Water levels at Lake Powell, Lake Mead could go dangerously low
May 11-Spring is a critical time for the Colorado River Basin watershed, when snowmelt flows into major reservoirs. But after a hot and dry winter, the state of spring runoff is grim, especially at Lake Powell, where forecasters are predicting the lowest water flows ever recorded.
The Colorado River Basin Forecast Center expects 800,000 acre feet of water to flow into Lake Powell in the period between April and July this year. That's just 13% of the 30-year average, between 1991 and 2020.
What's more, about half of that water has already showed up to Lake Powell, thanks to a record-breaking warmup in March that triggered an early runoff, said Cody Moser, senior hydrologist at the Colorado River Basin Forecast Center, in a webinar on Thursday.
"We are seeing the water from that March heatwave showing up in early April," Moser said.
Lake Powell's current record for low water flow is 963,960 acre feet, set in 2002.
April precipitation and cooler weather slowed down some of that snowmelt, Moser noted.
"But that paled in comparison to this five-, six-month stretch of just record warm and dry weather that we've seen," he said.
Lake Powell's water levels are measured at 3,526 feet in elevation - about 30 feet lower than this time last year. Powell is on track to dip below the minimum power pool level, elevation 3,490 feet, by August, according to a two-year outlook published by the Bureau of Reclamation. If the water were to dip that low, the downstream impacts would be severe, curtailing water and power for millions of people.
Last month, the Bureau of Reclamation announced a plan to intervene and prop water levels up at Lake Powell. To do so, the bureau plans to release somewhere between 660,000 acre feet and 1 million acre feet from the Flaming Gorge Reservoir in Wyoming, upstream of Lake Powell, in the coming year.
The bureau also plans to limit how much water is released from Lake Powell downstream to Lake Mead. It plans to hold back 1.48 million acre feet of water from flowing into Lake Mead, reducing the amount of water that typically flows downstream from Lake Powell to 6 million acre feet.
The bureau acknowledged that limiting water out of Lake Powell will accelerate the decline of Lake Mead's water levels, potentially reducing the amount of hydropower produced by the Hoover Dam by 40% as early as this fall.
The low water flow coming out of Lake Powell may also impact rafting in the Grand Canyon this summer, as well as boating access at Lake Mead National Recreation Area. On the Lake Mead website, the National Park Service warns boaters to launch at their own risk and advises that, as the water continues to recede, extending launch ramps is becoming more difficult and expensive.
Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.