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January 12, 2024
The Colorado River comprising the border between California and Arizona. On its shores in Arizona, land has been converted for agriculture. Credit: Google Earth
The Colorado River has been a source of power, growth, and dispute in the southwestern United States since its waters were first diverted by European settlers in the early 1800s. Over the last two decades, increasing temperatures, urban growth, and a lengthy drought have contributed to rising tensions between the river's stewards and those who hold rights to water withdrawals. The river’s two largest reservoirs, Lake Powell and Lake Mead, hit historic lows in 2021 and again in 2022, spurring a decision to renegotiate the Colorado River Compact of 1922 to prevent the reservoirs from reaching “dead pool”—the level at which their waters no longer flow downstream and their dams can no longer produce electricity.
The compact, or agreement, establishes water allotments for the seven “basin” states—Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, California, Nevada, and Arizona—that rely on the river, as well as for 30 federally-recognized tribal nations and Mexico. In May of 2023, the most recent round of negotiations concluded with guidelines for water management through 2026. The resulting agreement saw the river’s Lower Basin states, Arizona, California, and Nevada, volunteer to cut their withdrawals by an aggregate 3 million acre-feet of water. These cuts promise to secure potable water for 40 million people, maintain electricity production in the two reservoirs, and send ripples through the region's thirstiest industry, agriculture.
Agriculture is responsible for almost 80 percent of water consumption in the basin states, with 55 percent going to forage crops such as water-intensive alfalfa. Other industries diverting from the Colorado River account for only about 4 percent of use, while residential uses account for 12 percent.
The agricultural sector’s water use is defensible both legally (farmers and ranchers have some of the most senior water rights in the region) and economically (the Lower Basin’s crop yield is worth about $600 million). However, as the largest water user in the region by far, the industry has inevitably been targeted for cuts.
Gene Shawcroft is the current chair of the Colorado River Authority of Utah and has spent his career working in western water management. In an interview with EESI, he described the economic and environmental impacts of water cuts on the agricultural sector, as well as methods for adapting.
“In small, rural communities, water cuts leave farmers unable to irrigate all of their fields, which has ripples across the whole community,” Shawcroft cautioned. “Along with lower revenue from lower crop yields, lack of equipment use directly impacts those who repair or sell farm equipment for a living.”
Shawcroft also highlighted how water cuts in the agricultural sector may impact wildlife. “When irrigation ditches run dry or are replaced with systems that use less water, it destroys the conditions needed for quail, pheasants, and other animals to nest,” he said.
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) (P.L. 117-169) allocates $4 billion in federal funds for water conservation projects in the basin states, $1.2 billion of which would go to users in three basin states, contingent upon successful water usage reduction measures in those states. These funds could also pay for the leasing and purchasing of water rights from farmers and ranchers. The lease or sale of water rights in the agricultural sector can lead to the disuse of farmland. Although this can offer some benefits in the short term, over time disuse can push farmworkers into economic instability, disproportionately impacting rural areas and destabilizing food systems. In an attempt to avoid these damages and adapt to water cuts, farmers and ranchers across the southwest have begun to experiment with alternative crops and land uses that may keep their farms and communities alive.
A solar farm in Arizona, operated by Nestle Purina. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
One of the most appealing alternative uses for farmland in the southwest is the installation of solar panels. Leveraging their sunny climates, some farmers have begun leasing their land to solar companies or installing panels themselves and selling the power to local utilities. In states with ambitious clean energy goals such as California, using farmland to generate solar power can support those goals while meeting energy demand and driving down the cost of power. Selling or leasing land for solar use also eases some stress as farmers face an uncertain future in an increasingly arid climate. Solar power provides a reliable income comparable to crop yield as well as some resilience to extreme temperatures, wildfires, and low water availability.
Despite the clear benefits of solar, bringing a new industry into rural areas whose economies are typically dependent on agriculture can have adverse effects. Among these is the loss of jobs for farmworkers and workers in adjacent industries. While installing solar does promote jobs in the clean energy sector, without proper retraining, those positions cannot be filled by existing farmworkers. There are also equity challenges. A lack of demand or grid infrastructure in less populated communities can force farmers to sell solar-generated electricity to the nearest urban area, leading to an uneven distribution of costs and benefits. The most obvious barrier for members of the agricultural sector interested in solar is its upfront cost. In leasing agreements, it is not uncommon for solar companies to cover the cost of the solar installation. But for farmers and ranchers interested in owning their panels, construction costs can add up to $500,000 per acre. While some economic support is available through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Energy for America and Business & Industry Loan Guarantee programs, additional investment at the local, state, and federal level is essential to encourage solar as an option for farmers and ranchers in drought-impacted areas.
Members of the agricultural community have also taken a mixed-use approach to solar in an emerging practice dubbed agrivoltaics. Agrivoltaics uses land for both solar power and agriculture, creating a symbiotic relationship between the two. The practice allows farmers and ranchers to diversify their income and increase their climate resilience, and provides additional benefits—including lower energy costs. It also yields advantages for the growing process itself. Planting shade-tolerant crops beneath raised solar panels can lower water use by slowing the rate of evaporation and trapping moisture in the soil for extended periods. If panels are placed high enough, livestock can graze underneath, limiting their heat stress. Early adopters of agrivoltaics have also observed a decrease in frost impacts as soil beneath the panels holds onto heat in colder temperatures.
Farms experiencing water shortages have also begun to experiment with new water-efficient crops.
“Farmers are being encouraged, and in some cases required, to use crops that are less water-intensive,” Shawcroft said. “For example, if they go from alfalfa to corn, corn uses less water than alfalfa, which can help make permanent reductions to water use.”
Planting new crops is another way to diversify income and increase resilience to water scarcity and other climate impacts without taking on some of the dramatic changes associated with solar. Across the basin states, universities and other research centers have invested in testing new crops that could replace some of the thirstier forage crops currently being grown with Colorado River water. For example, their studies have shown that Kernza, a strain of wheatgrass, uses 30 percent less water than alfalfa while maintaining a high yield and providing nutrient-dense forage. Other viable alternatives to some of the most commonly-grown crops in the West include drought-tolerant species of grapes, chia, and sorghum. Some farmers have ventured into entirely new markets, growing species such as the remarkably low-water agave to insulate their crops from drought impacts. Guayule, a fibrous shrub native to Mexico, uses half the water that other commercial crops require and could be used to feed domestic rubber supplies (currently, most rubber trees are grown in Asia). Both crops have attracted investment from the public and private sectors.
Projections from climate models indicate that the drought currently gripping the West is unlikely to ease in the near future. Adapting to an increasingly arid climate is in the best interest of not only the agricultural workers of the region, but of the United States as a whole. While funding designated by the IRA could mitigate the economic effects of water cuts made today, greater support for exploring long-term sustainable solutions will inevitably be needed in the future. Shawcroft is confident that further support would not be wasted on an inactive or disengaged industry.
“Farmers and ranchers are eternal optimists,” Shawcroft contended. “You might not think that when you talk to them because they have to talk about water and there’s never enough of it, but they’re optimists in that they continue to find ways to adapt to changing circumstances.”
Author: Maggie Christianson
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