U.S. Water News Online
NORTHGLENN, Colo. -- With another year of drought looming, officials charged with managing Colorado's tight water supply met to find ways to share the increasingly rare commodity.
Meeting at the Colorado Water Congress' annual gathering in this Denver suburb are one-time foes who have been forced to work together to find solutions to the state's water woes.
Compounding the below-average snowpack and already low rivers and reservoirs is the fact Colorado voters this fall rejected a statewide referendum authorizing $2 billion in bonds for water projects.
The fight over that referendum was expensive and nasty, with many western Colorado groups fearing the unspecified projects would amount to nothing more than a water grab by the ever-thirsty Front Range, the area east of the Continental Divide. Much of the Front Range water is piped from the western part of the state.
``The people of Colorado spoke in Referendum A that you have to give us a proposal that works for everybody, not just one side,'' said T. Wright Dickinson, chairman of Club 20, a powerful lobbying group of Western Slope business and government leaders.
Now water experts are hoping that by working together they will be able to guide the state through the drought and bring lasting solutions to pressures created by scarce water and the demands from a growing population.
How that goal will be accomplished, however, is still open for debate.
``We have to build storage,'' said state agriculture Commissioner Don Ament. ``Granted, Referendum A obviously wasn't the answer, but we have to find a way to store the water Colorado has rights to under all these compacts.''
Increased storage would provide additional water to the Front Range, ensure farmers and ranchers across the state have the water they need to survive and replenish aquifers, Ament said.
He said a number of storage projects could start within a year, including several along the South Platte River Basin, which is currently at just 62 percent of average snowpack.
Melting snow contributes about 80 percent of the water in the state's rivers, streams, lakes and reservoirs. Eight major Colorado river systems also provide water to 10 western states.
Ament said capturing excess water in the good times would help deal with dry times.
``I really feel a need to get going on this,'' Ament said. ``It's just a waste of some precious time.''
But water storage is just one part of an equation that also includes conservation and developing new sources of water for the areas that are most in need, said Peter Binney, director of utilities in the fast-growing suburb of Aurora.
Developing new sources includes capturing water from areas currently untapped, or reallocating water already being used. Binney said conservation alone won't provide enough new water.
Aurora will continue its water restrictions this year because of the drought and low reservoir levels.
Agriculture uses 85 percent of the state's water, amounting to about 15 million acre feet each year. The Front Range, including the Denver area, will need only about 500,000 acre feet of that, Binney said.
Reallocating water from agriculture to metropolitan areas is not the answer because farmers and ranchers are already struggling, Ament said.
The Colorado Water Conservation Board is studying how much water municipalities will likely need in the future. The study should be completed by the end of the year.
The board has already stated that the Front Range will need 60 percent more water in 2030 than it uses now, if growth projections are accurate.
Dickinson said the Statewide Water Supply Initiative is a key foundation in evaluating water projects as they come up and making sure a solution is reached that benefits everyone involved.
He said it also makes sure everyone comes to the table.
``If you just talk to yourself, you're only going to get what you think is the best answer,'' Dickinson said.
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