Today its about half full, Kuhn said. Such is the nature of the climate change beast that we have unleashed.. Officials have already taken some stopgap measures to avert the lake getting down to the pivotal 3,490-foot mark. This cookie is used to manage the interaction with the online bots. Levels on Lake Powell, which stores water for the. But while Lake Mead . This cookie is associated with Django web development platform for python. With the reservoirs approaching their lowest levels in modern history, that brings us to our final number: 2026. Luke Runyon is the water reporter at KUNC in Greeley, Colorado. JOHN DANKOSKY: When you use the term megadrought, that sounds like a newer term. This year, because things have been so dry some of the states in the Colorado River watershed have had the driest year on record over the last year, and thats left the soil incredibly parched. Overall, the river's flowis down 20% in this century relative to the 20th century. Nothing physically changed at that threshold, but its the agreed-upon alarm bell for trouble in the near future. Kuhns analysis is the worst case, said Pat Tyrrell, Wyoming state engineer who has been involved in the Upper Basin water talks. What is the current status of Lake Powell? He covers the Colorado River basin. And by themselves they are no longer sufficient to meet the area needs. The April-July forecast for Colorado River runoff into Lake Powell is 74 percent of average. The Santa Cruz River is now a giant bed of dust and sand. Those cutbacks are likely to grow steeper in 2021. So the question is, how bad is it going to get? Its lagging in both the Upper and Lower basins, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration projects much of the watershed totilt toward hotter and drier weatherfor the rest of the winter. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Weve seen evaporation increase from reservoirs and streams at higher temperatures. Join half a million readers enjoying Newsweek's free newsletters. What is the long-term future of Lake Powell? The low levels arent just causing hand-wringing among the Wests water officials. LinkedIn sets this cookie to remember a user's language setting. At full capacity, Lake Powell holds enough water to flood the entire state of Kentucky a foot deep. However, the receding water levels have already greatly reduced the reservoirs generating capacity, to about 800 megawattsabout 60 percent. An acre-foot is the amount of water needed to fill one acre of land to a height of one foot. Lake Powell is also a popular tourist destination for water recreation. Im John Dankosky, and now its time to check in on the state of science. With the dropping water levels, this industry is likely to be extremely impacted, as seen by a boating ramp that used to. The Nature Conservancy receives some funding from the Walton Family Foundation, which also provides funding to KUNC for reporting on the Colorado River. "Based on the best climate data that's available, it's really unlikely that this reservoir is going to be around in the decades to come," Eric Balken of the Glen Canyon Institute told 12News. Set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin, this cookie is used to record the user consent for the cookies in the "Advertisement" category . It wascreated by blocking the Colorado River atGlen Canyon in southern Utah and northernArizona. So, what would happen if Lake Powell dried up? Lake Powell has been called Jewel of the Colorado by the federal agency that built it, the Bureau of Reclamation. This summer, the water. Alex is KUNC's reporter covering the Colorado River Basin. Issued by Microsoft's ASP.NET Application, this cookie stores session data during a user's website visit. After seeing 30 inches of rain in one day in Louisiana, 20 inches in Houston, unprecedented drought in California over the last 5 years, not to mention the flow reductions in Colorado River, Udall said, I think we need to seriously consider water-related climatic events that have no historical precedent.. This segment is part of the The State Of Science spotlight. For context, on the scale of no drought to worst drought, theres no category that captures conditions more dry than exceptional. Lakes Mead and Powell. And its split into two watersheds. It is something in peer-reviewed, published science for decades and decades that the managers of the Colorado River have been ignoring.. The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. If that does come to pass, Tyrell said he is fairly confident we can deal with worst case scenario if it ever happens.. Lake Powell has many functions, one of them as a major recreation center for fishermen, houseboaters and other tourists. If the water levels drop to levels below the intake pipes, the water flow will cease to turn the hydroelectric turbines, and the dam won't generate any power. The D4 category is something that is only supposed to be designated when youre seeing conditions that are so extreme theyre only happening once every 50 to once every 100 years, said Becky Bolinger, Colorados assistant state climatologist. "Its hard to overstate how important the Colorado River is to the entire American southwest.. The ranking by American Rivers is the sixth time since 1991 that all or part of the Colorado topped its endangered list. works with the radio team to create our weekly show, and is helping to build our State of Science Reporting Network. The Southwest United States is wrapping up an abnormally dry winter. Shes a big fan of stories related to strange animal facts and dystopian technology. And you know, those are cutbacks that users are actually going to feel and that municipal leaders, farmers, tribal users in Arizona are having to plan for right now. Lake Mead the largest reservoir in the Colorado River Basin is losing water at record speeds, dropping . The loss of generation from the lake would deprive the grid of about a quarter million households worth of power. The lake that once covered 400 square miles has shrunk 90 percent, leaving behind oxygen-deprived, highly salinized water with a rotten-egg odor that permeates the surrounding area. The two. The JSESSIONID cookie is used by New Relic to store a session identifier so that New Relic can monitor session counts for an application. And thats because some of these past agreements have put that state in the most vulnerable position for cutbacks. Joining me to shed a little bit more light on this is Luke Runyon. At Lake Mead's current capacity, one foot of elevation in the lake equals 85,000 acre-feet. In . Lakes in the Colorado River Basin are drying up and losing water, with severe water cuts now expected across four states - the start of a water crisis in the West. It stores water as part of the Colorado River Compact and produceselectricity through the hydroelectric turbines in Glen Canyon dam. I'm not sure a lot of Las Vega. In the abstract, people seem to think that hydropower can be compensated from other sources, [but] in practical terms, no one really seems to have that figured out, said Mankin, who co-wrote the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrations Drought Task Forces annual report in 2021. Lake Powell, the nation's second-largest reservoir and one thatprovides water and power to millions of people in southern California, has reached its lowest levels since its first filling in the 1960s. . The Department of the Interior had asked the seven states of the Colorado River Compact to come up with a plan to cut between 2 and 4 million acre-feet of water by January. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". If Lake Powell recedes much further, one of the nations largest reservoirs could be at risk of no longer generating hydropower for the region. What would constitute that? This is very unpredictable and these are going to be difficult conversations in the coming years.. Depending on how you define "dry up." It's doubtful that all 1,450 miles of the Colorado River will turn to dust, even if we drain Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the nation's two largest. And this is just the beginning of what could happen if the lake keeps drying up. In the year 2000, the two reservoirs were 95% full. Is this as bad as climate change is going to get in shrinking the snowpacks in the headwaters? Given todays changing climate, led by continued warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions, any knowledge we have of the past that historically would help us make predictions does not help us any more, Udall said. At its highest, in 1983, the lake was 3,708 feet above sea level. In parts of the Colorado River basin, Bolinger said climate change has caused conditions on the ground to bump up against the designated drought categories. Glen Canyon Dam, Colorado River, Arizona. We don't know if we can release water to meet downstream requirements. Plastic milk jugs inexplicably dangle from the tops of the dead trees along the shore. : Subscribe to the weekly Climate Point newsletter, READ MORE: Latest climate change news from USA TODAY. That year is the deadline for water users to negotiate a new set of managing guidelines for the Colorado River. A dry spell like the one from 2000-2005 could have serious consequences for the lake. As water levels fall in the reservoirs and river, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has implemented a tiered shortage system to reduce the allocated amount certain regions in the lower basin receive from the river to preserve water. Tanya Trujillo, the departments assistant secretary, sent a letter to the seven states in the Colorado River basin warning of cutbacks to the water supply for Nevada, Arizona and California. The water in Lake Powell is low because the amount of water in the Colorado River has been falling for decades. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". In an average year, Lake Powell gets enough water that it can release a bit more 8.23 million acre-feet a year. JOHN DANKOSKY: Luke Runyon is a reporter based at KUNC in Fort Collins, Colorado. Copyright 2021 Science Friday Initiative. Lake Oroville, a key component of California's water supply, also benefited from the early-winter storms, as . And right now, people are watching the level of Lake Mead very intensely, because when it dips below a critical threshold, people have to start taking less water from the river. The water levels behind the Colorado Rivers biggest dams are fast-approaching or already at record lows. water level is too low to flow downstream, Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. LUKE RUNYON: Well, this is kind of a narrative or storyline in the basin that has gotten a lot more attention recently, is how have tribal users been excluded from agreements in the past? Much of the water from the river is used for irrigation and agricultural uses, but there are municipal users, as well. The finding is ominous for the region's future drinking-water supply. So Luke, I dont know is this all just because of climate change? Correction: A previous version of this story indicated that 3,490 feet is Lake Powell's "dead pool" level. If its done intentionally, the drawbacks of losing the reservoir could be minimized and the benefits could be maximized, Balken told The Hill. But its fundamental purpose under the federal law that created it is to serve as a water insurance policy for the Colorado River Basin. In coming years, it's going to get worse and worse and worse.. You would have to go back to April of 1937, also twoyears into its initial filling, to find levels that low. Since Lake Powell is primarily sandstone, the lake actually leaks water into the porous rocks. 40 fun events happening in Tucson this weekend Feb. 23-26 , Opinion: Help protect Lake Mead and Colorado River water, Colorado River runoff forecast keeps dropping, Warm weather reducing Colorado River runoff, study finds, Feds back off from Lake Mead water demand, Businesses, residents paid to save water in this Arizona valley, Tucson to leave nearly 20% of its CAP water in Lake Mead, 'Toilet to tap' water treatment will soon be legal in Arizona, officials say, Big snowstorms put Colorado River drought plan on ice, Colorado River tops group's 'endangered' list again, CAP-California water deal that Arizona nixed provokes ongoing conflict, Water bailout? Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Cookie used to remember the user's Disqus login credentials across websites that use Disqus. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". Thanks so much for joining us. Conditions have been deteriorating across the river basin since the summer of 2020. In this column provided by Writers on the Range . And Lake Mead is currently at 37% capacity. These cookies help provide anonymized information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Lake Oroville (of the enormous spillway failure fame) and Lake Shasta, two of California's largest reservoirs, are at critical levels. What are the effects of climate change? Legions of climate scientists have produced evidence that less snow is falling, its melting more quickly, and thirsty soils along the way are soaking it up before it reaches rivers and streams. ET: The dead pool level of Lake Powell has been corrected. We'll assume you're okay with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Subscribe to the weekly Climate Point newsletter, Latest climate change news from USA TODAY, Western water crisis looms as California complicates critical water deal. At full pool, Powell's water line lies 3,700 feet above sea level, and at 3,370 feet, it will reach deadpool levels. The second would step up cloud-seeding programs to try to boost snowfall in the region. Lake Powell is facing such a high degree of risk that federal water managers recommended taking emergency action to hold additional water in Lake Powell, an action all seven states in the Colorado River Basin . The answer is almost certainly, no, we're not at the bottom of impacts, said Zach Frankel, executive director of the Utah Rivers Council. He and his wife have four cats, thousands of bees, and a yoga studio in the sleepy Northwest hills of Connecticut. An acre-foot is 325,851 gallons, or the amount of water that will flood an acre of land to a depth of one foot. Lake Powell (credit: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation) The power pool mark is 3,490 feet of elevation. It's partly that there's less rain and snow, partly that as temperatures rise, plants use more water and more water evaporates out of the soil which would otherwise have ended up in the river. We called several of them and asked for discrete numbers that capture the current state of the Colorado River basin. Lake Powell is hemmed by the Glen Canyon Dam, which generates hydroelectric power via the dam's water flowing through the dam back into the Colorado River. KUNC is solely responsible for its editorial coverage. In addition, Mankin said, interventions like the Flaming Gorge release treat the western U.S.s 20-year drought as a localized phenomenon rather than a regional one. Experts think that eventually, Lake Powell might dry up altogether, in the face of the droughts plaguing the Western U.S. Over two thirds of the entire country is now in some degree of drought conditions, with the area of state borderland where Lake Powell is situated being classified as in "Extreme Drought," according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. LinkedIn sets this cookie for LinkedIn Ads ID syncing. By themselves they are no longer sufficient to meet the area needs in Lake Powell, which also funding! Generation from the Walton Family Foundation, which stores water for the River... Sea level brings us to our final number: 2026 our state of science spotlight sure a lot Las. Capture the current state of science from USA TODAY now a giant bed of dust and sand officials! Sleepy Northwest hills of Connecticut capacity, Lake Powell gets enough water that it can release water flood. 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