An initiative of the Center for Environmental Journalism at the University of Colorado Boulder

Utah’s Suicide Pact With the Fossil Fuel Industry

The state’s fixation on oil and gas development threatens the Colorado River watershed.
Integrated Water Resources Plan land photo

Aspen officials release plan laying out 50 years of water projects

Aspen’s new water resource plan outlines the strategy for creating emergency storage to address threats to existing supplies.

Aspen joins water managers using new technologies to map mountain snowpack, predict streamflows

As a changing climate renders streamflow predictions less accurate, water managers are turning to new technologies for a clearer picture of what’s happening in their basin’s snowpack.

Upper Basin states test methods to fill Powell pool

States say automatically turning to agriculture isn’t always reliable

How a high-elevation irrigation study in Kremmling could help Colorado avoid future water shortages

A group of ranchers is helping scientists learn more about what happens to pastures that receive less irrigation water.

Once ‘paradise,’ parched Colorado valley grapples with arsenic in water

Decades of climate change-driven drought, combined with the overpumping of aquifers, is making the valley desperately dry — and appears to be intensifying the levels of heavy metals in drinking water.
Roaring Fork photo 1

Roaring Fork on its way to 100 more acre-feet of flows

Pitkin County took the final step in a years-long effort to get more water into the often water-short upper Roaring Fork River.

Humans are great at giving real problems the side-eye

Two new books provide insights into the willful ignorance that lead to the West’s water woes.

East Troublesome Fire could cause water-quality impacts for years

The Colorado fire grew 100,000 acres in 24 hours, eventually becoming the second-largest wildfire in the state’s recorded history.

10 visuals that show how climate change is transforming the West’s snow and water...

The latest National Climate Assessment warns of a shrinking snowpack and serious downstream consequences.