December 30, 2025

Arizona Colorado River Update

December 30, 2025

The Un-Holiday Edition

A while ago the Kyl Center for Water Policy introduced a new blog series featuring updates on Colorado River, groundwater and other water policy issues in Arizona.

The next year will be pivotal because the reservoir operating rules that dictate Colorado River shortages in our state sunset at the end of 2026. We will try to bring some clarity through light-hearted updates featuring a movie theme. This is our sixth segment in this series. We hope you enjoy it!

 

We’d like to throw some holiday cheer into the mix, but we’re in a deep winter gloom: Colorado River hydrology is becoming ever more dire. Snowpack is sitting at a little over 50% of normal in a year in which we desperately need something more like 300%. Mother Nature is taking on the role of Javier Bardem as the hitman Anton Chigurh, inflicting cruel, pointless punishment for a transgression no one can remember. We may be about to get t-boned: NOAA is forecasting a warm winter. 

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California, the largest user of Colorado River water, is projecting that its 2025 water use will be the lowest since 1949, largely due to farmers being compensated to fallow their fields. Here in Arizona, farmers, tribes, and cities are also being paid to use less water, but they are subject to additional involuntary and uncompensated Colorado River cuts, as is Nevada. Will our water-savings alliance endure the war between the great houses? Who is the Kwisatz Haderach and when will he make himself known? We don’t know, but in the meantime, we celebrate and are grateful for the wise water management of all three states. See you at the sietch (an underground water cache on the planet Dune)!

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Although they are working very hard to achieve a breakthrough, the Basin States have so far failed in their negotiations to reach a seven-state agreement for the post-2026 operations of Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Logically, states, tribes and Mexico fight to maximize deliveries of Colorado River water to support their economies and way of life, but hydrology doesn’t care much about logic or economies. Or way of life for that matter. It would help if a mega-drought weren’t simultaneously pummeling us. Every. Single. Year. Jeez. Honestly, at this point, we’re not sure there’s much water left to fight over. What was this all about?

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So, what happens if there’s no agreement for post-2026 operations of Lake Powell and Lake Mead? Yeah, we tried to explain a few things about that, but honestly no one really knows. We might revert to the operating criteria developed in 1970, or the Secretary of the Interior might impose something entirely different. The relative lack of snowpack presents additional uncertainty. Does free will exist in a system designed for control and regulation? Will we be in control of the river, or will the river control us?

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Let’s face it, all we have left is chicken wire and duct tape, but it is possible to fix big messes with simple tools. The nerds* at the Water Infrastructure and Finance Authority of Arizona are the ones to watch this year. The WIFA board voted to advance four water importation proposals into a study phase to bring new, reliable water resources into Arizona. Will these projects take years and require vast sums of money? Why yes, glad you asked. But as things continue to deteriorate on the Colorado River, these projects may be Arizona’s moonshot.

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During the Dust Bowl, things were so bad that the federal government resorted to buying out farmers. Several national grasslands were developed with the land, including the Cimarron and Comanche, Thunder Basin, Buffalo Gap and the Little Missouri. While a similar program in the Colorado River basin may have something everyone can hate, times are tough, and it may be productive to at least engage in a conversation about how voluntary transactions can produce lasting benefits for all stakeholders on the River. 

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Image credits: IMDB, Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros., Columbia Pictures, HBO, Universal Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox

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• Try our Colorado River Story Map, that explains all things related to shortage in Arizona.
• Explore our new CAP Water Deliveries Over Time Story Map.
• Read our papers Enduring Solutions on the Colorado River and Floating Pools and Grand Bargains.
• Read our paper on Colorado River Shortage Impacts to Tap Water Deliveries in Central Arizona, which details where major water providers get their tap water and how they will continue to meet tap water needs under shortage conditions.
• Our Shortage Impact Calculators might also be helpful.