DENVER-Demand for water and available water supply disparities led the governor’s office to issue an executive order last year directing the Colorado Water Conservation Board to initiate the Colorado Water Plan. The Board-formed in 1937 to protect and develop Colorado water- was charged with addressing this broadening gap after two of the warmest decades on record in a critical headwater state from which eighteen other states depend as well as Mexico.
Recognizing the parallel values shared by each other, environmental groups the Audubon Society of Greater Denver and the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the Sierra Club held a joint Legislative Forum today addressing the current status of Colorado water and prioritizing the work needed for the upcoming year. Held at the First Plymouth Congregational Church, about a hundred members of the public attended to hear an overview of environmental bills and a panel discussion of the Water Plan and the impacts on Colorado water from climate change and energy production. Jen Boulton, Audubon Colorado Legislative Liaison presented on current bills that were considered by the legislature and stressed the need for public input to prevent the passage of legislation that the Audubon Society considers a threat to the quality and quantity of water to the state. Priority bills included what the group says are threats to SB-252 signed on June 5, 2013 by Governor Hickenlooper. The law expands renewable energy standards in the rural electric associations and promotes wind and solar energy thereby moving away from the fossil fuel industry. In May of 2013, the Sierra Club launched an online campaign dubbed-Beyond Coal-in support of the bill which saw support from 2,500 members or volunteers through online actions. Nellis Kennedy-Howard, Colorado Campaign Representative for the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign said of the win, “Colorado’s renewable energy standards-RES have already created thousands of jobs, and with this new law, we look forward to continued economic growth and clean energy leadership that will inspire others across the country.” But Boulton warned that follow-up attack bills like SB-82 sponsored by District 2 Republican Representative Kevin Granthan, HB1113 sponsored by District 55 Republican Senator Ray Scott, and SB025-a bill that attempted to directly repeal SB-252 and sponsored by District 30 Republican Representative Ted Harvey and District 63 Republican Representative Lori Saine were all introduced this past year but were killed. SB-82 attempted to reduce the Renewable Energy Standard-RES for Rural Electric Coops setting the same renewable energy standard regardless of size and attempted to set a 0.5% standard for distributed generation. This attempt at net metering would have allowed the target to be met by larger polluters collectively with smaller ones rather than by each rural energy association. A similar attempt at this measure was HB1113 which would have reduced the RES for rural electric associations from 20% by 2020 to 15%.
A panel presentation followed the legislative outline and covered topics of the State Water Plan including from an environmentalist’s perspective, the effect of climate change on water, and energy impacts.
Tom Beaslely is the Director of Programs for the Rocky Mountain Climate Organization presented on the Impacts of Climate Change on Water Supply,
“We’re a small nonprofit. What we do is try to keep the West a special place by reducing climate disruption and its effects here. We operate as a coalition: ten local governments, Colorado’s largest municipal water supplier, Denver Water, four nonprofits, four businesses, so kind of a mainstream sort of an organization. We all come at it from different perspectives but we’re all in it because we all love Colorado.
In 2010 when Congress said we don’t believe the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change- IPCC and the United Nations [so] go look at it yourself and they said the same thing, ‘Water availability is going to decrease in mountainous areas.’
This is a great year to be in the climate business because there [are] zillions of reports coming out. The IPCC is coming out with their 5th assessment report this year. The National Climate Assessment is coming out this year. Jacob’s organization – The Water Conservation Board is going to have more stuff on water than anyone can even begin to absorb. And of course climate change is the bottom line.
The current IPCC assessment report says this about the West:
We expect a 6.1 degrees Farenheit rise in temperature by 2100 which is really the bottom line as far as water in Colorado goes. What it means is increased heat. Decreases in snow pack. More winter rain events, rather than snow, increased peak winter flows and flooding and reduced summer flows.
The fact is, we live in a drought prone region, the Southwest. In the last century we have been in a comparatively wet period. That’s really the context we operate in in terms of climate change. Really the question is if we’re going to have these long term variability in drops in stream flows. Really the question is, under climate change how much are we influencing that and pushing things back up towards the drought sorts of periods.
The Water Conservation Board is the agency in the state that is probably the only one that is directly taking on the issue of climate change and talking about it. I really admire what Jacob [Borenstein] and his staff and with his partners at the Water Conservation Board have done within the last 10-15 years as far as bringing the conversation along on climate change and water which is really a delightful change from the past.
This is a long term record of the variability of stream flows in four basins: the Colorado [River], the South Platte, the Rio Grande, and Arkansas. I serve on a climate change technical advisory group for the Water Conservation Board
[Stream flows have] been up and down for a thousand years. It’s been above the average, it’s been below the average. And that’s really kind of the bottom line for precipitation in stream flows in the West. So what’s already happening as far as climate change goes? This is from the CWCB report. Compared to the 1971-2000 baseline, this is the departures from the norm for heat and cooler temperatures and certainly the trends are up toward more heat. What that means as far as on the ground? One of the indications is when the runoff starts. From the 2001-2010 period, compared to 1950-2000, the middle of the runoff period in the spring has advanced by 15-20 days. Just in that short time period. That has a lot of impacts. This is the growing season. In the Southwest the number of increased days in the growing season is about 15-25 days over the norm which has a lot of implications.
For the Colorado River Basin, this shows the precipitation[levels]. The average from 1890-2010 shows that it’s up and down. It doesn’t show a clear trend whether we are having less water in the upper Colorado River Basin or more. In the last few years we have seen [both] drops and high periods.
In looking at the departures in temperature, we are seeing a clear trend in the increase in the upper Colorado River Basin since about 1970. So the bottom line is, we know we have more heat. We’re not so sure about precipitation in the past and in the future about what we can expect. For the Colorado River Basin it means that going back to 1906-2008 there has been a clear trend in stream flows down[ward]. The demand for water in the basin and the supply in the basin during the last decade we are now at a point where the demand is exceeding the supply.
So what can we expect in the future? All models that currently exist show increasing temperatures globally. It’s after 2050 when model trends really start to diverge. We are seeing about a 4 degree temperature rise by 2050 and then increasing past that. The precipitation prediction shows not much change. From the Southwest Climate Assessment that is part of the National Climate Assessment that is coming out this year we expect much more warming [when coupled] with a high emissions scenario but with a low emissions scenario we would see about half of that. All [predictions] show additional warming. This is the reason to really work on emissions and lower the emissions scenario because it makes a huge difference as far as the modeling goes. The predicted changes in the water cycle in the Southwest Climate Assessment is using the high scenario [example] and what it shows is the snow pack equivalent on April 1st increases by about 30-40 percent reduction, April to July runoff by about midcentury a reduction of about 10-25 percent, and then the June 1st soil moisture a reduction of about 0-10 percent. So we are seeing all huge changes in the water cycle, all driven by the heat. From a Bureau of Reclamations’ study we see expected runoff, change in annual runoff in 2050 compared to the 1990s. In the Colorado mountainous areas that feed the Colorado River Basin there is a predicted 10-20 percent range in stream flow reductions out to 2050. It means that the peak runoff moves by about a month and the end of the peak runoff moves by about a month also. This has huge implication for the way people use water especially for agricultural use. The bottom line for the Colorado River Basin is when you look at the mean of all of the models, they are all showing a 6-20 percent reduction in flows in the Colorado River Basin. The dust on snow measures show that with low, medium, and extreme dust events we expect a 9-12 percent reduction range.
The Bureau of Reclamations’ study shows about a 7 percent reduction in future supply which is modest in the overall scheme of things. The projected demand up to about midcentury shows a difference of about 3.2 million acre feet. It’s a big thing to overcome for the 40 million people who depend on it. The impacts and the implications are huge between agriculture water quality, ecosystems, tourism, recreation, and especially for future generations. ”
Refufia Gaintan/The Nation Report
