From email from Northern Water (Jeff Stahla):
Northern Water’s Board of Directors has set the initial 2023 quota for the Colorado-Big Thompson Project at 40 percent.
At its meeting on Thursday, Oct. 13, the Board voted to set the quota at 40 percent in light of uncertainty regarding Colorado River Basin hydrology and Northern Water’s commitment to system resiliency. In recent years, the initial quota had been set at 50 percent.
“This is what we need to do to protect the system for the long term,” said President Mike Applegate.
Quotas are expressed as a percentage of 310,000 acre-feet, the amount of water the C-BT Project was initially envisioned to deliver to allottees each year. A 40 percent initial quota means that the Board is making 0.4 acre-feet of water available at the beginning of the water year (Nov. 1) for each of the 310,000 C-BT Project units. In April, the Board will assess conditions such as available local water storage levels, soil moisture, mountain snowpack and more to adjust the quota for the 2023 peak water-use season.
Water from the C-BT Project supplements other sources for 33 cities and towns, 120 agricultural irrigation companies, various industries and other water users within Northern Water’s 1.6 million-acre service area. According to recent census figures, more than 1 million residents now live inside Northern Water’s boundaries. To learn more about Northern Water and the C-BT quota, visit www.northernwater.org.
