Colorado River

Water from Colorado’s Blue Mesa reservoir was sent to Lake Powell in the summer of 2021. It was an emergency move to help the second-largest reservoir in the U.S. keep producing hydropower.

Water agencies from Arizona, Nevada, California and the federal government agreed to a multimillion dollar plan to keep more water in Lake Mead. The deal was signed at the Colorado River Water Users Association conference in Las Vegas.

State water managers and the federal government say they will include tribes in upcoming Colorado River policymaking negotiations for the first time.

Almost 100 years ago, seven states signed the Colorado River Compact, which lays out how much river water each state gets. If the river keeps drying up, that agreement could soon be broken.

In an effort to prop up water levels at the declining Lake Powell, federal water managers are negatively impacting recreation on Colorado’s biggest man-made lake. That’s the message from Colorado water managers and marina operators at Blue Mesa Reservoir in Gunnison County.

Wildlife crews and water quality experts struggle to even assess the damage, as emergency management officials warn of threats to the western lifeline for years to come.

Federal officials declared a first-ever water shortage for the lower Colorado River, triggering mandatory cutbacks for some users.

The Colorado River through the national park holds lessons for managing an essential and diminishing resource in a rapidly warming climate.

Seven years ago, a pulse of water on the Colorado River at the U.S.-Mexico border temporarily reconnected it to the Pacific Ocean. Scientists used the so-called “pulse flow” to study what plant and animal life returned to the desiccated delta along with water.

The nation’s second-largest reservoir, Lake Powell, is now at its lowest point since it filled in the 1960s.