Water officials celebrated Arizona’s outcome in the Bureau of Reclamation’s final Colorado River use guidelines, but say they will not so easily agree to more aggressive cuts in the future.
By Joe Duhownik, Courthouse News Service
Arizona officials are unsure how negotiations will progress after Nevada sued the federal government Monday over mandatory Colorado River cuts that will reclaim up to 71% of the Silver State’s total entitlement.
In Arizona, experts are torn between celebrating what they call best-case-scenario in terms of the options considered by the Bureau of Reclamation, and lamenting the reality of losing nearly a third of its share of the river. Though it threatened to sue over its water rights before the bureau released its decision on Friday, Arizona Department of Water Resources Director Tom Buschatzke called the decision a win.
Nevada’s lawsuit might complicate things.
“We’re still evaluating it,” Buschatzke said in an Arizona Reconsultation Committee meeting Monday afternoon. “We will provide more information at a later date for how we are going to deal with this complaint. But it certainly adds a significant additional level of uncertainty to all of the outcomes facing us.”
If the lawsuit prevents the agreement from moving forward, Buschatzke said he doesn’t know what mandatory cuts the federal government would impose while the litigation pends.
“The uncertainty is going in the wrong direction and it seems to continue to go in that direction,” he said.
The bureau’s plan comes after years of negotiations to finalize post-2026 operating guidelines. Those negotiations missed several deadlines and ultimately deadlocked because the upper basin states — Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico — refused to agree to mandatory cuts, citing senior priority according to the Law of the River.
Under the bureau’s plan, the lower basin states — Arizona, Nevada and California — will collectively cut back by a total of 3.5 million acre feet over the next two years. Arizona will give up more water than any other state: 760,000 acre-feet per year for two years. Adding an additional 300,000 acre-feet of voluntary conservation, the state will lose more than 1.8 million acre-feet by the end of water year 2028.
The plan provides for a reconsultation at the end of every two years, which could more than double the cuts Arizona faces in the future.
In the driest of years, the Central Arizona Project, a canal that spans 330 miles across the desert and provides nearly 50% of Phoenix’s water supply, could be cut off from the river completely. In 2022, the canal cut off deliveries to most of its non-tribal agricultural fields.
“We expect to be in a constant cycle of negotiation moving forward,” Central Arizona Project General Manager Brenda Burman said Monday.
Though she did not take a stance on Nevada’s lawsuit, she said at the beginning of the meeting that the post-2026 operating guidelines decision “includes fundamental legal flaws including a failure to comply with the Colorado River Compact and other key elements of the Law of the River,” including the decision not to impose cuts on the upper basin.
Buschatzke reiterated that the state has not agreed to any further cuts beyond the first two years of the operating guidelines.
Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis said he and his community support Nevada’s lawsuit.
“It’s because the U.S. did not address their concerns that we now have this situation,” he said in the meeting.
Future cuts to the lower basin will be determined in part by elevation in Lake Powell, the second largest reservoir of Colorado River water behind Lake Mead. The bureau will conduct 24-month studies to determine the highest release possible to keep Lake Powell at 3,510 feet, which is just 140 feet above deadpool.
If that release is at or below 6 million acre-feet, it will trigger reconsultations to further reduce lower basin use by as early as June 2027. A 7 million acre-foot release would avoid further consultations.
Lakes Mead and Powell currently sit at 27% and 22% capacity, respectively, while upper basin reservoirs together remain above 60% capacity.
To move forward, Arizona will have to give legislative authorization for the lower basin agreement, and facilitate smaller agreements between water users to coordinate statewide cuts.
Buschatzke warned water users to be ready for more updates soon.
“Keep your hands on your cell phone, because another short notice meeting might happen,” he said. “Things are moving quickly.”
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes has not said whether she will join Nevada’s lawsuit.
