“This could potentially be a pretty big bucket of projects,”
Water users around the west seek billions in federal drought help as Colorado River forecast worsens
Stakeholders signing onto the emergency funding request range from the Navajo Nation to Routt County in northwest Colorado to the National Audubon Society.
It’s not clear yet how the money would be distributed among several states in a river basin where political fights and an impasse over how to share water long-term have persisted even during a historic drought.
- The funding request arrived a week after federal hydrologists said Lake Powell, the largest reservoir in the upper basin, is on track to receive the lowest amount of runoff in its history.
- The Interior Department last month started pulling massive amounts of water out of Flaming Gorge Reservoir on the Wyoming-Utah border to boost flows down into Powell and prevent it from getting so low that it stops generating electricity.
This story is part of ongoing coverage of the Colorado River, produced by KUNC in Colorado and supported by the Walton Family Foundation. KUNC is solely responsible for its editorial coverage.
Anyone shocked?
Drought panel recommends – again – that drought emergency status in Arizona continue
According to the NWS forecasts, the strong El Niño condition also brings with it a 46 percent probability that Summer 2026 will prove to be hotter than normal. Like we haven’t seen that before.
Unsurprisingly, the predictions for atmospheric conditions going into the next six months, combined with a report from Arizona State Climatologist Dr. Erinanne Saffell on the recent winter conditions, which were often much hotter and drier than normal, the panel, co-chaired by ADWR Director Tom Buschatzke, opted to recommend that the Governor continue with the state’s drought emergency declaration.
The ICG is an advisory group to the Arizona Governor composed of over 20 federal state agencies and tribes that considers whether to recommend the continuation of a drought declaration to the Governor.
That is its formal function. Additionally, the biannual meetings of the ICG also serve as perhaps the premier analysis of weather and precipitation conditions in Arizona and the Southwest for the six-month period immediately preceding the meeting and for projections and expectations for weather and precipitation for the coming six months. Additionally the meetings provide briefings on conditions on the Salt River Project watershed and on the conditions of state and tribal forests.
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