A Tragedy of the Commons: Efforts To Stop the Western Drought Are Themselves Drying Up

Hopes are sagging that a Tuesday deadline looming for states to cut a deal on rights to water from the Colorado River, leading to calls for the federal government to get involved before the situation goes to worse from bad.The Colorado River is running dry — and fast. The issue is “what economists call a tragedy of the commons,” at least according to a regents professor emeritus, Robert Glennon, at the University of Arizona.First problem, the professor says, is that the southwest is facing the 23rd year of drought, and “no one knows if this is a 23-year drought or a 50-year drought.”Second problem is a changing climate, which has led to increased evaporation from the Colorado — as well as from Lakes Mead and Powell.Third problem is that the river is “overallocated,” meaning that there are more water rights than there is water. Between states, reservations, and international treaties, the parties have rights to between 18 million and 20 million acre feet* of water, even though the annual flow averages around 12 million acre feet.All of this has created a situation in which the river is rapidly drying up, approaching “deadpool,” meaning the water level in the river is so low that it no longer flows downstream at all. If that were to happen it would cut off the states at the lower basin from their water supply.The states of the basin have historically maintained that they are the best authorities to manage the water, which they have done for a century, leading to the current situation in the river.They operate within the framework of the Colorado River Compact, an interstate compact enacted in 1922. It established the water rights for each state in the upper and lower basin, in addition to a number of other laws concerning the specific allocation to each state.America itself is bound by an international treaty to deliver some 1.5 million acre feet of water each year, an agreement which could be threatened if the situation continues in the basin of the Colorado.Additionally, the Supreme Court has awarded the native tribes of the Colorado basin some 2 million acre feet of water, most of which is currently unused. This commitment could also be at stake, even as the tribes are not represented in negotiations.At Senate hearings in June, the reclamation department commissioner, Camille Touton, tasked the states of the Colorado River basin to preserve 2 to 4 million acre feet of water — between about 12 percent and 25 percent of the river’s volume.A proposal from the signatories of the compact is expected to be announced at a press conference scheduled for Tuesday and it looks like the states are about to come up dry.So far the states of the upper basin — Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah — have proposed a plan to preserve 400,000 acre feet of water and put the onus on the lower basin states — Nevada, Arizona, and California — to sort out the rest.In the opinion of a former commission of reclamation, Daniel Beard, this is almost certainly not going to happen, and it’s threatening Lakes Mead and Powell, as well as those who rely on them for water and electricity.“The prospects are only slightly above zero,” Mr. Beard tells the Sun. “The savings that they proposed are at best illusionary and the Tuesday deadline is looming.”He argues that the lower basin states “need to come forward with their own proposals and if history is any guide, they won’t.” He argues that, in pitching the decision back to the states, Ms. Touton is “calling their bluff.” Mr. Beard argues that “it is possible to meet the 2 to 4 million acre feet challenge that the secretary has laid out but it just involves making difficult decisions.” The states, he argues, are probably not going to make those decisions.The director of Save the Colorado, Gary Wockner, says the states are not taking the problem seriously, pointing to the Windy Gap Firming project and the Gross Reservoir Dam expansion — two projects that will divert more water — as evidence.“When you’re in a hole stop digging,” Mr. Wockner tells the Sun. “These states, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, are still digging to try and divert more water when the reservoirs are already collapsing.”Mr. Wockner argues that they should not only stop building new reservoirs but abandon some of the reservoirs that are currently at risk of failure in the near future, namely Lake Powell.The Lake Powell reservoir on the Utah-Arizona border is approaching the point where water will no longer be able to be released from the dam, which would not only dry up parts of the river downstream, but halt the generation of electricity and threaten the structural integrity of the dam as its turbines take in air.Mr. Wockner argues that, given the long odds of striking a timely deal, the states should move to abandon the reservoir there and allow water to flow downstream around the dam.Mr. Beard agrees, calling this the most immediate and meaningful solution to the drought there. “It’s no longer needed, we ought to abandon it and leave it there as a monument to the past failures of out policy,” he argues.A long-term solution to the water crisis along the Colorado River will almost certainly require adjustments to agriculture in the southwest, which accounts for about 80 percent of the diversiton from the river.The problem, however, is that none of the state leaders want to make decisions that will be unpopular with their farmers, which is why Mr. Beard argues that any solution will have to come from the federal government.“We all know where the financing for any solution is going to come from. — it’s going to come from the federal taxpayer,” he said. “The frustration that I’ve always had is why does a taxpayer in New York, Massachusetts, Texas need to pay for the myopic tendencies of the Colorado River basin?”Even as the public is expected to foot the bill for the mismanagement of water in the southwest, there still hasn’t been much of a negotiation, according to Mr. Beard.As far as prospects for a deal ahead of Tuesday’s deadline go, Mr. Beard says: “I wouldn’t hold my breath because I don’t think the states are going to come forward with meaningful proposals.”It’s not all doom and gloom though, at least in Mr. Glennon’s opinion. He argues that, though the states are unlikely to deliver a plan in the immediate future, the prospects in the relatively near term are quite good.He argues that a strategy of conservation, reuse, water prices, reallocation, and desalination could solve the south west’s water crisis in the long term, should someone step in to make the executive decisions.________* An acre foot is a measure of water an acre in area and a foot deep.

A Tragedy of the Commons: Efforts To Stop the Western Drought Are Themselves Drying Up

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