Colorado Rural Water Association

• Year: 2004
• Title: Colorado Rural Water Association
• Author: National Rural Water Affiliate
• Description: 4th Edition 2004
• Publications - Doc Type: Other

YOU WANT MY WATER
FOR WHAT? WHEN7
By Jerry Biberstine
This is a brief
discussion of inter-
1f state compacts and
agreements that
.F regulate how much
water can be used
by a state, and how
much water must be
passed on to states
downstream. There
are many areas of
discussion dealing with these issues, but
this presentation will deal with only a few. It
will deal with Colorado,and the surrounding
states, and the problems that have occurred
in recentyears,and howthe states have had
to deal with the very common Western issue
of having too little water to fill the needs of
everyone.
The streams arising within the
borders of Colorado are vital to the eco-
nomics of eighteen other states and the
Republic of Mexico. Not only is geography
an issue on the matter of water rights, but
economics is even more important. When
you consider the use of surface water for
irrigation purposes, one - twentieth of the
state of Colorado is under irrigation, the
most of any state. This water usage has
resulted in Colorado being involved in
one international treaty, nine interstate
compacts, two U.S. Supreme Court decrees,
and one interstate agreement, all designed
to protect water use by all parties involved.
The agreements date back as far as 1901,
and are still evolving. Let's take a lookatjust
a couple of these interstate agreements and
see what new issues have arisen since they
were written.
The Colorado River Compact was
finalized in 1922. It involved the states of
Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New
Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. Its purpose
was to designate how much each state
was allowed to use out of the river. It
divided the River into two basins, the
Upper Colorado and the Lower Colorado.
The Upper Colorado River Compact was
not completed until 1948. The Mexican
Treaty on Rio Grande, Tijuana, and Colo-
rado Rivers was not completed until 1945.
These treaties have always been involved
in controversy. In order for any state to
use its full allocation, reservoirs would
need to be built to store the water for use
over the entire year, and prevent it from
flowing downstream during spring runoff.
Flow was estimated at 15 million acre -feet
per year (MAF), and the amount of water
that was allocated was based on that flow.
With 7.5 MAF being allowed to each basin,
and any amount over 15 MAF granted to
Mexico, there was barely enough flow to
go around. Part of the problem has been
that the original flow estimates were tak-
en during a wet year. Actual flow in the
river has been argued for years as being
between 13 and 15 MAF. While minimum
stream flow has been maintained across
the Mexican border, the high flows of
years ago have ceased. The Mexican al-
location, which was set many years ago,
is not adequate to meet the needs of a
rapidly growing arid nation and has re-
sulted in the mighty Colorado River dying
a dry and dusty death in the desert before
it ever reaches the ocean. Law suits be-
tween the two countries have been dis-
cussed for years to revisit the amount of
water flowing between countries. Argu-
ments still continue on just who (Upper or
Lower Colorado Basin) is required to give
up water to meet this flow requirement.
Within the states, most of the Upper Basin
states do not have adequate reservoirs to
hold their full allocation, resulting in most
of the water flowing to the Lower Basin
states. For many years, California has
taken advantage of this issue by pumping
any excess flows (water granted to other
states that they were unable to withhold)
out of the river to meet the demands of
irrigated agriculture and domestic water
within California. Overthe past fewyears,
the other states have begun fighting back
to reclaim their rights to that water, and
to prevent California from establishing
long term rights to the water. Arizona
has started pumping its full allocation,
even though there is no established
need. The people of the state feel that
it is not suitable for domestic purposes
without expensive treatment, so the
water is being pumped underground to
feed aquifers, and thereby protect their
full allocation of Colorado River water. A
recent update to the Compact, pushed
by the Department of Interior, has lim-
ited California to pumping only 4.4 MAF
from the river, down from the 5.2 it cur-
rently pumps. Colorado, which currently
loses over 1.3 MAF is seeking a $5 billion
bond issue to build new reservoirs to hold
the full allocation, aimed at uses such as
irrigation and domestic water needs.
Recent drought has brought this issue
to the forefront, and greatly impacted
public opinion on keeping the state's
water within the state. Other states in
the compact are taking similar action.
The latest news on this issue is
that, after seven years of negotiations,
four giant southern California water agen-
cies have finally agreed to a plan that will
allow California to continue to take the
surplus water from the Colorado River,
when it is available, for the next 12 years,
thereby allowing these systems to wean
themselves from this water use. It also
provides protection for the Salton Sea,
which presently relies on Imperial Valley
irrigation runoff to prevent salt buildup
in the soil. A plan of water transfers and
sales will bring approximately $300 mil-
lion into state hands to be used for a
Salton Sea Rescue Program. The City of
San Diego, which presently wholesales
water to districts throughout the county
but does not own water itself,will receive
up to 200,000 acre -feet per year from the
farming areas in the Imperial Valley. This
will prove to be the largest farm -to -city
water trade ever made, but will assure the
city of adequate water in times of drought.
The State legislature quickly approved the
necessary bills,and the systems are in the
process of getting their own approvals to
finalize the revolutionary agreement.
The Arkansas River Compact of
1948, is an agreement between Colorado
and Kansas. Flow in the Arkansas River
is divided between the two states at ap-
proximately 60% for Colorado and 40%
for Kansas. Again, this compact has been
controversial since its inception. Most
recently, Kansas sued Colorado for taking
more than its share of the river, by allowing
irrigation wells that prevented recharge of
the river,thereby cutting flows that crossed
the state border. Kansas won the law suit in
1996, resulting in an award of many million
dollars, but more importantly,the reduction
of irrigation wells in the Arkansas River Val-
ley part of Colorado.
(continued on page 12)
11