Laserfiche WebLink
Colorado River Compact Operations, Administration, and Compliance <br />SEO Forum <br />October 31, 2007 <br />James Eklund, Assistant Attorney General1 <br /> <br />I. Colorado River Compact. Negotiated in 1922 by representatives of the seven Colorado <br />River Basin states and the federal government; effective in 1929 after congressional <br />approval in the Boulder Canyon Project Act (43 U.S.C. § 617-l). <br /> <br />Apportionment provisions: <br /> <br />Article III(a): "There is hereby apportioned from the Colorado River System in perpetuity to <br />the Upper Basin and to the Lower Basin respectively the exclusive beneficial consumptive use of <br />7,500,000 acre feet of water per annum, which shall include all water necessary for the supply of <br />any rights which may now exist." <br /> <br />Article III(b): "In addition to the apportionment in paragraph (a) the Lower Basin is hereby <br />given the right to increase its beneficial consumptive use of such waters by one million acre per <br />annum." <br /> <br />Article III(c): "If, as a matter of international comity, the United States of America shall <br />hereafter recognize in the United States of Mexico any right to the use of any waters of the <br />Colorado River System, such waters shall be supplied first from the waters which are surplus <br />over and above the aggregate of the quantities specified in paragraphs (a) and (b); and if such <br />surplus shall prove insufficient for this purpose, then, the burden of such deficiency shall be <br />equally borne by the Upper Basin and the Lower Basin, and whenever necessary the States of the <br />Upper Division shall deliver at Lee Ferry water to supply one-half of the deficiency so <br />recognized in addition to that provided in paragraph (d)." (emphasis added) <br /> <br />Article III(d): "The states of the Upper Division will not cause the flow of the river at Lee <br />Ferry to be depleted below an aggregate of 75,000,000 acre feet for any period of ten consecutive <br />years reckoned in continuing progressive series beginning with the first day of October next <br />succeeding the ratification of this compact." <br /> <br />Article III(e): "The States of the Upper Division shall not withhold water, and the States of the <br />Lower Division shall not require the delivery of water, which cannot reasonably be applied to <br />domestic and agricultural uses. <br /> <br /> 1 The views expressed in this presentation are solely those of the author, not the official position of the Colorado <br />Department of Law or the State of Colorado.