Lake Powell Glen Canyon Dam water launch delayed due to drought

Water levels are at a historic low at Lake Powell on April 5, 2022 in Web page, Arizona.

Rj Sangosti| Medianews Group | The Denver Post via Getty Pictures

The federal government on Tuesday announced it is going to delay the release of water from one of the Colorado River's major reservoirs, an unprecedented motion that can quickly deal with declining reservoir ranges fueled by the historic Western drought.

The choice will maintain extra water in Lake Powell, the reservoir located on the Glen Canyon Dam in northern Arizona, instead of releasing it downstream to Lake Mead, the river's different primary reservoir.

The actions come as water ranges at each reservoirs reached their lowest levels on document. Lake Powell's water degree is at the moment at an elevation of three,523 ft. If the extent drops beneath 3,490 feet, the so-called minimum power pool, the Glen Canyon Dam, which provides electricity for about 5.8 million clients within the inland West, will no longer have the ability to generate electricity.

The delay is anticipated to protect operations on the dam for next 12 months, officials said during a press briefing on Tuesday, and will maintain practically 500,000 acre-feet of water in Lake Powell. Under a separate plan, officers may even release about 500,000 acre-feet of water into Lake Powell from Flaming Gorge, a reservoir situated upstream at the Utah-Wyoming border.

Officials stated the actions will help save water, defend the dam's capability to supply hydropower and supply officials with extra time to determine the best way to operate the dam at lower water levels.

"We have by no means taken this step before within the Colorado Basin," assistant Interior Department secretary Tanya Trujillo informed reporters on Tuesday. "But the situations we see as we speak, and what we see on the horizon, demand that we take immediate motion."

Federal officers last year ordered the first-ever water cuts for the Colorado River Basin, which provides water to more than 40 million folks and a few 2.5 million acres of croplands in the West. The cuts have largely affected farmers in Arizona, who use almost three-quarters of the obtainable water supply to irrigate their crops.

In April, federal water managers warned the seven states that draw from the Colorado River that the government was contemplating taking emergency action to handle declining water ranges at Lake Powell.

Later that month, representatives from the states despatched a letter to the Interior agreeing with the proposal and requesting that momentary reductions in releases from Lake Powell be implemented without triggering further water cuts in any of the states.

The megadrought within the western U.S. has fueled the driest two decades in the area in not less than 1,200 years, with conditions more likely to continue via 2022 and persist for years. Researchers have estimated that 42% of the drought's severity is attributable to human-caused local weather change.

"Our climate is changing, our actions are chargeable for that, and we have to take accountable action to respond," Trujillo mentioned. "All of us must work together to protect the sources we now have and the declining water supplies within the Colorado River that our communities rely on."