Not enough water to go around: Colorado River Basin, ravaged by drought, plans for a drier future

the drought-stricken Colorado River is in critical condition almost two years ago the federal government declared the first ever shortage on the River triggering cuts to Water Supplies in the southwest today the river remains unsustainably low the Colorado is the lifeblood of the region it Waters some of the country's fastest growing cities nourishes some of our most fertile fields and Powers 1.4 trillion dollars in annual economic activity the river runs more than 1400 miles from Headwaters in the Rockies to its Delta in northern Mexico where it ends in a trickle seven states and 30 Native American tribes lie in the Colorado River Basin as we first reported in 2021 the river has been running dry due to the historically severe drought the story will continue in a moment The Majestic Meandering Colorado River that cut through these Red Cliffs carving the Grand Canyon is a Wonder of Nature and human Ingenuity the Glen Canyon Dam created Lake Powell and 300 miles down river Lake Mead sits behind the Hoover Dam these reservoirs are now being sucked dry by 40 million different straws that's the number of people in booming Western States who depend on the Colorado to quench their thirst power their homes water Lawns and splash in the sun its Waters irrigate Farms that produce 90 percent of the country's winter greens to all these demands add the stress of a 23-year drought as dry as any period in 1200 years and you have a river in crisis these white bathtub Rings is this where the water used to be absolutely Brad Udall a climate scientist at Colorado State University went out on Lake Powell with us so all of this would have been underwater yeah so what does this tell you about what's happening on the Colorado River well it's a signal of the long-term problem we've been seeing since the year 2000 which is climate change is reducing the flows of the Colorado significantly Lake Powell and Lake Mead the two biggest reservoirs in the country were nearly full in 2000 by 2021 they'd Fallen to about 30 percent capacity the Lake's now 155 feet below full it's dropped something like 50 feet this year and it's still dropping yes and that's when power generation actually becomes to come into question it would drop so low that it may not be able to generally not be able to generate power hydroelectric power yeah Brad Udall has strong connections to the river as Secretary of the Interior his uncle Stuart Udall opened the Glen Canyon Dam his father Congressman Mo Udall fought to channel river water to Arizona 100 yards as a Young Man Brad was a Colorado River guide today he analyzes the impact of climate change on Water Resources is the West on a collision course with climate change in some ways yes but we have fully utilized this system we've over allocated it and we now need to think about how to turn some of this back because the only lever we control right now in the river is the demand lever we have no control over the supply so we have to dial back demand 70 percent of Colorado River water goes to agriculture when the federal government declared the water shortage it triggered mandatory cutbacks Pinal County Arizona got hit hard anell County alone we're going to be losing 300 000 acre feet of surface water that's water that would be delivered from Lake Powell Lake Mead as part of the Colorado River 300 000 acre feet is 98 billion gallons of water whale and Wertz Farms 500 acres in Pinal County south of Phoenix his family has tilled soil here for four generations it's some of the most productive land in the state crops from Pinal County are shipped all over the country words grows gourds cotton and Alfalfa profitable but thirsty crops and his allotment of Colorado River water is being cut by 70 percent this is Colorado River water yep kind of the the lifeline of our irrigated AG here this comes straight in from Lake Mead correct this is uh through hundreds of miles of canal system it's made its way down here to Central Arizona and what percentage of your water is supplied by this canal it's been close to 50 percent of the water that we've used to to farm here and uh this next year it's probably going to drop down to about 20 percent of the water that we use on Seventh of what he was getting a decade ago it's water and make ends meet warts sold more than 300 acres to a solar farm retirement funds to repair and restart old Wells he laser leveled his fields to make irrigation more efficient but it's just not enough in the middle of this drought no it's it's not enough so he told us he'll have to leave 150 acres uncultivated what you see green here is eventually going to die I hope we'll have enough water to plant it in the future but more likely it's going to stay Brown for quite some time all the water users are going to have to give up something to keep that water in the lake Amelia Flores is chairwoman of the Colorado River Indian tribes a reservation of four tribes a few hours West of Phoenix with the oldest and largest water rights in Arizona after being moved to reservations Southwest tribes got rights to about a quarter of the river's flow but government red tape and lack of infrastructure have prevented them from using their full allotment Flores told us until this drought tribes were never included in water negotiations why had you not had a seat at the table before this because the tribes have always been overlooked in the policy making and in in the law of the river but that day has come to an end when Western States first divvied up the Colorado River in 1922 and later when the federal government built the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams the future seemed boundless and manageable through negotiation and Court battles States worked out agreements the law of the river to split the water equally between upper and lower Basin States the lower States used just about all their allotment and it's fed their tremendous growth the upper states have never used their full share now they are booming and say they need the water they've been promised I can see the bathtub rings around here too we're trying to keep every drop of water we can into this reservoir for next year's drinking water Zach renstrom manages the water system for Washington County in southwest Utah St George the county seat is one of the fastest growing Metro areas in the U.S its population grew 29 percent this past decade the state of Utah gets about a quarter of its water from the Colorado but most of Washington County has only one source the Virgin River which fills this Reservoir so right now we're in the process of implementing really strict conservation measures and if the cities don't adopt those standards then we'll be out of water very quickly what is very quickly within the next five to ten years so in the midst of this drought Utah is proposing to build a one to two billion dollar pipeline able to bring 27 billion gallons of water a year from dwindling Lake Powell Utah says it's entitled to the Water by law you're talking about siphoning off water from a lake that's already at a critically low level to help a city grow in the desert every state on the Colorado River was allotted so much water and at a water budget and so with their water budget the state of Utah has decided that it wants to use a portion of its water here in St George Utah but it was a budget that was set when water was plentiful it isn't anymore what is Utah hoping for Utah wants the right to do what every other Basin state has done we want to make sure that we have water for our future for a hotter drier scenario that's coming up building a multi-billion dollar pipeline to pump out more water from an already rapidly declining Reservoir simply doesn't make sense in the 21st century JB Hamby is Vice President of the board that runs California's Imperial Irrigation District one of the richest agricultural regions in the country with the single largest allocation of water on the entire River there's a lot of urban growth and sprawl occurring in other parts of the Colorado River Basin that's really not necessarily sustainable Hamby says California's Imperial Valley Farms have cut water usage almost 16 percent since 2003 but points out as the population of Saint George Utah grows so does its water use we need to think and rethink about how we grow and if we grow and where we grow St George would say that they're not asking for more they're asking for what they need I think what we all need to have as a reality check here and recognize that we live in an era of limits right now and that's not going away anytime soon in fact it's only going to get worse a big part of the problem is the law of the river itself a hodgepodge of rules and regulations pieced together over the course of a century for example after all the litigation and negotiations the law ends up allocating more water than actually flows down the Colorado and this in times of shortage channels that provide more than a third of Arizona's water must run dry before California is required to cut back so so wait a minute Arizona is being called on to cut its water intake before California has to give up even one drop pretty amazing can't work in today's world and it's in some ways a little microcosm right of this whole law of the river with these systems that have been put in place that just don't work that can't work and that's why a rethink's needed one example of rethinking the Colorado River Indian tribes agreed to leave Fields uncultivated leaving 48 billion gallons almost three feet of water in Lake Mead the State of Arizona agreed to pay them for their losses my people want to help during this drought we want to save the river because for centuries the river has always taken care of us so now we have to take care of the river that's what negotiations are all about right it may be their ways to conserve and figure out how to get the same goods and services for less water let's let AG grow crops that use less water let's figure out how to make cities use water as efficiently as possible so I mean we need some optimism here right it's desert ground but as we saw at this meeting of Pinal County Farmers optimism is in short supply the farmer who's prepared the whole life worked the land farmed the land is getting the short end of the stick Farmers here and across the Southwest feed the country but it takes more than two-thirds of the Colorado River to produce the bounty with lake levels dropping Arizona Farmers like whale and worst fear their fertile Fields could become desert again you're going to see drastic cuts a drastic change of what next year has to bring and for my particular Family Farm we're doing all that we can to keep it going but I have a feeling it's just a matter of time for none of this exists this past January whale and Wertz lost his entire Colorado River allotment but his farm got a reprieve from an unusually wet winter the Colorado is still in Dire Straits in May Arizona California and Nevada agreed to conserve nearly a trillion gallons of water by the end of 2026 hoping the unprecedented cutback will stabilize the river

Channel: 60 Minutes

Views: 750,314

Keywords: 60 Minutes, CBS News, colorado river, drought

Id: gmeWydWm2MU

Length: 13min 50sec (830 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 31 2023