Others, including the Yampa River and the headwaters of the Colorado itself, did not break records but saw snowpack shrink to 70 percent or less of average.
A big reason is that Lake Powell has been used to keep Lake Mead from sinking to an elevation of 1,075ft, the point at which the federal government must declare a water shortage under a 2007 agreement.
This would cause mandatory water delivery cuts to the Lower Basin states, triggering widespread water rationing.
If the Lower Basin declares a compact call, Kenney says, it would surely be contested by Upper Basin water users.
And Lake Powell is likely to go on shrinking as long as these water releases continue.
Most of this growth will occur on the Front Range, from Fort Collins to Colorado Springs, a region served by water imported by tunnels through the Rockies from the state’s West Slope.
Known as the System Conservation Pilot Program, it paid farmers to fallow crops, allowing the saved water to flow downstream to Lake Powell.
But over three years, it saved only about 22,000 acre-feet of water at a cost of $4.6 million.
Today, any water that reaches Lake Powell is fair game to be sent on to Lake Mead and the Lower Basin states.
One is that Colorado River water users need to stop thinking of the watershed as two separate basins.