TY - JOUR
T1 - The Three Colorado Rivers
T2 - Hydrologic, Infrastructural, and Economic Flows of Water in a Shared River Basin
AU - Rushforth, Richard R.
AU - Zegre, Nicolas P.
AU - Ruddell, Benjamin L.
N1 - Funding Information:
Multiple awards have supported the authors during the development of this manuscript. First, this work has been supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. ACI‐1639529 (Ruddell and Rushforth), OIA‐148952 (Zegre), and CBET‐2115169 (Rushforth). Second, the authors acknowledge funding from the “Reanalyzing and predicting U.S. water use by economic history and forecast data; an experiment in short‐range national hydroeconomic data synthesis” Working Group supported by the John Wesley Powell Center for Analysis and Synthesis, funded by the U.S. Geological Survey. U.S. Geological Survey Grant/Cooperative Agreement No. G20AP00002 (Ruddell and Rushforth). Finally, this work has been supported by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture Hatch Project, grant number 1004360 (Zegre). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and U.S. Geological Survey.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 American Water Resources Association.
PY - 2022/4
Y1 - 2022/4
N2 - The Colorado River Basin is a hydrologic river network that directs runoff from rain and snow falling on mountains, primarily in Colorado and Wyoming, to the Colorado River Delta in Mexico. Over the last century, in response to basin-wide water shortages, legal agreements between stakeholders in seven U.S. states and Mexico, hydrologic flows from users on the main stem of the river have been reallocated to junior water rights holders. Municipalities, businesses, farmers, and households utilize the Colorado River water to produce and trade valuable, water-derived goods and services, which effectively reallocates water through a continually adapting, boundary-free economic river network providing indirect access to "virtual" Colorado River water. We conceptualize the Colorado River Basin as a multiplex network comprised of interdependent natural flow networks, direct (infrastructural) flow networks, and indirect (virtual) flow networks. Using this reframing, we quantify the total hydrosocial impact of the Drought Contingency Plan (DCP) on Lower Basin states. For each Mm3 of water reduced through the DCP, Arizona, Nevada, and California lose an additional 0.42–0.43 Mm3, 0.33–0.51 Mm3, and 1.06–1.10 Mm3 of virtual water flow, respectively. Hence, the DCP will require Arizona, Nevada, and Southern California to restructure how they use water, relying less on direct and indirect consumption of the Colorado River water and finding more indirect water sources outside that basin.
AB - The Colorado River Basin is a hydrologic river network that directs runoff from rain and snow falling on mountains, primarily in Colorado and Wyoming, to the Colorado River Delta in Mexico. Over the last century, in response to basin-wide water shortages, legal agreements between stakeholders in seven U.S. states and Mexico, hydrologic flows from users on the main stem of the river have been reallocated to junior water rights holders. Municipalities, businesses, farmers, and households utilize the Colorado River water to produce and trade valuable, water-derived goods and services, which effectively reallocates water through a continually adapting, boundary-free economic river network providing indirect access to "virtual" Colorado River water. We conceptualize the Colorado River Basin as a multiplex network comprised of interdependent natural flow networks, direct (infrastructural) flow networks, and indirect (virtual) flow networks. Using this reframing, we quantify the total hydrosocial impact of the Drought Contingency Plan (DCP) on Lower Basin states. For each Mm3 of water reduced through the DCP, Arizona, Nevada, and California lose an additional 0.42–0.43 Mm3, 0.33–0.51 Mm3, and 1.06–1.10 Mm3 of virtual water flow, respectively. Hence, the DCP will require Arizona, Nevada, and Southern California to restructure how they use water, relying less on direct and indirect consumption of the Colorado River water and finding more indirect water sources outside that basin.
KW - Colorado River
KW - drought
KW - hydrosocial
KW - interdependent flow networks
KW - virtual water
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U2 - 10.1111/1752-1688.12997
DO - 10.1111/1752-1688.12997
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85125072060
SN - 1093-474X
VL - 58
SP - 269
EP - 281
JO - Journal of the American Water Resources Association
JF - Journal of the American Water Resources Association
IS - 2
ER -