blue Mesa, Flaming Gorge and Lake Powell. Such is not the case in the lower basin, where evaporative losses in reservoirs remain unaccounted for.</p>
<p>Upper basin water managers have long said this accounting is unfair and enables overuse in the lower basin.</p>
<p>“We are asking for (the lower basin) to be treated the same way we are so the system and the playing field is even,” Mueller said. “Once we are on an even playing table, then we can address the way we work in the future, but it’s really hard to do that when the rules they play by down here enable so much more water use than what we have in the upper basin.”</p>
<p>The upper basin may finally be making progress on this point, for at least one lower basin water provider has taken up the rallying cry. In an August letter to federal officials, Southern Nevada Water Authority’s John Entsminger recommended that each lower basin contractor be charged for evaporation losses so that “the lower basin can reduce its reliance upon excess water from the upper basin to balance reservoirs.”</p>
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