California, Arizona, and Nevada have reached an agreement to take less water from the Colorado River in an effort to save Lake Mead near Las Vegas, which declared a water shortage for the first time in its history earlier this year.
Western states are struggling with a crippling drought, in which recent rains and snowstorms have barely made a dent.
While more winter storms are predicted, the effect on reservoir levels and river flow is not likely to be significant, at least for several months.
The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday:
The agreement, which was signed Wednesday after four months of negotiations, aims to keep an extra 1 million acre-feet of water in the lake over the next two years. Water agencies in Southern California, Arizona and Nevada agreed to find water savings from various sources and split the $200-million cost with the federal government.
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The Colorado River provides water for about 40 million people and farmlands from Wyoming to the U.S.-Mexico border.
The Times cited global warming as a cause of the dry conditions, though there is evidence that the 19th and 20th centuries, during which much of the West was settled, were unusually wet in the region, compared to the historic record of rainfall.
California has not built a major reservoir in decades, though a smaller project in Santa Clara County appears to be on track.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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