Administration of Colorado River allocations: the law of the river & the Colorado River water delivery agreement of 2003
Date
2004-10
Authors
Harkins, Jayne, author
Snow, Robert F., author
U.S. Committee on Irrigation and Drainage, publisher
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Abstract
Under federal law developed over the past century, each of the seven Colorado River Basin States of Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming has an allocation to water from the Colorado River. In addition, pursuant to a 1944 Treaty with the Republic of Mexico, the United States agreed to annual deliveries of water to Mexico. This body of law is commonly referred to as "the Law of the River." Under this legal system, the Secretary of the Interior, through the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, is responsible for the operation of massive storage facilities in the Colorado River Basin. Primary storage in the Colorado River's Lower Basin is provided by Hoover Dam. Within the Lower Basin, California has a "basic" annual allocation of 4,400,000 acre-feet (at), yet has been using significant amounts in excess of this amount since the early 1950s, with recent use exceeding 5,300,000 af. While this use has been legal during this period, continued overuse of the Colorado River by California reduced storage amounts in system reservoirs and threatened the allocations of the other six basin states. This paper will present a case study and an overview of the history, issues, and operation of the Colorado River in the Southwest United States. This paper will have a particular emphasis on the increase in use of water in the Lower Basin and recent developments in the Lower Basin States of California, Arizona and Nevada. This paper will identify legal and operational issues that have been the subject of active negotiations by the Department of the Interior for nearly a decade. This effort, undertaken in close consultation with the seven Colorado River Basin States, lead to a successful agreement in October 2003 on a long-term transfer of Colorado River water from high priority agricultural users in the Imperial Valley to municipal users on the coastal plain in San Diego. The recently executed Colorado River Water Delivery Agreement provides a turning point in Colorado River management and operations: it provides the necessary agreement among Colorado River water users in California for an agreed-upon reduction in California's Colorado River use over the upcoming decades. With the successful implementation of this Agreement each state's allocation from the Colorado should be more secure, and these arrangements will demonstrate that there is sufficient flexibility within the Law of the River to meet the changing needs and increased demands for urban use of water in the Colorado River Basin.
Description
Presented during the USCID water management conference held on October 13-16, 2004 in Salt Lake City, Utah. The theme of the conference was "Water rights and related water supply issues."