River Report Winter 2005-2006

• Year: 2006
• Title: River Report
• Author: Colorado River Project
• Description: A Project of the Water Education Foundation; Winter 2005-2006
• Publications - Doc Type: Other

FEATURE
Continued from front page
between the U.S. and Mexico grow
closer. The relationship also extends
to water, but as competition for water
increases, will it be an issue that brings
the two countries closer together or
one that divides them?
"We're moving from a period of
relative abundance of water on the river
toward a future where we're going to
have to work quite a bit harder to meet
the water needs of people as well as the
environment and agriculture in both the
United States and Mexico," says Peter
Culp, project manager and attorney
for programs at the Sonoran Institute.
Border water controversies cover
a wide range of environmental and
economic issues, including habitat
preservation and enhancement, water
quality and water to support agricultural
and economic development. In the
past, the U.S. and Mexico might try
to address those issues separately or
The Colorado River in the limitrophe section.
through limited depend •
binational programs, pulse
but as border cities •
and economies have
grown more interde-
pendent, so has the
need to find solutions that satisfy
constituencies on both sides of the
border. A solution to a problem on
one side of the border likely will have
repercussions, sometimes negative,
on the other side.
There have been numerous official
and nongovernmental efforts over many
decades to address border water issues,
but progress has been slow. The decades
of negotiations and hundreds of millions
of dollars spent on wastewater treatment
facilities to clean up two of the borders
most notoriously polluted rivers, the
Tijuana River near San Diego and the
New River flowing through Mexicali
and Calexico, are examples of the slow
pace of binational efforts to address
common problems. Similarly, it took
15 years for Mexico to repay a 1.5
4.
4 • COLORADO RIVER PROJECT • RIVER REPORT • WINTER 2005-2006
flows • • million acre -feet
water debt September
30 on the other
major binational
border river system,
the Rio Grande.
Three current issues relating to the
Colorado River illustrate both the range
of border issues and the different kinds
of forums in which they are addressed.
One example is a recently released white
paper of recommendations for operation
of the Yuma Desalting Plant (YDP)
offered by a collaboration of agencies
and stakeholders as a step toward
addressing environmental problems in
Mexico while also providing assurances
to U.S. water users about their supplies.
The collaboration is an example of how
public and private stakeholders can find
common ground where little was
thought to exist.
A second border issue burst on the
scene in July, when a lawsuit was filed
seeking to stop the reconstruction of a
23 -mile section of the All- American
Canal. The case raises complex legal
questions about rights to water that
currently seeps out of the unlined canal
and across the border, where it helps
recharge the Mexicali aquifer, and the
application of U.S. environmental laws.
A third emerging issue is the develop-
ment of shortage guidelines for the
Colorado River system in the U.S. If the
guidelines are adopted, and if a shortage
were declared, how would that affect
Mexico? Under a 1944 water treaty
between the U.S. and Mexico, Mexico's
share of the river could be decreased
"in the event of extraordinary drought or
serious accident to the irrigation system
in the United States," but that language
has never been invoked, so it is unclear
how it might interplay with shortage
guidelines.
This issue of River Report focuses on
water and environmental issues facing
the U.S. and Mexico in the Colorado
River Basin drainage they share. How
the two countries will cope with the
water challenges they face was the
subject of a panel discussion at the