Lake Powell

Lake Powell’s dire water level forecast is prompting an unprecedented move: transporting a massive marina to deeper waters. It’s another example of how the West’s historically dry, warm year is straining the Colorado River.

The three Western states say their proposal would save 3.2 million acre-feet of water through 2028. That’s enough water to serve more than 25 million people a year.

Trial runs are happening in some of the nation's most remote and sensitive ecosystems. Dinosaur National Monument recently set up an eDNA autosampler to detect signs of invasive rusty crayfish in the Green River.

Lake Powell is at just 23% capacity and approaching the point where water won't be able to flow into its hydroelectric turbines without air causing damage.

Estevan López, New Mexico's water negotiator, said talks resumed in March, and the upper and lower basin states are using a short-term proposal from Nevada as the starting point.

The Colorado River Basin appears to be gearing up for a legal fight. And the federal government is weighing its options for making the states share the shrinking river.

Utah’s statewide snowpack level has reached a record low. Much of the West is in the grip of a snow drought, impacting everything from water supplies to mountain forests.

Four days of negotiations in a Salt Lake City conference room earlier in January did not appear to have sparked a breakthrough.

The proposals range from taking "no action" to a scenario that might result in water cuts to the lower basin states of California, Nevada and Arizona. One alternative developed in partnership with conservation groups would incentivize proactive conservation of the river.

“We're closer to the edge of the cliff than we realize,” said one Colorado River expert who worked on a new report outlining what 2026 could hold for Utah’s Lake Powell.

Because of drought, mandatory water cuts are nothing new in Utah. But the potential of large-scale reductions across the Colorado River Basin would present a steep challenge.

Drought and steady demand along the Colorado River are draining the nation's second-largest reservoir. Land that was once submerged is now full of beavers and thriving ecosystems.