Abstract

Much of the American West was settled and developed in the nineteenth century, when gray infrastructure and water rights systems were molded around agricultural needs. However, what was cleverly conceived and constructed in the past eventually became more problematic over time, increasingly clashing with water needs in highly populated urban and suburban communities in the modern era, marked by a changing climate. This paper investigates four problematic legacies that shape current Western water policy, and constrain current efforts to adapt to modern weather extremes: (1) a water utilization legacy that prioritized agriculture usage over other uses; (2) an infrastructure legacy of large reservoirs that cannot easily be replaced; (3) a fractured water governance and rights legacy; and (4) a legacy of demand hardening with population growth. We find that the environmental movement and the growth of urban uses have put a strain on a water supply system that was rooted in economic and legal assumptions of the past. Climate change has exacerbated these tensions, prompting some policy and institutional changes, most notably the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act of 2014. Yet, many legacy features remain, and how these will evolve to resolve these tensions is murky at best.