Federal Managers to Enforce 10-Year Colorado River Management Plan

Overview

• The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation said it will move forward with a 10-year framework that can be renegotiated every two years if the seven basin states do not produce a consensus plan.
• State negotiators have failed for more than two years to agree on a multistate operating deal, prompting the federal fallback to avoid a gap when current agreements expire this fall.
• A central dispute remains over which states or basins must take the deepest water cuts, with Upper Basin and Lower Basin commissioners pointing to the other to shoulder most reductions.
• The Bureau and California, Nevada, and Arizona signed a memorandum of understanding to study desalination and advanced water purification as possible new supplies while states pursue conservation and efficiency measures.
• The river supplies water to over 40 million people and tribal communities report growing losses of continuous water, so the federal plan is pitched as a flexible, interim measure to manage shrinking supplies and reduce risk to farms, cities, and ecosystems.