Colorado Springs Utilities watching drought for future water planning

Despite showers over the weekend, drought conditions are still prevalent throughout Colorado –especially in the southern part of the state.

Colorado Springs Utilities administrators say they are already seeing some of the initial effects of low precipitation levels and snowpack.

Right now, the last bit of runoff from the winter snow is melting and draining into local reservoirs. Normally, the snowpack would stick around for a few more weeks.

Colorado Springs manages dozens of local bodies of water and determines the best way to handle seasons of drought.

Kalsoum Abbasi, a planning supervisor in water conveyance group at Colorado Springs Utilities, says the area had average levels of moisture and snowpack in the last few years, meaning the water storage levels are looking good, despite the drought.

Some of the major storage reservoirs like Pueblo, Turquoise, and Twin Lakes all have good water supplies right now. Abassi says there is about three years’ worth of water built up in storage, so there likely will not be any water restrictions for residents anytime soon.

Looking to some of the other bodies of water, like Rampart Reservoir west of Woodland Park, water levels are already seemingly low.

The water levels in that body of water are mostly dependent on customer demand. A line break early in the spring left the reservoir lower than normal, and with the dry conditions over the last month and a half, more people are using water for personal use and landscaping.

Abassi says last summer, average customer demand for water was about 85-90 million gallons per day. This year, Colorado Springs Utilities says demand is running closer to 120 million gallons per day on the hot and dry days we have seen so far.

With rain on Sunday, they say that number dropped to about 104 million gallons on that day for demand.