Lake Mead Falls To Historic Low
Lake Mead has fallen to its lowest level since the great Colorado River reservoir was filled nearly 90 years ago, sharpening fears over the water future of roughly 40 million people across the American West and Mexico.
The reservoir stood at about 1,040.4 feet above sea level, a historic low that exposes the worsening imbalance between the Colorado River’s shrinking supply and the enormous demands placed upon it. Years of drought, extreme heat, heavy water use and exceptionally weak Rocky Mountain snowpack have pushed both Lake Mead and Lake Powell toward unprecedented lows, threatening municipal supplies, agriculture, hydropower and fragile river ecosystems.
The crisis is becoming harder to postpone politically. Arizona, California, Nevada and the Upper Basin states have spent years struggling to agree on new long-term rules for sharing a river that no longer reliably produces the water assumed under twentieth-century agreements. Federal officials have proposed deep reductions during dry years, potentially reaching millions of acre-feet annually. With projections showing Lake Mead could fall still further, the Colorado is becoming one of the clearest tests of whether governments can adapt quickly enough to a hotter, drier climate.
