By Kennedy Maize
As a November deadline looms, discussions on a new plan for managing the Colorado River as it flows through seven Western states remain stalemated.
Under the 1922 Colorado River Compact, the states in the basin must agree on a plan to share the water that provides for irrigation, electricity, and drinking water. The decisions on the management of the river impact some 40 million Americans.
Two factions dominate the discussions of how to implement the compact. Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming constitute the upper basin states, which primarily account for the water that flows into the basin, which also impacts 30 tribal nations and a portion of northern Mexico. Arizona, California, and Nevada, the lower basin states, are primarily consumers.
The current agreement dates to 2007 and officially runs out on Oct. 1, 2026. If states are unable to agree on a deal among themselves by Nov. 11, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Reclamation, which ultimately owns the river basin and its dams and diversions, could take over. None of the states want that outcome.
According to the statewide online news service Colorado Politics, “Negotiations are moving so slowly that some basin leaders are questioning whether that agreement will happen before the deadline or whether the Bureau of Reclamation, which still doesn’t have a permanent commissioner, will have to step in.”
On Sept. 16, the White House withdrew its June nominee to head BuRec, Ted Cooke, former general manager of the Central Arizona Project, which distributes Colorado River water to Maricopa, Pinal and Pima counties. Cooke told the Arizona Republic the White House informed him the move was a result of “paperwork problems.” He responded, “That was a cockamamie excuse.” Several accounts pointed to opposition from the four upper basin states for sinking the nomination, suggesting the administration did a typically sloppy job of vetting the nomination.
In July, it looked like the states were reaching an agreement, based on scrapping the previous practice of divvying out specific and firm acre-foot water allocations, instead moving to flexible allocations based on the available water supply. The basin has seen consistently diminishing flows during a 25-year regional drought.
Scott Cameron, Interior’s acting assistant secretary for water and science, said in August, “The urgency for the seven Colorado River Basin states to reach a consensus agreement has never been clearer. We cannot afford to delay.”
The July optimism quickly evaporated. On Sept. 15, BuRec released its “September 2025 Most Probable 24-Month Study” of the future hydrology of the basin. The report predicted a near-crisis water level at Lake Powell next year, behind the Glen Canyon Dam, of 7.48 million acre-feet. An acre-foot of water is enough water to cover an acre of land with a foot of water, or about 360,000 gallons.
Added to the discussions of allocating the water is the impact of low water on the two major hydropower projects that have seen production decline as water volumes shrink: Nevada’s Hoover Dam and the Glen Canyon Dam at Page, Ariz., the two largest dams on the river system.
Iconic Hoover Dam, which went into service in 1936 during the Great Depression, was equipped over the years to generate a maximum capacity of 2,078-MW of power from Lake Mead. Over the years, power sales paid off the 50-year construction loan that financed the dam.
The long-running drought has sapped the power output. In 2014, BuRec downgraded the capacity by 23% and moved to supplying peaking power only. Today, Hoover Dam’s effective capacity is 1,304 MW.
The Water Desk, published by the Center for Environmental Journalism at the University of Colorado Boulder, noted in July that BuRec has projected that if “Lake Mead falls another 20 feet, Hoover Dam’s capacity to generate electricity would be slashed by 70 percent from its current level.”
The publication added, “Lake Mead now sits at an elevation of 1,055 feet. The break point for hydropower is 1,035 feet. At that level, 12 older turbines at Hoover that are not designed for low reservoir levels would be shut down, Reclamation said. That would reduce the capacity to 382 MW.”
Five newer turbines installed a decade ago to generate from a lower water head would continue to generate power. BuRec estimates that replacing the 12 older turbines to upgrade the dam’s generating capacity would cost $158 million.
Glen Canyon Dam is also facing troubles as the drought has clobbered the water levels in its companion Lake Powell. Located on the border with Utah and controlling water from the upper basin states, Glen Canyon Dam was completed in 1966 after 10 years of construction. The lake wasn’t filled to capacity until 1980. The power house consists of eight Francis turbines with a combined capacity of 1,320 MW.
According to BuRec, Lake Powell could reach “minimum power pool” height of 3,500 feet by December 2026. That’s the lowest level at which water can flow through the hydropower penstocks. Below that are “river outlet works” (ROWs) at 3,370 feet that allow lower-head water to continue to flow to the turbines, while producing less power. Below that is “dead pool.”
A major source of contention between the lower and upper basin states has been over what to do if the drought continues . The upper basin states want to restrict flows from Glen Canyon, which would beggar Lake Mead. The lower basin consuming states are, unsurprisingly, opposed.
Salt Lake City-based Glen Canyon Institute, which advocates for “the restoration of Glen Canyon and a free flowing Colorado River through Grand Canyon,” has a different proposal that would please the more populous lower basin states. Eric Balkin, executive director, told Salt Lake magazine, “You’ve got this impending engineering disaster at the dam. We don’t have enough water to fill either Powell or Mead. So, what we’re proposing is what we call ‘Fill Mead First,’”
Instead of two half-empty reservoirs, which the institute argues “makes no sense,” Lake Powell would become a true lake behind the dam.
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