The Colorado and the Republican rivers differ greatly in fundamental ways but they share a critical challenge. More conservation will be crucial. It needs to happen very quickly.
by Allen Best
Like the Colorado River, a compact governs the shared Republican River. That compact was adopted in 1943 by Colorado, the headwaters of the Republican and several tributaries, and Nebraska and Kansas, the two down-river states.
The Republican and the Colorado differ in one fundamental respect. Nearly all the water in the Colorado River comes from the sky, mostly from last winter’s snow. Nearly all Republican River water comes from underground.
Water in the Republican River Basin comes almost entirely from the Ogallala, an aquifer formed over two million years. The river itself originates more than 100 miles from the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
Now, that aquifer is being rapidly depleted in Colorado. That makes compliance with the Republican River Compact more challenging. One strategy has been to pump water from eight wells north of Wray to augment the North Fork of the Republican as it enters Nebraska.
This strategy was adopted in 2010 by the Republican River Water Conservation District. Created by state legislators in 2004, the district was tasked with keeping Colorado compliant with the compact. Buying water rights, boring wells, and laying a pipeline for 10 miles to the river cost $60 million in that first project.
The Republican River originates on the high plains of eastern Colorado and flows into Nebraska and Kansas.
In May, directors of the district approved boring of two new wells and reworking several existing wells of declining production. This will cost $15 million to $22 million, depending on the full scope of expansion. The Colorado Water Conservation Board recently approved a $15 million low-interest loan to the district.
This work fundamentally kicks the can of water conservation down the road, and some directors of the district readily acknowledge this. Water of the Ogallala needs to be used more judiciously. The same hard thinking about how to do with less water must also occur in the Colorado River Basin. But the Colorado River will continue to flow. Once the Ogallala in Colorado is gone, it will take millennia to replenish.
The Republican River Basin consists of parts or all of eight counties in northeastern Colorado. Again, this basin gets no runoff from the Rocky Mountains. It does not include the South Platte Valley. What farming that occurred before the 1950s was nearly all dryland.
Arrival of high-capacity pumps changed farming entirely. Pumping levels during the 1960s rose like Pikes Peak from the prairie. Twice in the ‘70s, total volume exceeded one million acre-feet. In comparison, Denver Water uses about 232,000 acre-feet to distribute to 1.5 million people. Another comparison is to Dillon Reservoir, which has a capacity of 257,000 acre-feet.
Pumping in recent years has slackened to an average of 705,000 acre-feet. Hot, dry years, as this one has started, can result in nearly 900,000 acre-feet being mined. District officials want to shave this to an annual 600,000 acre-feet. Pumping that much cannot be sustained infinitely, but it makes compact compliance easier.
Why so much water? It results in higher crop yields. Yuma, one of the most productive agricultural areas in Colorado, averages 18 inches of precipitation a year. That precipitation varies, however. Groundwater can reliably deliver 30 to 36 inches to a field of corn, ensuring robust yields for an ethanol plant or livestock.
The Republican River Basin is not Douglas County or Boulder, but people sometimes go on cruises. Towns mostly have several restaurants. A recent analysis by a Colorado State University team revealed an annual economic benefit of up to $1.5 billion from water extracted from the Ogallala.
Several strategies have been deployed to remain in compact compliance. To the dismay of boaters and anglers, Bonny Reservoir, north of Burlington, was unplugged in 2012. Broad and shallow, it lost too much water to evaporation.
Land has been taken from irrigated production. Some 40,000 acres have reverted to dryland because of the shrinking aquifer. Financial incentives offered by the conservation district, in conjunction with federal programs, have enticed farmers in the South Fork of the Republican River near Burlington to end irrigation on an additional 20,000 acres. Colorado added $30 million to that pot several years ago.
Another 5,000 irrigated acres must be snipped by 2030. District officials believe the aging of existing farmers with no succession plans, less valuable soils in that area, and the current low prices for commodities make financial incentives more attractive and the target attainable.
Pumping water from the wells north of Wray into the North Fork is a confounding delay strategy. It buys time to get serious about conservation.
I first began to understand the Republican River Basin in 2012. A native son took me to a place outside Wray where, as a boy in the 1960s, he and his fellow students would gather in a small pond to frolic. It was, my guide explained, the result of water bleeding from the Ogallala. The pond had vanished when we visited, a result of the shrinking aquifer.
Rivers in the basin — the North Fork, the South Fork, and the Arikaree — are similarly creations of the aquifer. They, too, have withered as the aquifer declines each year by a foot or two. The impacts of pumping take years, maybe decades to be fully manifested.
“We are paying for the sins of our past,” says Randy Hendrix, a consultant who helps the river district track its compact compliance. “Nobody knew back then.” Now, there’s no excuse not to know. “It could be the next generation of farmers who will have to pay that bill” for today’s pumping.
Nearly all the crops grown with water extracted from the Ogallala in Colorado produce feed for livestock, cattle especially, although an ethanol plant in Yuma also provides a market for corn. Photo/Allen Best
How can mining of the Ogallala in Colorado be slowed?
The water conservation district arguably lacks the tools needed to live up to the conservation part of its name assigned by state legislators. For example, it has no power to shut down wells.
Jason Ullmann, the Colorado water engineer, has been clear that he has authority to shut down wells or order reduced pumping as necessary for Colorado to remain compliant with the Republican River Compact. That is a last resort.
The district, which has an annual budget of $15 million, does have the power to tax. Before, it taxed farms based on acreage. The district recently adjusted the formula. Half is now based on volume of water pumped, delivering an incentive to use less water. The fee adjustment captured the attention of many farmers about the underlying need for reform.
A new program has a soft approach. Named after the late Steve Kramer, a former director, it has enlisted six volunteer growers. They have agreed to reduce the volumes of seed, fertilizers and other “inputs” — including water — in fields to see if lesser volumes of harvest coupled with lesser costs can deliver equal profit or even greater profit. Pumping less water also lowers the electricity bill. Electricity for a mid-sized farm can cost $50,000 month.
The state in recent months has begun nudging the river district and the eight groundwater districts within the basin to begin taking more concrete steps to slow the depletion.
Groundwater districts, while long reluctant to engage in conservation planning, do have statutory authority to do so. Several have interest in doing so now. Lacking is the money for enforcement. Might the state help?
Rod Lenz, chair of the board of directors, says a culture change has started but more is needed. Photo/Allen Best
A culture change is needed, says Rod Lenz, chair of the conservation district’s board of directors. That change has started. Farmers are more inclined to shut off pumps if it has rained and the supplemental water is not needed. But the pace of change, he says, must accelerate. One solution is to use the remaining water to grow plants with higher value. But figuring out marketing and supply chains is difficult work.
The overarching question in the basin is how the remaining water can be used to the greatest advantage before the wells all go dry?
Near Stratton, on a farm operated by Tim Pautler and his brother, pumps yielded such little water by 2006 that they reverted to dryland farming. Many of their neighbors have similarly abandoned their pumps for all but household and livestock purposes. The local agricultural cooperative now struggles given the absence of irrigated agriculture in that area overlying the Ogallala.
Irrigation creates a prosperity in the Republican River Basin that should not be squandered. Some farms, particularly around Yuma, can expect the Ogallala to provide water for several more decades. Other farmers will lose their water in the next decade or two.
With the new wells for compact compliance now planned, the Republican River district and the local groundwater districts must get serious about conservation planning.
“We’re closer to the end (of the life of the aquifer) than the beginning,” says Pautler.
If the Colorado River Basin differs in crucial ways from that of the Republican, the two basins are alike in this way: The 20th century was devoted to building the infrastructure that enabled exploitation of the water. The 21st century challenge is to figure out how to use less water to maximum purpose.
This story was first published in The Denver Post Perspective section on June 14.
For other stories about the Republican River Basin, see:
“A stormy meeting in Yuma about water.” Sept. 18, 2025
“Why declining aquifers in Colorado matter.” Sept. 12, 2025
“Part IV: Balancing demands of today and tomorrow.” July 22, 2025
“Part I: Hard questions about groundwater mining in Colorado.” July 20, 2025
“A Republican River Basin milestone.” Dec. 23, 2024
“The declining Ogallala Aquifer,” June 3, 2023
“Democrats a plenty gather to celebrate a Republican.” May 16, 2023
“Can Colorado grow as much food with less water?” Dec. 27, 2022
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