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Arizona, California and Nevada have agreed to take less water from the drought of the Colorado River, an agreement that, for now, keeps the river from falling so low that it will jeopardize the water for major Western cities like Phoenix and Los Angeles as as well as to some of America’s most productive farmland.
The agreement, announced Monday, calls for the federal government to pay about $1.2 billion to irrigation districts, cities and Native American tribes in the three states if they use less water. States have also agreed to make additional cuts beyond that amount to produce the total reductions needed to protect against river collapse.
Combined, these reductions are about 13 percent of total water use in the Colorado Basin — among the most aggressive experienced in the region, and require significant water restrictions for residential and agricultural use.
The Colorado River provides drinking water for 40 million Americans in seven states and is part of Mexico and irrigates 5.5 million hectares of agricultural land. The electricity generated by the dams on the river’s two main reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, powers millions of homes and businesses.
But the drought, population growth and climate change have dropped the flow of the river one-third in the new year compared to the historical average, threatening to provoke a water and power catastrophe across the West.
California, Arizona and Nevada get their share of water from Lake Mead, which is formed by the Colorado River at the Hoover Dam and controlled by the federal government. The Bureau of Reclamation, an agency within the Department of the Interior, determines how much water each of the three states receives. Other states that depend on the Colorado get their water directly from rivers and tributaries.
The agreement reached over the weekend only runs until the end of 2026, and still needs to be formally adopted by the federal government. At that time, all seven states that depend on the river – which includes Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming – could face a deeper reckoning, because the decline is likely to continue.
Negotiations over Colorado were spurred by a crisis: last summer, the water level in Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two largest reservoirs along the river, fell enough that officials feared the hydroelectric turbines they powered could soon stop operating.
There is even a risk that if the reservoir level drops so much, the water won’t reach the intake valve that controls the outflow from the lake – essentially drying up the river downstream.
Faced with that prospect, the Interior Department last June told seven states to find ways to reduce water use by two to four million acre feet of water a year. (Acre-foot is about as much water as two to three households use in a year.) The state failed to reach an agreement, even as the water level in both reservoirs remains dangerously low.
That inertia led the federal government to lay the groundwork to unilaterally cut off the country. Adding to the pressure, the department said last month that it might ignore a century-old rule that says it must bear the deduction and instead come up with a different formula.
The federal government gave the states until May 30 to take a position on the prospect of unilateral reductions. But behind closed doors, the Biden administration is negotiating with states to reach an agreement and not have to implement cuts that will surely face legal challenges and will delay any action.
In the agreement announced Monday, most of the cuts – 2.3 million acres – will come from water districts, ranch operators, cities and Native American tribes that have agreed to take less water in order to get federal funds offered under the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The payout is about $1.2 billion.
Another 700,000 hectares will come from California, Nevada and Arizona, which agreed to cut between themselves in a few months. If not, the Interior Department says it will withhold water — a move that could face legal and political challenges.
Together, the reductions will save three million acres over the next three and a half years, above and beyond existing agreements. That’s lower, year-over-year, than the federal government expected last summer.
The Department of the Interior was able to negotiate a less drastic cut thanks to the unusually rainy season provided the level of snowpack in the Colorado Basin is far above average, especially in California. That is expected to increase the amount of water in the river, at least temporarily.
The terms of the deal were described to The New York Times by a senior Interior Department official involved in the negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The Washington Post reported elements of the deal last week.
The structure of the agreement allows the Biden administration to sidestep, for now, the issue of the state of affairs.
The Department of the Interior refused to give a breakdown showing how much of the 2.3 million hectares in voluntary, federally awarded compensation will come from each state. And, finding an additional 700,000 acre-feet remains a problem for the three lower basin states to solve, at their own pace.
As a result, what seemed until now like a cage match between countries has produced results that are more acceptable to the countries involved, if not acceptable.
The rule that regulates the river, which dates to 1922, says that much of the Arizona source of the Colorado River will be cut to almost zero before California experiences red. Though Arizona will still see its water supply reduced significantly, the deal effectively eliminates the threat of drastic slashes.
California is also worth much better than it turned out to be. The Interior Department raised the prospect of cutting each country’s supply equally, as a share of total use. Because California uses more water from the Colorado than any other state, it will likely lose the most — to the surprise of farmers in Southern California, as well as cities like Los Angeles and San Diego. Relying largely on voluntary reductions addresses these concerns.
The deal is also a victory of sorts for the Biden administration, which has at times been unsure how to respond to the growing crisis. In the past year, twice set a deadline for countries to give an agreement, which could not be met. The department said the agreement shows the state can work with the federal government to address Colorado’s decline challenges.
Their understanding will also be tested. The Department of Home Affairs said the next step was to study the effects of the deal it had reached, before deciding how to proceed. In the meantime, the next round of negotiations, on what to do after 2026, will begin next month.
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