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  Home Page » Opinion » Editorial » Water

Water

Seeking a way to 'win' with thirsty Front Range

Last week, Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter said the Front Range should not be allowed to take more water from the Western Slope unless it presents a plan that is a “win-win-win” for the entire state.

Ritter has consistently said he considers trans-basin diversions as a last resort. Unfortunately, conservation, by its very definition, can bring into play only some fraction of the water that is already in use. Ritter’s other favorite, sharing water between cities and farmers, is likewise limited; there is simply not all that much agricultural water left on the arid Eastern Plains.

The Western Slope is equally arid, but more water runs through it. As Front Range cities run dry, their water managers cast covetous glances over the Continental Divide, simply because there is still water to be had on this side of the state. Fort Collins developer Aaron Million has proposed building a private pipeline to carry as much as 250,000 acre feet of water a year from the Green River to the Front Range and eastern Wyoming.

Southwestern Wyoming – where the Green actually runs – is not pleased. Flaming Gorge Reservoir attracts recreationists who spend money in the area and contribute tax revenue to the state. Like most people, Wyomingites would prefer that “their” water support growth in their own part of the West, not somewhere else. A bigger problem for Million’s plan, though, is a recent Bureau of Reclamation study that suggests the Green may not have 250,000 acre feet to give away. BuRec numbers show the basin’s annual water availability at closer to 165,000 acre feet until 2050, when the number drops to 120,000 acre feet. By then, Colorado’s Front Range will be far more developed, and far thirstier.

Million, predictably, has said he believes the bureau’s draft water-availability report is “extremely conservative.”

“I think the important thing from the public’s standpoint is that there is a major surplus of water in the system,” he said.

It is safe to say that most people in southwestern Wyoming, eastern Utah and northwestern Colorado do not consider their water to be a major surplus Million ought to tap.

Ritter’s “win-win-win” would be a water deal that does not pit two regions of the state against each other. It is hard to envision another way to make the deal. Money would help, of course, but Westerners, especially rural Westerners, understand that people can neither drink money nor irrigate with it. They also understand that energy development, upon which many are pinning their economic hopes, requires substantial amounts of water. Energy and water are the only two resources that region has.

Most of Colorado has little concern for what happens in Green River and Rock Springs, Wyo. From Front Rangers’ standpoint, they would acquire both badly needed water and the revenue it helps to generate. Whether residents of the far northwest corner of Colorado see much value in Colorado’s gain is questionable. Denver residents will say that a lot of tax money flows to rural projects; rural taxpayers will scoff at the idea that they get much help from the state. They are likely to have more sympathy for their closer neighbors in Wyoming and Utah.

Colorado’s relationship with the Green is complicated. The river makes only a short loop into Colorado, but its basin includes a not-inconsequential chunk of Northwest Colorado (along with big pieces of Wyoming and Utah). In Canyonlands National Park in southeastern Utah, the Green joins the Colorado, which is the lifeblood of the Southwest. Water diverted from Flaming Gorge changes the picture not too far west of here, and it could potentially change the picture here too, when downstream users look to Southwest Colorado for bigger contributions.

Ritter will not be in office long enough to see his winning situation develop, but his belief that the Western Slope deserves consideration is heartening.