NEWS: Ohio Avenue ribbon cutting, A11
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VOL. 143 NO. 43 | THURSDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2024 | $1.00
Gunnison Rising creditors meet in bankruptcy court GVP works to keep project viable Abby Harrison Times Staff Writer
All those who put money into Gunnison Rising had a chance to meet in bankruptcy court at the start of the month to question owners about the Rising A6
SPOOKY STORIES: Witches, unicorns and forest critters listened attentively to a series of haunting tales during a Super Saturday Storytime session at the Gunnison County Library on Oct. 19. For more, see A12. (Photo by Mariel Wiley)
Loss of spring moisture a culprit for TODAY missing water in Colorado River INSIDE
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Gunnison Basin research to continue in 2025 Bella Biondini Times Editor
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Reduced spring snow and rain falling in the West explain years of missing water in the Colorado River Basin, according to new research with a genesis in the East River corridor above Crested Butte. Generating water supply forecasts is a tricky task. The local water district has put a great deal of energy and money toward annual snow survey flights in the valley’s major drainages — an effort to create a more accurate picture of exactly how much water will be
available when the snow melts. Understanding how spring precipitation influences runoff later in the year may also help reduce forecast errors. For example, if it’s dry in May, the landscape not only lacks moisture from the sky, but may also see less snowmelt enter the river system later in the year. “The difference is you need to update the prediction more dramatically than you would think from the precipitation alone,” said Jessica Lundquist, one of the lead scientists on study. She is based at the University of Washington. The Upper Colorado River Basin, where the Gunnison Valley is located, produces approximately 90% of the water that flows through the Colorado River — a resource that more than 40 million people rely on for drinking water, hydropower, recreation and development. Much of this water originates
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high in the Rocky Mountains as snowfall, which then melts in the springtime and refills the reservoirs and rivers downstream.
“It’s [water] on a journey from the snowpack into the soil and plants and back into the atmosphere.” Ian Breckheimer RMBL scientist Winter snowpack levels have the largest influence on water supply forecasts, used to guide
reservoir operations and manage irrigation for the upcoming year. But it is not uncommon for forecasts to be inaccurate, especially in the spring, when weather is variable. For example, the average margin of error at Taylor Reservoir in May is 14%. This is the equivalent of 11,000 acre-feet of water (an acre-foot of water is the amount of water it takes to cover an acre of land one foot deep). At Blue Mesa Reservoir, in some years, the error has been up to a fourth of its volume, nearly a quarter million acre-feet. “If you take the error in each one of those reservoirs and add it up, that's a lot, I think, within one state, or one West Slope community,” said Sonja Chavez, general manager at the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District. To add to water supply forecast errors, during periods of drought, the amount of water
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