Four upstream states in the Colorado River Basin, including Colorado, agreed to release up to 325 billion gallons of water out of a Wyoming reservoir to help one of the basin’s most important water supplies, Lake Powell. 

The lake’s water levels have fallen to historical lows after 20 years of prolonged drought, and this year’s record-poor snowpack is exacerbating an already tense situation. The Upper Basin states’ approval is the first step in finalizing the releases under a 2019 agreement to help the basin respond to extremely dry years. The Department of the Interior is expected to approve the plan this week after announcing the intended drought-response releases Friday.

But pulling from the Wyoming reservoir, Flaming Gorge, will have local impacts, the state’s officials said during an Upper Colorado River Commission meeting Tuesday. 

“Nobody’s incredibly anxious to do this,” Colorado’s Commissioner Becky Mitchell said before a vote.

“All in reluctant favor?” she said, followed by unanimous approval.

The releases could begin as soon as Thursday pending the Secretary of the Interior’s final approval, said Wayne Pullen, the Upper Colorado Basin regional director for the Bureau of Reclamation.

Basin states were still waiting for the expected federal approval as of Wednesday afternoon.

The mountains in Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico provide most of the water that flows through the Colorado River Basin to support 40 million people and multibillion-dollar industries. 

This year, the Upper Colorado River Basin’s snowpack peaked around March 9, a month early, and has been declining rapidly, Chuck Cullom, UCRC executive director, said Tuesday.

The forecast flows into Lake Powell totaled 1.4 million acre-feet as of April. It was expected to drop to 900,000 acre-feet within the next month — which roughly equals the spring runoff into the immense reservoir in 2002, another extremely dry year, Cullom said.

One acre-foot equals about 325,800 gallons, or the water used by two to four households each year.

With the small inflows at Powell, officials are warning that water levels in the reservoir, located on the Utah-Arizona border, could fall below a critical elevation. 

At that point, low water levels could lead to damage in the dam’s internal infrastructure, like the pipes that lead to electricity generating turbines, or fall below the turbine intakes, which would halt power production altogether.

“It’s clear that additional actions at Lake Powell are necessary,” Cullom said.

But the decision comes with local impacts and basinwide drawbacks.

The upstream reservoirs, including Flaming Gorge on the Wyoming-Utah border, are small and the drought releases are a limited tool, Wyoming’s Commissioner Brandon Gebhart said. 

The drought releases won’t rescue the basin from an extended water crisis, he and other state and tribal officials said. 

It’s a short-term solution: Once released, the water can’t be relied upon year after year, officials said. It’s going to take time for these reservoirs to recover before the states can do this again.

Flaming Gorge was 46% full and 57 feet below capacity as of Tuesday.

The drought releases will have significant negative impacts on water resources, local economies, fisheries, local marinas and recreation in the Upper Basin, Gebhart said.

Colorado communities felt similar impacts in 2021 and 2022 when state and federal officials agreed to draw down Blue Mesa, a federal reservoir near Gunnison and the largest in Colorado, to support water levels at Lake Powell. 

Blue Mesa recovered its lost water, but with spring runoff so low, federal and state officials do not plan to tap Blue Mesa this year as part of the drought-response plan.

This year’s decision to release additional water in response to drought wasn’t made lightly, Gebhart said. 

“We wouldn’t be recommending this release, except for the historically dry conditions,” he said.

A rare fire weather warning has been issued by the National Weather Service, warning both rural and urban residents in south central and southeastern Colorado of 60-mph wind gusts and extremely dry conditions Wednesday that pose a “significant threat to life and property.”

Strong winds out of the southwest, between 25 and 35 mph, coupled with relative humidity levels in the single digits, prompted forecasters to warn of a “particularly dangerous situation” in the Upper Arkansas Valley, the San Luis Valley, the Wet Mountains and Sangre de Cristo Mountains.

The conditions are expected from 10 a.m. to midnight Wednesday, though the highest risk will be between 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.

“In some cases, safe and timely evacuation may not be possible should a fire approach,” forecasters in Pueblo said. 

Critical fire weather conditions are forecast across much of southeastern Colorado on Wednesday, stretching from the New Mexico border to the south to the Kansas border to the east.

In the San Luis Valley, blowing dust could bring very low visibility at times, making travel difficult, and strong winds could blow down trees and power lines.

“Use caution if you must drive across the San Luis Valley on Wednesday,” forecasters warned. 

Xcel Energy said it will shut off power, starting at noon, to about 7,100 customers in Alamosa, Conejos, Costilla and Rio Grande counties to reduce the risk of wildfire. Customers can look up their address online to see if they may be impacted by the power shutoffs. 

According to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor, issued April 16, 97% of Colorado is in moderate to exceptional drought conditions, caused in part to record-high temperatures in March and historically low snowpack. 

Elevated fire danger could continue through Thursday, forecasters said.

Federal and state officials have proposed severe drought response actions, like drastically cutting water releases from Lake Powell, in face of a historically dry year and worsening conditions in the Colorado River Basin.

The Bureau of Reclamation announced Friday it will likely reduce Lake Powell water releases to 6 million acre-feet, the lowest amount in decades. It also intends to release additional water from Flaming Gorge, an upstream reservoir, to help elevate the water level in Lake Powell. The decisions could raise the specter of forced water cuts in states including Colorado, impact endangered fish populations and affect communities and economies.

Basin states, tribes and partners continue to provide feedback on the proposed releases. A final decision will be coming next week, Reclamation said Friday in a news release.

“Given the severity of the risks facing the Colorado River system, it is imperative that we take action quickly to protect a resource that supplies water to 40 million people and supports vital agricultural, hydropower production, tribal, wildlife, and recreational uses across the region,” Andrea Travnicek, Reclamation’s assistant secretary of water and science, said in the news release.

The Colorado River Basin, which stretches from Colorado’s mountains to the Pacific Ocean, saw about a quarter of its typical snowpack this year. The skimpy snowpack also shrank the amount of water flowing into the basin’s two major reservoirs, lakes Mead and Powell, the largest reservoirs in the nation. Lake Powell’s lower probable inflow is forecast to be just 2.78 million acre-feet — 29% of historical average and one of the lowest on record.

Powell held about a quarter of its storage capacity as of a Bureau of Reclamation presentation Friday. Mead held about a third of its capacity. The amount of water stored in federal reservoirs across the basin was just 36% as of Friday.

If the water level at Lake Powell falls too low, it can endanger critical infrastructure in the dam and stop hydroelectric power generation, which helps supply communities across the West with affordable, renewable energy. 

The immense reservoir’s water levels are projected to fall below these key points by August, according to a monthly federal forecast released Friday called the 24-month study.

Or it could be as early as June, the Upper Colorado River Commission said in a news release Friday. The commission is a joint body that includes the Upper Basin states, like Colorado, and is a deciding force in Upper Basin water policy.

In response, the Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency that operates Glen Canyon Dam at Lake Powell, has already held back about 598,000 acre-feet of water to try to maintain higher water levels in the reservoir. (One acre-foot roughly equals the annual water use of two to four urban households.)

That water was scheduled to flow to downstream communities in Arizona, California, Nevada and northern Mexico. The bureau still plans to release it before the water year ends Sept. 30, according to the April 24-month study. 

But that is not enough.

To elevate water levels in Lake Powell, Reclamation officials intend to release 660,000 to 1 million acre-feet of additional water from Flaming Gorge Reservoir on the Utah-Wyoming border. The reservoir was 83% full as of Friday, and the releases over the next 12 months will reduce it to 59% of its capacity.

As of Friday, Reclamation did not plan to release water from two other upstream reservoirs — Blue Mesa, the largest reservoir in Colorado, and Navajo Reservoir on the Colorado-New Mexico border — because of their low water levels and poor forecast inflows.

The bureau also intends to release a total of 6 million acre-feet from Glen Canyon Dam this water year, which began Oct. 1 and will end Sept. 30.

For months, Reclamation has been planning to release a total of 7.48 million acre-feet from the dam. Since 2015, releases have ranged from about 7.08 million acre-feet in 2022 to 9.26 million acre-feet in 2019, according to a 2024 report from the Upper Colorado River Commission.

Reclamation only has limited authority to drop releases to 6 million acre-feet because of a near-term agreement developed in 2024 in response to the basin’s prolonged drought, shrinking flows, overuse and plummeting reservoir levels.

If the feds release 6 million acre-feet of water this year, it could open the door to legal arguments from Lower Basin states calling for upstream states to make forced water cuts.

Lawsuits — often dubbed the nuclear option — could mire the entire basin in years of legal uncertainty and expensive court battles while leaving the basin’s water future in the hands of U.S. Supreme Court justices instead of local and state water managers.

Responses around the basin

Politicians, water officials, environmental groups and other water users are voicing widespread concerns about conditions in the basin. 

The shrunken releases from Lake Powell will accelerate declining water levels in Lake Mead, potentially reducing Hoover Dam’s hydropower generating capacity by 40% as early as this fall, Reclamation’s announcement said.

At upstream reservoirs, boating access may be reduced earlier in the season than normal. In the Grand Canyon, lower flow rates will affect rafting conditions, and fishing may be more challenging. At Lake Mead National Recreation Area, reduced water levels may further limit boating access, the bureau said.

In Colorado, cities and water utilities are calling for residents with lawns and gardens to make voluntary water cutbacks. In some cases, they are implementing drought restrictions.

Some environmental advocacy groups, including Western Resource Advocates, are pushing Reclamation to time releases to mimic natural conditions to benefit native and endangered fish and other aquatic species if they have to make releases from upstream reservoirs. 

There are endangered fish in the Green River below Flaming Gorge that could benefit if the drought response releases replicate the natural surge of water during spring runoff.

“The water is going to Powell regardless, so let’s do it in a way that actually provides some benefit along the way,” said John Berggren, WRA’s regional policy manager for the healthy rivers department.

In a joint statement earlier this month, governors from the four Upper Basin states — Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming — said their states are actively cutting off water users, like farmers and ranchers.

“This is an unprecedented year on the Colorado River, and likely will be one of the worst on record,” governors from four upstream states, including Colorado, said in a news release this month. “A dry year like this reminds us of why it is critical that all who rely on this resource learn to live within its means and adapt our uses accordingly.”

In early April, the governors spoke in favor of releasing water from Flaming Gorge or other upstream reservoirs, as long as the releases comply with existing agreements and reservoirs eventually recover the water they lost because of the drought release.

“We must have a clear understanding of how these proposed releases will effectively protect elevations at Lake Powell,” the governors said. “Once the releases conclude, we expect that all water released from Flaming Gorge and other upstream reservoirs will be fully recovered.”

This year’s water challenges come at a time of transition, Reclamation said. The existing agreements that guided Colorado River reservoir operations for 20 years are set to expire this year. 

The seven basin states have not reached consensus on a new operating framework, the bureau said. 

Without that agreement, the Interior Department, which oversees the bureau, “will be prepared to determine operations for post-2026 later this summer to provide certainty and stability for the Colorado River Basin,” Reclamation said.

The first time Toni Fernandez got high off opioids, the pills were stolen from a little orange bottle in a friend’s parent’s medicine cabinet. She was in the seventh grade, growing up in Alamosa, the region of Colorado flooded with the most prescription opioids during the height of the opioid epidemic.

“One of the kids in our school, I guess his dad was prescribed large amounts of narcotics,” Fernandez said. “And he would just bring them and share them with us.”

Alamosa, in the high-desert basin of the San Luis Valley, was flooded with more than 17 million prescription pain pills between 2006 and 2019, equating to 77 pills per resident per year. Two worlds coexist in the quaint rural town. In one, children play in the park next to the Rio Grande while neighbors wave hello to each other along Main Street. In the other, a mass dumping of opioids has led to life-altering addictions that have broken families, devastated bank accounts and left some without homes.

Fernandez found herself living in the latter world. At 21 years old, she was prescribed Percocet and Valium for a back injury. Once the pain resolved, she continued to chase the euphoric high the pills brought her.

“Living the fast life, doing drugs, selling drugs, all the things — that was just the culture,” Fernandez said. 

From there, Fernandez struggled through years of addiction, moving to meth and heroin when pills sold on the street got too expensive.

In 2020, Fernandez sought medical treatment for her addiction, accessing Medicaid, the federal government’s health insurance program for the poor and disabled, to pay for drug treatment that played a central role in her journey of recovery.

“For the first two and a half years of my recovery, I was using a Vivitrol shot, which was like a godsend,” she said, referring to a prescription drug used to treat addiction by blocking opioid receptors and reducing cravings.

But these days, the passage of Medicaid cuts under the Trump administration may make the treatments that helped turn Fernandez’s life around inaccessible to the many still struggling in Alamosa and throughout the valley. Under new work requirements and federal funding cuts, those in need of costly treatments for their addictions may face insurmountable financial barriers.

Without insurance, treatments that help curb withdrawal symptoms like Vivitrol cost around $1,000 to $1,500 per monthly injection. Suboxone, a similar treatment, costs between $150 and $500 for a 30-day supply. For someone in Fernandez’s situation, accessing these treatments without any form of insurance is nearly impossible.

“We have some of the poorest counties in Colorado, and then you add that substance use disorder on top of it (and) the lack of being able to work,” said Melissa Dominguez, a nurse and lifelong resident of the valley. She is a member of the Colorado Opioid Abatement Council who spends her time connecting people struggling with substance use disorder to recovery resources.

“It’s just not really attainable for them to be able to go to the pharmacy and pick up their script and pay a couple hundred dollars every week, or even once a month,” Dominguez said. 

Cutting holes in the safety net

The budget reconciliation bill, passed in July 2025, cuts federal funding for Medicaid by 15% over the course of 10 years. Additionally, new Medicaid provisions planned for 2027 will require nondisabled adults under the age of 65 who are childless or the parents of older teenagers to prove that they are working, volunteering or attending school for at least 80 hours a month.

 While people with substance use disorder are explicitly excluded from the work requirements, there are no written guidelines within the provisions that define how individuals can prove their exemption. 

According to Deborah Steinberg, a senior health policy attorney at the nonprofit Legal Action Center, these cuts will have dramatic consequences for substance use disorder treatment.

“We know that any cuts, whether it’s to eligibility categories or to benefits, are just going to make treatment less affordable and less accessible,” Steinberg said. “For a lot of providers, Medicaid is also their largest revenue source so it means that some providers might close.”

There is also no standardized way states will implement the exemptions or define substance use disorder, Steinberg added. She worries that many people who would qualify for an exemption for their substance use disorder could fall through the cracks and lose coverage without a formal diagnosis.

“We’re going to miss a lot of folks,” Steinberg said. “I fear these exemptions are just not going to be enough to actually protect people as they were theoretically intended.”

The Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing estimated that the implementation of these work requirements would affect 375,000 Coloradans.

And while crackdowns by the Drug Enforcement Administration have reduced opioid prescriptions, street drugs like heroin and fentanyl are becoming new vices for people formerly dependent on their doctor-approved medications. Dominguez said many of her patients were first prescribed opioids for pain then were abruptly cut off, prompting them to move on to illicit drugs. 

When her prescriptions ran out, Fernandez felt she needed to fill the void. She stopped showing up to her job as a certified nursing assistant and began working different jobs — often waitressing — to earn quick money. In 2013 she began using heroin and, that same year, became pregnant with her youngest son. From there, Fernandez was in and out of jail, stealing to support her addiction. 

“People think of being a mom and being an addict, that we love the drug more than we love our kids, which is never the case,” Fernandez said. “It’s just all the trauma that’s surrounded our circumstances that keeps us there and we just don’t see a way out.”

As a high schooler, Fernandez had a 4.0 GPA and received multiple acceptance letters from universities. But, she said, substance abuse was normalized by her parents throughout her youth. When she was 17 years old, her father, who struggled with a dependency to alcohol and cocaine, died by suicide. Addiction was always in close proximity, so Fernandez followed the paths carved out by the generations before her.

“I call it valley-minded because we just don’t see outside of it,” Fernandez said. “I had never had anybody in my life show me that there was something bigger than what was here.”

Judy McNeilsmith, the director of operations and program services at La Puente, a nonprofit organization in Alamosa, said that it’s difficult to break habits and escape social groups that encourage substance abuse in the small, rural communities sprawled across the valley.

“You can’t live in a rural area without going to the grocery store and seeing somebody you know so it’s really hard to break those patterns,” McNeilsmith said.

Stopping a destructive cycle

At La Puente’s homeless shelter, on a quiet Saturday afternoon, employees serve bolognese pasta, mashed potatoes and bread. People eat their meals by a box full of Narcan, a nasal spray used to reverse opioid overdose, that is free to take. Many of the people at the shelter, McNeilsmith said, have struggled or are actively struggling with substance use disorder. She said that some people lost their homes after struggling with addiction, while others have stories that reverse that order.

“It’s kind of like the chicken and the egg,” McNeilsmith said. “Poverty begets crisis and crisis — you do what you can do to get money.”

By 2020, Fernandez had enough. She was in jail for drug charges and her kids were nearing the age she was when she tried her first prescription pill. The fear that they might repeat the same cycle that was drowning her was mortifying.

“I know how old I was when I started experimenting, so that kind of hit hard,” Fernandez said. “I just totally started rebuilding my life.”

Once she was released, Fernandez began her journey in sober living and, with Dominguez’s guidance, accessed the medication-assisted treatment that helped lift her from where she’d been stuck. She received Vivitrol shots for the first two and a half years of her recovery.

“It just took away the cravings and the thoughts. I didn’t like the smell of barbecue sauce, vinegar — any of that stuff — because it smelled like the heroin. And when I was taking the Vivitrol, that just wasn’t there,” Fernandez said.

Fernandez accessed these treatments through Medicaid. Without it, she said, she likely would not have been able to receive them and doesn’t know what her alternative treatment paths could have been. She actively works as a recovery coach for Hard Beauty, a nonprofit organization that offers peer support to those struggling with or recovering from addiction. Her clients, Fernandez said, also rely on Medicaid to pay for her coaching services.

McNeilsmith worries that Medicaid cuts will decimate the health care services for those in recovery across the valley. Approximately two in five residents in Alamosa County rely on Medicaid, and, for hospitals and treatment centers in the region, Medicaid makes up a significant portion of the payments they receive. If people lose their Medicaid coverage, these institutions will not get that money. McNeilsmith worries that with some residents losing their Medicaid, local hospitals could face devastating financial strain and be forced to close.

“We are a high-poverty area and adding those additional requirements is going to really impact the safety net and have folks with no resources,” McNeilsmith said.

New hope in the valley

One of these resources is a new detox and rehabilitation center that just celebrated its first anniversary in July.

The center opened with some help from the projected $880 million in opioid settlement funds paid by pharmaceutical companies to the state of Colorado following lawsuits over their role in the opioid crisis.

South of Main Street, nestled between railroad tracks and the Alamosa County Jail, is the aptly named Hope in the Valley. Its staff describes it as the only full-scale treatment center with withdrawal management in the San Luis Valley. Community members say it brought much-needed support to the area. The long one-story brick building is split: one side is a detox with a 10-person capacity and the other is a residential treatment program that houses up to 15 patients.

On the rehabilitation side, residents take part in a ceremony for two individuals who will soon be graduates of the program. David Herrera, the center’s community engagement coordinator, shares his favorite stories of the two residents as the room bursts into chuckles. Herrera expresses excitement that, with one of the graduates gone, he will now be the funniest person at Hope in the Valley again. The room joins hands in prayer for the two and wishes them well in their recovery journeys outside the brick walls.

Herrera himself struggled through addiction. In the backyard of the facility — which for now is just asphalt, a chicken coop, some chairs and a basketball court — Herrera says he wants to build a labyrinth for residents to walk through, a representation of the addiction and recovery process he found himself in. Herrera sought treatment for alcohol addiction in Estes Park and said that when he told his case manager he would be moving on to the valley, she expressed hesitation.

“She just said, ‘David I’m going to be honest with you. There’s not a lot of resources down in the valley,’” Herrera said. “This was only two and a half years ago.”

At that time, Herrera said, there were only about four Alcoholics Anonymous meetings a week in Alamosa. But now there are daily recovery meetings hosted by Hope in the Valley that are open to the public. According to Herrera, this shift has been needed.

“The psychological defeat from the opioids has been devastating to our community. You have people that have lost family members to this addiction — moms and uncles and dads and the whole thing,” Herrera said. “And you hear it all the time, but it’s very real here.”

Fernandez, who helps lead peer support groups at Hope in the Valley, witnessed many of her acquaintances and loved ones from her youth, including her own brother, fall victim to addiction.

“A lot of us are not here anymore,” Fernandez said.

However, Fernandez and Herrera say, because of the opening of the center, there’s more local support for people struggling with addiction.

“The first time I went to treatment, I had to go to Pueblo,” Fernandez said. “And now this treatment center has built more of a community — which I love — for all of us, not just the people that have been here.”

This community is also reliant on Medicaid. Most residents, Herrera said, use Medicaid to access Hope in the Valley’s detox treatment, 30-day residential program, any necessary hospitalizations, intensive outpatient treatment, telehealth services and medically-assisted treatment.

On a brisk Saturday in November, outside Milagros Coffee House, a focal point of downtown Alamosa, a small number of protesters gather, holding signs reading, “Medicaid protects your family” and “Unite and resist” as cars pass through the intersection.

McNeilsmith says, given the impact cuts in government benefits would have for many valley residents, the community has been protesting for health care access and rallying around food drives. This community-based activism and support is not well-recognized by the rest of the state, according to Dominguez.

“A lot of times I feel like up north they don’t see the community that we do have here,” Dominguez said. “Compared to Denver, compared to Greeley, we don’t have half of some of the resources that they have. But the resources we do have, we work really hard to connect with each other and get people connected to the resources that are going to be best for them.”

Fernandez is grateful for this community and with its backing, she’s been able to raise her kids in a healthier environment. Instead of experimenting with prescription drugs, they play basketball at the local recreation center. Still, many of the people and resources in this environment rely on Medicaid, and cuts could make the already precarious and difficult process of recovery more so.

“I think there would be people a lot worse off,” Fernandez said. “To cut somebody off their medication — people are just going to go full blown back into addiction.”

GRAND JUNCTION — In a Colorado Mesa University ballroom Tuesday, about 200 farmers, water professionals and community members watched as the Colorado River District staff flipped through graph after graph during a presentation. 

Each new slide had one fundamental message: Colorado and downstream states are heading into summer with epicly poor water conditions. 

“If there’s anything in your memory about a dry year that you’ve seen, a warm year that you’ve seen, 2026 is beyond all of that,” said Raquel Flinker, the district’s director of interstate and regional water resources.

Research groups, news organizations and water officials have been blaring warnings about the worst snowpack in history and water supply concerns heading into the summer. In some ways, conditions are so bad, the state is headed into uncharted territory, experts said. In the face of a worrisome year, farmers, reservoir operators and city utilities are focused on getting the best data possible. They’re turning to scientists and pilots with newfangled snowpack measurement methods — plus the tried-and-true measurement methods used since the early 1900s.

Their goal: Figure out how to use a scant water supply as effectively as possible.

“There’s not a lot of snow out there, nor has there been,” said Jeff Deems, co-founder and chief technical officer with Airborne Snow Observatories Inc. “We’ve had very little snow and it’s melting early.”

The ASO teams found themselves in a flurry of activity in March. The company, born out of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, takes to the skies and slopes each year to snag snow measurements using laser technology and staff members’ own two feet. 

Their flights provide a highly detailed and accurate snapshot of conditions in each watershed. Water managers use the ASO lidar maps (short for a remote sensing method called light detection and ranging) to complement federal data. In all, it gives reservoir operators, city water utilities and water officials a better idea of how much water is in the mountains — and what their summer water supply might be.

ASO did 18 flights in seven days across Colorado, from St. Vrain and Big Thompson watersheds in northern Colorado to the Rio Grande, Boulder Creek, Roaring Fork and Dolores watersheds in central and southern parts of the state. What they found was more grim data.

“It’s been pretty frantic,” Deems said.

Fine-tuning the data

Mountain snowpack is a vital water source for Coloradans and downstream communities in 19 states and Mexico. For decades, Colorado communities have relied on federal data provided by snow-telemetry stations, which often feature small sheds outfitted with scientific gear in remote parts of the mountains.

These measurement stations, called the SNOTEL network, provide continuous data and many stations have accrued decades of historical data.

The network has been around since the 1970s and is made up of over 900 stations in the West, 114 of which are in Colorado. Researchers have been taking widespread manual measurements since the early 1900s.

According to SNOTEL data, Colorado’s snowpack was at 24% of its 30-year norm as of Wednesday, the same date, April 8, that usually marks its peak each year. The snowpack for the roughly 250,000-square-mile Colorado River Basin was at about 25% of its norm, according to a Colorado Basin River Forecast Center update Tuesday morning — one day after the basin’s normal peak date, April 6.

But SNOTEL stations miss snow below 9,000 feet and above 12,000 feet. They are a point measurement: They don’t, and can’t, actually measure an entire basin.

ASO flights capture all elevations in a watershed, instead of just one point. In the past these flights have found more water in Colorado watersheds than appeared in SNOTEL data. But the flights only provide a snapshot of winter conditions, on a certain day at a certain time, instead of a continuous historical record.

This year, not so much. Some parts of watersheds are doing better or worse than indicated by the SNOTEL stations, Deems said. But by and large, the ASO data is lining up with SNOTEL measurements and federal river forecast centers.

“There is quite a lot less snow than we’re used to having. No surprise there,” he said. 

The ASO teams flew over the Blue River watershed near Silverthorne and Breckenridge. The terrain funnels water into the 65-mile waterway that eventually flows into the Colorado River, the lifeblood for communities, farms, environments and industries in much of the Southwest and parts of northern Mexico.

The Blue River also feeds Dillon Reservoir, an important water source for Denver Water, Colorado’s oldest water utility, and about 1.5 million people in the Denver area.

For most of the watershed, the snowpack on March 20 was about half what it was on April 11, 2025. 

But ASO also found variations in watersheds. Some areas are substantially worse than last year. Other parts are about the same as last year, he said. 

And knowing exactly where water is — and isn’t — can help reservoir managers and city planners use water more efficiently this summer.

“That’s not like a miracle save or anything,” Deems said. “But what that says is that there’s enough complexity out there that we need to measure it carefully so that those managers understand that there may be more water in parts of their watersheds than is suggested by one or two (SNOTEL) stations.”

Planning for a hot, dry summer

As snowpack melts, irrigation district managers in the Grand Valley, an area with some of the most secure, reliable and oldest water rights in the state, are trying to decide how to handle their water supply for the summer, some said at the Colorado River District gathering Tuesday.

Long-time peach growers in Palisade are keeping an eye on the skies as they aim for efficient water use. 

Everybody is trying to be very cautious, said Priscilla Walker, a Palisade resident whose family has owned peach orchards for decades. 

“Peaches don’t use the water as much as alfalfa and subdivisions,” she said. “Would you rather have the best peaches in the world or fountains, neon signs, swimming pools and Kentucky bluegrass lawns? That’s really the choice because we have no control over how much water falls.”

The next question for water managers is: How much will actually end up in reservoirs? 

Some of the snow simply turns directly into water vapor in a process called sublimation. Plants and soils suck up snowmelt as it passes through watersheds toward rivers. Some water can evaporate along the way.

“All of these factors affect what fraction of the snowpack we get as runoff,” Deems said. “Last year, one of the stories was that runoff efficiency was quite low. Given the hot, dry, windy weather that we’ve had, we might expect similarly very low runoff efficiencies this year.”