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A 26-year drought and century-old math error have brought the Colorado River to a breaking point. WSJ goes inside the legal battle and breaks down the structural overhauls necessary to protect a crucial regional economy.

on.wsj.comThe 100-Year-Old Math Miscalculation That Broke the Colorado RiverWatch how a century-old mistake and a continuing drought have pushed the Western water supply to the brink—and what overhauls are needed to save it.

11/10/26, 4:08 pm10 reposts24 likes

Alan Smithee

@m6i2k6e.bsky.social

math miscalculation. nothing to do with climate change?

ctgr8.bsky.social

@ctgr8.bsky.social

Arizona has a water shortage. It is irrational to grow products in Arizona to export to Saudi Arabia.

Nikolay Remizov

@nikolrem.bsky.social

Congress brushing off the person with the actual data is the recurring failure here. Bad inputs produce bad allocations, and the correction never comes cheap.

Nikolay Remizov

@nikolrem.bsky.social

The 1922 Compact split the river using flow numbers from an unusually wet era, so the states were promised more water than it actually carries. Reopening that math was always a matter of when, not if.

Smoochy Rhino

@el-gran-rosamondo.bsky.social

And the hydrologist who knew that the allocations would be based on skewed data actually tried to get Congress to listen to the fact that they were overallocating that water, but they simply didn’t listen to him.

Nikolay Remizov

@nikolrem.bsky.social

Good catch. He raised it and Congress ignored it — which is exactly why reopening the numbers matters now.

doasadi.bsky.social

@doasadi.bsky.social

Water vapor is not coming down as rain or snow as much anymore due to Global heating. Glaciers are not being replenished, the great lakes are losing water and not regenerating the loss. Your publication supported and to this day conspires to maintain a fossil fuel economy. The Wet bulb is coming