Breaking News: As the Colorado River shrinks, the White House for the first time proposed cutting water allotments, reducing the water delivered to California, Arizona and Nevada by as much as one-quarter. https://t.co/B6XaAGYdEs
— The New York Times (@nytimes) April 11, 2023
Currently the 6 western states were trying to come to an agreement. 5 did that spread the pain evenly. The 6th, CA, didn't participate and instead developed their own, which had them with the least reduced and AZ as the most.
The Biden-Harris plan honors senority of water rights, which puts CA up in 1st, least reduced. But even then, you cannot deny water levels so everyone is going to take a cut. The majority of usage is Ag. So homeowners will feel the brunt.
"The Colorado River supplies drinking water to 40 million Americans as well as two states in Mexico, and irrigates 5.5 million agricultural acres. The electricity generated by dams on the river's two main reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, powers millions of homes and businesses.
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The Biden administration is desperately trying to prevent that situation, known as deadpool. But it faces a political and ethical dilemma: How to divvy up the cuts required.
The Interior Department, which manages the river, released a draft analysis Tuesday that considered three options.
The first alternative was taking no action a path that would risk deadpool. The other two options are making reductions based on the most senior water rights, or evenly distributing them across Arizona, California and Nevada, by reducing water deliveries by as much as 13 percent beyond what each state has already agreed to.
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But that would greatly harm Nevada and force disastrous reductions on Arizona: the aqueduct that carries drinking water to Phoenix and Tucson would be reduced almost to zero.
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Another challenge with letting the cuts fall disproportionately on Arizona: Doing so would hurt the Native American tribes that rely on that water, and whose rights to it are guaranteed by treaty. Governor Stephen Roe Lewis of the Gila River Indian Community, which is entitled to a significant share of Colorado River water, said the goal should be "a consensual approach that we can all live with."
Spreading the reductions evenly would reduce the impact on tribes in Arizona, and also help protect the state's fast-growing cities. But it would hurt Southern California's agriculture industry, which helps feed the nation, as well as invite lawsuits. The longstanding legal precedent, often called the law of the river, has been to allocate water based on seniority of water rights.
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The federal government has the legal authority to impose cuts only on the lower-basin states that rely on water released from Lake Mead and Lake Powell. As a result, the draft analysis is focused on how to distribute cuts among those three states. (CA is a lower state)"
This will be an insane hot button issue. Couple this with the proposed energy fee system based on household income, the costs for energy and water in CA will skyrocket.
aTm '99
Gig 'em Aggies!