9476

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 9476
• Author: Colorado Foundation for Water Education.
• Title: Citizen's Guide to Colorado Water Law.
• USFW Year: 2003.
• USFW - Doc Type: \
• Copyright Material: NO

Glossary
Abandonment Loss of whole or part of a
water right by intent to permanently
discontinue use. Period of non-'use for
ten years raises rebuttable presump-
tion of abandonment. A conditional
water right is conclusively presumed
to be abandoned, if an application for
finding of reasonable diligence is not
made within six years of the entry of
the conditional decree or the most
recent diligence decree. The State
Engineer prepares a periodic aban-
donment list. Water rights are
declared abandoned through a water
court proceeding.
Acre-Foot Volumetric measurement of
water used for quantifying reservoir
storage capacity and historic consump-
tive use. This is the amount of water
that will cover an acre of land at a
depth of one foot, or 325,851 gallons
of water.
Adjudication The process for obtaining a
water court decree for a conditional
water right, a finding of reasonable dili-
gence, an absolute water right, an
exchange, an augmentation plan, a
change of water right, or a right to with-
draw nontributary water or Denver
Basin groundwater that is outside of a
designated groundwater basin.
Appropriation Placement of a specified
portion of the waters of the state to a
beneficial use pursuant to the proce-
dures prescribed by law. Speculation is
prohibited. The appropriator must
have its own use for the water or have
a contract to serve the customers that
the water will benefit. Only previously
unappropriated surface or tributary
groundwater water can be appropriat-
ed. The appropriator must have a plan
to divert, store, or otherwise capture,
possess, and control the water for ben-
eficial use.
Aquifer A subsurface water-bearing geo-
logical structure capable of storing
and yielding water to streams, springs,
or `yells.
Augmentation Replacing the quantity of
water depleted from the stream system
caused by an out-of-priority diversion.
When adjudicated and operated to
replace depletions to the stream sys-
tem, the out-of-priority diversion may
continue even through a call has been
placed on the stream by senior
decreed rights.
Beneficial Use Beneficial use is the basis,
measure, and limit of a water right.
Colorado law broadly defines beneficial
use of water as a lawful appropriation
that uses reasonably efficient practices
to put that water to use without waste.
Call Demand for administration of water
rights. In times of water shortage, the
owner of a decreed water right will
make a "call" for water. The call
results in shut down orders against
undecreed water uses and decreed
junior water rights as necessary to fill
the beneficial use need of the decreed
senior calling right.
Colorado Revised Statutes or C.R.S. The
annual compilation of Colorado
statutes and court rules published by
the Colorado General Assembly. Also
called "the red books."
Consumptive Use The amount of water
used up by application of that water to
beneficial use. Examples include:
water for drinking, water taken up by
growing crops.
Cubic Feet Per Second (cfs) Measurement
of flow rate of water in running stream
or taken as direct diversion from the
stream. Water flowing at 1 cfs will
deliver 448.8 gallons per minute or
648,000 gallons per day
Denver Basin Groundwater Groundwater
of the Dawson, Denver, Arapahoe, and
Laramie-Fox Hills aquifers underlying
the Denver Metropolitan Area outside
of any designated groundwater basin.
This water is allocated to the overlying
landowner by statute, administered by
rules of the State Engineer, allowing
pumping at a rate of one percent per
year assuming ahundred-year life of
the aquifer and requiring some of the
pumped water to be put back into the
stream system.
Designated Groundwater Groundwater
areas not adjacent to a continuously
flowing natural stream, where ground-
water has been the principal water
supply for at least fifteen years preced-
ing the designation of the groundwater
basin. Eight designated groundwater
basins exist on Colorado's eastern high
plains. Use of designated groundwater
requires a permit from the Colorado
Groundwater Commission.
Developed or Imported Water Water
brought into a stream system from
another, unconnected source, for
example, transmountain diversion
water or nontributary well water. This
type of water can be reused and suc-
cessively used to extinction, and is
often used in augmentation or
exchange plans. In contrast, native
basin water is subject to one use, and
the return flow belongs to the stream
system to fill other appropriations.
unless a decree was obtained for the
right to reuse and successively use
return flows.
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