Every ditch is different: Barriers and opportunities for collaboration for agricultural water conservation and security in the Colorado River Basin

Abstract

Irrigated agriculture in the Colorado River Basin (CRB) has a target on its back. One of the most critical sources of water in the western United States, the Colorado River extends 1,450 mi (2,334 km) through seven western states from Wyoming to California. It provides drinking water for nearly 40 million people, irrigates over 4.9 million ac (2 million ha) of land, and can generate more than 4,200 MW of electricity. Today, the CRB and the people and environments it serves face a looming supply-demand imbalance. Extended drought and climate change threaten unprecedented reductions in surface water flows even as urban population growth and new environmental and recreation demands promise to dramatically increase need for the river's water. The region's irrigated farmers, who hold legal rights to 70% to 80% of Colorado River surface water flows, are being asked to help cover expected supply-demand imbalances by conserving and sharing their agricultural water with other users. However, formidable legal, social, and cultural barriers make it difficult for farmers to share their water without facing real or perceived risks of permanent loss of their resource rights and of threats to their livelihoods and rural communities. This study draws on field visits and in-depth interviews with more than 60 irrigators, agricultural leaders, water experts, environmentalists, and federal and state officials in three western states—Colorado, Arizona, and California. It analyzes six instrumental case studies of innovative collaboration between irrigators and environmentalists, municipalities, and government agencies to conserve agricultural water while generating water for nonagricultural purposes. Based largely on in-depth interviews, the study analyzes existing legal, social, and cultural barriers to agricultural water conservation collaboration in the case study regions. It then identifies key hydrological and legal structural openings and related social conditions that have facilitated collaboration in these six cases among diverse, often opposing water interests. The study concludes by proposing a preliminary framework of analytical questions that can be applied in other contexts in the CRB where collaboration for agricultural water conservation may find favorable structural and social conditions. These cases suggest that in a highly diverse CRB in which uniform, system-wide solutions face many obstacles, responses to the CRB's formidable problems may benefit from close attention to innovative insights and lessons generated at the local level.