Lake Powell Glen Canyon Dam water release delayed resulting from drought

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

Rj Sangosti| Medianews Group | The Denver Put up via Getty Photographs

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

The decision will preserve more water in Lake Powell, the reservoir positioned at the Glen Canyon Dam in northern Arizona, instead of releasing it downstream to Lake Mead, the river's other primary reservoir.

The actions come as water levels at both reservoirs reached their lowest ranges on report. Lake Powell's water stage is at the moment 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 electrical energy for about 5.8 million customers in the inland West, will not be able to generate electricity.

The delay is predicted to guard operations on the dam for next 12 months, officers stated during a press briefing on Tuesday, and will maintain nearly 500,000 acre-feet of water in Lake Powell. Beneath a separate plan, officers will also launch about 500,000 acre-feet of water into Lake Powell from Flaming Gorge, a reservoir positioned upstream on the Utah-Wyoming border.

Officers mentioned the actions will assist save water, defend the dam's ability to provide hydropower and provide officers with more time to figure out tips on how to function the dam at decrease water levels.

"We've never taken this step before in the Colorado Basin," assistant Interior Department secretary Tanya Trujillo advised reporters on Tuesday. "However the conditions we see at the moment, and what we see on the horizon, demand that we take prompt motion."

Federal officials last 12 months ordered the first-ever water cuts for the Colorado River Basin, which provides water to more than 40 million individuals and some 2.5 million acres of croplands in the West. The cuts have largely affected farmers in Arizona, who use almost three-quarters of the available water provide to irrigate their crops.

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

Later that month, representatives from the states sent a letter to the Inside agreeing with the proposal and requesting that temporary reductions in releases from Lake Powell be applied 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 region in a minimum of 1,200 years, with circumstances prone to proceed by 2022 and persist for years. Researchers have estimated that 42% of the drought's severity is attributable to human-caused climate change.

"Our climate is altering, our actions are responsible for that, and now we have to take responsible motion to respond," Trujillo said. "We all need to work together to guard the resources we've got and the declining water supplies within the Colorado River that our communities rely on."