A heavy dusting of snow — or the lack of it — can set the tone for water availability in dry desert states like Nevada.
While most of Nevada is in good shape, the same can’t be said for the Rocky Mountains that fuel Lake Powell, the reservoir that sends water into Lake Mead. It’s been an average snow year in the Colorado River Basin with snowpack at 96 percent of its historical average as of Wednesday — not quite a match to the wet year of 2023 or ordinary 2024.
Meteorologists look to April 1 as the date when snowpack peaks and begins to melt, leaving little time this year to make up the difference. The Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency that manages dams and water in the West, estimates that Lake Powell will receive an amount of water equivalent to 71 percent of normal.
That projection takes into account other factors such as soil moisture and vapor lost to the atmosphere.
“Right now, they’re forecasting most probable conditions for Lake Mead for the end of 2026 going into 2027 to be right on the cusp of elevation 1,050, which could put the Lower Basin into a whole new tier of shortage,” said Jennifer Pitt, the Audubon Society’s Colorado River program director. “It’s concerning to see that decline in elevation projected.”
Uncharted waters
The variable future of the Colorado River is juxtaposed with a contentious negotiation process between the seven Western states that depend on the river. Two coalitions, north and south, disagree on who should shoulder inevitable cuts to water usage that are becoming more possible every year.
The ongoing snafu was highlighted last month when Nevada’s Colorado River czar, Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager John Entsminger, sent a letter to the Trump administration.
Along with water officials from California and Arizona, Entsminger asked the administration to address infrastructure issues at Glen Canyon Dam, which could one day prevent water from flowing downstream into Lake Mead.
The Bureau of Reclamation’s two-year projections don’t place Lake Powell elevations anywhere near a level that would be cause for concern. Still, Pitt said a future where some users can’t access water from the river because levels are too low is getting closer.
“Since they were built, and more so in the last 25 years, those reservoirs have served as a buffer,” Pitt said of Lake Powell and Lake Mead. “Those reservoirs have been drained bit by bit over those years to the point where they are now.”
Bronson Mack, a spokesman for the Southern Nevada Water Authority, said the uncertain hydrology of the basin and larger trends of less available water mean that Las Vegas’ water conservation efforts are critical.
“We know that conditions over the long term will continue to be hotter and drier, which underscores the importance of our community’s water conservation efforts as we adapt and prepare for that warmer, drier future ahead,” he said in a statement.
Nevada snowpack, however, has a better year
While not much good news exists for Colorado River water users this year, Nevada’s mountain ranges have bounced back in a big way.
Snowpack in the Spring Mountains in Southern Nevada, an important water source for domestic well users in Nye County, sits at 103 percent of normal — a vast improvement from earlier in the season when no snow was on the mountains at all.
The rest of Nevada’s snowpack numbers are well above 110 percent of normal, boding well for water supply in parts of the state that don’t rely on the Colorado River.
“Years that are a bit above the normal or median values help with groundwater and reservoirs,” said Baker Perry, Nevada’s state climatologist and a professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. “Even if they’re not banner years, they can really play a big role in keeping us prepared for bad years.”
Perry pointed to the lack of rain across Nevada, including in Las Vegas where meteorologists didn’t record more than a tenth of an inch of rain for 214 days. The U.S. Drought Monitor puts nearly 70 percent of Nevada under some level of drought conditions.
“Even though snowpack is better in the mountains, we need precipitation, not just in the mountains, in order to make a more substantial dent in this drought,” Perry said.
Contact Alan Halaly at ahalaly@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlanHalaly on X.
