The Colorado River Storage Project
in the 21st Century

It seems such a simple question: why have dams on the Colorado River? Viewed by some as life-givers; by others as intruders. Some perceive that we can’t live without them; others perceive that we have somehow outgrown them, their necessity faded away. The past debated their existence. The present debates their operation, dividing the surplus, traditional water and power benefits and instream flows. Like most societal issues, there can be no segregation of humans, their values, and their surroundings. As the West continues to press the boundaries of population growth, the future will debate our use of limited resources, particularly water. We will have to address the hard questions of why, how, and what’s next.
Why
There can be no getting around it; we live in a desert. It took early settlers just one year to realize that this wasn’t Ohio. Streams dried to a trickle. It would take some type of water storage to supply human needs during the parched summers. Early attempts were humorous; buckets, vats and tubs were scripted into service. For a settlement of just a few, small efforts might have worked. But for our current population, we speak in a language of water demands that the early settlers could never have understood. And the demands are still growing.
In the Colorado, Congress provided the Boulder Canyon Project and the Colorado River Storage Project (crsp) as water resources to satisfy these life demands. About thirty million acre-feet of storage in both the Upper and Lower Basins. For the Lower Basin, the purpose was storage delivered directly to the thirsty states of Arizona, Nevada and California.
But upstream the purpose seems less clear. In truth, crsp was a giant exchange agreement. Compact and potential treaty requirements would be delivered from the lower end of the Upper Basin, while depletions were allowed to develop upstream. Absent the storage to fulfill our Lower Basin commitments, upstream users would be forced to abandon, as the Anasazi, their water use during cyclic periods of drought. With crsp, those threats were subdued. The Colorado is a system of extremes, with annual flows varying historically by a factor of five. Reservoirs smooth the extremes and society benefited from this certainty.
So the answer to “why?” is simple; crsp exists because we have chosen to live in this part of the West. Absent our existence in this basin, there would be no need for reservoir storage. We could point to others and their excessive water demands, but in truth the answer to “why?” will be found in the mirror.
How
Not only was crsp designed to provide water, but also it was a power generation project. Revenues from the sale of power not only were to repay the construction costs of the project (with interest), but also provided financial assistance for the development of irrigation projects in the basin. The irrigation subsidies designed to support farmers and keep food prices competitive came not from the federal government, but from the basin’s power users. Initially, the projected power rates to accomplish all this were higher than the open market, and non-profit public power municipalities took some risk in signing contracts for crsp power. In recent years this situation has reversed, and public power customers now enjoy crsp rates lower than the open market.

The development and financing scheme developed during the 1950s has worked flawlessly. Much of the original construction costs have been repaid, and numerous water development projects are providing upstream water supplies. What wasn’t completely foreseen was the change in society’s expectations or the resource implications of constructing crsp. River restoration and endangered species are now part of the demands that are placed on the reservoir system, necessitated by human demands on the water resources of the West.
What’s Next
The regulating nature of reservoirs reduced sediment load, spring peak flows and river temperatures, while increasing base flows during the summer, fall and winter months. The natural functioning of watersheds and river systems has been altered, declining native species the result.
Seems fair to ask the value of these natural resources; indeed, this question often frames the debate over the Endangered Species Act. What is sometimes lost in the debate is the recognition that there is something about the Intermountain West that either draws us away or keeps us from coastal metropolises. We choose to live here. There is a premium that we place on the quality of life in the Colorado Basin. That premium is the currency that bridges human demands and human surroundings.
It’s no surprise that there are a multitude of beliefs and positions on this issue, but perhaps it will be a surprise how we will address these differences of opinion in the future. One emerging technique that may assist in this discussion is adaptive management. Adaptive management can be viewed as an admission of incomplete knowledge, which leads us to experiment to find solutions to current challenges. This incompleteness results from the extraordinary complexity of both ecosystems and our relationship to them. When crsp is viewed through this filter, the debates over operational issues can change from polarization to solution-finding. It is inaccurate to assume that solutions only exist which result in winners and losers. Clearly we stand at a point in time when the possible universe of solutions has only been partially explored.
Future exploration depends on commitments to scientific rigor, respect for all needs, and a willingness to try. Litigation seems a failure of all three. The greatest creativity we can muster will be required, nurtured by trust. Crsp and its original purposes will continue to endure, but it will adapt as water use pressures continue to increase. That adaptation will bear the same marks of ingenuity as the early settlers, who not surprisingly were drawn here by the quality of life. Surely, that deserves our best efforts.

Randall Peterson
Manager, Adaptive Management and
Environmental Resources Division, Upper Colorado Region, Bureau of Reclamation
(also Program Manager, Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program)