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<br />OnjZS8 <br /> <br />been abandoned. The State Engineer is given broad powers to enforce priorities to water <br />by curtailing diversions by junior rights when supplies are short. Section 37-92-502(2)(a), <br />c.R.S. However, under the "futile call" doctrine he may not curtail a junior diversion, unless <br />he is reasonably certain the water will actually benefit the calling senior right. lQ, Under <br />this doctrine the SEO refuses to curtail a junior right for the benefit of a wasteful water <br />diversion. The SEO is also directed to investigate and remove abandoned water rights from <br />the priority system. Section 37-92-402, C.R.S. <br /> <br />These powers and duties can draw the SEO into any irrigation efficiency program, even <br />if there is no attempt to change the use of the water. Under current law, if efficiency <br />improvements are made by a water right holder, the SEO may reduce the size of any call <br />made by that right to the extent water is not needed for beneficial use. If actual diversion <br />rates remain reduced for a sufficiently long time the SEO could, or may be forced to, find <br />that a portion of the decreed water right of the improved system has been abandoned. <br />However, such a determination, while it might reduce a portion of the diversion right, could <br />not impair the irrigator's ability to continue to beneficially use the quantity of water actually <br />used and needed for the perfected historical purposes of the original appropriation. <br />