Final November, the Division of Inside launched 5 proposed options to handle Colorado River water after December 2026, when present tips expire. None of those options brings new water to the Colorado River.
We consider it’s crucial to carry new water to the Colorado if we need to maintain the Colorado Basin system. This basin contributes no less than $1.4 trillion in GDP, serves greater than 40 million individuals with water and irrigates 5.5 million acres of farmland producing tens of billions of {dollars} price of meals for the whole nation.
Las Vegas and the remainder of the Southwest couldn’t exist of their present type with out that water from the Colorado River.
Lakes Mead and Powell, which feed the water for the decrease Colorado Basin, have a mixed capability of 16.4 trillion gallons. As of late Could, the include simply 5.2 trillion gallons (31.9 p.c of capability). To get to even 50 p.c capability we would want to carry 3 trillion gallons of latest water to the Glen Canyon Dam after which let it move downriver utilizing the present infrastructure.
There are two locations in the US that might present the mandatory water: the Atchafalaya River in Louisiana and the Lake Tahoe outflow on the California, Nevada border.
The Atchafalaya River drains 30 p.c of the whole Mississippi watershed into the Gulf of Mexico with out producing any electrical energy or offering industrial delivery. As of late Could, this river is discharging 2.970 million gallons per second into the Gulf, and the long-term common for the previous 60 years has been 1.4 million gallons per second, in accordance with rivergages.com.
If a 1,200-mile aqueduct with simply 2 p.c of the Atchafalaya’s common move had been constructed from Vidalia, Louisiana, to the Glen Canyon dam, we may get that 3 trillion gallons in roughly three years.
Lake Tahoe accommodates 40 trillion gallons of water, greater than twice the capability of Lakes Mead and Powell mixed. The outflow averages 212 billion gallons per 12 months (6,700 gallons per second). Constructing an aqueduct of half that may clearly assist the water scarcity in Lakes Powell and Mead. The benefit of this route is that it’s all downhill from 6,200 toes at Lake Tahoe to Glen Canyon’s 3,500 toes. It’s 500 miles shorter, so little electrical energy if any could be wanted.
In fact, the ecological impression of slicing again the move into the Truckee River, the one outlet of Lake Tahoe, must be thought of. However as a result of the Tahoe outflow offers solely 30 p.c of the water within the Truckee River, we don’t assume that may be an issue. The Truckee River merely flows into Pyramid Lake and evaporates with out flowing to the ocean.
Moreover, the water in Lake Tahoe is “navigable waters of the US” similar to lakes Mead, Powell and Havasu. This implies the water is managed by the Bureau of Reclamation, not California or Nevada.
Adopting one or each of those options would enormously contribute to fixing the Colorado River water scarcity.
The engineering to construct and keep such aqueducts and pipelines is well-known and has been used repeatedly in our nation’s historical past. The issue is financing. We estimate the price of the Atchafalaya path to be on the order of constructing 1,200 miles of latest interstate freeway, roughly $15 billion. The Lake Tahoe route could be roughly $20 billion as a result of there could be extra mountain valleys to traverse.
Financing would come from a brand new Nationwide Infrastructure Financial institution. An identical establishment financed Hoover and Parker dams and two giant oil pipelines in World Struggle II. There’s a invoice in Congress, HR4052, that may create a $5 trillion Nationwide Infrastructure Financial institution to just do this. It might require no new federal spending or new federal taxes. There are at the moment 48 sponsors of this invoice, however none from Nevada.
We urge Nevada Reps. Dina Titus, Susie Lee, Mark Amodei and Steven Horsford to signal on as co-sponsors of this invoice.
Alphecca Muttardy is a macroeconomist with the Coalition for a Nationwide Infrastructure Financial institution (NIBCoalition.com), and 25-year veteran of the Worldwide Financial Fund. Don Siefkes represents the coalition within the San Francisco Bay Space. They are often reached at, amuttardy@gmail.com and donsiefkes@aol.com, respectively.
