20-02-2025
Utah could grab Colorado River water before it gets there, conservation group says
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — A water grab is taking shape in Utah, where thirsty urban development north of Salt Lake City has created demand where supplies are limited.
Enter the 'Utah state water agent,' a position created in 2024 with the mission of seeking water supplies beyond Utah's borders. It's a bold move by a state that once pushed a plan to pipe water from Lake Powell to St. George to secure water for that fast-growing community.
Now conservation groups are among the voices speculating that Utah could divert water from the Green River — the largest tributary of the Colorado River, providing about 40% of all the water that flows into Lake Powell.
'This expensive fantasy that there's surplus water in the Colorado River Basin for Utah has real impacts on 30 million people downstream – yet Utah's water lobby loves the idea that we are just one diversion away from water nirvana,' Zach Frankel, executive director of the Utah Rivers Council, said in a news release on Wednesday.
'These costly dead-ends are a waste of precious time,' Frankel said.
Utah straddles the upper and lower basins of the Colorado River. Glen Canyon Dam, which creates the second-largest reservoir in the U.S. at Lake Powell, is just south of the Utah-Arizona border, but the majority of Lake Powell is in Utah. That's hundreds of miles away from growing Utah cities.
But the Green River is closer, and the distance is even shorter — less than 100 miles — if water was piped to the Bear River, which winds its way through Utah, Wyoming, Idaho and back to Utah, emptying into the Great Salt Lake. The Bear River is one of three rivers from the Uintah mountain range flowing into the lake, but less water makes it that far each year as development continues. Residents have seen the lake drop to record low levels in recent years.
Utah's share of the Colorado River from the Upper Basin amounts to 1.4 million acre-feet, more than four times Nevada's share from the Lower Basin. An acre-foot is 325,851 gallons of water, or enough to cover one acre in water a foot deep.
The Colorado River provides more than a quarter (27%) of the water used in Utah, and about 68% of that water is used to grow alfalfa and other types of hay, according to a 2022 report from The Salt Lake Tribune.
The Utah Rivers Council has previously spotlighted the increased suburban use of the Bear River and how it's contributing to the demise of the Great Salt Lake. But now, Frankel is sounding an alarm about actions in the state legislature that set up a conflict with other states that rely on the Colorado River.
Frankel said Utah's current water agent, Department of Natural Resources Executive Director Joel Ferry, supported a previous effort to advance the 'Green River Pipeline' in 2020 when he was a legislator. Ferry sponsored legislation to study the project and testified on its behalf. Now, HB311 in the Utah State Legislature could give Ferry the authority to clear the way for projects that would remove water from the Colorado River system.
The Utah legislation doesn't say how much water, or where the water would go. Frankel said the initial verson of HB311 was gutted and replace with the current version with no public notice. He notes that the water agent doesn't have to disclose everything he does.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox appointed Ferry to his current position, and Utah leaders have been vocal critics of federal decisions about Utah lands, including Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, in recent years.
'Utah is taking its anti-federal-oversight mindset on public lands to the Colorado River,' according to Kyle Roerink, executive director of the Great Basin Water Network.
'This could pose major questions for the 25 million people who depend on water in the Lower Basin. HJR9 and HB311 open the door to more shenanigans in the Colorado River system. These policies don't necessarily authorize a given project, but they send a strong signal to the Colorado River Basin that Utah wants to play by a very limited set of rules that don't account for climate change or senior water rights holders in other states,' Roerink said.
Overall, the entire Colorado River Basin supplies water to 40 million people across parts of seven states. Southern Nevada gets 90% of its water from the river, pumped from the bottom of Lake Mead to homes and businesses across the valley. The other 10% comes from groundwater.
Any attempt to pump water from the Green River would likely get attention from federal officials and other states involved in crafting agreements on how the Colorado River is managed. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has been working with representatives from Nevada, Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming, as well as tribal representatives. They all have a stake in the future of the river.
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