Lake Powell Glen Canyon Dam water launch delayed on account of drought

Water ranges are at a historic low at Lake Powell on April 5, 2022 in Page, Arizona.

Rj Sangosti| Medianews Group | The Denver Publish through Getty Photographs

The federal government on Tuesday introduced it should delay the discharge of water from one of the Colorado River's main reservoirs, an unprecedented motion that will temporarily address declining reservoir ranges fueled by the historic Western drought.

The choice will keep extra water in Lake Powell, the reservoir situated at 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 levels at both reservoirs reached their lowest ranges on record. Lake Powell's water stage is presently at an elevation of three,523 feet. If the level drops beneath 3,490 feet, the so-called minimum power pool, the Glen Canyon Dam, which supplies electricity for about 5.8 million clients within the inland West, will not be able to generate electricity.

The delay is expected to protect operations on the dam for subsequent 12 months, officers stated throughout a press briefing on Tuesday, and will hold practically 500,000 acre-feet of water in Lake Powell. Beneath a separate plan, officers can even launch about 500,000 acre-feet of water into Lake Powell from Flaming Gorge, a reservoir positioned upstream on the Utah-Wyoming border.

Officers said the actions will assist save water, shield the dam's ability to supply hydropower and supply officers with extra time to determine easy methods to operate the dam at decrease water ranges.

"We've got never taken this step earlier than within the Colorado Basin," assistant Inside Division secretary Tanya Trujillo told reporters on Tuesday. "But the conditions we see at the moment, and what we see on the horizon, demand that we take immediate motion."

Federal officers last 12 months ordered the first-ever water cuts for the Colorado River Basin, which provides water to more than 40 million folks and some 2.5 million acres of croplands within the West. The cuts have principally affected farmers in Arizona, who use nearly three-quarters of the accessible 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 considering taking emergency action to deal with declining water ranges at Lake Powell.

Later that month, representatives from the states sent a letter to the Interior agreeing with the proposal and requesting that short-term reductions in releases from Lake Powell be carried out with out triggering further water cuts in any of the states.

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

"Our local weather is altering, our actions are chargeable for that, and we have to take responsible motion to respond," Trujillo said. "We all must work together to guard the resources we now have and the declining water provides in the Colorado River that our communities depend on."