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The Bureau of Reclamation has predicted three possible outcomes for Lake Mead's water levels this summer.
Lake Mead's water levels currently stand at 1,050.71 feet as of May 8.
According to a Maximum Probable Inflow 24 month report released in April 2023, Lake Mead's water levels could rise to 1,060.30 feet by the end of July 2023. This, in other words, is a best-case scenario for the drought-stricken reservoir.
The Bureau has also released "most probable" inflow predictions, which are more likely, but still see a rise to 1,057.68 feet by the end of July 2023.
If correct, these numbers will present a completely different situation to last year. By the end of July 2022, Lake Mead was seeing some of its lowest water levels ever. The lake reached a low point of around 1,040 feet. This was due to the extremely dry conditions in the Western U.S. because of the megadrought gripping the region.
In the worst-case scenario, Lake Mead's water levels will be at around 1,050 feet at the end of July 2023.
Lake Mead is a reservoir of the Colorado River, formed by the Hoover Dam. Built in the 1930s, it's the largest reservoir in the U.S. by volume. Lying on the Nevada-Arizona border, Lake Mead provides essential water for drinking and agriculture for around 25 million people across the U.S. Southwest.
The higher water levels are a result of a very high level of snowpack, accumulated through months of winter storms and rain.
As the weather starts to warm during the spring months, that snowpack is going to melt, creating higher than normal flows.
The Bureau of Reclamation has already implemented an initiative to help manage these flows. At the end of April, a High Flow Experiment (HFE) saw up to 39,500 cubic feet per second of water being released from the Glen Canyon Dam over a three-day period.
This was to help replenish sandbars and beaches, and to carry sediment downriver, all the way to Lake Mead.
Although the high levels of snowpack will certainly help replenish the West's reservoirs, it could also cause flooding in the surrounding areas as the weather warms.
Lake Mead and Lake Powell will also still be fairly low. Even under the best-case scenario, Lake Mead water levels would still be below its "normal condition" in July, although it could get back to normal levels in 2024, according to the Bureau of Reclamation.
Paul Miller, a hydrologist at the Colorado Basin River Forecast Center, told Fox 5 Vegas that even if water levels do rise, Powell's levels will still be "pretty low."
"People are still going to be able to see like the bathtub ring that people talk about at Powell," he told the news outlet.
At both Lake Powell and Lake Mead, white "bathtub rings" can be seen along the edges, marking where the water used to be before it was affected by years of drought.
Tom Corringham, a research economist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, previously told Newsweek: "Statewide snowpack in Colorado is about 120 percent of normal this year, which is a good thing, but refilling Lake Mead and Lake Powell will take years of above-average snowfall. We're definitely hoping for a run of good years, but the long-term outlook is not good. On the basis of climate models, researchers have been predicting this disaster for decades. What's scary is that it's all happening faster than we expected."
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About the writer
Robyn White is a Newsweek Nature Reporter based in London, UK. Her focus is reporting on wildlife, science and the ... Read more