Managing future water supplies in the Colorado River Basin in the southwestern United States requires an interdisciplinary systems approach

The Colorado River and its interbasin transfers supply water to 40 million people including 30 federally recognized Native American Tribes in the United States and to 2.3 million people in Mexico. Over 80 percent of consumptive use is for agriculture. The growing Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Tucson metropolitan areas also depend on Colorado River water. Future management of the Colorado River in the context of prolonged regional drought requires a systems approach because the conflicting societal goals related to Unsolved Problems in Hydrology (UPH) #22 require difficult trade-offs among the stakeholders involved. The U.S. National Science Foundation funded the Lake Powell Research Project (LPRP) from 1971 to 1978 on the impacts of coal and water development in the Colorado River Basin. IAHS Past President (1970-1971) William Ackermann helped geophysicists Orson Anderson and Charles Drake create LPRP. Allen Kneese helped LPRP develop a systems approach to coordinate 19 subprojects at 9 institutions with 26 Senior Investigators in natural and social sciences, law and medicine. LPRP revealed serious past water deficits in the Colorado River Basin through tree ring studies, found that energy-related industrialization was not significantly improving the economic condition of the Navajo people, and identified systemic threats to indigenous water rights. The LPRP success in addressing the issues in UPH #22 and training new interdisciplinary practitioners was due to its equal balance of natural and social scientists recruited for their individual prominence and expertise in their respective fields, and their willingness to collaborate with specialists in other disciplines.
The 28th IUGG General Assembly (IUGG2023) (Berlin 2023)