What is ‘dead pool’ and what does it mean for Colorado River?

The Colorado River lives many lives – harboring trout in the Rocky Mountains, powering ACs in Arizona, greening fields of alfalfa in California. The 1,450-mile-long lifeblood supports more than two dozen tribes, seven U.S. states, and Mexico, but Americans living outside the Western region benefit, too. The river preserves national parks and produces winter vegetables, shipped countrywide.

Yet a long-term rise in demand – and increasingly arid conditions linked to climate change – have resulted in a dire river reality. Though conservation efforts have helped states stay afloat, negotiations aimed at better balancing water supply and demand seem as stuck as the once-sunken boats now seen in depleted Lake Mead. 

Worst-case scenario? Lake Mead and Lake Powell, major reservoirs along the river, could reach “dead pool,” with levels so low that water can’t flow out of those dams. That could turn off river supplies to cities like Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and Phoenix.

“A series of failures to govern, failures to make the compromises necessary to bring water supply into balance” could emerge, says Eric Kuhn, co-author of the book “Science Be Dammed: How Ignoring Inconvenient Science Drained the Colorado River.” 

While this is a longstanding problem, the river splashed back into headlines this summer with news of water cuts. Here’s some context for understanding why it’s been so hard to balance this water budget. 

Who’s in charge?

The official “water master” is the secretary of the Department of the Interior, which follows complicated rules for releasing Colorado River water from dams. But many levels of government are involved in river negotiations.

The river is regulated by a tangle of contracts, laws, and legal decisions, but the closest to a Magna Carta is the Colorado River Compact of 1922. The compact divided the flows into two basins – the upper (Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico) and lower (Nevada, Arizona, California), each originally allowed an apportionment of 7.5 million acre-feet per year. A 1944 treaty carved out 1.5 million acre-feet of annual flow to Mexico. (An acre-foot of water is enough to cover one acre, one foot deep.) 

Despite their high-priority water rights, many Native American tribes have yet to access their full allotments due to problems involving funding, infrastructure, and bureaucratic barriers. 

“Until you start to deal with the inequities or the injustice, you can never really have any momentum going forward,” Shaun Chapoose, chairman of the Ute Business Committee, told The Associated Press. 

How has the river – and need for its water – changed over time?

Demand for the river water has steadily grown over decades as Western state populations swelled alongside an agriculture industry worth billions, which is the largest Colorado River consumer. Meanwhile, against the backdrop of a mega-drought made worse by climate change, many experts say the real culprit responsible for lower flows is a process called aridification. 

The issue is that more water has been taken out of the reservoirs than what has flowed in over a long period of time, says Kathy Jacobs, director of the Center for Climate Adaptation Science and Solutions at the University of Arizona. 

“The water levels are declining, and so the focus is really on how can there be either a mandatory or voluntary reduction in the amount of water that gets distributed,” she adds.

Indeed, the Colorado River Compact refers to a river that no longer resembles what it was a century ago.

“The compact has weathered well because it keeps the states glued together and talking. It keeps them in the same room,” says Mr. Kuhn, former general manager of the Colorado River Water Conservation District. However, he adds, “it hasn’t provided a mechanism to adapt to change.” 

That’s where the multistate stalemate comes in.

Gabriela Campos/Santa Fe New Mexican/AP/File

Workers harvest and bag green chiles on Glen Duggins' farm in Lemitar, New Mexico, on Aug 27, 2020. The agriculture industry, worth billions, is the largest consumer of water from the Colorado River.

What hasn’t worked?

Reservoirs like Lake Mead and Lake Powell – designed to hold four years of water supply – have served as a savings account of sorts. However, those reservoirs are now hovering at about a quarter full. Some states have made considerable strides in conservation, but the status quo isn’t considered sufficient. Experts and officials say progress toward a sustainable future on the river will take compromise, as well as more action from the federal government.

In 2007, during the eighth consecutive year of drought in the area, river parties reached a set of interim guidelines that will expire in 2026. Those guidelines were updated in 2019 through drought contingency plans, which spelled out a series of water supply cuts – or tiers – triggered by water levels in the reservoirs.

Fast forward to last year: The Department of the Interior announced mandatory water cuts for Arizona, Nevada, and Mexico, triggered by those drought contingency plans. Then, this August, the government declared that another tier of cuts had been triggered for those same states and Mexico. (Water allocated to California, the Lower Basin state exempt from these cuts, is given priority based on a congressional act.) 

Separately, on June 14 of this year, Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Camille Touton outlined a 60-day deadline for basin parties, collectively, to find a way to cut an additional 2 million to 4 million acre-feet of water use, “just to protect critical levels in 2023.”

Yet, despite the stakeholders not having met that deadline, no clear repercussions from the federal agency have emerged so far.

The 721,000 acre-feet expected to be cut from Arizona, Nevada, and Mexico next year are roughly a third of what’s considered necessary to stabilize the reservoirs. Under the current drought contingency plans, Arizona will be hardest hit, with a reduction of 592,000 acre-feet, or 21% of its usual allotment. 

“It is unacceptable for Arizona to continue to carry a disproportionate burden of reductions for the benefit of others who have not contributed,” Arizona Department of Water Resources and Central Arizona Project leaders said in a statement. 

The problem seems to be a collective lack of compromise.

“It’s political resistance, it’s entrenched economic interests, and there’s this lingering, lingering hope that climate change is not real,” says Mr. Kuhn.

What are hopes for balancing supply and demand? 

A complex river system – serving an estimated 40 million people – will involve complex solutions.

Reducing demand is paramount, because it’s not obvious how supplies can increase, says Professor Jacobs, who has convened interdisciplinary conversations about the Colorado River. One idea involves expanding programs that would essentially pay farmers not to farm, so that their water allocations are conserved. 

“There are plenty of ideas about how the underlying allocation system could be modified – if people were willing to do that,” says Professor Jacobs. And yet, “there’s so much legal and financial investment in the status quo. It’s very difficult to make big changes.”

Incoming funds from the ​​Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act might also help. The latter includes $4 billion intended to help relieve drought impacts for the Colorado River and other basins. Meanwhile, stakeholder talks continue. 

And, for the first time, Upper Basin states and six tribes have begun a series of formal meetings focused on the water rights of tribal communities, reports Fresh Water News.

Editor’s note: The description of “dead pool” has been clarified.