Biden administration offers alternatives for Colorado River’s long-term operations

Biden administration officials on Wednesday announced several potential alternatives for the Colorado River's long-term management, as the expiration date for the current rules approaches.

The five alternatives will be considered as possible replacements for the 2007 Interim Guidelines for Lower Basin Shortages, which are valid through the end of 2026. These rules will steer conservation policies for a 1,450-mile river that provides water to about 40 million people in the U.S. and Mexico.

"We're in a moment for solutions and leadership," Acting Deputy Interior Secretary Laura Daniel-Davis said on a Wednesday press call. "Today, we're putting forth alternatives that have established a robust and fair framework for a basin-wide agreement."

The Interior Department’s Bureau of Reclamation, which is overseeing the revisions in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), had given Colorado River basin states an early March 2024 cutoff date for submitting a consensus-backed alternative themselves.

The U.S. portion of the Colorado River region is split into a Lower and an Upper basin, which, respectively, include California, Arizona and Nevada, and Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico.

Back in March, the two basins were unable to come to a unified agreement and ended up filing competing proposals for the river's long-term management.

The Lower Basin states had agreed to reductions of their own while also placing an emphasis on shared cuts across the whole watershed — basing storage capacity totals not just on the massive Lake Powell and Lake Mead, but also on other smaller reservoirs in the Upper Basin.

The Upper Basin states, on the other hand, submitted a plan that they felt would better reflect changing hydrological conditions in a region where water supplies come from mountain snowpack.

In the absence of a March consensus, the federal government on Wednesday released its own alternatives, which will undergo extensive analysis in a forthcoming draft environmental impact statement (EIS). Those alternatives, according to the Interior Department, reflect elements proposed by basin states, tribes, cooperating agencies and non-governmental organizations.

"We have laid the foundation to ensure that future guidelines and strategies will be sufficiently robust and adaptive to withstand the uncertainty of climate change impacts," Daniel-Davis said.

The release of the proposed alternatives on Wednesday serves to facilitate a "timely development of final operating guidelines that will need to be in place by August of 2026," explained Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Camille Touton, on the same press call.

Touton stressed that there are no preferred alternatives and that the options "represent a wide range of actions that provide improved predictability of water availability, enhanced opportunities for conservation and respond to a broad spectrum of hydrology."

The proposals include four viable alternatives as well as a fifth "no action" alternative, which Touton explained is simply a NEPA requirement but would involve reverting to guidelines in place prior to 2007.

Alternative 4, a "Basin Hybrid" plan, attempts to include portions of the plans submitted by the Upper Basin, Lower Basin and tribal nations. That option, according to the Interior Department, could help facilitate collaborative action among stakeholders.

In this proposal, Lake Powell releases would generally be based solely on the lake's elevation, but with some consideration of Lake Mead's levels. New delivery and storage mechanisms would serve both reservoirs, including conservation incentivization for both tribal and non-tribal parties.

This option would also make basin-wide cuts more equitable by spreading the burden, which has long been a priority of the Lower Basin states. Specifically, a portion of the reductions that the Lower Basin must make amid shortages would be based on a seven-reservoir capacity, rather than just that of Lake Powell and Lake Mead.

Alternative 3, called "Cooperative Conservation," was informed by proposals from conservation organizations and would predicate Lake Powell releases upon total Upper Basin system storage and recent hydrological conditions, according to the Interior Department. Under this option, a large share of Lower Basin cutbacks would be based on the seven-reservoir storage capacity, recent hydrology and voluntary contributions from the two basins.

In Alternative 2, called the "Federal Authorities Hybrid," Lake Powell releases would be based on a combination of Lake Powell and Lake Mead elevations, hydrological records and Lower Basin deliveries. Shortage responsibilities under this plan would be triggered entirely by the combined seven-reservoir storage capacity and distributed proportionally among parties.

A "Federal Authorities" option, Alternative 1, would provide "robust protection of critical infrastructure" within the federal government’s current statutory authorities. Lake Powell released would be based on Lake Powell's elevations, with Lower Basin shortages distributed based on the region's century-old water rights priority system.

"These alternatives represent a responsible range from which to build the best and most robust path forward for the basin," Touton said. "There certainly are extremely difficult choices and tradeoffs to be made, but we believe that there are ample opportunities to create a fair path to solutions that work for the entire region."

In addition to presenting the alternatives, the Biden administration officials also devoted ample time in the Wednesday press call commending the progress made under President Biden on Colorado River issues.

Daniel-Davis recalled how "in 2021, impacts of a historic drought in the West brought the Colorado River Basin and the communities it serves to a near crisis," stressing how Lake Mead and Lake Powell plunged to critically low elevations.

But she touted the administration's "all-of-government approach" and "really bold and decisive action" for helping solve the crisis.

Touton offered a similar perspective, adding, "We were able to bring the Colorado River into the back in the break of the worst drought in 1,800 years."

White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi, credited not only the administration, but also the region's bipartisan partners for bringing "the river back from the brink." He commended U.S. West governors by name, and from both sides of the aisle, for their work on natural resource conservation and for recognizing the strain on the Colorado River system.

Zaidi described the alternatives as "a playbook to come together once again, to meet the urgent need of stabilizing situation beyond 2026."

In response to the Interior Department's publication of alternatives, JB Hamby, Colorado River commissioner for California, said in a statement that "federal law requires the Colorado River Basin’s reservoirs be managed in accordance with the Colorado River Compact."

The most significant components of that 1922 water agreement, Hamby stated, are "mandatory deliveries of water from the Upper Basin to the Lower Basin and Mexico."

"In order to be valid, any alternative considered must meet this requirement unless the states agree to a compromise otherwise," he said.

Becky Mitchell, Colorado River commissioner for the state of Colorado, said in a statement her state did not have specific comments on the alternatives "at this time."

"Colorado continues to stand firmly behind the Upper Division States’ Alternative," she said, noting that this proposal is supply-driven and aims to boost Lake Powell and Lake Mead while protecting Colorado's "significant rights and interests" in the river.

"Colorado remains committed to working collaboratively with the other Basin States, the federal government and tribal Nations towards a consensus approach and also stands ready to protect our State’s significant interests in the Colorado River," Mitchell added.

In a separate press call following the Interior Department's announcement, Tom Buschatzke, director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources, told reporters that he needed "a lot more time to digest all this."

While he noted "some really positive elements to these alternatives," he also said that he was "disappointed that Reclamation chose to create alternatives, rather than to model the Lower Basin state alternative in its entirety."

"It didn't start at one extreme or the other, and it showed unequivocally that the Lower Basin was willing to take the first tranche of cuts," Buschatzke added.