The Water Center helps Upper Colorado Basin communities understand and respond to new water challenges through research, education and facilitation.
Research
Promoting and showcasing research on water issues in the Upper Colorado basin:
- Promoting research on how reservoirs and other management activities interact with fens through a competitive grant program.
- Developing an on-line Upper Colorado River Basin resource guide (under construction here).
- Developing a new scientific and technical report series. Initial titles include:
- Tamarisk beetle (Diorhabda spp.) in the Colorado River basin: synthesis of an expert panel forum
- Riparian groundwater and baseflow studies in the Upper Colorado River Basin
Education
Educating community leaders, the general public and K-12 teachers and students on water issues.
- Developing a new Upper Colorado Basin Water Education Training (WET) Center.
- Producing a documentary film about the Grand Valley & its rivers.
- Developing a River Studies and Leadership Certificate program with the River Management Society and several other colleges and universities. New draft website under development here.
- Working with the Colorado and Gunnison Basin Roundtables to increase awareness of water planning efforts.
- Annual Water Course
- Natural Resources of the West Seminar Series, which is open to the public as well as to students.
- Water Diversion Selection Tool - The Water Center partnered with Trout Unlimited to develop a "Water Diversion Selection Tool" that can be used to aid water users planning for new or rehabilitated flow diversions from streams in selecting diversion technologies that are resilient and meet multiple objectives.
Dialogue
Promoting the development of sophisticated, homegrown policy solutions to protect the region's water interests by facilitating and supporting stakeholder dialogues and collaborative problem solving.
- Supporting the Grand Valley River Corridor Initiative, which seeks to build a unified community vision for our river corridors and identify projects to realize that vision.
- Coordinating and hosting Grand Valley discussions on practices and policies related to demand management and water security.
- Coordinating the Colorado Basin Roundtable's Integrated Water Management Planning Framework Project, which seeks to provide the informational and procedural foundation for integrated water management planning across the mainstem Colorado River Basin in Colorado.
- Annual Upper Colorado River Basin Water Forum
- On January 7, 2014, the Water Center hosted a stakeholder dialogue on barriers and opportunities for the beneficial re-use of produced water from oil and gas development activities. The final report from the dialogue is available here.