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Colorado River Update! Congress Needs To Act To Address “MEGADROUGHT”

Hello Friends of the Colorado River!

Will Congress act if MEGADROUGHT looms?  Next week will be a big week for the Colorado River as a U.S. Senate Subcommittee convenes a hearing to discuss the Colorado River Basin Study.  This hearing — initiated by Colorado U.S. Senator Mark Udall — will offer testimony about water conservation in cities and farms, and about healthy flows in the Colorado River.  The hearing comes on the heels of a scientific paper that predicted a potential “MEGADROUGHT” could be hitting the Southwest U.S. and the Colorado River basin that could reduce flows in the river up to 45%.  You can read a newspaper story about the MEGADROUGHT prediction here.  The Save The Colorado River Campaign will be following the hearing closely and live tweeting from @SaveTheColorado starting at 12:30pm on Tuesday, July 16th.  Take at look at our press release about the hearing here.  It’s great news that the U.S. Senate is paying attention to this issue, and a Big Thank You to U.S. Senator Mark Udall for leading the fight!

Is Lake Powell causing the water supply crisis in the Southwest U.S.?  A new scientific paper authored by hydrologist, Dr. Thomas Myers and published in the Journal of the American Water Resources Association, indicates that the problems with Lake Powell are only increasing as water supply challenges escalate across the Southwest U.S.  We’ve all known for a long time that over a half-million acre feet of water — which is over 1/30th of the entire flow of the Colorado River — evaporates out of Lake Powell each year.  But, what this new report indicates is that another 380,000 acre feet of water “leaks” through the banks of the reservoir into the surrounding desert landscape and is completely lost to the system.  This scientific article received wide media attention when it was released 2 weeks ago, including this story here in the Summit County Voice.  Adding evaporation and leakage together, Lake Powell loses almost 1 million acre feet of water per year!  Does this reservoir even make any sense anymore?  So we ask the question again, is Lake Powell causing the water supply crisis in the Southwest U.S.?

Do you have cool photos of having fun in the Colorado River?  Do you want to win a free raft trip through Dinosaur National Monument?  Then send us your photos!  Thanks to our friends at O.A.R.S Rafting, we are giving away a 4-day raft trip for 2 people on the Green River.  You can submit photos for the contest by clicking here — that’s all you have to do to potentially win!  On July 25th, which is Colorado River Day, we will open the contest voting so the public can pick the winner!  So, send us your photos and enter to win.  Here’s the itinerary of the great rafting trip.  It will take you through the heart of Dinosaur National Monument and one of the most scenic and remote canyons in the U.S.  Send in your photos in the next 2 weeks.  Click here to enter!

Thank you for your support and stay tuned for more news and action about the Colorado River!

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