The 2011-2012 Monthly Speaker and Conference series, sponsored by The Colorado College’s State of the Rockies Project, continues to draw hundreds of students, faculty and area residents. The series, titled “The Colorado River Basin: Use, Restoration and Sustainability as if the Next Generation Counts,” features experts talking each month through February about issues surrounding the Colorado River.

On Monday night in the Celeste South Theater, located in the college’s Cornerstone Arts Building, the project presented “Environmental Perspectives and Action.” Three experts participated:

• Bart Miller, the water program director of the Western Resource Advocates, a nonprofit law and policy organization that influences water use through lobbying, civil litigation and legislation;
• Jennifer Pitt, a manager of the Environmental Defense Fund who focuses on legal and policy issues involving the Colorado River; and
• Tom Chart, director of the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program.

For millions of years, the Colorado River was an unbroken chain from the headwaters of Longs Peak in the Colorado Rockies to the Sea of Cortez delta in Mexico. But since 1998, overuse of the river’s water has left 90 miles of dry delta.

The Bureau of Reclamation maintains that Westerners are using every drop of the river, yet the demand for its water is expected to increase substantially over the next decades. The federal government says use of the river is expected to increase 8.5 percent by 2050.

Monday night, Miller, Pitt and Chart discussed problems and solutions involving the river.

Miller told about 350 people attending that oil companies have bought up water rights on the Colorado River in areas where they hope to mine for oil shale, which uses tremendous amounts of water and energy to squeeze oil out of rock. He also said the Flaming Gorge pipeline, if completed, will drain 250,000 acre feet from the Green River, which will greatly impact recreational activities on the river in Wyoming, and result in extremely expensive water for Coloradoans.

He suggested that through legislation, oil companies and the proposed pipeline can be limited in their river-water allocation. Miller also said that now is the time for parks along the river to legally nail down their future water rights. An example is Colorado’s Gunnison National Park, which three years ago won water rights that will keep substantial river water flowing through it.

Pitt began her talk by pointing out that 25 to 30 million Americans drink the river water, and that agricultural needs account for 80 percent of river-water allocation.

But, she said, “we are now living in the age of limits,” as water supply cannot keep up with demand.

She explained that, during flood years, four times that of a year’s Colorado River flow is held in reservoirs, and that’s the only reason demand is being met today. “We sip and gulp our way through storage,” Pitt said.

She suggested that the solutions to balancing the integrity of the river with its utilitarian use are conservation; “alternative transfers,” which involves water sharing of, say, agriculture with city use; water banking, which, among other things, protects water for those least able to go without; and in-stream flow protections, which would monitor streams that normally flow into the river to make sure they weren’t being bled dry, which negatively impacts wildlife.

“There is growing recognition that we live in the age of limits,” Pitt said. The positive aspect of this is that “we might be able to right some of the wrongs done to this river.”

The final speaker was Chart, who is leading a team to protect endangered fishes in the Upper Colorado River Basin.

Chart said that there are four endangered fish species in the Upper Colorado. And though it’s been difficult, some headway has been made to protect them, with the biggest success story being the razorback sucker.

Helpful to the return of endangered native fishes is flow management of the river water through a delicate part of the Upper Colorado. “We are able to (control the water) at a time that makes biological sense,” he said.

Among the factors for native fish depletion is climate change, Chart said, but he didn’t elaborate.

For detail, you’ll have to wait till next month. The December 5 State of the Rockies speaker event will focus on the impact of climate change to the Colorado River Basin. Scheduled to speak are Beth Conover, a partner at Econover, LLC, a Denver consulting firm involved in climate change and resource sustainability issues; and Stephen Saunders, founder of Rocky Mountain Climate Organization and former deputy assistant of the U.S. Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

There will also be another update on two young men who in October set out on their goal of paddling the entire length of the Colorado River, which is expected to take four months. A video of their launching their rafts high in the Wyoming Rockies on the Green River was shown at Monday’s event.

The Conference and Speaker series continues through February. For more on its speakers and events, go to http://www2.coloradocollege.edu/stateoftherockies/speakerseries.html.

Written by Mark Barna, State of the Rockies Project Writer

Come out to the South Theater of the Cornerstone Arts Center on the CC campus at 7pm tonight to hear a panel on The Colorado River Basin- Environmental Perspectives and Action.

The panel will consist of experts from across the environmental field working on different issues throughout the Basin. Bart Miller, of Western Resource Advocates, heads up the organization’s water program. At WRA he works to promote urban water use efficiency, minimize water-related impacts of energy development, and protect and restore river flows. Jennifer Pitt manages the Environmental Defense Fund’s efforts on the Colorado River, specifically to restore the Delta and reform water policy. Her expertise includes the US-Mexico border environmental issues, the legal and policy framework for Colorado River management, the economics of water use and water transfers, and the science of river restoration. Tom Chart has spent his career largely working for State and Federal agencies and is now the Director of the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program. His graduate studies got him hooked on the native fishes of the Colorado River system when he studied the initial effects of mainstem impoundment on the fish community of Colorado’s White River, and he has largely remained in the field ever since.

Join us on Monday 11/7 @ 7pm in the South Theater of the Cornerstone Arts Center to hear a panel on The Colorado River Basin: Environmental Perspectives and Action.  The panel will consist of experts from across the environmental field working on different issues throughout the Basin. Bart Miller, of Western Resource Advocates, heads up the organization’s water program. At WRA he works to promote urban water use efficiency, minimize water-related impacts of energy development, and protect and restore river flows. Jennifer Pitt manages the Environmental Defense Fund’s efforts on the Colorado River, specifically to restore the Delta and reform water policy. Her expertise includes the US-Mexico border environmental issues, the legal and policy framework for Colorado River management, the economics of water use and water transfers, and the science of river restoration. Tom Chart has spent his career largely working for State and Federal agencies and is now the Director of the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program. His graduate studies got him hooked on the native fishes of the Colorado River system when he studied the initial effects of mainstem impoundment on the fish community of Colorado’s White River, and he has largely remained in the field ever since. To see more on each of our speakers for this event and information regarding the rest of this year’s Rockies Project Speakers Series go to the Rockies Project Speakers Series page.

For the third State of the Rockies Project Speakers Series event of the year, the Project will be hosting a panel on: The Colorado River Basin- Environmental Perspectives and Action. The panel will consist of experts from across the environmental field working on different issues throughout the Basin. Bart Miller, of Western Resource Advocates, heads up the organization’s water program. At WRA he works to promote urban water use efficiency, minimize water-related impacts of energy development, and protect and restore river flows. Jennifer Pitt manages the Environmental Defense Fund’s efforts on the Colorado River, specifically to restore the Delta and reform water policy. Her expertise includes the US-Mexico border environmental issues, the legal and policy framework for Colorado River management, the economics of water use and water transfers, and the science of river restoration. Tom Chart has spent his career largely working for State and Federal agencies and is now the Director of the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program. His graduate studies got him hooked on the native fishes of the Colorado River system when he studied the initial effects of mainstem impoundment on the fish community of Colorado’s White River, and he has largely remained in the field ever since.

For all of you who were unable to attend our second Speakers Series event of the year with Justice Gregory Hobbs and U of WY Professor of Law Larry MacDonnell on 10/17, here is a a short YouTube video covering some of the highlights of the talk:

Rockies Speakers Series: Hobbs and MacDonnell talk from 10/17/2011

Take a look at Chris Woodka’s article in the Pueblo Chieftain regarding last week’s Rockies Project Speakers Series event on the Law of the Colorado River Basin. The article speaks to the differing views of both men regarding the legal framework of the Basin: http://www.chieftain.com/news/local/colorado-river-law-time-for-change/article_f0e0e0a6-fdf3-11e0-85eb-001cc4c03286.html

For millions of years, the Colorado River was an unbroken chain from the headwaters of Longs Peak in the Colorado Rockies to the Sea of Cortez delta in Mexico. But since 1998, overuse of the river’s water has left 90 miles of dry delta.

The Bureau of Reclamation maintains that Westerners are using every drop of the river, yet the demand for its water is expected to increase substantially over the next decades.

What can be done to balance the growing utilitarian need and preservation of the Colorado River?

The laws governing the river were addressed Monday, Oct. 17, during the second of The Colorado College’s State of the Rockies Project 2011-12 Monthly Speaker and Conference Series. The series examines the use, restoration and sustainability of the Colorado River Basin.

Greg Hobbs, a Colorado Supreme Court judge, and Lawrence MacDonnell, a law professor at the University of Wyoming College of Law, talked to about 300 students, faculty and El Paso County residents in Celeste South Theater on The Colorado College campus in Colorado Springs. The event was titled “The Colorado River Basin: Rigid Relic or Flexible Foundation for the Future?”

Hobbs and MacDonnell spoke of preserving river water through sensible use, and of solutions to the perfect storm of more demand for a finite resource.

The speakers said areas for conservation might occur in the unreasonably high allocation of water to California’s Imperial Valley, which gets one-fifth of the Colorado River water, and the high cost of delivering river water to metropolitan Arizona.

Solutions involved placing a limit on how much water new projects can allocate and decreasing use by the Lower Colorado River Basin.

“All these are easily doable by existing laws of the river and some new laws,” MacDonnell said, though he wondered if, politically, any of it was possible.

“My guess is we’ll wait to the crisis happens, when reservoirs are empty,” MacDonnell said. As humans, “we tend to put off unpleasant tasks” until the last minute.

Hobbs and MacDonnell also said that Westerners don’t value water because they don’t realize its actual cost. “If people paid anything close to what water actually costs,” MacDonnell said, “you would have different decisions being made.”

A short Q & A followed the speaker presentations.

A student wondered how you get companies, city governments and consumers to use less water when legally they are allowed their quota. Neither of the speakers had a good answer.

The next State of the Rockies speaker event is November 7 at the campus. It’s titled “The Colorado River Basin: Environmental Perspectives and Action.” Speaking at that event will be Bart Miller, a water program director at Western Resource Advocates; Jennifer Pitt, manager of the Environmental Defense Fund; and Tom Chart, an expert on fish biology. All series events are free and open to the public.

For more on upcoming State of the Rockies speaker events, go to http://www2.coloradocollege.edu/stateoftherockies/speakerseries.html.

Written by Mark Barna, State of the Rockies Project Writer

The second State of the Rockies Speakers Series event of the year is tonight! Come join us at 7pm in the Celeste South Theater of the Cornerstone Arts Center on the CC campus to hear Colorado Supreme Court Justice Gregory Hobbs and U of WY Professor of Law Larry MacDonnell speak on The Law of the Colorado River Basin- Rigid Relic or Flexible Foundation for the Future?

The Colorado River Basin faces mounting challenges for the future, including the implications of climate change and the exploding demographic trends of the West. Roughly 27 million people rely on the river for water, energy, and healthy ecosystems. Studies predict that by 2050 the river system will be unable to meet the growing demand from the next generation. Can a nearly 90-year-old set of laws weather the turbulence of the 21st century? The Colorado River Basin is ruled by a compilation of decrees, rights, court decisions, and laws that together are referred to as the “Law of the River.” The keystone of these “commandments” is the 1922 Colorado River Compact, an interstate agreement created by the seven basin states with provisions for general water allotments. As municipalities, agriculture, and environmental interests jockey for continued water supplies in the face of projected diminished flows, will the Law of the River be able to bend under new stresses or will it break? For this talk, Colorado Supreme Court Justice Greg Hobbs and Colorado River legal scholar Professor Larry MacDonnell will discuss the implications of the river’s legal foundation for the next generation.

Come out to the Cornerstone Arts Center on the CC campus next Monday 10/17 to hear Supreme Court Justice Greg Hobbs and U of WY Law Professor Larry MacDonnell speak on The Law of the Colorado River Basin: Rigid Relic or Flexible Foundation for the Future?

In 1998, the Colorado River ran dry for the first time on its journey to Mexico’s Sea of Cortez, leaving 90 miles of dusty, cracked delta. Over a spec of time in human history, humankind turned a boiling, dynamic 1,450-mile natural wonder into a smelly, listless cappuccino pit at its delta.

This issue was addressed Monday during the kick-off to The Colorado College’s State of the Rockies Project 2011-12 Monthly Speaker and Conference Series. The series examines the use, restoration and sustainability of the Colorado River Basin.

Pete McBride, a nature photographer, and Jonathan Waterman, a nature writer, spoke at the campus’s Celeste South Theater in Colorado Springs, Colo., to about 450 students and guests about the river’s challenges. They also showed McBride’s 20-minute film, “Chasing Water,” and answered questions from the audience.

McBride and Waterman are no strangers to the Colorado River.

In May 2010, Waterman published “Running Dry: A Journey from Source to Sea Down the Colorado River,” which describes his 100 days paddling, with extended breaks, the snaking river from headwaters to delta between May 2008 and January 2009. Six months later, “The Colorado River: Flowing Through Conflict” was published, a 160-page coffee table book of astounding river photographs by McBride and text by Waterman.

Waterman told the audience how 80 percent of the river water is siphoned away for agriculture. He said agricultural laws in the seven Western states the river flows through need to be revisited, and asked whether it’s sustainable to raise cotton and cattle in a burning desert-like climate where water is so scarce.

Waterman also said that oil-shale development is being proposed by oil giants that would use an enormous amount of Colorado River water. Oil-shale development requires 5 gallons of water for every 1 gallon of oil mined, Waterman said.

McBride and Waterman asked the audience to be more aware of where they get their water (85 percent of Colorado Springs water is from the Colorado River, McBride pointed out) and that the resource is finite.

“When you ask too much of a limited resource, it disappears,” McBride said.

Each month through January, Colorado College’s State of the Rockies Project is presenting a speakers event on various issues that influence the Colorado River Basin. The next event is Oct. 17 at the Celeste South Theater in the Cornerstone Arts Building on the Colorado College campus in Colorado Springs, Colo.

The event is called “The Law of the Colorado River Basin: Rigid Relic or Flexible Foundation for the Future?” Speakers are Gregory Hobbs Jr., of the Colorado Supreme Court, and Larry MacDonnell, a professor at the University of Wyoming College of Law.

The Colorado River Basin speaker series is free and open to the public. For more information of the series, go to http://www2.coloradocollege.edu/stateoftherockies/.

by Mark Barna, State of the Rockies Project writer