Colorado River states reach deal with Biden to protect drought-stricken river
The states along the Colorado River — a vital source of water and electricity for the American West — reached an agreement with the Biden administration to conserve an unprecedented amount of their water supply in exchange for $1.2 billion in federal funding, state and federal officials said on Monday.
After nearly a year of negotiations and multiple missed deadlines, the deal amounts to a temporary solution intended to protect the country’s largest reservoirs — Lake Powell and Lake Mead — from dropping to critical levels over the next three years. These reservoirs have fallen dramatically as the warming climate and the past two decades of drought have pared down the river’s natural flow by some 20 percent.
To stabilize the river, the three states that comprise the Lower Basin — California, Arizona, and Nevada — have agreed to voluntarily conserve 3 million acre-feet of water over the next three years, which amounts to 13 percent of these states’ total allocation from the river. The Biden administration has committed to compensating the states for three quarters of the water savings — or 2.3 million acre-feet — which would amount to some $1.2 billion in federal funds, the people familiar with the talks said. The money from the Inflation Reduction Act would pay farmers, Native American tribes, cities and others who voluntarily forego their supplies.
not really sure how this deal is a "solution". so it's basically payment to conserve? seems like fewer humans living in Arizona and California in the medium term, and solutions for climate change in the longer term, are the actual "solutions".
