From The Albuquerque Journal (John Fleck):
…before I got to Ghost Ranch on Friday afternoon, I took the turnoff to Abiquiu Reservoir. In drought-parched New Mexico, this is the one reservoir that has a lot of water. It glistened blue-green beneath a bowl of rust-red cliffs, shimmering in a brisk afternoon wind. For fans of cooperation, there is hope in plans for a release beginning today or Wednesday out of Abiquiu, a big slug of municipal water now in storage to try to boost the meager flow of the Rio Grande. The water is part of whatever the opposite of a “rainy day fund” might be, water the Albuquerque agency has been importing into the Chama Basin from the headwaters of the San Juan River and stashing at Abiquiu for later use. Even in this dry year, Albuquerque has a smartly acquired stockpile.
For about three weeks, Albuquerque will release about 200 million gallons of that water per day, running it down the Chama, into the Rio Grande north of Española, and down through Albuquerque to eventually to drought-depleted Elephant Butte Reservoir. It’s not a donation. Under its water rights permits, Albuquerque is required to make up some of the water its groundwater pumping indirectly sucks out of the Rio Grande as the river flows through the metro area.
The most efficient way for Albuquerque to do that is to move the water in the dead of winter, when evaporation losses are lowest, sending it down to Elephant Butte to make up for the impact of pumping on the river. Moving it now instead, Albuquerque will lose about 10 percent to 15 percent of it to evaporation, according to John Stomp, the Albuquerque water utility’s chief operating officer.