Laserfiche WebLink
<br />~~ <br /> <br />Most recently, the focus of the Seven Basin States and the Department of the Interior has <br />been on the operation of Lake Mead during surplus and shortage conditions. <br /> <br />Again, the common theme is certainty. Prior to the 1990s and the completion of the CAP, <br />the water supply available in the Colorado River system generally exceeded the demands. Until <br />recently, the Secretary never had to make any difficult decisions related to allocating either a surplus <br />or shortage. <br /> <br />Today, conditions are fundamentally different. Recently, demands for Colorado River water <br />have exceeded its supply. The Secretary and all the Basin States face difficult decisions. At least for <br />the moment, the States have chosen a strategy of dialogue and negotiations rather than confrontation. <br />The risks of confrontation are simply too great. <br /> <br />Within Colorado, certainty underlies our basic system of water law and it is the primary <br />motive behind most of our current disputes. The law was originally developed to provide certainty <br />for the miners and irrigators that first diverted water out of a stream and applied it to beneficial use. <br />The concept behind an augmentation plan is that newer or junior water users get judicial certainty <br />that its plan can truly offset the impacts to downstream senior users. <br /> <br />For water suppliers, three primary factors increase certainty. First, is the seniority of the <br />water rights, obviously the more senior, the more reliable the rights. In the Colorado River Basin, <br />water rights perfected by use prior to the signing of the Colorado River Compact cannot be impaired <br />or called out to meet compact delivery requirements. These rights have additional certainty against <br />a future basin wide call under the 1922 Compact. 8 <br /> <br />The second factor in certainty is surface or underground storage. In general, systems with <br />greater storage have more certainty. The amount of certainty provided by storage can, however, vary <br />depending on the operational criteria used by the owner. If an owner operates a reservoir to provide <br />a firm yield through a relatively infrequent drought, the certainty or reliability is enhanced. <br /> <br />The final factor is redundancy. Systems with more than one source of supply have more <br />reliability and thus certainty, than single source projects. Denver Water, for example, obtains its <br />water supply from three different basins, the Fraser River, the Blue River (both the Blue and Fraser <br />are tributaries to the Colorado), and the South Platte River. Unfortunately, currently only the more <br />populous municipalities in Colorado can afford the luxury of redundant systems. <br /> <br />The Colorado IntraState Compact (a/kIa/ HB-1177) Process <br /> <br />The HB-1177 process has now been underway since early 2006. The legislation includes <br />direction to each basin roundtable to make a needs assessment and determine how much <br /> <br />IArtide VIII of the 1922 Compact states "Present perfected rights to the beneficial use of water of the Colorado River system are <br />unimpaired by this compact." <br /> <br />Page -4- <br />