The Colorado River deal announced Monday is more of a temporary reprieve than a solution to plummeting water supplies. The deep water cuts for California, Arizona and Nevada will tide over thirsty residents and farmers only until the end of 2026.
The real reckoning comes when operating agreements expire for Lake Mead, which feeds the Colorado’s water to Southern California and the two other lower-basin states, and Lake Powell, which regulates the flow into Lake Mead while serving Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico.
The agreement among the seven states gives California, especially, some additional time (although very little) to prepare for a drier future, including a much steeper permanent reduction in its allotment of Colorado River water. Many of the projects that will be needed to replace diminished river supplies are well into the planning, approval and financing stages, including recycling projects that allow all that precious water to be used multiple times. We’ll need even more locally generated supplies and water-saving measures to meet the needs of a state with an increasingly arid climate.
