Colorado River consensus is ‘tenuous’ 2 months before federal deadline

The likelihood of Western states reaching a consensus on a plan for the future of the Colorado River is dimming as time runs out for the negotiators tasked with dividing up the shrinking river relied upon by 40 million people.

“The path to success seems tenuous at this point,” Arizona’s negotiator, Tom Buschatzke, said in an interview this week with The Denver Post. “The discussions continue to revolve around the main issue that we’ve been struggling with for some time since these discussions started.”

Colorado and the six other states in the Colorado River basin for more than a year have failed to agree on how to share the river’s water after current management plans expire at the end of 2026. Little progress has been made on the central question: How should the states divide up the cuts required as the river is shrunk by drought and climate change?

“We’re pretty far apart, and we haven’t made a lot of progress closing the gap,” Buschatzke said.

The states have until Nov. 11 to tell the federal government whether they will have a deal and until Feb. 14 to submit a detailed plan. If consensus cannot be reached, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation will implement its own plan — a scenario that would likely prompt years of expensive litigation and put complicated water management questions in the hands of judges who aren’t specialized in the issues.

Litigation would create massive uncertainty in the basin and result in a decision that is not ideal for anyone, experts and state negotiators have said.

Buschatzke’s candid comments are rare for negotiators involved in the closed-door discussions, though tensions have occasionally flared into the public eye. Colorado’s negotiator, Becky Mitchell, said in a statement this week in response to Buschatzke’s comments that time is of the essence in the negotiations. The states have no option but to live within the means of the river, she said.

“We’re grappling with complex, difficult trade-offs — but we’re all at the table,” Mitchell said. “Too much is at stake for positioning and posturing in the media, and ignoring the fact that Lake Powell and Lake Mead are in big trouble.”

The Colorado River is the lifeblood of southwestern U.S. cities, irrigates more than 5 million acres of farmland, provides critical wildlife habitat and fuels recreation economies worth millions of dollars. The river supplies large portions of many Western cities’ water portfolio: Half of Denver’s water comes from the Colorado River system, as does 90% of Las Vegas’ water.

The Upper Basin states — Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico and Utah — sit upstream of Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Without large reservoirs in which to store water, those states’ water supply is reliant on snowpack and precipitation, which can vary widely year to year.

In contrast, the water supply for the Lower Basin states — California, Arizona and Nevada — is more consistent and predictable as it comes from Lake Mead and Lake Powell.

Who should take cuts?

Both basins say they have already borne the brunt of the cuts that both sides agree are necessary.

Negotiators from the Lower Basin for months have argued that their counterparts in the Upper Basin must agree to mandatory usage cuts in the driest years. The Lower Basin has already made significant cuts to address the shrinking river, Buschatzke said this week.

Arizona has reduced its water usage by 900,000 acre-feet in 2024 and 800,000 acre-feet in 2025, Buschatzke said. Much of those cuts were required by the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan and many water users were paid for using less water, he said. An acre-foot of water would cover a football field in a foot of water and is generally enough for two to four families’ annual use.

The Upper Basin states maintain that they already take water cuts every year because they are above the system’s two major reservoirs. Since they’re reliant on snowpack and precipitation, they’re forced to live within the supply of the river. Unlike the Lower Basin states, the Upper Basin has never used its entire legal allotment, while the Lower Basin for years used more water than the river supplied and depleted water supplies stored in Mead and Powell, the basin’s negotiators have said.

In Colorado, when there is not enough water to fulfill water rights, the state engineer’s office cuts users’ supplies. This summer, drought and low river flows prompted water-use restrictions across much of the Western Slope.

On average, Colorado water users take 600,000 acre feet of cuts every year because of a lack of water, Mitchell said. Water users are not paid for those cuts.

“We have the tools to solve this — we just need the leadership and resolve to implement them,” Mitchell said in her statement. “In Colorado, we use the prior appropriation doctrine to live within our means. It is harsh. It means that water users take uncompensated, mandatory reductions.”

Split is ‘about as wide as Grand Canyon’

Negotiators continue to discuss a concept that would base the amount released from the system’s two major reservoirs on the amount of water flowing in the river, rather than the decades-old system that bases releases on water levels at Lake Powell and Lake Mead.

The negotiators spoke publicly last month about the concept, which some hailed as a potential breakthrough in negotiations.

But optimism around that concept has faded.

Mitchell said it was unclear whether an agreement could be reached around the framework. Buschatzke said major sticking points remained, like what percentage of the flow each basin should receive.