Colorado River Basin Aquifers Are Declining Even More Steeply Than the River, New Research Shows

Declines of underground water supplies that are vital to cities and farming in the Colorado River Basin are outpacing the losses of the river’s water, according to new research published last week based on NASA satellite data.

It’s the latest warning of the region’s rapidly declining water supplies as the seven basin states—Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming—engage in tense negotiations over the Colorado River’s future and cuts to water supplies, but with losses to groundwater left out of the debate.

Across the basin, the rate of water storage decline increased by a factor of three between 2015 to 2024 compared to the previous decade because of climate change, said Jay Famiglietti, the study’s senior author and science director for Arizona State Universit