Will taking out lawns in municipal areas in Colorado add to the Colorado River supply?

Can temporary reductions in use provide meaningful water to the Colorado River?

Can the Department of the Interior require the Upper Basin states to curtail use of Colorado River water?

Can we buy our way out of drought?

The answers to all of the above, according to a panel at Thursday’s Colorado Water Congress, is a firm “no.”

The panel, which included folks involved in negotiations for the 2026 guidelines for Colorado River operations, took aim at several “big river myths.”

A 2023 survey by the Colorado Water Conservation Board busted the first myth, on water savings from turf reduction.

Savings from turf removal may be lower than previously assumed, the study found. Out of 100,000 acres of turf in Colorado, 26,000 acres are what’s known as ‘functional turf” which is found in parks and ballfields.

Removal of non-functional acreage could save up to 20,000 acre-feet of water per year, but it would take a decade. In addition, Colorado won’t get the same water savings as has been seen in Las Vegas, which is often cited as the model for water savings from turf removal. That’s primarily because annual turf watering demands in Las Vegas are four times higher than in Colorado, tied to a longer watering season and higher evaporation rates in Las Vegas. 

An acre-foot of water is about 326,000 gallons, or the amount it would take to cover a football field with one foot of water.

The second myth busted started with the system conservation pilot program utilized by the Upper Colorado River Commission about a decade ago and restarted in the last year, complete with federal funding from the Inflation Reduction Act. 

What it would take for Colorado to provide meaningful water to the Colorado River, estimated at about 200,000 acre-feet of water? Erin Wilson of Wilson Water Group said that reduction could come from several sources: the Yampa River Basin could contribute about 100,000 acre-feet of water; transmountain diversions would have to be cut by 20% for the same reduction; the Grand Valley would have to irrigate with 175,000 acre-feet less water, or the Montezuma Valley/Dolores region in southwestern Colorado could reduce their consumptive use by 100,000 acre-feet.

But sending 200,000 acre-feet, which is a substantial amount of the water Colorado gets annually from the Colorado River, would not provide a meaningful supply to Lake Powell, the panel said. That 200,000 acre-feet is less than what annually evaporates out of Lake Powell, on top of transit losses.

Myth No. 3, which held Interior can force the Upper Basin states to cut back on Colorado River water, was busted by attorney David Robbins of Hill & Robbins, who is also an alternate commissioner on the Upper Colorado River Commission.

Robbins said the secretary of the Interior does not have the legal authority to impose those cuts. The allocation of water within states is a state’s right, where the secretary gains authority in Colorado is on construction and contracts tied to water projects. The state engineer administer water rights, not the Interior department, he said. 

That’s totally different for the Lower Basin, however, Robbins said. The Interior Department has contracts with water users who get water from Lower Basin reservoirs; the Secretary has the authority under the Law of the River and rulings from the U.S. Supreme Court to be the river master in the Lower Basin. That’s law that goes back to the Civil War era.

John McClow of the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District, who is also an alternate commissioner to the Upper Colorado River Commission, said that any effort from Interior to have  impact on projects, it would have to be done on a project by project basis and not like a sweeping effort that could take place in the Lower Basin.

“We know that’s the case,” said Jennifer Gimbel of the Colorado Water Center. “Does Interior know that?”

“It’s critical that we not allow the Secretary of the Interior and her officials to assert that they will do things” that have no legal basis, Robbins added. “These are high stakes negotiations, but you have to separate out bluster from what will really happen.”

Robbins said people should take comfort that state officials, including the state’s Upper Colorado River Commission representative, Becky Mitchell, will protect Colorado’s rights. 

The last myth, buying our way out of drought, prompted a story from McClow.

He said 97% of water in the Upper Gunnison goes to irrigation, and once upon a time ranchers were offered an opportunity to participate in a demand management program (that temporary, voluntary and compensated program to reduce water use). As the proposal was made, the consensus was “you can’t give us enough money to make a temporary reduction in our use. We want to ranch. It’s not about the money.”

There will never be enough volunteers to make this work, McClow said. 

Robbins noted other basins have been experiencing drought longer than the Colorado River, specifically the Republican River on the Eastern Plains and the Rio Grande River Basin in the San Luis Valley.

“Whether you want to take money in exchange for no longer irrigating, it’s sometimes better to do that than to have [the state engineer] shut down irrigation and for zero money,” he said.

“We have an obligation to our neighbors” through compacts, Robbins explained, and the only question is whether to shut off irrigators so the water goes to the state that’s entitled to it, or what happened in the two basins. Producers raised money and obtained assistance from the state and federal government to obtain financial compensation so they could reduce operations with “their heads held high” and still able to participate in the community and still pay mortgages, Robbins said.

Both basins are now participating in programs to shut down groundwater wells in exchange for about $60 million in funding from the American Rescue Plan Act and as directed by the General Assembly last year.

No one wants to give up the opportunity to do what they’ve done for generations, Robbins said. Sometimes, however, “you’re forced to accept a plan to reduce water use” in order for the state to comply with its compact obligations. That’s not drought. It’s longstanding deals, he said.

It could be realistic to get 100,000 acre-feet of water per year, McClow said, but incentives produced from the system conservation pilot program never produced more than 25,000 acre-feet of water savings in its best year, which was 2014.

Buying our way out of drought is not tenable, McClow said. 

The most important thing for people to know about what’s going on with the Colorado River is that there are a number of myths, which McClow said have been popularized by the media, and to be cautious about making assumptions about what will happen in the future. 

“Remember that Becky is the commissioner for the whole state,” Robbins said. “All of us are in this together because at the end of the day it’s our state that will have to manage whatever comes out of this current period of significant shortage.”

He also asked people to set aside their short-term interests and be supportive with their commentary with neighbors who might not share the same interests, and to be supportive of the efforts of the state on its water uses. “We’re working very hard on your behalf,” Robbins said.

Wilson said to thank the Attorney General, the Colorado Water Conservation Board and Mitchell. 

“Don’t be afraid to fight,” Robbins said. “As long as we stand staunch together, we’ll be okay.”