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9h ago

Interior Issues 10-Year Colorado River Plan That Puts Cuts on Lower Basin

The plan ties reductions to reservoir levels to protect dam operations and sets two-year check-ins to guide water use over the next decade.

Farms are seen in Yuma, Arizona, in April 2023.
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Overview

  • Federal officials published a Final Environmental Impact Statement on July 31 that lays out a preferred 10-year framework for managing the Colorado River after state talks failed.
  • The framework uses reservoir-driven triggers to limit deliveries and allows the Lower Basin states of Arizona, California and Nevada to face up to 3 million acre-feet of collective cuts in severe conditions.
  • Upper Basin states (Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico) are spared mandatory cuts for now but can participate in voluntary conservation programs capped at modest volumes.
  • The Bureau of Reclamation is expected to issue a formal Record of Decision and the first two-year operating plan in the coming days or weeks with operational changes slated to begin on October 1.
  • Arizona officials warned the heaviest options would be devastating and signaled legal and political pushback while utilities, farmers, tribes and hydropower customers prepare for higher costs, more groundwater use and possible fallowing of farmland.