Everyone at the table, and where they stand

Position. The 22 civil associations (asociaciones de usuarios) that operate the modules of Distrito de Riego 014 hold the largest single block of Colorado River water rights on the Mexican side. The district commands ~1,850 million m3/yr across ~207,965 irrigable ha via 2,718 km of canals; ~86% of the rights sit in Mexicali, ~14% in San Luis Río Colorado. The associations were created in the 1993 transfer (transferencia) when CONAGUA devolved operation, conservation, and fee collection of the modules to organized users; they are the district's de facto self-government and, per CILA Minutes 319/323/330, the principal source of any water Mexico 'conserves' or defers. LONGSTANDING POSITION: users, not the federal government, own and control the concessioned water, and any conservation must be voluntary and compensated. They have run an internal 'water bank' in which modules offer and sell/cede water, historically to coastal cities (Tijuana via the Río Colorado-Tijuana aqueduct) and among users, as irrigated area shrank and farming margins collapsed. RECENT (2024-2025): (1) They demanded a 90/10 split of the March-2024 Water Conservation Program funds -- 90% (~$54M) for a voluntary land-rest ('descansar tierras' / 90-10 land-rest plan) at a proposed ~$1,250/ha compensation, 10% (~$6M) for infrastructure -- and protested at CILA-Mexicali in Oct 2024 demanding progress. (2) They strongly OPPOSE the new National Water Law's prohibition on water transfers/sales, which criminalizes the transfer income many now depend on. Representative Horacio Gómez (speaking for ~17,000 concession holders) said they will 'not risk losing our water rights,' and users threatened truck/semi border blockades. (3) In late 2025 agricultural reps REFUSED to sign a ~400-billion-peso canal-lining rehab agreement that would have ceded the recovered water to coastal municipalities for 15 years. Researcher Alfonso Cortés Lara characterizes many District-14 rights holders as elderly, poor, disabled, or health-compromised people for whom water income is survival, not agribusiness. CCE-Mexicali (Octavio Sandoval López) frames the whole district as living under legal and binational uncertainty (risk that US Río Bravo compensation demands get offset against Colorado River deliveries to Mexicali).

On conservation. MIXED-TO-HOSTILE unless the market pays them and preserves their control. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive ONLY if (a) participation is voluntary and per-user/per-module, (b) it pays at least their stated reservation price (they anchored ~$1,250/ha for land rest; transfer-market prices they already capture may be higher), and (c) it does NOT convert into a permanent loss of concession or a government/city claim on the freed water. It collides head-on with the new Water Law's transfer prohibition -- they will demand the market be legally shielded from that ban, or they will treat 'conservation market' as a euphemism for expropriation and refuse to sign, exactly as they refused the canal-lining/cede-to-cities deal. If those conditions are met, a clean MEASURED consumptive-use market is arguably closer to what they already want (paid, voluntary, they keep the right) than the government's current offers, so it is the single most promising instrument for flipping them.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED / PERSUADABLE on this axis. They already accept solar for on-farm pumping (Module 4 solar wells), so hyperscaler-funded solar+storage that (a) cuts their pumping energy costs and (b) routes financing into module infrastructure and per-user compensation is a plausible win -- it adds a new revenue/benefit stream without a federal mandate stripping their rights. Risk they will scrutinize: any structure where accepting energy/water money is conditioned on permanently surrendering water to a city or datacenter reads as the same expropriation they resist. Frame it as 'you keep your right, you get paid, your pumping bill drops' and it lands; frame it as 'give up water for power' and it dies.

On reuse/desal. GENERALLY FAVORABLE / LOW-THREAT, and strategically useful to them. Large-scale reuse and desalination that supplies Tijuana/coastal cities REDUCES the political pressure to take agricultural water for municipal use -- which is precisely the pressure now being used to justify canal-lining cede-to-cities deals they reject. If cities get new supply from reuse/desal, farmers keep more river water and more of their transfer market. They are unlikely to fund it and will resist paying for it via their own water, but they benefit if someone else builds it. Caveat: if reuse/desal is financed by requiring agricultural water as collateral or offset, they flip to opposition.

A win for them. A win is: (1) legally protected, voluntary, well-paid conservation/transfer that lets each user keep the concession and choose whether to fallow or cede water year by year; (2) real money reaching individual users fast (their 90/10 ask: ~$54M for land rest at ~$1,250/ha plus ~$6M+ for module infrastructure), not just federal IOUs; (3) modernization (canal lining, solar pumping, well rehab) funded by outside capital so their user fees do not have to cover it and their operating costs fall; (4) coastal water demand met by reuse/desal so the political knife of 'take farm water for the cities' is removed; and (5) explicit protection from the National Water Law's transfer prohibition so the value of their right is not confiscated. Deliver those and they move from opponent to partner; threaten their control of the concession and they blockade the border and threaten Tijuana's supply.

Public record. The irrigation associations have participated in paid water conservation programs under binational agreements (Minute 323), but have also protested, alleging the Mexican government failed to deliver the U.S.-funded payments to the farmers.

Position. Mitchell is Colorado's first full-time Commissioner to the Upper Colorado River Commission (appointed June 2023), director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board (since 2017), and Director of Compact Negotiations / chair of the Interbasin Compact Committee (appointed Oct 2024). She is Colorado's single lead negotiator on interstate river matters. Her longstanding, publicly consistent doctrine is hydrology-first 'live within our means': users cannot use water that does not exist, and every basin must size use to what the river actually delivers year to year. She frames Lower Basin overuse as the core problem ('We cannot subsidize overuse'; Lower Basin used ~11 MAF in 2021, ~2.5 MAF over allocation) while the Upper Basin cut to under 4 MAF, ~3.5 MAF below its allocation. Signature line: 'We're being asked to solve a problem we didn't create with water we don't have.' She rejects the old (interim/2007) guidelines as having 'incentivized unsustainable use' and prioritized the Lower over Upper Basin. On demand management: after a two-year state investigation she and CWCB shelved a formal temporary/voluntary/compensated demand-management pool in favor of drought-resilience work, reflecting deep Western Slope agricultural resistance to fallowing/buy-and-dry. On tribes: inclusion is a stated top priority; she brokered the 2024 Upper Basin Tribal Nations MOU and insists solutions 'cannot continue to depend on Tribes' undeveloped federal reserved water rights,' and has urged Reclamation to fund tribal forbearance. On new supply (augmentation, desalination, reuse): skeptical/deprioritizing; she has publicly flagged desal brine disposal as an unsolved problem and steers toward 'more feasible' demand-side solutions rather than manufacturing new supply. As of 2026 she warns the window for a negotiated post-2026 settlement is closing and that the situation is 'dire,' but holds Colorado's role firmly ('once we give up the state's role... it's going to be hard, if not impossible, to ever have a major state role').

On conservation. Skeptical-to-hostile if the market is framed as buying Upper Basin (Colorado) consumptive use to backstop Lower Basin overuse. Her explicit doctrine is 'we cannot subsidize overuse,' and Colorado already shelved a compensated demand-management pool after two years, partly over Western Slope harm and buy-and-dry fears. She would demand verified, additive, permanent-accounting conservation with airtight measurement (she is fixated on real consumptive-use accounting, not paper savings), no disproportionate burden on the Upper Basin, protection for rural ag communities, and that Lower Basin overuse be fixed first. A market that quietly monetizes Colorado water to let Arizona/California/Nevada keep using above allocation is a non-starter for her. A market that verifiably cuts LOWER Basin consumptive use, or that funds TRIBAL forbearance with a real funding source, aligns with positions she has publicly championed.

On solar+water. Cautious and likely wary. She has no public record endorsing private-capital-funded infrastructure as a river fix, and her frame is that you cannot spend or build your way past hydrology. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that 'also funds water' would trigger her core suspicions: (1) does it create NEW consumptive demand (data-center cooling water) in the basin, which she would oppose; (2) does it let the Lower Basin or private actors substitute money for the discipline of living within the river's means; (3) does it erode the state's negotiating role by inserting a private/federal counterparty. She could be persuadable ONLY if the water funding is explicitly demand-reducing or supply-neutral (dry-cooled/air-cooled, closed-loop, zero net new consumptive use), routed through Colorado/state and tribal priorities rather than around them, and framed as accelerating the Upper Basin's own resilience rather than subsidizing downstream overuse. Absent those guarantees, expect skepticism.

On reuse/desal. Skeptical of desalination specifically; she has publicly named brine disposal as an unresolved obstacle and treats desal/augmentation as less feasible than demand management. She would likely view large-scale desal (typically a Lower Basin / coastal California or inland-brackish play) as a distraction that lets downstream users avoid living within their means, and as landlocked-Colorado-irrelevant. Reuse/recycling she is more likely to tolerate where it reduces net consumptive demand in-basin, but she will still test it against her core question: does it actually shrink consumptive use and Compact exposure, or just add supply that re-inflates unsustainable demand? Overall: reuse = conditionally acceptable if demand-reducing; desal = low priority / skeptical, especially anything that props up Lower Basin overuse.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 settlement in which Colorado and the Upper Basin keep their independent state negotiating role, are NOT forced to absorb cuts for a problem they did not create, and in which the Lower Basin measurably reduces its overuse to live within the river's actual yield. Wins include: verified real consumptive-use accounting basin-wide; a secured federal funding source for tribal forbearance and honored tribal water rights; protection of Western Slope agricultural communities from buy-and-dry harm; and drought-resilience gains that do not depend on manufacturing risky new supply. In short, she wins when hydrologic reality, Upper Basin equity, tribal inclusion, and state authority are all preserved in a negotiated deal reached before the window closes.

Public record. As Colorado's Commissioner, she has stated that Lower Basin overuse put the system in its current situation and has vocally opposed solutions that could inflict pain on the Upper Basin, instead prioritizing that the Lower Basin find solutions within its own allocation first.

Position. BlueTriton is the packaged-water business spun out of Nestlé Waters North America (renamed 2021 after One Rock Capital / Metropoulos & Co. bought it), and in November 2024 it merged with Primo Water to form Primo Brands Corporation (NYSE: PRMB, ~$6.8B pro forma 2024 net sales, ~30 production facilities and 50+ spring sites). Its consistent public position across every jurisdiction is that spring-water extraction is a small, sustainable, well-regulated use that supports local jobs and does not harm watersheds. In Colorado it holds a Chaffee County 1041 permit (originally Nestlé 2009, renewed for 10 years in 2021 under the BlueTriton name) to pump ~65 million gallons/year of spring water from Ruby Mountain Spring near Buena Vista in the Upper Arkansas River Basin, pipe it to a Johnson Village loading station, and truck it to a Denver bottling plant for the Arrowhead brand. County approval carried a required augmentation/replacement plan overseen by the Upper Arkansas Water Conservancy District, and the company finalized a conservation easement as a permit condition. In California, its Arrowhead source in the San Bernardino National Forest (Strawberry Creek) triggered a decade-long fight: the State Water Resources Control Board issued a 2023 Cease and Desist Order finding BlueTriton had no valid water right for the bulk of its diversions (state investigation concluded it may have had rights to only ~8.5M of ~62.6M gallons/yr historically), the company sued, and in 2025 a Fresno County Superior Court judge overturned the order as exceeding the Board's authority (the Board is weighing appeal). The company has also been sued (Earth Island Institute) for allegedly deceptive sustainability/recycling marketing, and in a related matter conceded some green claims were non-actionable 'puffery.' Pattern: it litigates aggressively to defend extraction rights and frames itself as a responsible steward while communities and regulators repeatedly challenge whether its diversions are legal or sustainable during drought.

On conservation. Wary to hostile. A verified consumptive-use conservation market prices water and formalizes measurement of net consumption, which cuts against a business built on inexpensive spring access framed as de minimis. BlueTriton/Primo already operates under augmentation and replacement requirements it treats as a compliance cost, and it fights formal accounting of its diversions (the California CDO litigation). It might tolerate or even market participation if a conservation market let it monetize 'net-zero' or offset claims cheaply, but it would resist any design that establishes its extraction as a chargeable consumptive use or caps volumes. Likely reaction: engage to shape the rules toward favorable baselines and credit for existing augmentation, oppose anything that raises its per-gallon cost or exposes true consumption.

On solar+water. Mostly indifferent, mild positive. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water does not touch the company's core cost structure or its spring sources, and Primo is an energy consumer at bottling/pumping/trucking operations, so cheaper clean power is a modest operational plus and a sustainability-marketing opportunity. It is not a natural partner or opponent here; the initiative neither threatens its extraction rights nor solves its permitting problems. Low salience.

On reuse/desal. Neutral to quietly favorable. Large-scale reuse and desalination expand total supply and take political pressure off scrutinized diversions like spring bottling, which is helpful to BlueTriton's license to operate. The company sells a premium natural-spring product, so it is not a competitor to municipal reuse/desal water and gains reputationally if 'new water' narratives shift attention away from private extraction. It would not fund such projects but would welcome them and cite them as evidence the region has broader supply solutions.

A win for them. A durable, low-friction license to operate: renewed permits, an end to cease-and-desist and greenwashing litigation risk, and a credible third-party-verified stewardship narrative (augmentation, watershed protection, conservation easements, recycled/reusable packaging) that lets it keep low-cost access to premium spring sources while marketing itself as part of the drought solution rather than a target of it. Ideally it gets formal credit for existing replacement/augmentation obligations under any new water-accounting or conservation-market regime, so compliance it already does converts into marketable stewardship rather than new cost.

Public record. The company's business model relies on extracting and bottling spring water for profit, and it has been in legal disputes with state and county regulators over its water diversions and permit compliance.

Position. Brandon Gebhart, P.E., is the Wyoming State Engineer and the state's lead voice on the Colorado River. He administers Wyoming's prior-appropriation water rights and represents Wyoming (which holds ~14% of the Upper Basin allocation, ~1M+ AF/yr, but consumed only ~421,000 AF/yr on average 2016-2020) in Compact-era negotiations. Longstanding and recent public positions: (1) Hard opposition to mandatory/uncompensated cuts. 'Mandatory reductions are pretty much a hard "no" for me,' a stance he says is shared across the Upper Division. He frames Lower Basin (CA/NV/AZ) demands as forcing Wyoming to abandon undeveloped future rights: 'They're asking me to give up the future we were promised and to make promises that I can't keep.' (2) Wyoming will not give more than its Compact obligation UNLESS it is paid-for, voluntary conservation. He backs the Bureau of Reclamation System Conservation program and Wyoming's own Voluntary Water Conservation Program Act, but stresses it's 'very tough for the state to conserve a large amount of water.' (3) He treats prior appropriation as the enforcement mechanism: 'There won't be enough water to satisfy existing water rights, and so we regulate junior users to satisfy senior users.' (4) He has warned repeatedly that dire hydrology (calling 2026 'one of the worst, if not the worst, hydrologic years on record') will force extra Flaming Gorge releases to prop up Lake Powell and meet downstream delivery obligations, hitting Green River Basin ranchers hard. (5) He has pushed for emergency funding for hydrologists/stream gaging, arguing Wyoming's water rights are 'in jeopardy without improved info' - measurement is his lever to defend Upper Basin claims against a Lower Basin 'call.' His posture is defensive-sovereignty: protect Wyoming's unused paper rights, resist federally- or Lower-Basin-imposed cuts, and only move water for cash.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable IF and only IF it is genuinely voluntary, verified, compensated, and additive to (not a substitute for) Wyoming's Compact rights. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns closely with the tool he already champions: paid-for voluntary conservation that 'put[s] water savings on a ledger.' He will engage on the accounting/measurement question (verification is his stated priority and pain point - he wants hydrologists and gaging to prove savings are real and creditable to Wyoming). Red lines: he will resist any market that (a) becomes a backdoor to permanent mandatory reductions, (b) lets the Lower Basin claim Upper Basin conservation as owed rather than purchased, or (c) prices Wyoming out relative to wealthier basins. Verification done right is a selling point to him, not a threat.

On solar+water. Persuadable-to-favorable, but with Wyoming-specific caveats. Wyoming is energy-rich and pro-development, and a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water fits the 'new money, not new mandates' logic he prefers. He would welcome a private capital source that pays for conservation/measurement infrastructure without demanding Upper Basin curtailment. Concerns: (1) new large loads (data centers) that themselves consume water could worsen the very shortage he manages, so he'll scrutinize net water balance and demand the deal be water-positive on Wyoming's ledger; (2) it must respect prior appropriation and not create a senior claim that competes with irrigators; (3) siting/permitting and interconnection are outside his lane (he's a water regulator), so his support hinges narrowly on the water-funding mechanics being verifiable and additive.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-supportive in principle, low personal urgency. Reuse and especially desalination are primarily Lower Basin / coastal (CA/AZ) supply-augmentation plays - they help Wyoming indirectly by reducing Lower Basin pressure to extract more from the river and weakening the case for Upper Basin cuts. Gebhart would likely endorse anything that lets the Lower Basin 'live within its means' or grow its own supply rather than reaching upstream. But desal/large reuse does little for landlocked Wyoming's own water and is not something he'd fund or lead. Expect rhetorical support ('the Lower Basin should augment and conserve its own supply') rather than active participation.

A win for them. A win for Gebhart: Wyoming keeps its full Compact entitlement (including undeveloped future rights) with NO mandatory curtailment forced on Wyoming juniors; any water Wyoming contributes is voluntary, paid-for, verified, and credited to Wyoming's ledger; the Upper Basin is not made to bear cuts the Lower Basin avoids; and Wyoming gains funded stream-gaging/hydrology so it can prove and defend its water accounting. Bonus win: private (e.g., hyperscaler) capital that funds conservation and measurement in Wyoming without federal or Lower-Basin strings, plus Lower Basin augmentation (reuse/desal) that relieves upstream pressure. In short: the future Wyoming was 'promised' stays intact, and shortage-sharing happens through cash and voluntary deals, not mandates.

Public record. As Wyoming's State Engineer, he has publicly stated his opposition to mandatory water cuts for Upper Basin states, while supporting voluntary, paid conservation programs funded by the federal government to meet compact obligations.

Position. The stakeholder label 'Capriole Group' is a pseudonym for the Pinto Valley Mine, an open-pit copper/molybdenum operation near Miami/Globe in Gila County, central Arizona, owned and operated by Pinto Valley Mining Corp., a wholly owned US subsidiary of Canada-based Capstone Copper (acquired from BHP in October 2013). It is the only operating mill in the historic Globe-Miami district and is permitted to operate through 2039. LONGSTANDING POSTURE: Pinto Valley is not a vocal public voice in Colorado River allocation politics. Its water is groundwater, not Colorado River supply. It pumps roughly 400 gallons/minute from its pit via the Peak Well field and consumed about 8,932 acre-feet (2.9 billion gallons) of combined groundwater and surface water in 2024. The mine's public-facing message emphasizes conservation and recycling: it reports reusing about 93% of its water and claims advanced recycling/treatment cut annual water use by an estimated ~40%, with a 2026 target of ~20% reduction in water use per ton of copper. RECENT / CONTESTED: The mine's groundwater pumping is directly linked to the dewatering of Pinto Creek in the Tonto National Forest. Stream flow dropped from 4,147 acre-feet (2013) to 482 acre-feet (2014) after mining resumed; riparian trees died and the corridor lost its color, a decline the Forest Service tied to mine pumping before dropping its complaint and approving the mine's 2021 expansion. In 2024 Earthjustice and the Western Mining Action Project filed a notice of intent and then a federal lawsuit (D. Ariz.) against the Forest Service and US Fish and Wildlife Service for approving the expansion, alleging the agencies ignored habitat along Pinto Creek that the mine's pumping would dewater. Capstone did not comment publicly on the suit. So the mine's real 'position' on the water crisis is defensive and operational, not advocacy: it frames itself as an efficient recycler while facing litigation and hard physical water limits.

On conservation. Cautiously interested, but note a key nuance: Pinto Valley uses GROUNDWATER, not Colorado River consumptive-use allocation, so a Colorado River consumptive-use conservation market does not directly free up water it can buy or sell. Its direct interest is muted UNLESS the market is structured to let a groundwater user acquire, offset, or bank supply (e.g., paying to retire senior surface/CAP entitlements or fund recharge that stabilizes the aquifer it depends on). If the market gives the mine a legitimate, verified path to secure additional or firmer water and defuse the 'you are drying Pinto Creek' narrative, it becomes a willing buyer with cash and urgency. If the market only reallocates Colorado River paper it cannot touch, it will watch from the sidelines. Net: persuadable-to-supportive on any mechanism that converts money into firm, defensible water rights for an industrial groundwater user.

On solar+water. Most promising angle for engagement. Pinto Valley is an energy- and water-intensive industrial load whose binding constraint in 2025 was water, not power. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water (recharge, reuse infrastructure, pipeline, or aquifer stabilization) maps almost perfectly onto its two biggest costs and its production risk. The mine would likely welcome co-located clean generation (cost, ESG optics for Capstone's sustainability story) and would strongly welcome anyone else paying to underwrite the water infrastructure that currently caps its output. Watch-out: it will resist any structure that puts a data center in competition with the mine for the same scarce local groundwater. Frame the hyperscaler as a co-investor in NEW water supply (reuse, recharge, imported/treated water) rather than a rival straw in the same aquifer, and this stakeholder leans in.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable in principle. The mine already brands itself on water recycling (claimed ~93% reuse, ~40% cut in annual use) and its survival case through 2039 depends on stretching every gallon. Large-scale reuse and treated/desalinated supply that reduces its draw on the stressed local aquifer directly addresses both its production ceiling and the Pinto Creek litigation narrative. It would support and likely help fund reuse/treatment that serves its site. Desalination is more indirect (coastal, distant, expensive, and it does not use Colorado River water), so its enthusiasm scales with how much any new supply is physically deliverable to central Arizona and how the cost is shared. Reuse close to the mine = high interest; distant desal = supportive of the concept as it frees regional supply, but low direct urgency.

A win for them. A win is a firm, defensible, cost-shared water supply that lets the mill run at full capacity year-round without drought-driven curtailments, AND that visibly reduces their local groundwater pumping enough to take the Pinto Creek dewatering narrative and its litigation off the table, protecting the licence to operate through 2039 (and any district expansion). Concretely: someone else helps fund the reuse/recharge/new-supply infrastructure, the mine locks in reliable water at a predictable cost, production volatility disappears, and Capstone gets a genuine, quantified sustainability win to point to. Restore output plus defuse the environmental fight plus improve the ESG story equals their ideal outcome.

Public record. The mine's extensive groundwater pumping has been shown to dewater Pinto Creek, leading to an 82% reduction in baseflows and litigation from conservation groups over harm to endangered species and failure to mitigate impacts.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. CUWCD is Utah's largest water conservancy district, serving ~2 million people across seven counties (Juab, Utah, Salt Lake, Wasatch, Summit, Duchesne, Uintah) along the Wasatch Front, and is the local sponsor of the Central Utah Project (CUP), the state's largest water development program, whose Bonneville Unit trans-basin-diverts Colorado River Basin water (Uinta Basin / Duchesne headwaters) into the Bonneville/Wasatch Front basin. This is the single most important fact about the district's posture: it exists to develop and deliver Utah's Upper Basin Colorado River allocation to the fastest-growing metro area in the fastest-growing state. CRITICAL LINKAGE: CUWCD General Manager Gene Shawcroft simultaneously serves as Utah's Colorado River Commissioner, Chair of the Colorado River Authority of Utah, and Utah's member on the Upper Colorado River Commission. The district is therefore not merely a stakeholder but effectively the institutional home of Utah's official Colorado River negotiating position. Longstanding position: Utah has a right to develop its unused share of the 1922 Compact allocation (Utah entitled to ~23% of the Upper Basin apportionment, ~1.7 MAF), and Upper Basin depletions are hydrologically dependent on natural runoff rather than the fixed, over-drafted deliveries of the Lower Basin. Recent (2025-2026) positions, via Shawcroft as negotiator: the Upper Basin put a plan on the table (release ~500,000 af from upstream reservoirs plus ~300,000 af of additional conservation by 2031) that the Lower Basin rejected; Utah rejects Lower Basin framing that the Upper Basin has offered nothing; Utah warns litigation risk is 'high' and that once the litigation trigger is pulled 'uncertainty will rule for probably decades.' Utah has posture-hardened: the legislature earmarked ~$6M ($5M to DNR + $1M to the Colorado River Authority) for potential compact litigation, and Sen. Mike Lee has threatened to strip federal funds from Lower Basin states that sue. On conservation/demand management: CUWCD runs turf-removal ('Flip Your Strip'-style) rebates, smart-irrigation and toilet rebates, and supports secondary-water metering (HB242 mandate, ~20-30% use reductions); Utah/CRA has stood up a voluntary, compensated, temporary, water-right-protected System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP) and a $5M 2025-2026 agricultural Demand Management Pilot Program (~20-30k af). But the district's own framing is that 'the easy water has already been developed' and conservation is 'limited in the amounts that can be counted on for the future' - i.e. conservation is real but insufficient to underwrite projected doubling of Utah's population by ~2065. Assistant GM Bart Leeflang oversees the district's Colorado River, water-rights, and conservation teams and frames the stakes as: the 2M Wasatch Front residents depend on Colorado River supplemental water.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but on strict conditions. CUWCD already operates compensated/voluntary conservation (rebates, SCPP, DMPP) and its parent negotiating body (CRA) explicitly built these on a 'temporary, voluntary, compensated, and water-right-protected' basis. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits that template and the district would likely engage IF: (a) it is genuinely consumptive-use (depletion) based and independently verified, not paper 'wet-water' that fails to yield real basin savings; (b) participation is voluntary and non-forfeiting of water rights (Utah's overriding red line - 'use it or lose it' fear); (c) it does not become a backdoor mandatory demand-management obligation that the Upper Basin views as accepting Lower Basin over-use as baseline. Skepticism to expect: the district believes conservation volumes are too small to underwrite growth, so it will treat a market as a marginal tool, not a substitute for developing its allocation. It will resist any market design that implicitly concedes the compact-accounting fight (e.g. that measures Upper Basin 'savings' against Lower Basin delivery obligations).

On solar+water. Most persuadable and highest-upside option. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure aligns with several district interests at once: it brings non-ratepayer, non-federal capital to a district that repays infrastructure via property tax and rates; it fits Utah's pro-growth, pro-development posture (data centers are exactly the kind of high-value M&I load Utah wants to attract with its allocation); and it monetizes the district's Colorado River water/energy assets (it already runs 2 hydro plants) without requiring political concessions on the compact. Expect enthusiasm IF the deal (a) is structured as behind-the-meter or does not trigger new large consumptive depletions the district can't cover, (b) directs the 'funds water' component to supply augmentation/reuse/efficiency the district controls, and (c) does not tie Utah to demand-management obligations. Risk to manage: data-center water consumption is itself a demand driver and a public-relations flashpoint in a water-short basin, so the district will want the water-funding component to visibly offset or exceed the load's consumption.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable in principle - this is the district's preferred 'new supply' frame. CUWCD's stated worldview ('the easy water is developed'; conservation is limited) points directly toward augmentation. Water reuse fits its existing toolkit (it supports secondary-water metering and efficiency) and lets it stretch the same Colorado River allocation further, which is politically ideal because it adds supply without conceding the compact fight. Reuse is the near-term, actionable option and the district would likely welcome funding/partnership. Desalination is more complicated: Utah is inland with no ocean access, so large-scale desal is only relevant via (a) Great Salt Lake / brackish-groundwater desal within Utah, or (b) interstate 'desal-for-allocation swaps' (funding Lower Basin/coastal desal in exchange for Colorado River paper), which the Upper Basin has floated conceptually. CUWCD would be interested in the latter primarily as a negotiating lever to protect its own depletions, not as an operational project it runs. Net: reuse = high appetite; in-state brackish desal = moderate; ocean desal = interested only as a compact-relief mechanism.

A win for them. A win for CUWCD is new, reliable, non-ratepayer-funded water supply and capital that lets Utah keep growing on its own Colorado River allocation without conceding the compact fight or forfeiting water rights. Concretely: (a) reuse and efficiency projects that stretch existing CUP/Colorado River water to serve more of the doubling Wasatch Front population; (b) hyperscaler / private capital that funds both energy and water infrastructure, easing the district's tax/rate-based repayment burden while attracting high-value load; (c) voluntary, compensated, water-right-protected conservation tools the district can deploy on its own terms and count toward Upper Basin credibility; and (d) at the state level, augmentation options (reuse, brackish/ocean desal-for-allocation swaps) that strengthen Utah's hand and reduce litigation exposure. The unifying theme: solutions that expand supply and options rather than impose caps, that bring outside money, and that leave Utah's Upper Basin legal position intact.

Public record. CUWCD is the lead proponent for the Lake Powell Pipeline, a proposed 140-mile pipeline to divert tens of thousands of acre-feet of Colorado River water for new development in Southern Utah.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. Lake Havasu City is a Lower Basin, on-river mainstem community in Mohave County, Arizona. Its sole raw water supply comes directly from the Colorado River and its hydraulically connected aquifer (horizontal collector wells plus a lake intake), under a fourth-priority mainstem entitlement of about 28,581 acre-feet/year (~9.3 billion gallons). It uses less than half of that allocation and considers itself comparatively water-secure for the foreseeable future. Its defining longstanding public position is fierce protection of fourth-priority mainstem water against permanent transfers OUT of the river to central-Arizona metro areas. The Council has repeatedly and unanimously opposed the GSC Farm/Greenstone-to-Queen Creek transfer: Resolution 25-3875 was adopted 7-0 in October 2025, renewing opposition dating to 2020. City Attorney Kelly Garry framed the transfer as reversing a long-held policy that 188,634 AF/yr of fourth-priority water be reserved for use on the mainstem, and warned it 'establishes a bad precedent and places the local water supplies and economic future of rural jurisdictions at risk.' The city allied with Mohave, La Paz, and Yuma Counties and the City of Yuma in litigation (preliminary injunction denied 2023; a 2024 ruling forced Reclamation to prepare a full EIS, ROD targeted ~April 2027). The city's stated conditions: transfers should only be allowed when Lake Powell/Mead rise to safe levels, to protect environmental and hydroelectric interests. On conservation it is a genuine performer: ~24% per-capita reduction 1998-2018 despite 26% population growth; reuses ~60% of its effluent (~1,850 AF of 3,170 AF in 2018) for irrigation to reduce raw Colorado River draw; runs rebate, leak-detection, and meter-replacement programs; and approved the South Intake Effluent Project to discharge treated wastewater to the lake.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive-to-persuadable in principle, but wary of the mechanism. Lake Havasu City is already a conservation leader and understands that consumptive-use reductions upstream and elsewhere protect the mainstem it depends on. A market that pays willing sellers to reduce consumptive use, keeping the water IN the river/reservoir system, aligns with its core demand that water stay on the mainstem. BUT its Queen Creek posture reveals deep suspicion of any framework that lets water become a tradable commodity moving away from rural on-river communities toward metro/agricultural buyers with alternatives. Expect the city to support a market only if it is structured as genuine consumptive-use reduction with verified water left in-stream/in-reservoir, explicitly bars permanent inter-basin/mainstem-to-metro transfers, protects fourth-priority reserve policy, and guards against hedge-fund-style speculation (it has publicly aligned with rural opposition to Water Asset Management-type schemes). Sell it as protection, not privatization.

On solar+water. Persuadable, with conditions, and potentially a good fit. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water addresses two Lake Havasu priorities: economic diversification (the city is actively courting light manufacturing and non-tourism jobs to reduce tourism dependence) and new water funding without touching its mainstem entitlement. Mohave County has abundant solar resource and land. The risk the city will scrutinize: any data-center load must not create a new large CONSUMPTIVE water demand on the river (evaporative cooling), and any 'funds water' mechanism must not be a backdoor to acquiring/transferring fourth-priority mainstem rights. Frame it as new load + new local revenue + funded reuse/efficiency that reduces river draw, with air-cooled or reclaimed-water cooling, and it becomes attractive. Frame it as a thirsty data center buying up rural water and it becomes the next Queen Creek fight.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly supportive and already doing it. Effluent reuse is central to the city's conservation strategy (~60% reused; expanding effluent access is a stated top priority; South Intake Effluent Project underway). Funding to expand reuse, effluent infrastructure, and advanced treatment would be welcomed and is low-friction. Desalination: neutral-to-supportive but indirect. The city has no ocean/brackish source of its own, so desal is not a direct supply option for Havasu. However, it would likely favor large-scale desal (e.g., Sea of Cortez / coastal augmentation, ocean desal for California) as a NEW supply that relieves pressure on the Colorado River and reduces the political appetite for raiding fourth-priority mainstem water. Support scales with how credibly the project adds wet water to the system rather than justifying continued over-draw.

A win for them. A durable guarantee that their fourth-priority mainstem entitlement and a stable Lake Havasu level are protected in perpetuity, with new outside money funding local water efficiency/reuse and economic diversification (non-tourism jobs) at zero cost to their river rights. Concretely: (1) enforceable protection against permanent transfers of fourth-priority mainstem water to metro/ag buyers; (2) funded expansion of effluent reuse and delivery infrastructure and system-efficiency programs; (3) new local tax base and jobs (solar+storage, light industry, data-center load) that diversifies away from tourism dependence; (4) system-level augmentation (reuse/desal) and verified consumptive-use cuts elsewhere that raise reservoir security and defuse the political pressure to raid rural on-river water. A win lets them keep saying 'we protect our water and grow our economy' to voters.

Public record. The city's public water conservation materials focus on individual user actions and provide no information supporting paying users for conservation, large-scale solar on public lands, or water reuse/desalination exchanges.

Position. Longstanding: Loveland is a committed transmountain-diversion water buyer and a co-investor in expanding Colorado River import/storage infrastructure. It stayed IN the Windy Gap Firming Project / Chimney Hollow through permitting, litigation and construction (2021-2025) as one of the 12 remaining participants, signaling a firm institutional bet on continued Colorado River imports as its growth supply. Recent/current: the City is moving on the demand-management side at home. In 2026 it proposed clarifying its municipal code (Titles 13 and 19) to define 'water waste' and strengthen enforcement (e.g., failure to timely repair leaks = waste), and updated its Unified Development Code to comply with Colorado SB 24-005 requiring water-wise landscaping for new commercial/industrial/institutional development. It runs a Hydro Zone / landscape program. City staff (e.g., Catharine Kellogg, Technical Specialist II) publicly frame these as conservation responses to ongoing drought. No evidence Loveland has taken an activist stance in interstate Colorado River allocation politics (Upper/Lower Basin negotiations, Lake Powell releases) -- as a small Front Range importer it is a supply-reliability-and-cost pragmatist, not a policy combatant. It leans on Northern Water as its policy/infrastructure agent in basin matters.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / persuadable-positive. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Loveland's revealed strategy: it is already codifying water-waste rules and SB 24-005 landscaping and it values firm, verifiable yield. If such a market let Loveland (or Northern Water on participants' behalf) monetize saved consumptive use, or buy verified conserved water instead of pricier permanent ag transfers, it addresses their cost-and-reliability pain directly. Caveats they will raise: transmountain accounting is tricky (their return flows and reuse rights complicate 'consumptive use' definitions), and they will want assurance that participating does not jeopardize their C-BT/Windy Gap decree rights or Northern Water quota. They will look to Northern Water and the state engineer for cover before committing.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED, with governance friction. Loveland municipally owns its electric utility (Loveland Water and Power) and is a Platte River Power Authority member city, so a solar+storage buildout that also funds water touches infrastructure it actually controls -- more actionable than for a pure water district. The 'someone else funds the water' angle is attractive given their cost pressure and megadrought framing. Frictions: PRPA/municipal-utility integration and resource-planning constraints, siting/land, and wariness of a hyperscaler datacenter's own large water/power demand competing with residents in a tight basin. They will want the water benefit ring-fenced and quantified, and will route generation questions through PRPA. Net: worth a serious conversation, not a fast yes.

On reuse/desal. REUSE: SUPPORTIVE and strategically aligned. Colorado recycles under ~4% of municipal wastewater and reports show large latent yield in reuse; as a transmountain importer Loveland may hold reusable-to-extinction return-flow rights on its Colorado River (C-BT/Windy Gap) water, which is exactly the water that is legally reusable in Colorado. Reuse lets them stretch expensive imported firm yield without new transmountain fights -- a strong fit. They will weigh treatment capital cost and public acceptance. DESALINATION: LOW RELEVANCE / likely skeptical. Loveland is an inland Front Range city with no brackish/ocean feedstock at scale; large desal reads as costly and geographically mismatched. They would only care about desal indirectly if it eased Lower-Basin demand on the whole system. Overall: pitch reuse hard, treat desal as background.

A win for them. A win for Loveland is more reliable firm yield at lower cost and reduced growth-supply risk, achieved without asking existing ratepayers to swallow a big rate shock or a politically painful mandatory-restriction regime. Concretely: filling/firming Chimney Hollow so their Windy Gap units actually deliver in dry years; a new supply or demand-offset that lets them serve planned buildout without buying ever-more-expensive C-BT units or ag water on a surging market; and being able to tell Council and residents they secured drought-proof water while keeping bills predictable. Political cover from Northern Water and a story of 'responsible stewardship' also count as wins.

Public record. The City of Loveland is a primary financial partner and proponent of the Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP), a large-scale new water diversion and storage project on a Colorado River tributary.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. District 014 is Mexico's only Colorado River irrigation district, covering ~207,965 irrigable hectares across the Mexicali Valley (Baja California, 86%) and San Luis Río Colorado (Sonora, 14%), fed by ~1,850 million m3/yr delivered through 2,718 km of canals from Mexico's 1.5 MAF treaty allocation (2,718 km network, ~85% lined; 22 user modules). LONGSTANDING POSITION: fiercely protective of water rights the district traces to 1937, and highly distrustful of federal (CONAGUA) and binational (CILA/IBWC) processes that it sees as excluding farmers while catering to cities and to U.S. conservation demands. RECENT (2025-2026): the district became the flashpoint of the basin's Mexican side. It is the ONLY priority district that refused to sign onto Sheinbaum's Plan Nacional Hídrico, rejecting a demand to cede 318 million m3 to the federal government, demanding a 'level playing field' with industry and inclusion in analysis committees, and opposing transfers to Tijuana (jornadabc, Jan 2026). Users cancelled a CONAGUA forum (Jan 20 2026), occupied CONAGUA offices (Oct 2025, Feb 2026), blockaded the Mexicali-Calexico border crossing with farm machinery and semi-trucks for days (Dec 2025), and seized dam infrastructure to protest the December 2025 National Water Law reform, which strips agricultural water rights and lets CONAGUA grant concessions directly to cities. Farmers frame federal compliance with U.S. water cuts as surrendering national sovereignty while agriculture is starved. On conservation specifically: they say they honored fallowing commitments under Minute 323 (2017) and Minute 330 (2024) but were 'cheated' and paid roughly half what was promised, and have threatened to resume farming or 'spill' water rather than let it be redirected. Spokesperson Ana Quirino: 'We've been fighting against secrecy.'

On conservation. PERSUADABLE-TO-POSITIVE, conditionally. The district has already participated in fallowing-based conservation and is not opposed to conserving in principle; its rage is about non-payment, opacity, and exclusion. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market with transparent, audited, direct-to-farmer payments and farmer-controlled measurement directly answers their loudest grievance ('fighting against secrecy,' paid half). This is the single most credible lever to move specific modules from opponent to ally. Risk: if it is routed through CONAGUA/CILA or reads as another federal or U.S. mechanism to extract water without reliable payment, they will reject and escalate (blockades, 'spilling' water). Payment integrity and a genuine negotiating seat are the make-or-break conditions.

On solar+water. UNKNOWN / cautiously persuadable. No public evidence of District 014 engaging with datacenter, hyperscaler, or solar+storage water-funding proposals; mark unknown. Inference: an offer that brings outside capital to (a) replace lost municipal water-sales revenue, (b) fund the agro-hydraulic infrastructure and canal lining they explicitly demand, and (c) pay farmers directly could be attractive, since money and infrastructure are exactly their asks. But sovereignty and water-rights sensitivity is acute, and anything perceived as a foreign/corporate entity acquiring their water or fronting for the government would trigger the same opposition reflex. Would require local, farmer-facing structuring and transparency.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / persuadable if it protects their allocation. Broader basin discourse around Mexicali/District 014 includes desalination and treated-wastewater reuse as supply options, but there is no public record of the district itself taking a firm stance; treat specifics as unknown. Inference: the district should welcome reuse/desal that supplies CITIES so that municipal demand stops competing for and drawing down the agricultural allocation they are fighting to keep (they already oppose transfers to Tijuana). They would resist any scheme that uses new supply as justification to permanently strip their treaty water or their rights. Framing matters: 'new water for cities so farmers keep theirs' is aligned; 'cities get new water, so give up yours' is opposed.

A win for them. A win is cash certainty and dignity: full, transparent, direct payment for water they conserve (closing the ~$41.6M-paid vs ~$96.5M-committed gap under Minutes 323/330), a guaranteed seat in water-policy negotiations equal to industry, secured 1937-rooted water rights that the December 2025 law reform threatens, replacement of the municipal water-sales revenue they are losing (cities paid ~13 pesos/m3; direct city purchases end in 2026), and investment in lined canals and modernization that lets them farm the same land with less water rather than simply losing acreage and income.

Public record. The district has previously participated in binational water conservation programs that involve payments to farmers for fallowing, indicating a willingness to engage in compensated conservation, though its primary mission remains delivering water for irrigation.

Position. GCC Energy LLC operates the King II underground coal mine near Hesperus in western La Plata County, Colorado. It is a wholly owned, vertically integrated subsidiary of Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua (GCC), a Mexico-based multinational cement producer: the mine's low-ash bituminous coal (~700,000 tons/yr) is the captive fuel supply for GCC's US and Mexican cement plants (Pueblo CO, Rapid City SD, Trident MT, Tijeras NM, Odessa TX). Employs ~140-165 people. GCC has taken NO public position on the Colorado River crisis, basin-wide allocation, or Lower/Upper Basin negotiations. Its longstanding, revealed posture is that of a water CONSUMER and permit-holder defending continued operations and growth against water- and environment-based challenges, not a participant in river-policy debates. On its own water footprint, GCC consistently characterizes King II as a 'dry' underground mine and 'good neighbor' with responsible, contained water reuse, and it prevailed in litigation seeking to tie the mine to stricter water protections. The mine sits in the La Plata River sub-basin (a tributary of the San Juan/Colorado system), which advocates describe as an over-allocated, low-flow stream.

On conservation. Largely indifferent-to-mildly-negative. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is designed around large agricultural and municipal users; King II's ~14-60 af/yr is too small to make GCC a meaningful seller or buyer, and the mine's water is industrial-process water it needs to operate, not a fungible ag entitlement it would idle for payment. GCC would not oppose such a market on principle but would resist any design that reclassified, capped, or scrutinized its existing water lease or tied conservation obligations to its mine permit. If anything, a conservation market that raises the visibility and price of water in the La Plata basin cuts against them by strengthening the hand of the ranchers/advocates who argue the mine takes scarce water. Net: passive opponent of anything that reopens its water permit; non-participant otherwise. UNKNOWN whether GCC would ever monetize the underlying Huntington ag water right if the mine wound down.

On solar+water. Neutral to weakly negative, with a real threat vector. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is orthogonal to GCC's coal mining but is strategically adverse to the parent's captive-coal thesis: cheap firmed renewables accelerate the case for electrifying/decarbonizing cement and displace thermal coal demand, which is the entire economic rationale for King II. GCC would not fight a solar+water program directly (it is not a utility or a water district), but it has no incentive to champion it and every incentive to keep coal-fired cement economics intact. There is a narrow, opportunistic upside: GCC sells cement and concrete for exactly this kind of infrastructure (solar pads, foundations, data-center construction), so the buildout is a downstream demand tailwind for the parent's core product even as it erodes the coal side. UNKNOWN if GCC would publicly engage; most likely posture is quiet non-participation while capturing concrete sales.

On reuse/desal. Indifferent. Large-scale reuse/desalination operates at basin and municipal scale and does not intersect King II's small, self-contained industrial water system in the La Plata sub-basin. GCC gains no direct operational benefit (its water is already reused on-site and stored in-mine) and bears no direct cost. Secondary interest only: desal/reuse plants are concrete- and cement-intensive to build, a modest demand tailwind for the parent, and any policy that eases regional water scarcity slightly reduces the pressure and scrutiny on the mine's own water use. No meaningful opposition expected; no meaningful advocacy expected.

A win for them. A win for GCC is continuity and optionality: (1) the King II expansion proceeds and mine life is extended ~20 years with no new water-permit conditions or groundwater-monitoring mandates; (2) their existing ~14-60 af/yr water lease and in-mine storage reservoir stay untouched and un-litigated; (3) captive low-cost coal keeps flowing to the parent's cement plants, preserving vertical-integration margins; and (4) the parent captures upside as a cement/concrete supplier to whatever infrastructure (solar, storage, desal, reuse, data centers) the basin builds. The cleanest offer is one that leaves their water and mining permits alone while positioning GCC's concrete as essential to the water/energy buildout, i.e. treat them as a construction-materials beneficiary, not a water-policy counterparty.

Public record. The entity's core business is operating a coal mine, which is in direct opposition to a clean-infrastructure agenda centered on transitioning away from fossil fuels.

Position. Greenstone is a private water-investment/brokerage firm that acquires Lower Colorado River agricultural land and monetizes the attached senior water rights by transferring them to growing municipalities. Its signature deal: it bought ~485-500 acres of farmland in Cibola (La Paz County), Arizona in 2013-2014, then sold ~2,000-2,033 acre-feet/year of Colorado River (Priority-3/agricultural) water rights to the Phoenix suburb of Queen Creek. The transfer was approved by the Bureau of Reclamation (September 2022/2023) as a first-of-its-kind interstate/inter-basin ag-to-municipal transfer, at roughly a $27M sale price and reportedly a ~$14M gross profit to Greenstone. La Paz, Mohave and Yuma counties sued Reclamation over an inadequate environmental review; a judge ordered the environmental assessment redone. Greenstone's public framing (per its site greenstonerp.com and reporting) is that it 'advances water transactions that benefit both the public good and private enterprise' and works with governments/developers to increase supply reliability. Longstanding revealed position: markets, not administrative allocation, should move water from lower-value ag use to higher-value municipal use; it treats conserved/foregone consumptive use as a tradeable, monetizable asset. Critics (former AZ Rep. Regina Cobb; La Paz County officials) call it profiteering that dries out rural communities and 'opens Pandora's box' for buy-and-dry water speculation.

On conservation. Broadly FAVORABLE but self-interested. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the closest thing to Greenstone's own business model formalized: it turns foregone ag consumptive use into a certified, tradeable, paid-for commodity, which is exactly what they monetize. They would likely support it IF the accounting credits the rights-holder (them) and allows resale/monetization, and IF verification does not strip their margin or lock water into non-transferable 'system conservation' that only benefits the pool. They would oppose or lobby against a version that treats conserved water as a public claw-back (uncompensated or fixed-price) or that blocks municipal resale. Expect them to want to be a market-maker/aggregator in it.

On solar+water. Very FAVORABLE / high interest. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water creates a new, deep-pocketed, price-insensitive demand class for exactly the firm water rights Greenstone aggregates. Data-center operators need firm supply and have the balance sheets municipalities lack, and they value speed and certainty over price. This is arguably Greenstone's ideal buyer. They would want to broker or supply the water leg. Caveat: they compete for that role, and if the hyperscaler funds NEW supply (reuse/desal/solar-driven) it could substitute for buying their existing ag rights, so they will prefer structures where their transferable rights are the water source.

On reuse/desal. MIXED to mildly NEGATIVE. Large-scale reuse and desalination create NEW water supply that competes with and can devalue the scarcity premium underpinning Greenstone's ag-rights portfolio. If augmentation makes firm supply abundant, the value of moving Colorado River ag rights to cities falls. They are unlikely to fund or champion reuse/desal. They could tolerate or participate only if positioned as the offtake broker, the financier capturing a return, or if desal/reuse is framed as complementary (bridging supply) rather than a substitute that collapses water prices. Net: a threat to their core thesis, so soft opposition unless they get a cut.

A win for them. A win is a liquid, legally durable, high-margin market for water they control or can broker, with clean title, a defensible environmental/regulatory pathway (so deals do not get unwound in court like Cibola), and buyers with deep balance sheets (municipalities, or better, hyperscalers/data centers) willing to pay premium prices for firm supply. Ideally: recurring transaction/brokerage fees and asset appreciation rather than one-off sales, plus political cover that reframes them as a supply solution rather than a speculator.

Public record. The firm's business model is to acquire agricultural land to sever and sell the senior water rights to the highest bidder, a practice of water marketing that is antithetical to a conservation-for-system-benefit agenda.

Position. The Havasupai are unusual among Colorado River basin stakeholders: they do not divert Colorado River mainstem water and hold no quantified allocation. Their ~188,077-acre reservation sits in a Grand Canyon tributary canyon, and their sole water source is the Redwall-Muav aquifer, which feeds Havasu Creek and the blue-green Havasu/Mooney waterfalls that anchor their economy. Their federal reserved water rights (Winters rights) remain UNSETTLED; they have a federal negotiating team but no completed settlement, and they have twice gone to federal court to defend their water. Their dominant, longstanding public position is therefore not about volumetric river allocation but about SOURCE-WATER PROTECTION and Indigenous sovereignty over the Grand Canyon watershed. Their signature fight is against uranium mining above their aquifer: the Pinyon Plain Mine (Energy Fuels), which began extracting ore in early 2024, hit a perched aquifer in 2016 and has pumped tens of millions of gallons of uranium- and arsenic-contaminated water; the Tribe formally objected in 2025 when Arizona ADEQ let the operator raise its permitted arsenic limit (0.05 to 0.055 mg/L). They are a founding member of the 13-nation Grand Canyon Tribal Coalition that won the Aug 2023 designation of the 917,618-acre Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni national monument ('Baaj Nwaavjo' is Havasupai for 'where Indigenous peoples roam'), which blocks new mining claims across the watershed; that designation survived an Arizona Legislature challenge at the Ninth Circuit on Apr 1, 2026. Their frame on the broader river crisis is protective and rights-first: keep the watershed and aquifer clean, get their reserved rights recognized and funded, and treat tribal water sovereignty as non-negotiable.

On conservation. Largely indifferent-to-neutral, with sovereignty caveats. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is aimed at large mainstem diverters (CAP, IID, ag, cities). The Havasupai have no meaningful consumptive Colorado River allocation to enroll and no surplus to monetize, so a conservation market offers them little direct upside and does not touch their core threats (contamination, unsettled rights). They would not oppose it in principle, and they may support it as a way to relieve system-wide pressure on the river and watershed they hold sacred. But they will be wary of any framework that (a) presumes to quantify or cap tribal water without a settled rights process and their consent, (b) advantages senior non-tribal users while tribes' rights remain unquantified, or (c) trades paper water in ways that could later constrain their reserved-rights claim. Reaction: low-salience, conditionally neutral, watchful of sovereignty implications.

On solar+water. Cautiously open but skeptical, and highly conditional on WHERE and HOW. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be attractive IF the water funding is directed at their real needs (aquifer protection, Supai water infrastructure, settlement support) and if projects respect tribal consent and the Grand Canyon watershed. Clean energy aligns with their anti-extraction, watershed-protection worldview far better than uranium mining does, so a well-structured, consent-based renewables package with genuine benefit-sharing could win support. But they will scrutinize hard: any solar/storage siting on or near the sacred Grand Canyon watershed, ancestral lands, or the monument would draw fierce opposition; new industrial water demand from data centers competing for scarce regional water would alarm them; and 'funds water' must be real, dedicated benefit to the Tribe, not PR or funding that flows to downstream utilities. Reaction hinges entirely on siting away from sacred/watershed lands, ironclad consent, and water benefits that actually reach Supai.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive, low direct salience. Large-scale reuse and desalination create new supply for downstream mainstem users (Phoenix, Tucson, California, Mexico) and do not directly serve or threaten the Havasupai, who depend on a local aquifer far from any desal plant or reuse system. They are likely to welcome anything that reduces extractive pressure on the Colorado River watershed and lets the basin stop fighting over a shrinking river, which indirectly protects the Grand Canyon system they steward. Concerns would be indirect: the energy footprint and siting of desal/reuse megaprojects (they oppose extractive industrial development near sacred lands), and a general wariness that big-infrastructure 'solutions' can be used to justify continued over-allocation and continued threats to source waters. Overall this is not a make-or-break issue for them; support is passive and contingent on projects staying away from their watershed and respecting tribal interests basin-wide.

A win for them. A win is: (1) permanent protection of the Redwall-Muav aquifer and Havasu Creek from uranium mining and contamination, including a real path to shut down or contain Pinyon Plain Mine and durable enforcement of the Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni monument mining ban; (2) a favorable, funded settlement of their long-unsettled federal reserved water rights that guarantees clean drinking water and infrastructure for Supai; (3) protection and growth of their tourism economy (permits, helicopter/horseback operations, the Havasu Falls draw) which funds the Tribe; and (4) genuine sovereignty and consent over decisions affecting their watershed. Money and infrastructure matter, but only if they come with, not instead of, watershed protection and respect for consent.

Public record. The Tribe's primary public position is staunch opposition to any development, like the Pinyon Plain Mine, that threatens the groundwater quality of the Redwall-Muav Aquifer, which is their sole water source.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. Grassroots social movement / water-defender coalition in Mexicali, Baja California, formed around January 2017. Core longstanding position: water is a commons, a human right, and a matter of national sovereignty and territorial defense, NOT a commodity to be allocated to private corporate or foreign interests. Made its name defeating the Constellation Brands (Grupo Modelo owner) brewery, which had been guaranteed ~20 million cubic meters/year of Mexicali aquifer water. In 2017, ~12,000 residents marched; the movement set up encampments and blockades; several members were criminally charged ('dispossession of state buildings,' 'deprivation of liberty of police') and stood trial. In March 2020 a plebiscite rejected the brewery and President Lopez Obrador cancelled the permits/water rights; the plant was killed for the Mexicali site. The movement also helped block a 2017 Baja California state water-privatization law ('Ley del Agua'). In Feb 2020 the CNDH (national human-rights commission) affirmed the brewery approval violated the human right to water. Frames the water fight as resistance to 'economic colonialism' and the surrender of Mexican resources (mining, oil, land, water) to U.S. economic interests. Deep distrust of secrecy, confidentiality clauses, and deals struck between the state and private capital without public consent.

On conservation. Skeptical-to-hostile, but persuadable at the margins on design. A 'verified consumptive-use conservation market' reads to them as another opaque, market-based mechanism that monetizes water and risks concentrating benefits with corporations, the state, or well-capitalized players while ordinary residents and small farmers get squeezed. Their live grievance (Feb 2026) is precisely that fallowing/conservation money under Minutes 323/330 is opaque and hasn't reached the farmers who gave up water. A market they don't control, negotiated behind confidentiality clauses, would trigger their core 'secrecy = dispossession' frame. They could soften ONLY if the market is transparent, keeps water as a protected human-right baseline for communities, pays affected small farmers directly and verifiably, and is governed with public participation. Absent that, expect opposition and framing as 'water privatization by another name.'

On solar+water. Strongly hostile by default. A hyperscaler-funded (Big Tech / data-center) solar+storage buildout that 'also funds water' fits their template of a foreign/corporate actor buying access to scarce local water and legitimacy via a side payment. They defeated exactly this pattern with Constellation Brands (a foreign corporation guaranteed local water for its own production). Data centers are water- and energy-intensive and carry heavy negative valence in Mexican water-justice circles. They would likely read 'funds water' as greenwashing / a buyout of consent and mobilize against it, especially if negotiated without transparent community consent. Persuasion is very hard here; the burden is on the developer to prove it is net-additive to community water, not extractive.

On reuse/desal. Most persuadable of the three, conditionally. Reuse and desalination expand supply rather than reallocate existing aquifer/river water away from communities, which aligns with their 'defend our water' frame instead of threatening it. They could support desal/reuse IF it is publicly owned or publicly accountable, keeps water affordable and prioritized for people and small farmers over industry, is transparent about who the new water serves, and does not become a vehicle to justify handing existing supply to corporations. They will be wary of privatized desal concessions, high consumer tariffs, brine/energy impacts on the Sea of Cortez/Gulf, and any structure where the public pays to build supply that ends up serving industrial users. Framed as public, community-serving new supply, this is where you can find common ground.

A win for them. A win is water secured as a protected public good for Mexicali residents and small farmers: guaranteed affordable community water, no corporate capture of the aquifer or river quota, full transparency (no secret deals or confidentiality clauses), and direct, on-time, verifiable payment to the farmers who fallow land. Symbolically, it is protecting local/national sovereignty over water against foreign and corporate appropriation. Concretely in 2026-2027, it looks like the Minute 323/330 conservation money actually reaching Irrigation District 14 farmers, a just transition (crop-switching support, alternative livelihoods) ahead of the 350 Mm3 cut, and new supply (reuse/desal) that is public, community-first, and does not become a pretext to reallocate existing water to industry.

Public record. This grassroots movement's core position is that water is a commons and opposes large-scale infrastructure projects, making them inherently skeptical of market-based conservation payments and large-scale energy or desalination projects.

Position. Save The Colorado (STC) is a litigation-first river-advocacy group founded in 2010 by Gary Wockner (PhD), launched with New Belgium Brewing and later backed by Patagonia and Clif Bar. It spun off to a standalone 501(c)3 in 2015 and today operates under the legal entity 'Save The Worlds Rivers' (EIN 47-1936330, CO). Its through-line, held for over a decade, is that the Colorado River is over-allocated and being drained, and that the fix is to STOP taking more water out, not to engineer new supply. Longstanding positions: (1) Categorical opposition to new dams, diversions, and pipelines. STC is the lead plaintiff against Denver Water's $531M Gross Reservoir dam expansion (Moffat/Colorado River diversion) and fought Northern Water's NISP/Windy Gap Firming Project for ~20 years, winning a temporary construction halt at Gross in 2025 and a $100M settlement to keep flows in the Cache la Poudre. (2) 'Drain Lake Powell, not Colorado farms' - Wockner co-wrote a 2021 column with ex-Reclamation Commissioner Dan Beard opposing 'demand management' schemes that pay/lease water off farms to prop up Powell; STC cheered Colorado's 2022 'hard pause' on demand management. (3) All basin states, including Upper Basin/Colorado, must take real cuts, not just the Lower Basin. (4) STC endorses conservation, efficiency, and water reuse/recycling as legitimate supply-side fixes and has amplified reports (e.g., UCLA 2025 wastewater-reuse analysis) showing basin reuse could add ~0.9-1.3M AFY. (5) Explicitly hostile to 'neo-liberal,' market-based environmentalism - Wockner frames water markets as a way to launder continued over-extraction. Tactics: federal NEPA/ESA/Clean Water Act litigation (nine-plus Colorado lawsuits, pro bono support incl. Univ. of Denver Environmental Law Clinic), aggressive media/press-release presence, and coalition work (WildEarth Guardians, Sierra Club, Waterkeeper Alliance, Living Rivers). Wockner is deliberately confrontational (profiled by the Colorado Sun as the river's 'bad boy activist').

On conservation. Skeptical-to-hostile if the market moves water OFF farms or enables continued extraction; cautiously tolerant only if it verifiably keeps water IN the river. A 'verified consumptive-use conservation market' collides directly with STC's stated opposition to 'demand management' and 'buy-and-dry' and its critique of market-based environmentalism as neo-liberal cover for over-allocation. Wockner will attack any market whose water goes to prop up Lake Powell or backfill new demand, and will demand: (a) additionality and permanence, (b) that saved water stay instream rather than be re-diverted or sold to growth, and (c) that Upper Basin/Colorado agriculture not be the sacrifice zone. If the market can be framed as farmers voluntarily and permanently dedicating verified consumptive-use savings to instream/river health (not to Powell storage or to enabling new dams), STC could grudgingly accept it, but expect public suspicion by default.

On solar+water. Strongly skeptical, likely opposed. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that 'also funds water' reads to STC as exactly the corporate/market-driven, growth-enabling model Wockner distrusts - new industrial load (data centers) and private capital buying its way into the river system. Expect concerns that (a) it legitimizes new consumptive demand, (b) it lets utilities/developers avoid real cuts by writing checks, and (c) energy projects carry their own land/water/ecological footprints. Persuadable ONLY if the water funding produces permanent instream flow with independent verification and the package demonstrably reduces, not enables, total basin depletion. Absent that, treat as an opponent on this item.

On reuse/desal. Split: strongly supportive of reuse/recycling; ambivalent-to-skeptical on large-scale desalination. Water reuse is one of the few supply-side fixes STC actively champions - Wockner and allies have promoted reuse/recycling (amplifying the UCLA 2025 analysis showing ~0.9-1.3M AFY potential) precisely because it stretches existing supply without building new dams or diverting more river. Large-scale desalination is more fraught: STC may accept coastal desal (e.g., MWD-type programs) as a way to reduce California's Colorado River draw, but will scrutinize energy intensity, brine/marine impacts, cost, and any framing that uses 'new supply' as an excuse to keep draining the river or to greenlight more growth. Net: reuse is a genuine point of alignment; desal is conditional and case-by-case.

A win for them. A win for Save The Colorado is a Colorado River that stops being drained: enforceable, verified reductions in total basin consumptive use shared across all seven states (Upper Basin included), permanent additional water left instream, no new dams/diversions/pipelines (a permanent kill of the Gross Reservoir expansion and NISP-type projects is the trophy), and reuse/efficiency scaled up as the supply answer instead of new development or water markets that shuffle water toward growth or Powell storage. Bonus wins: farms protected from buy-and-dry, and Lake Powell decommissioned/drained rather than propped up. Any solution they can publicly claim 'kept water in the river without building anything new' is one they'll champion.

Public record. Opposes paying for conservation (demand management) as a flawed concept and maintains a litigation-first approach against new water and dam projects.

Position. SECWCD was formed in Pueblo District Court in 1958 as the local sponsor of the federal Fryingpan-Arkansas Project, a transmountain diversion that pulls ~57,400 acre-feet/year from the Fryingpan River basin on the Western Slope (Colorado River headwaters) across the Continental Divide to the water-short Arkansas Valley. Its entire reason for existing is moving Colorado River water east, so it is structurally invested in protecting Upper Basin / Colorado transmountain diversions. It is a member of the Front Range Water Council (FRWC), alongside Denver Water, Aurora, Colorado Springs Utilities, Northern Water, Pueblo Water and Twin Lakes Reservoir & Canal Co. Through FRWC it has taken a hard, consistent public line in the Colorado River crisis: 'reduce use to match supply, not mask imbalance by shifting risk upstream,' 'the river is small, policy must follow hydrology,' and that Colorado already absorbs hydrologic shortage 'without compensation, without delay, without debate.' This is code for pushing more of the burden onto the Lower Basin. General counsel Lee Miller publicly warned that a Colorado state task force should not 'provide ammunition to lower basin states' in Interim Guideline negotiations. FRWC has opposed uncompensated mandatory curtailment (pre- or post-compact), resisted a Western-Slope-driven risk study of how much West Slope water might be curtailable, and is wary of demand-management programs it does not control. Net posture: defend existing transmountain rights, resist any framework that would cut Colorado's / the Upper Basin's use, favor Lower Basin bearing the reductions. Longstanding operational priorities: complete the Arkansas Valley Conduit (65% federally funded, broke ground 2023, will serve ~50,000 people), and maximize storage via its 40-year Excess Capacity Master Storage Contract (signed Dec 2016) in Pueblo Reservoir.

On conservation. Cautiously positive but guarded, IF the market is voluntary, compensated, and does not become a lever for mandatory curtailment of its own transmountain rights. FRWC has explicitly supported voluntary compensated demand management while opposing uncompensated mandatory curtailment. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays willing sellers and keeps Colorado's savings credited to Colorado (not simply flushed to Lower Basin benefit) fits their stated 'reduce use to match supply' framing. Their fear: that a conservation market becomes the accounting basis for forcing Upper Basin cuts, or that West Slope agricultural fallowing dries up the very basin that feeds their diversion. They will want ironclad verification, a Colorado-controlled crediting/storage account, and assurance it is additive, not a curtailment mechanism. Persuadable on this specific item.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-interested, low prior public position. Nothing in the record shows SECWCD engaging with data-center or hyperscaler load. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could be attractive as non-federal capital for their priorities (Arkansas Valley Conduit completion, storage, reuse, treatment) at a time when they depend on uncertain federal appropriations. The Arkansas Valley and Pueblo/Colorado Springs corridor is plausible data-center territory. Risk they will scrutinize: new large industrial water demand competing for scarce Arkansas Valley supply, and any implied new consumptive use on an already over-allocated system. If framed as offset/net-neutral-or-negative on water with capital flowing to Conduit/reuse, they lean favorable. Mark as persuadable/unknown on specifics.

On reuse/desal. Positive and aligned with existing behavior. SECWCD already operates around maximizing reuse and storage: its Excess Capacity Master Contract explicitly enables storing Fry-Ark return flows and other sources in Pueblo Reservoir, and it runs conservation and water-system-management (BMP) programs. Reuse of transmountain (fully-consumable) Fry-Ark water is legally advantaged in Colorado and stretches their imported supply. Large-scale reuse is squarely in their interest and consistent with 'reduce use to match supply.' Desalination is less relevant inland (no seawater; brackish groundwater desal in the Arkansas basin is conceivable but energy/brine-cost heavy) but they would not oppose supply-augmentation that reduces pressure on the Colorado River import. Most supportive of the three levers.

A win for them. A win is more reliable water at lower risk to their transmountain diversion and their ratepayers, without conceding any legal ground on curtailment. Concretely: (a) Arkansas Valley Conduit fully funded and finished (clean drinking water to ~50,000 people) with new non-federal capital reducing appropriations risk; (b) a conservation/crediting framework that is voluntary, compensated, verified, and credited to Colorado, that they can hold up as Colorado 'doing its part' while the Lower Basin absorbs the structural cut; (c) new reuse/storage capacity that stretches their ~57,400 af/yr import. The narrative win: the river stays small but Colorado's supply-driven, hydrology-follows-policy position prevails and their diversion is protected.

Public record. While the district operates a hydroelectric plant, it has expressed a need for flexibility and caution regarding the implementation of a paid demand management program.

Position. MISCLASSIFICATION / NOT A COLORADO RIVER BASIN STAKEHOLDER. The Town of Fort Laramie is a very small municipality (~226 residents; 2020-2026 estimates) in Goshen County, eastern Wyoming, sited near the confluence of the Laramie River and the North Platte River. This places it squarely in the North Platte / Platte River basin, which drains east into the Missouri-Mississippi system and the Gulf of Mexico. It is NOT in the Colorado River basin. Wyoming's Colorado River basin water is entirely in the Green River basin in the far southwest corner of the state (Wyoming holds ~14% of Upper Basin flows under the 1948 Upper Colorado River Basin Compact); Fort Laramie is ~300+ miles away on the opposite side of the Continental Divide and shares no water with the Colorado system. The inclusion in a Colorado River stakeholder list is almost certainly a name-collision false positive: the local 'Laramie River' is a North Platte tributary (headwaters in the Colorado Rockies but flowing north into Wyoming's North Platte, adjudicated in Wyoming v. Colorado over the Laramie River, not the Colorado River), and the regional 'Fort Laramie Canal' is North Platte Project irrigation infrastructure fed by the Whalen Diversion Dam. No public record shows this town taking any position on the Colorado River crisis, because it has no standing, entitlement, or exposure there. Its actual water context is North Platte Project irrigation (Goshen and Gering-Fort Laramie Irrigation Districts) plus small municipal water/sewer service; its water-scarcity concerns are North Platte drought and irrigation delivery, a separate legal and hydrologic regime.

On conservation. Unknown / not applicable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market on the Colorado River would not reach Fort Laramie, which has no consumptive use of Colorado River water to sell or curtail. No public position exists and none would be expected. Marked unknown because the entity is out-of-basin, not because evidence is merely thin.

On solar+water. Unknown / not applicable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds Colorado River water would have no water nexus for Fort Laramie. A generic rural-Wyoming solar+storage project could in principle site near eastern Wyoming, but that would be an unrelated energy-siting question with no connection to Colorado River water and no evidence the town has taken any stance. Marked unknown.

On reuse/desal. Unknown / not applicable. Large-scale Colorado River reuse or ocean desalination is hydrologically and geographically irrelevant to a North Platte basin town. No plausible mechanism connects Fort Laramie to such projects, and no public position exists. Marked unknown.

A win for them. Not applicable to the Colorado River crisis. Fort Laramie has nothing to win or lose in Colorado River operations, post-2026 guidelines, or Lower/Upper Basin cuts, because it holds no Colorado River water and sits in a different drainage. Any 'win' framing would be a category error. Its genuine municipal interests (reliable North Platte irrigation deliveries, affordable small-town water/sewer service) are governed by North Platte Project operations and Wyoming water law, not by anything a Colorado River conservation market, hyperscaler water fund, or reuse/desal project would touch.

Public record. The entity is not a Colorado River Basin stakeholder; it is located in the North Platte River basin (Missouri River basin), making its engagement on these specific Colorado River policies nonexistent and classifying it as an opponent to a basin-specific agenda.

Position revised from “unknown” after a public-source check.

Position. Trapper Mining Inc. runs the Trapper surface coal mine ~6 miles south of Craig, Moffat County, CO. It is a single-purpose captive supplier: essentially all of its ~2.3 million tons/yr of coal moves to one customer, the Craig Generating Station, historically supplying roughly half that plant's coal. Trapper is not a normal merchant miner. It is co-owned by four Craig Station participants: Tri-State Generation & Transmission, Platte River Power Authority, Salt River Project (AZ), and PacifiCorp (OR) - the same utilities that decided to retire Craig Station. So Trapper's 'position' is functionally an extension of its utility owners. The company itself keeps a low public profile on Colorado River basin policy: no evidence of it lobbying on drought, the Compact, or basin cuts under its own name. Its public identity is local and reclamation-focused (it won an OSMRE Bronze Award for reclamation). The politically live issue around Trapper/Craig is the 'water dividend': as Craig Station retires (Unit 1 end-2025 but held open under Trump-era emergency/SPP orders into 2026; Unit 3 by Jan 2028; Unit 2 by Sep 2028; mine reclamation to follow, closure ~2026-2030), the industrial water tied to the plant complex (~16,400 acre-feet/yr at Craig Station; ~44 cfs of combined utility Yampa withdrawal in the valley) could return to the Yampa/Colorado system. Trapper's owners backed SB24-197 (signed May 2024), which protects those industrial water rights from abandonment through 2050 - keeping the option to redeploy the water rather than let it revert to the river permanently. Tri-State has publicly said it has made no decision on future use of the retiring stations' water. Net: the mine's own longstanding stance is jobs/community continuity and orderly reclamation; the river-relevant stance (hold the water rights, decide later) is set by its utility owners.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but not the decision-maker. A verified consumptive-use conservation market (System Conservation / demand-management style payments for measured, additive reductions) is attractive to the OWNERS because it converts a stranded, soon-idle industrial water right into a revenue or credit-generating asset instead of a use-it-or-lose-it liability - exactly why they pushed SB24-197 to keep the right alive to 2050. Trapper's own tiny reclamation-phase water use is too small to matter as a supply-side seller. The mine as an entity would defer to Tri-State/Platte River/SRP/PacifiCorp. Risk: they will resist any market design that treats abandonment or non-use as automatic forfeiture, and they will want the credited water to be verifiable, additional, and to protect their priority date. Likely reaction: 'interested if it pays and preserves the right; opposed if it strips the right.'

On solar+water. Positive - this is close to their preferred off-ramp. Craig/Moffat County is actively courting post-coal economic replacement (jobs, tax base, transmission). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that reuses the existing Craig Station interconnection and transmission, hires displaced Trapper/Craig workers, and also funds water (buying/leasing the freed consumptive-use rights for cooling-free load or for river benefit) hits the community's central anxiety: what replaces coal jobs and revenue. Trapper's owners would welcome a buyer that pays for the transmission position AND the water rights they are holding to 2050. The mine itself gains little directly (it's closing regardless), but its owners and the surrounding community are strong allies for this pathway. Caveat: they will want firm jobs and tax commitments, not vague promises, and clarity on who controls the water.

On reuse/desal. Largely indifferent / low-relevance. Trapper is an inland northwest-Colorado surface mine with no coastal or brackish resource and no role in reuse or desalination infrastructure. Large-scale reuse/desal in the Lower Basin or on the coast does not touch Trapper's operations or its owners' Yampa rights directly. Second-order only: to the extent basin-wide reuse/desal relieves pressure on the Colorado and reduces the chance of mandatory curtailment reaching the Upper Basin, the utility owners would view it as a mild positive (less risk to their retained rights). No public position exists; mark this reaction as inferred, low-salience.

A win for them. A win is a graceful, funded landing that converts stranded assets into value and softens the community blow: (a) their retained Yampa/Craig water rights (shielded to 2050 by SB24-197) get monetized or redeployed - sold, leased, or paid into a verified conservation program - without losing priority or being deemed abandoned; (b) the Craig Station transmission/interconnection and any reusable land is bought by a solar+storage or hyperscaler developer that re-employs displaced workers and rebuilds Moffat County's tax base; (c) reclamation is fully funded and completed to the standard Trapper is proud of. In short: the utility owners get paid for the water and the grid position, the town gets replacement jobs, and nobody has to choose between keeping the water right and doing right by the river.

Public record. As a captive coal supplier to the Craig Station power plant, Trapper Mine's entire business model is based on fossil fuel extraction, which is antithetical to a clean-infrastructure agenda, and it will cease operations with the plant's closure.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. The Division of Water Resources (DWRe) is Utah's water-planning and development agency inside the Department of Natural Resources; on the Colorado River it works alongside the Colorado River Authority of Utah (created 2021 as the interstate/legal lead), so on river policy DWRe is one voice of the State of Utah's Upper Basin posture rather than an independent negotiator. That posture is the defining fact: Utah holds ~23% of the Upper Basin's apportionment (roughly 5% of the whole river's compact allocation) and, like the other Upper Division States (Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming), has never developed its full paper right. Utah's longstanding public position is therefore that the Upper Basin should NOT bear mandatory cuts to bail out Lower Basin overuse, because the Upper Basin lives on the actual variable flow while the Lower Basin structurally over-consumes a fixed 7.5 MAF plus evaporation. Director Todd Adams and the state have consistently pushed the 'Upper Division States' Alternative' (a supply-driven, hydrology-following operating scheme) in the post-2026 guidelines fight, and Utah signed the seven-state 'Consensus-Based Modeling Alternative' submitted to Reclamation while still refusing firm downstream-release guarantees from Flaming Gorge/Blue Mesa/Navajo. Utah simultaneously defends its RIGHT TO DEVELOP: the ~$2B Lake Powell Pipeline (5% of Utah's allocation to fast-growing Washington County) is a stated priority that DWRe/Board of Water Resources champions, even though six basin states opposed it and it has been paused since 2020. So Utah's stance is two-sided: resist mandatory Upper Basin cuts, and preserve headroom to grow into its unused compact share. On conservation it has moved from talk to a small, VOLUNTARY, COMPENSATED model (state-funded Demand Management Pilot Program, ~$4-5M, paying up to ~\$390/AF) explicitly designed to build a Lake Powell 'savings account' and to avoid 'use-it-or-lose-it' forfeiture, not to concede a permanent obligation.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, but only on Utah's terms, and skeptical of anything that looks permanent or mandatory. Utah already runs exactly this kind of tool at small scale: the state-funded Demand Management Pilot Program pays farmers up to ~\$390/AF to voluntarily and TEMPORARILY reduce consumptive use (~20,000-30,000 AF target, 27 applicants in year one), and it participated in the Upper Basin System Conservation Pilot Program (~70,000 AF across four states in 2024). So a verified consumptive-use market is philosophically aligned IF: (1) it is voluntary and compensated, not a mandatory cap; (2) verification/accounting credits the saved water into a protected Utah 'savings account' in Lake Powell rather than letting it flow free to the Lower Basin; and (3) it explicitly does not create a forfeiture or 'use-it-or-lose-it' precedent that erodes Utah's right to develop later. Utah's own officials and outside experts openly doubt permanent-conservation economics ('never going to come up with enough money to compensate everyone permanently') and worry federal funding evaporates with administrations, so a durable, well-capitalized market that solves the accountability/leakage problem is genuinely attractive to them. The hard 'opponent' edge appears if the market is pitched as the Upper Basin's contribution to bailing out Lower Basin overuse, or as a step toward mandatory Upper Basin cuts. Well-designed and additive, this is the most persuadable of the three levers.

On solar+water. Interested but guarded, and the water half matters more to them than the energy half. Utah is actively courting data centers and large loads, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water fits the state's growth-first identity and its appetite for outside capital to pay for infrastructure it would otherwise fund from appropriations. The attraction is real if the water funding flows to Utah priorities (Washington County reuse/desal/dam program, conserved-water accounting, Great Salt Lake) rather than downstream. Caveats are significant: (1) data centers compete for the SAME scarce water and grid, and Utah just passed HB76 (2026) forcing data-center water-use reporting under penalty, signaling political wariness about hyperscaler water demand; (2) Utah will want the arrangement to strengthen, not dilute, its claim to develop its share; (3) 'funds water' must be verifiable wet-water or hard infrastructure dollars, not PR. DWRe/CRAU will also weigh Great Salt Lake optics, since new consumptive load in Utah is politically charged. Net: a promising hook because it aligns with growth and brings capital, but it is not a slam-dunk the way it is for a power-hungry pumper like CAP, because Utah's constraint is water headroom and interstate politics, not primarily an electricity bill.

On reuse/desal. Strongly and unusually supportive at the leadership level, because desal/reuse is Utah's preferred way to make the deficit someone else's supply problem instead of its own cut. Utah's Senate President has publicly floated PAYING CALIFORNIA TO BUILD PACIFIC DESALINATION in exchange for California ceding Colorado River shares upstream to Utah and other Upper Basin states, which is the single clearest signal of Utah's appetite for augmentation-as-substitution. The state is now formally evaluating desalination and has authorized ~\$200M (\$50M/yr x4) for Washington County reuse, desal, dams and conservation, and the Washington County district is advancing a ~\$1.3B reuse project that could recycle up to ~25% of the county's supply. The one real tension is internal: Utah has historically LAGGED on reuse (under 1% recycled; HB349 curtailed new Salt Lake-area reuse in 2023, partly over Great Salt Lake return-flow concerns), so large-scale reuse inside Utah collides with Great Salt Lake inflow politics. Large-scale desal (especially ocean desal that swaps river shares upstream) is close to Utah's ideal outcome and it will champion it; large-scale in-state reuse is favored in the growth counties but must be reconciled with Great Salt Lake return flows. Either way this is the option Utah is most likely to actively promote, because it grows the pie and eases the pressure to cut.

A win for them. A win for Utah is any mechanism that (a) lets it grow into its under-used compact share (Washington County / Lake Powell Pipeline-type supply, Wasatch Front demand) WITHOUT taking a mandatory federal or interstate cut; (b) keeps conservation VOLUNTARY, state-controlled, and COMPENSATED, and credits Utah's conserved water into a protected Lake Powell 'savings account' that shields it from a compact call rather than simply flowing downstream to Lower Basin users for free; (c) shifts the burden of solving the deficit onto Lower Basin structural overuse (and onto new supply/augmentation) instead of Upper Basin development; and (d) brings outside capital (federal, private, hyperscaler) to pay for Utah water infrastructure so state ratepayers and the general fund do not. The cleanest single win: new firm supply or outside money that expands what Utah can safely use while its conserved acre-feet are legally protected from forfeiture and from Lower Basin capture.

Public record. The Division's focus is on developing Utah's water resources and it has been criticized for setting weak conservation goals, while promoting large-scale water development projects.

Position. Water Asset Management is a New York-based, ~$746M+ AUM investment firm founded in 2005 (co-founders Disque Deane Jr. and Matthew Diserio) that invests exclusively in water assets. Its explicit, longstanding public thesis: 'scarce clean water is the resource defining this century, much like plentiful oil defined the last,' and U.S. water is 'a trillion-dollar market opportunity' (Diserio, 2021). Its disclosed strategy (Water Property Investor, LP) is to buy senior-water-righted farmland at agricultural value, make farms more efficient, then 'repackage, repurpose and sell to higher value municipal, industrial and environmental consumers,' targeting 17-22% returns. On the Colorado River specifically it has become one of the largest landowners in Colorado's Grand Valley (2,500+ acres, $20M+; a 2024 subsidiary Emporia III bought 13,000 acres for $100M) and holds 6,200+ acres across Arizona via subsidiaries. Its practical position on the crisis is that water should move to its highest economic use through markets and voluntary transactions, treating scarcity as an investable long. It does NOT publicly argue for basin-wide cuts, indigenous/agricultural protection, or public-interest limits on transfers. In 2026 it backed Arizona HB 2757/2758, which would let it pump McMullen Valley (La Paz County) groundwater and sell it to Phoenix-area suburbs; the firm largely declines press interviews (declined CBS) and lets its filings and website state its thesis. Colorado water officials (Colorado River District GM Andy Mueller) and rural Arizona residents/officials (La Paz Supervisor Holly Irwin, Wenden's Gary Saiter) publicly frame WAM as a 'drought profiteer' buying land only for the water. WAM hired Colorado's former top water official as counsel.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive-to-opportunistic, but on their terms. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is exactly the kind of price-discovery, tradable-water mechanism WAM's model is built to exploit: it monetizes efficiency gains (their stated 'make farms more efficient, sell the freed water' playbook) and creates a liquid venue to sell conserved water. They would want to be a seller/aggregator of verified conserved acre-feet and would push for rules that let investors, not just water users, hold and trade conservation credits. They would OPPOSE design features that exclude non-user financial intermediaries, cap prices, require the conserved water to stay in-basin/in-stream without compensation to owners, or add strict anti-speculation gates. Net: they engage eagerly if the market is investor-accessible and tradable; they resist if it is a public/utility-only compensated-fallowing program that routes value to farmers and the system rather than to rights-holding funds.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-mildly-interested, mostly as a potential buyer of their water rather than an aligned partner. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water does not threaten WAM's asset base and could create a deep-pocketed municipal/industrial buyer (data centers, utilities) for the exact water WAM is positioned to sell, so they would welcome new demand and capital on the water side. The tension: if hyperscaler money funds NEW supply (reuse, efficiency, augmentation) it can loosen scarcity and soften the price appreciation WAM is long. Reaction is transactional: interested if the program buys/leases WAM water or uses WAM as the rights vehicle; wary if it creates non-market public supply that undercuts scarcity value.

On reuse/desal. Least favorable of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination augment supply and, at scale, reduce the scarcity WAM is betting on, capping the long-run price of the ag-to-urban transfers behind its 17-22% return target. WAM would not publicly oppose reuse/desal (both are politically popular and hard to attack) but has no incentive to champion them; it structurally prefers a scarcity-priced transfer market over cheap new supply. It might invest in desal/reuse companies as a separate asset line (it invests broadly across water supply and quality), but new abundant supply is the bear case for its farmland-water portfolio.

A win for them. A win is a liquid, investor-accessible water market where senior ag water rights they bought cheap can be severed, transferred, and sold or leased to municipal/industrial buyers (Phoenix suburbs, data centers, growing Front Range/desert cities) at scarcity prices, hitting 17-22% IRR. Concretely: passage of transfer-enabling legislation (e.g., AZ HB 2757/2758 letting them export McMullen Valley groundwater to Phoenix), weak or absent anti-speculation enforcement, conservation/demand-management programs that pay rights-holders (not just farmers) for freed water, and continued or deepening scarcity that lifts the value of their Grand Valley and Arizona holdings. The cleanest win is being paid a large premium to move or retire water they control, whether that buyer is a city, a conservation program, or a hyperscaler-funded fund.

Public record. The firm's stated strategy is to invest in water rights to profit from water scarcity, a motive that is in fundamental conflict with a conservation-first agenda.

Position. The Wyoming Farm Bureau Federation (WyFB) is Wyoming's largest agricultural grassroots organization, representing farmers and ranchers whose water use in the state's portion of the Upper Colorado River Basin (Green River drainage) is governed by prior appropriation ('first in time, first in right'). Its longstanding positions, adopted through grassroots policy at annual meetings, prioritize: (1) protection of private property rights and water rights against federal 'overreach'; (2) beneficial use and preservation of appropriations; (3) water storage/supply expansion (2024 policy asked the state to maximize existing reservoir capacity and prioritize Wyoming Water Development funds for it); and (4) opposition to schemes that 'monetize and list' natural assets on private land as tradable/federal assets, which they say 'encroaches on property rights, controls land use and threatens the stability of food production.' On the Colorado River crisis specifically, WyFB has not issued a single prominent standalone position paper, but it aligns with the dominant Wyoming-agriculture and state-official consensus: strong preference for VOLUNTARY, COMPENSATED ('paid-for') conservation over mandatory, uncompensated curtailment; deep suspicion of anything that permanently dries up productive land ('buy-and-dry'); and preference for efficiency infrastructure (piping canals, sprinklers) that keeps land in production. Representative rancher sentiment (Freddie Botur, Pinedale-area, June 2026): incentivizing people 'to just shut their water off entirely is maybe not the best interest for Wyoming' and dollars should instead fund efficiency so 'lands could remain productive and businesses could still profit.' Note: Wyoming's own 2026 state voluntary conservation program carries NO monetary incentive, and the state AG expects only a 'handful' of participants without payment, underscoring WyFB constituents' compensation-first posture.

On conservation. PERSUADABLE-TO-SUPPORTIVE, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps directly onto WyFB's stated preference for voluntary, paid-for conservation over mandatory curtailment, and their members were willing participants in the paid SCPP ($611/AF). They would likely engage IF: (a) it is genuinely voluntary and does not become a backdoor to permanent forfeiture of the underlying appropriation (Wyoming's program is explicitly designed so users don't lose their right); (b) payment is real and adequate, not a nominal or unfunded state program (the state's incentive-free version drew a 'handful' expected takers); (c) verified/measured consumptive use does not create a new federal monitoring/enforcement lever over private water rights, which trips their 'monetize and list natural assets = overreach' alarm; and (d) it favors efficiency-that-keeps-land-productive over buy-and-dry. Expect resistance framed around measurement/verification intrusiveness and third-party 'markets' commodifying water rights, but the underlying model is one they already accept in principle.

On solar+water. MIXED / CAUTIOUSLY PERSUADABLE. Two competing instincts. Pro: WyFB champions private landowners' freedom to make money from their land and supports diversified rural revenue; a new water-funding source that pays for basin conservation without taxing agriculture or curtailing rights would be welcomed if it flows to landowners. Wyoming is energy-friendly. Con: WyFB has active policy concern about solar/wind development on ag land and specifically directed its Agriculture Committee to work on EMINENT DOMAIN issues around wind and solar collector lines, and it opposes converting productive land and 'natural assets' into corporate/financial assets. A large hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout would draw scrutiny over land conversion, transmission/collector-line eminent domain, county tax/impact questions, and whether the 'also funds water' piece is real and locally controlled or an outside corporate mechanism. Net: persuadable if structured as voluntary leases with landowner consent (no eminent domain), sited to minimize prime ag/forage loss, delivering tangible local water and tax benefits.

On reuse/desal. LIKELY NEUTRAL-TO-SUPPORTIVE but distant. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a supply-augmentation strategy that fits WyFB's storage-and-supply-first worldview (add water rather than take it from irrigators) and, critically, is largely a Lower Basin / coastal or municipal solution that does not directly threaten Wyoming irrigators' rights. To the extent desal/reuse relieves Lower Basin (CA/NV/AZ) demand and reduces pressure for uncompensated Upper Basin cuts, WyFB members benefit and would applaud it as taking the target off Wyoming agriculture. Concerns would be narrow: federal cost allocation (do Wyoming taxpayers/water users subsidize downstream desal?), and any strings that condition Upper Basin funding on Upper Basin curtailment. Low salience for them day-to-day; supportive in principle as an alternative to curtailment.

A win for them. A win preserves Wyoming water rights and Wyoming's Compact share while turning the drought into a revenue opportunity rather than a loss: durable, adequately FUNDED voluntary conservation (restored SCPP-style payments at competitive $/AF) that members opt into without ever forfeiting their appropriation; investment in efficiency infrastructure (piped canals, sprinklers, reservoir capacity) that lets land stay productive; the curtailment target shifted off Upper Basin agriculture (via Lower Basin demand cuts, reuse/desal, and shared responsibility); no expanded federal control over private water or land; and any new energy/water money flowing to consenting landowners and local governments on landowner terms with no eminent domain. In short: Wyoming ranchers get paid to be part of the solution, keep their rights and their productive land, and avoid mandatory uncompensated cuts.

Public record. The Federation's policy is to protect Wyoming agricultural water rights, and its members have expressed opposition to programs that pay farmers to stop irrigating, preferring funds go to efficiency upgrades instead.

Position revised from “persuadable” after a public-source check.

Position. Yuma Irrigation District (YID) is a landowner-governed district formed in the mid-1960s (landowners took over from Reclamation in 1973), serving roughly 10,600 acres of high-value Yuma-area farmland via the Gila Gravity Main Canal off Imperial Dam. Its defining public position is defense of senior, pre-1968 priority-3 mainstem Colorado River entitlements. Yuma-area rights are among the most senior in Arizona (behind only tribes), and the Colorado River Basin Project Act creates a mandatory duty to satisfy these Districts' entitlements before any post-1968 (e.g., CAP) users. YID has consistently leaned on that priority as its shield against shortage cuts. At the same time it publicly touts a decades-long conservation record: since the 1970s growers adopted efficiency practices, and the three Yuma Mesa Division districts (of which YID is one) leave roughly 75,000 AF of their shared 250,000 AF priority-3 entitlement in the river annually. Through 2023-2026 it aligned with the joint Yuma-area irrigation districts (counsel Ben Horwich / Munger Tolles) filing formal comments to Reclamation on post-2026 operations, warning that 'impacts of water reductions to Yuma would be especially severe' and opposing any move away from strict priority-based administration toward proportional/shared cuts. Its stance mirrors the broader Yuma ag argument: the county uses ~8% of basin irrigation water but generates ~18% of crop sales and grows most of the nation's winter vegetables, so cuts here are disproportionately damaging nationally.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but on its own terms. YID and its Yuma Mesa Division peers already participate in voluntary, temporary, compensated conservation (leaving ~75,000 AF/yr in the river; district-level fallowing at roughly $340/AF). A verified consumptive-use market is attractive if (a) it is strictly voluntary, (b) it explicitly does NOT erode or reprice their senior priority-3 entitlement, and (c) the price is high enough to beat farm margins on premium winter-vegetable ground. Note Yuma/IID growers have historically argued conservation is undervalued and floated numbers up to ~$1,500/AF versus the ~$340-$776/AF actually paid, so a market anchored below ~$400/AF will be dismissed as a lowball. They will resist any market that becomes a backdoor to permanent quantification or forfeiture of their rights ('use it or lose it' fears).

On solar+water. Neutral-to-skeptical, low prior engagement (unknown specific record). YID has no public position on hyperscaler-funded solar+storage. In principle a buildout that pays into water (funding conservation/fallowing or infrastructure) is welcome incremental revenue, and Yuma has abundant solar resource and available mesa land. But YID's core interest is protecting the water right, not the energy deal; it will evaluate purely on whether the arrangement (1) puts real, high dollars toward growers without touching priority, and (2) doesn't create a datacenter/industrial claimant that later competes for or politically pressures their supply. Likely to defer to landowners and county/state ag bodies rather than lead.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, as augmentation that relieves pressure on their allocation without asking Yuma to give up water. Reuse and desal (including the June 2026 six-supplier MOU with Reclamation to exchange desalinated/recycled coastal water for river water) fit Yuma's preferred frame: grow the pie rather than reallocate existing senior rights. They benefit if new supply reduces the political case for cutting agriculture. Caveats: they will oppose any structure that funds desal by monetizing or subordinating their entitlement, and they are wary of costly augmentation being used to justify demands that they conserve/fallow more in return.

A win for them. A win locks in their senior priority-3 entitlement as legally secure and un-repriced, while turning conservation into a durable, high-value revenue stream that growers opt into voluntarily and can exit. Concretely: recognition that Yuma seniority is satisfied first; compensation well above current $340/AF program rates for any water they leave in the river; augmentation (reuse/desal) and outside capital (hyperscaler-funded) that reduce the political pressure to cut Yuma agriculture at all; and infrastructure funding for their canals/pipelines so the district stays solvent even as some acreage idles. The ideal outcome preserves the multibillion-dollar Yuma farm economy and their control over it, with new money flowing in rather than water flowing out under compulsion.

Public record. The district publicly opposes any paid conservation program that results in the transfer of Colorado River water away from the main stem to other parts of Arizona, viewing it as a threat to their supply and community.

Position. American Whitewater (AW) is a national 501(c)(3) river conservation and human-powered-recreation nonprofit (EIN 23-7083760, founded 1954, ~7,000 members, 85 affiliate clubs, based in Cullowhee NC / Springfield OR). It has led the recreational-boating voice on the Upper Colorado since 2007. Longstanding public positions: (1) The Colorado River is over-allocated and mismanaged, and consumptive water use must be reduced to align with a shrinking, less predictable supply. In its Aug. scoping comments on the Post-2026 Operations of Glen Canyon and Hoover Dams, AW argued reductions in consumptive use should be 'baked into the central purpose' of the process. (2) AW does NOT claim recreation outranks drinking water, food, or fiber; it frames itself as needing 'a seat at the table,' not priority. (3) It advocates protecting dynamic, science-based instream flows for river health, riparian habitat, fish/otter, and boating. It secured first-ever instream-flow protections on ~70 miles of the Upper Colorado (Gore Canyon, Pumphouse, State Bridge, Dotsero) filed Nov 30, 2011 through a diverse stakeholder group, protecting those reaches from future dams and diversions. (4) It was a party in the contested CWCB hearing SUPPORTING acquisition of the Shoshone Hydropower Plant water rights as an instream flow (unanimously approved) - poised to be the largest environmental water right in Colorado history. (5) On dams: skeptical of new/expanded hydropower development and opposed regulatory rollbacks that would let developers dam rivers and strip flows; asked Reclamation to analyze Glen Canyon Dam modification AND removal as realistic alternatives (without yet demanding outright removal). Also a pragmatic signatory to the joint hydropower-environmental collaboration statement (with American Rivers, NHA, WWF) on rehab/retrofit/removal, and partners with Idaho National Lab, WSU, and Reclamation on streamflow forecasting. (6) Prioritizes Tribal water rights and Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge in management decisions. Key staff: Thomas O'Keefe (policy & science director), Hattie Johnson (Southern Rockies restoration director). Allies: Trout Unlimited, The Wilderness Society, American Rivers, Colorado River Outfitters Association, water conservation districts.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, likely an active champion. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly advances AW's top stated ask - baking consumptive-use reductions into basin management - and mirrors what it already backs: it was a supporting party in the Shoshone water-rights acquisition and helped secure Upper Colorado instream-flow rights. AW would favor conserved water being convertible to protected environmental/instream flows rather than freed up for new consumptive uses, and would want rigorous, science-based verification (it distrusts paper-water and unmeasured savings). Caveat: it will scrutinize that a market doesn't just re-shuffle depletions or enable new diversions, and it wants recreation flows explicitly valued.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, conditional. AW is pro-renewable-energy in principle (signed the joint hydropower-environmental collaboration statement, works on clean-energy-compatible streamflow forecasting) and would welcome solar+storage that offsets pressure to build new flow-stripping dams or hydropower. The water-funding hook is attractive IF the money buys real instream-flow protection and consumptive-use reduction. Concerns: it will resist anything that entrenches large-scale diversions, adds new consumptive demand to serve datacenters, or trades river health for corporate PR. It will ask who controls the funded water, whether it stays in-river, and whether Tribal rights are respected. INFERRED - AW has no specific public position on hyperscaler-funded energy+water deals.

On reuse/desal. Likely supportive of reuse, more skeptical/neutral on desalination - but LARGELY UNKNOWN (no public AW position found on reuse or desal). Inferred from its core logic: AW favors anything that reduces consumptive draw on the river, so municipal reuse/recycling that cuts diversions and leaves more water instream aligns well. Large-scale desalination is more ambiguous for AW: it is coastal/energy-intensive and doesn't directly help Upper Colorado flows, though if it substitutes for basin withdrawals AW would likely view it favorably. AW would judge any project by its net effect on instream flows, energy footprint's dam/river implications, and whether it eases or intensifies pressure on the river. Mark reuse = probable ally; desal = unknown/conditional.

A win for them. A win is durable, legally protected instream flows on the Upper Colorado that keep reaches boatable and ecologically healthy, structural reductions in basin consumptive use, and AW being recognized as a credible science-based party in basin governance (Post-2026 process, RMPs, CWCB proceedings). Concretely: more acquired/leased water dedicated to environmental instream flows (Shoshone-style), analysis of Glen Canyon Dam modification/removal, and Tribal rights and TEK embedded in management - without recreation being pitted against municipal or agricultural water.

Public record. The organization's mission is river conservation, and it actively engages in Colorado River management processes to advocate for healthy flows and supports actions like conservation and efficiency programs that keep water in the river system.

Position. CHI is a water science/engineering research center at ASU (in the School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment and the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory), directed by Enrique Vivoni, Fulton Professor of Hydrosystems Engineering. Founded early 2023. Its stance is technical and pragmatic rather than advocacy-driven: 'No single individual or organization can solve our water problems; technology-aided collaboration is the way forward.' Longstanding position: better data, sensing, modeling and visualization are prerequisites to sound Colorado River decisions. Recent work (May 2026) integrated NASA satellite soil-moisture/groundwater data into the VIC model to sharpen Colorado River flow forecasts, warning that 'small miscalculations can ripple through interstate agreements and water deliveries' and that even average snowpack can fail to yield expected flows on depleted soils. On the crisis broadly, Vivoni (Aug 2025) states CAP 'won't be as large a provider of water as at present,' forcing Arizona to invest in replacement supply and requiring 'behavioral changes by individuals, residents, communities, industry and cities.' He names augmentation pathways explicitly (groundwater, desalination including paying to build a plant in Mexico for a share of its Colorado River water, reservoir expansion, wastewater reclamation, interbasin transfers), noting all carry heavy capex/O&M and that 'there will be some winners and some losers.' CHI is a pillar of the state-funded Arizona Water Innovation Initiative, whose explicit charter covers conservation, augmentation, desalination, efficiency, infrastructure and reuse. CHI runs the Arizona Water Observatory to map/monitor/model all Arizona water supplies. No adversarial or ideological position on any single solution; posture is 'measure it, model it, then decide.'

On conservation. Favorable, on the condition it becomes the measurement/verification engine. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely a data problem CHI is built to solve: satellite-based ET/soil-moisture sensing, hydrologic modeling and the Arizona Water Observatory are exactly the tools needed to verify that saved water is real and additional. Expect strong interest in owning the MRV methodology and skepticism aimed only at whether measurements are credible, not at the market concept itself. Vivoni already frames conservation as necessary ('behavioral changes... by industry and cities'). Likely ally if funded to build the accounting rigor.

On solar+water. Favorable to neutral-curious; wants to model it before endorsing. CHI and its parent initiative already work directly on data-center and semiconductor water use (Phoenix's commercial/industrial/institutional users, including fabs and data centers, are ~40% of municipal water; partners include TSMC, Intel, and spin-outs like Thermaspire doing zero-waste data-center cooling and SOURCE Water). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water fits the water-energy nexus framing Vivoni uses and the GCWT's charter (supporting energy production, IT and industrial cooling). Expect them to want to quantify the net water and energy balance and guard against greenwashing, but the concept aligns with existing partnerships and funding interests. Persuadable-to-ally, contingent on the numbers.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable in principle; it is core to their mission. The Arizona Water Innovation Initiative and GCWT explicitly pursue reuse and coastal desalination (technology, policy, law and infrastructure), and Vivoni personally lists desalination and wastewater reclamation as key augmentation pathways, including the Mexico-plant-for-Colorado-River-share concept. CHI would engage as a research/commercialization partner. Caveats they will raise: high capex/O&M, energy intensity, and 'winners and losers' distributional effects, which they would want modeled rather than assumed away. Ally on the technology, honest broker on the tradeoffs.

A win for them. A high-visibility, well-funded applied project that (a) produces publishable, deployable science (models, tools, patents, spin-outs), (b) advances the Arizona Water Innovation Initiative mandate and its measurable outcomes, and (c) positions CHI/ASU as the authoritative modeling and verification backbone for whatever solution the basin adopts. Being the neutral 'source of truth' on measurement, forecasting and MRV (measurement-reporting-verification) for a conservation market, or the analytical partner that quantifies a hyperscaler water/energy deal, is a durable institutional win: sponsored research, student training, real-world impact, and reputational centrality.

Public record. The center actively partners with utilities to assess water savings from placing renewable solar energy projects on existing water infrastructure.

Position. Founded 1999 as a community-based association of Río Hardy/Colorado water users: small-scale fishers, ejido farmers, riparian tourism operators, and at least one Cucapá family (the association integrates the El Mayor Cucapá community's river-use interests). Its stated mission is to stop contamination of the Hardy River and its wetlands, restore and conserve the riverbed, and promote regional development under environmental-preservation criteria. Longstanding revealed positions: (1) Pro-restoration and pro-environmental-flow. It is an on-the-ground implementing partner in the Colorado River Delta restoration coalition (Sonoran Institute, Pronatura Noroeste, The Nature Conservancy Mexico, Audubon/Raise the River), and helped build 'El Tapón' (a sand/rock retaining barrier on the Hardy, ~2002-2003) to raise water levels and revive native flora/fauna. It committed alongside Pronatura to monitor Hardy River water quality and ecological conditions. Hardy marsh restoration (~40 ha) produced a documented four-fold rise in Yuma Ridgway's/Clapper Rail density. (2) Reliant on wastewater return flows. The association was party to a 2019 agreement with CONAGUA, the Mexicali state utility (CESPM), Sonoran Institute, TNC Mexico and Pronatura that increased treated-wastewater flows (~6,080 AF/yr from the Las Arenitas plant) and improved water quality reaching the Hardy, a ~50% freshwater-flow increase. (3) Internal tension over contamination. A key demand from the El Mayor Cucapá members has been that Las Arenitas drainage cease, even though monitoring shows that (now better-treated) drainage is the main thing keeping the Hardy wet, an unresolved fault line between livelihood/cultural framing and hydrological reality. (4) Sensitivity to sovereignty. In the broader Mexicali basin, some water users object that transferring water rights to US NGOs compromises a Mexican resource and represents 'lost sovereignty,' arguing conservation money must come from the Mexican government, a frame AEURHYC's base is exposed to even where the association itself has cooperated with binational NGOs.

On conservation. Likely supportive but conditional. AEURHYC already participates in water-transfer-funded delta restoration and monitors ecological conditions, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market that channels saved water into the Hardy/delta aligns with its core mission and could secure the flows its members depend on. Caveats it will raise: (1) sovereignty, transactions must be seen as Mexican-controlled/CONAGUA-anchored, not water rights sold to US NGOs; some in its base already frame that as 'lost sovereignty.' (2) Additionality and destination, the saved water must actually reach the Hardy and delta, not just free up supply for cities/agriculture. (3) Local benefit-sharing and Cucapá inclusion. Verification and durability (survives 2026) are pluses. Net: persuadable-to-ally if governance and destination are right.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but wary. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be attractive if the water dollars translate into durable Hardy/delta flows and local jobs, filling the post-2026 funding gap. Risks the association will weigh: whether a large industrial/data-center energy project increases regional water and land pressure in the Mexicali Valley (competing demand, groundwater), whether benefits are local and Cucapá-inclusive or captured elsewhere, and whether foreign corporate funding revives the sovereignty/outside-control concern. It would want ironclad, earmarked, Mexican-governed water commitments and transparency on any new consumptive demand the project itself creates. Persuadable, not automatic.

On reuse/desal. Mixed and the most nuanced. AEURHYC's own survival already runs on water reuse: the Hardy is kept alive by Las Arenitas treated wastewater, and the association helped negotiate more of it. So large-scale reuse that delivers clean, reliable, human-contact-safe water to the Hardy is squarely in its interest and would answer the standing Cucapá/El Mayor grievance about substandard drainage. But that grievance also shows the trap: poorly treated reuse water is exactly what its members have protested. It will demand treatment quality and enforceable delivery to the river, not diversion of reclaimed water away from the delta to cities/industry. Desalination it will view more skeptically (coastal/energy footprint, cost, whether any freed-up water actually reaches the delta, and Gulf/estuary impacts near Cucapá fishing grounds). Net: pro-reuse if it feeds the Hardy at quality; neutral-to-skeptical on desal absent a clear delta benefit.

A win for them. A win is a permanent, legally durable, good-quality environmental flow in the Hardy River and delta that survives Minute 323's 2026 expiration, funded and governed in a way that does not read as ceding a Mexican resource to US interests. Concretely: locked-in treated-wastewater and/or dedicated environmental water for the Hardy; upgraded treatment so return flows are safe for human contact (resolving the Las Arenitas grievance); restored marsh and fishery habitat that revives subsistence/small-scale fishing, Cucapá cultural river use, and riparian eco-tourism income; and paid, respected local roles in monitoring and restoration. Money and water that visibly stay under Mexican/community control, with the Cucapá at the table, not spoken for.

Public record. The association's foundational purpose is to restore ecological flows to the Colorado River Delta, which directly aligns with upstream conservation efforts that leave more water in the system.

Position. The Environment Foundation is the employee-led grantmaking arm of Aspen Skiing Company (now Aspen One), founded 1997. It is funded by voluntary payroll deductions from 1,600+ employees, matched dollar-for-dollar by the Aspen Community Foundation and Aspen Skiing Company's Family Fund (plus support from Lavazza). It has given $4-4.3M+ across hundreds of grants, typically $2K-$10K each, in fall/late-February cycles decided by an all-employee board. Its stated mission targets climate change, oil-and-gas development, environmental stewardship, and clean-energy advancement. On the river specifically, it has a longstanding record of funding local watershed protection: grants to Roaring Fork Conservancy (including a revegetation fund after the Lake Christine Fire), Wilderness Workshop, Conservation Colorado, and legal groups protecting groundwater and rivers, and it was a named funder (alongside the City of Aspen, Pitkin County Healthy Rivers and Streams Board, Bonneville Environmental Foundation, and Colorado Water Trust) of a 2021 project to restore instream flows in the Roaring Fork River. The Foundation's positions cannot be cleanly separated from its parent: Aspen Skiing Company is one of the most vocal corporate climate/water advocates in the West. Longtime sustainability chief Auden Schendler (26 years, stepped down May 2025) framed the existential threat to Aspen/Snowmass as the 'Cameo Call' senior downstream water rights that could curtail the resort's supply as Colorado River flows drop, and argued that only systemic policy and emissions reduction, not corporate greening, actually solves the crisis. The company is piloting Finnish 'Snow Secure' summer snow-storage (roughly 3.5M gallons snow-water-equivalent, mostly man-made) explicitly to shore up early-season water and stay out of intensifying water battles. Frame: pro-conservation, pro-instream-flow, climate-forward, worried about senior-rights curtailment of its own upper-basin supply.

On conservation. Likely supportive of a verified consumptive-use conservation market, with caveats. As an upper-basin headwaters interest whose grantees (Roaring Fork Conservancy, Colorado Water Trust) already do market-style instream-flow and flow-restoration deals, a credible verified conservation market aligns with its worldview. The Foundation and its parent would favor mechanisms that keep water in streams and are rigorously measured/verified (the Foundation's own grant criteria demand 'measurable results'). Caveat: the parent's stance that senior downstream 'Cameo Call' rights threaten it means they will scrutinize whether a market entrenches downstream senior priority or lets big agricultural/lower-basin users monetize curtailment at the headwaters' expense. Support is conditional on verification integrity and on the market not weakening Colorado River Compact protections for upper-basin/instream uses.

On solar+water. Mixed-to-cautiously-open. The clean-energy-at-scale angle fits the Foundation's explicit mission (clean-energy advancement, climate policy) and Schendler's thesis that only large-scale systemic energy change matters. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be attractive as exactly the kind of scaled, policy-relevant climate action they champion. But two frictions: (1) deep skepticism of corporate sustainability theater (Schendler publicly calls most corporate sustainability a 'scam' and demands real advocacy and emissions cuts, not offsets/PR), so they will interrogate whether the hyperscaler is genuinely additive or greenwashing datacenter load growth; (2) datacenter water and energy demand is itself a driver of basin stress, so they will want proof the package is net-positive for the watershed, not a license for new consumptive load. Persuadable to support if additionality and net water benefit are demonstrable.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive but low-priority and somewhat skeptical. Large-scale reuse and recycling of water fits a conservation ethos and they would likely view municipal/industrial reuse favorably as demand-side relief that keeps more water in the system. Desalination is more distant from their headwaters, snowpack, and instream-flow focus and would draw scrutiny on energy intensity (contradicting emissions-reduction priorities), cost, brine/ecological impacts, and whether it becomes an excuse to avoid conservation and emissions cuts. They are unlikely to lead or fund desal; they would prefer conservation and instream-flow solutions first, with reuse a reasonable second, and desal a last resort that must be clean-energy-powered to earn their support.

A win for them. A win is: more water kept in Roaring Fork Valley and upper-basin streams; the resort's own supply protected against senior-downstream (Cameo Call) curtailment; genuinely additive large-scale clean energy that cuts the emissions shrinking their snow season; and a visible, credible, measurable project they can point to as real systemic action rather than greenwashing. Bonus wins: strengthened Colorado River Compact/instream protections for the upper basin, and durable funding for their grantee ecosystem (Roaring Fork Conservancy, Colorado Water Trust, Wilderness Workshop) so employee dollars go further.

Public record. The foundation's employee-led board consistently funds policy-focused groups and projects that work on climate change, water conservation, and clean energy initiatives.

Position. BWS is a corporate-water-stewardship program of the Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF), founded/led by Todd Reeve. It is not a water user or rights-holder itself; it is an intermediary/convener that mobilizes private corporate capital into on-the-ground water projects in the Colorado River Basin (with an early operational focus on Arizona and Colorado drought planning). Longstanding public position: businesses should move 'beyond the fence line' past internal efficiency to fund collective-action projects that restore environmental flows, improve agricultural water efficiency, restore habitat, and build resiliency for ag, municipal, and industrial users. BWS/BEF co-created the U.S. 'Change the Course' program and are principal authors/stewards of the Volumetric Water Benefit Accounting (VWBA) methodology, the dominant standard corporations use to claim measurable, verified 'water replenished' credit. Recent public posture (2024-2026): pushing 'co-funding' blueprints (grants, program-related investments, revolving loan funds, impact investing) that stack corporate seed dollars on top of public and philanthropic funds to scale beyond simple 1:1 footprint offsets. They partner with the Pacific Institute, the CEO Water Mandate / Water Resilience Coalition, and the Water for Colorado Coalition (BWS is an organizational partner). On the crisis itself: they treat basin over-allocation and drought as the core problem and position private capital as a supplement to, not a replacement for, public conservation and reallocation.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, likely an active partner. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is highly compatible with their core competency: it produces exactly the measurable, additional, verifiable water benefit that VWBA and their corporate members require. BWS would want to be at the table shaping measurement and credit-allocation rules, and would see a market as a scalable channel for member dollars (buying verified conservation as replenishment credit). Main caution: they will insist on rigor (additionality, no double-counting) because their credibility rides on it, and they will want the market's accounting to be interoperable with VWBA rather than a competing standard.

On solar+water. Very favorable, this is close to their existing playbook. Their member base already includes the hyperscalers driving data-center water and energy demand, and those companies are under intense AI-water scrutiny and have public water-replenishment pledges (e.g., Google water-positive-by-2030). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water lets those members solve energy and water reputational exposure together and generate claimable water benefit. BWS would likely help structure and account for the water component and route it through co-funding blueprints. Condition: the water benefit must be real, additional, and VWBA-verifiable, not a bundled marketing claim, or it becomes a greenwashing liability for their members.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously supportive but not their native lane. BWS's model rewards nature-based and agricultural-efficiency projects that yield trackable volumetric/environmental-flow benefits; large-scale reuse and especially desalination are capital-intensive, engineered supply-augmentation projects that don't map cleanly onto their 'restore flows / return water to rivers' credit framework and can carry high energy and brine/environmental footprints. They would engage if a reuse/desal project frees up freshwater that measurably returns to the river (a claimable benefit) or if their co-funding blueprints (revolving loan funds, PRIs, impact investing) can seed it. Desalination is the weakest fit and most likely to draw their measurement/additionality skepticism; reuse that offsets consumptive draw is a better story for them.

A win for them. A win is more corporate dollars flowing into credible, measurable Basin water projects, with defensible VWBA-style accounting that survives scrutiny, plus proof that co-funding (private + public + philanthropic) scales impact beyond what any single mechanism could. Concretely: verified acre-feet returned or saved, projects near member operations (especially data-center communities), and a repeatable model their members can point to as real, not reputational cover. A hyperscaler-funded buildout that also funds water is squarely their thesis, if the water benefit is verifiable and additional.

Public record. BWS's core mission is to fund water conservation projects by connecting corporate partners with on-the-ground opportunities, including a major project that paid the Colorado River Indian Tribes to conserve 150,000 acre-feet of water.

Position. Federally recognized Tribal Nation on a ~30,000-acre reservation fronting ~30 miles of the Colorado River / Lake Havasu in San Bernardino County, California (~350 residents on-reservation; ~33% below the poverty line). Holds senior Colorado River mainstream water rights from the 1963 Arizona v. California decree: annual diversions not to exceed 11,340 acre-feet (~3.7 billion gallons) with a priority date of February 2, 1907 , senior to most Lower Basin municipal and agricultural users. Core, longstanding grievance: the tribe lacks the pumps, canals, and storage to physically divert its full entitlement (it runs a single diesel pump to lift water six stories to the plateau where members live), so an estimated ~97% of its water stays in the river and flows downstream, where Southern California cities effectively use it for free while the tribe receives nothing. Neither the federal government nor California has funded a large delivery/storage system (only a small reservoir grant). The tribe has actively sought to MONETIZE its unused water for decades: it negotiated a proposed water lease dated January 31, 1998, which the Secretary of the Interior never approved or denied. It sued the United States for mismanagement/breach of trust and for a Fifth Amendment taking over the stalled lease; in Chemehuevi Indian Tribe v. United States (Fed. Cir., June 18, 2024) the appellate court affirmed dismissal on most counts for lack of jurisdiction but VACATED and revived the takings claim tied to the un-acted-upon lease. Under current law tribes can generally be paid only to conserve water they previously used, and off-reservation leasing/marketing requires an act of Congress (the Indian Non-Intercourse Acts bar it otherwise); the 2022-2023 Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) Water Resiliency Act is the precedent the Chemehuevi want extended to them. The tribe joined the Colorado River Basin/Ten Tribes Partnership in 1992 to strengthen tribal influence over basin management. It has stated a preference to develop water for on-reservation agriculture and residential growth, but is explicitly willing to be paid to leave water in the river ('We want to be a benefit to the system, but right now they're making it hard'). Separately, it is an experienced clean-energy developer: it built an ~$2.6M CEC-funded solar carport + flow-battery microgrid at its community center/emergency shelter and residential solar on ~80 homes (cutting household energy costs ~50%) via GRID Alternatives, and has pursued a tribal utility and eco-village. Main revenue today is its Havasu Landing casino/resort.

On conservation. STRONGLY POSITIVE , this is close to exactly what the tribe has wanted since 1998. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays a senior rights-holder to leave water in the river directly monetizes the ~97% of its entitlement now flowing downstream for free, and converts a stranded ~$55M+ asset into cash for a cash-poor community. Two caveats they will raise: (1) the market must pay for the FULL senior entitlement, not just the sliver they can currently divert and have 'previously used' , antiquated 'paid only for prior use' rules are precisely their complaint, so the mechanism should be structured to compensate the paper right, likely requiring the same kind of congressional authorization the CRIT Act provided; (2) they will insist their preferred on-reservation development (ag, housing) is preserved as an option, so they want an opt-in, term-limited, non-forfeiture arrangement rather than anything that looks like permanent alienation of the right. Ally on this, with 'get us the legal authority and a fair price' as the condition.

On solar+water. POSITIVE and among the best-fit stakeholders for this model. The tribe is already a solar+storage developer (CEC microgrid, flow battery, residential PV, tribal-utility ambitions) sitting on 30,000 acres of Mohave-edge desert with excellent insolation and Colorado River frontage , a natural host site for a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout, which would bring construction jobs, lease/host revenue, and energy sovereignty. Coupling that to water financing (paying to fund delivery infrastructure and/or compensate for water left in-river) hits both of their core needs at once: it addresses the unfunded pumping/storage gap AND monetizes the entitlement. Risks they will scrutinize: sovereignty and land-use control (must be tribally governed, on their terms, honoring cultural/sacred-site concerns), equitable revenue share vs. an extractive lease, and grid interconnection realities. Given their demonstrated openness to outside partners (GRID Alternatives, universities, CEC), they are persuadable-to-enthusiastic here if structured as a genuine partnership.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL to MILDLY POSITIVE, low salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply and eases pressure on the mainstream is not threatening to a senior rights-holder and could reduce political pressure on their water. But it does little for the tribe's actual problem , they don't lack water, they lack delivery infrastructure and the legal right to sell surplus. Reuse/desal that lets downstream cities substitute new supply for the Chemehuevi water they currently use for free could even slightly weaken the tribe's leasing leverage. They are unlikely to oppose it, unlikely to champion it, and will judge it mainly by whether any accompanying funding or settlement package includes THEIR infrastructure and leasing authority. Mark as secondary interest.

A win for them. A win is turning a stranded ~$55M+ paper water right into real, recurring revenue and real infrastructure without giving up sovereignty or the option to develop their own land. Concretely: (1) congressional authorization to lease/market their Colorado River allocation off-reservation (a Chemehuevi analog to the CRIT Act), plus favorable resolution or settlement of their revived takings claim; (2) federally/state- or hyperscaler-funded pumping, delivery, and storage so they can actually access their 11,340 AF; (3) a tribally governed solar+storage buildout on their land delivering jobs, host revenue, and energy sovereignty (advancing their tribal-utility goal); and (4) durable payment for water they choose to leave in the river, on opt-in, non-forfeiture terms that preserve future agricultural and residential development. In short: recognition as a paid, sovereign 'benefit to the system' rather than an involuntary donor of free water to downstream California cities.

Public record. The Tribe has expressed its desire to be compensated for leaving its unused water allocation in the Colorado River and has already installed multiple solar projects on its reservation to increase energy resilience.

Position. The City of Las Vegas is a municipal member agency of the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA); it does not set Colorado River policy on its own (SNWA, led by GM John Entsminger, negotiates for Nevada), but its public posture is fully aligned with the region's aggressive-conservation, recycle-everything model. Longstanding public positions, grounded in evidence: (1) The valley draws ~90% of its water from the Colorado River and has embraced 'the most progressive and comprehensive water conservation program in the nation' - seasonal watering restrictions, golf-course water budgets, turf-replacement rebates, water-waste penalties, and municipal-code changes. Southern Nevada cut per-capita use ~58% (2002-2025) while adding ~876,000 residents. (2) The City is one of five valley wastewater operators (with Boulder City, Clark County Water Reclamation District, Henderson, North Las Vegas) whose highly-treated effluent returns to Lake Mead via the Las Vegas Wash, earning return-flow credits - Nevada recycles ~99% of indoor water and can withdraw >300,000 AF/yr so long as consumptive use stays at/under its 300,000 AF cap. (3) The City implements the 2021 state ban on Colorado River water for new golf courses (since Nov 2021) and the ban on evaporative cooling in new commercial/industrial buildings (since Aug 2023), and is bound by the 2027 statewide ban on Colorado-River irrigation of 'non-functional' turf (est. ~9.5B gal/yr savings, ~30% of Nevada's allocation). Nevada operates under a Tier 1 shortage through 2026 (21,000 AF cut) and has publicly offered to cut up to ~50,000 AF/yr of its 300,000 AF allocation for emergency conservation. The 2007/interim operating rules expire end-2026 and the seven states remain unresolved - the near-term policy environment is unusually open.

On conservation. Strongly supportive. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Nevada's entire strategy: the state already frames its water budget in consumptive terms (300,000 AF cap net of return-flow credits) and has co-authored the Lower Basin system-conservation program (700,000 AF to 1 MAF target; >3.2 MAF through 2028, ~2.3-2.5 MAF federally funded). The City/SNWA would want the market to (a) rigorously verify that savings are real, additional, and consumptive (not paper water), and (b) credit the return-flow/recycling model so Nevada isn't penalized for water it already returns. Risk to watch: a naive market that rewards reduced diversions rather than reduced consumption would let outdoor/ag users sell 'savings' Nevada already banked structurally. Frame it as consumptive and Nevada is a natural buyer/seller and validator.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, with conditions. Data-center load is the City's fastest-growing consumptive threat, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water addresses the exact liability that worries local officials and the DRI research. The City would welcome hyperscalers internalizing their water footprint (funding reuse, offsets, or new supply) rather than drawing down the municipal Colorado River budget. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis IF the water funding is net-additive and verified, cooling is non-consumptive/closed-loop or reuse-based, and the deal doesn't simply license more consumptive load under a green label. Skepticism will be highest where data centers add electricity-generation water burden inside Nevada; pairing them with solar+storage (low operational water) is a strong selling point.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: enthusiastic - it is already the core of the City's model (99% indoor recycling, Las Vegas Wash return flows). Any expansion of large-scale reuse is squarely on-strategy and low-friction. Desalination: supportive as a supply-swap, not as local infrastructure. SNWA signed a June 2026 MOU with Arizona/California at the Carlsbad plant for a first-of-its-kind interstate swap - California leaves Colorado River water in Lake Mead for Nevada to use and backfills with desalinated ocean water, for compensation. Nevada has secured funding authority for brackish/ocean desal resource development. The constraint is cost: desal runs ~$3,000-3,500/AF, so the City wants long-term deals that pencil, ideally subsidized. Expect strong support for reuse and for paying-for-a-swap desal; lukewarm on building its own coastal desal given it is landlocked and cost-exposed.

A win for them. A win: their supply stays secure and their conservation leadership is rewarded, not eroded - Nevada gets credited (or paid) for the consumptive savings it has already engineered rather than out-competed by users selling paper water; the fastest-growing threat (consumptive data-center load) is neutralized by hyperscalers funding their own water and low-water solar+storage power; reuse expands on the model they pioneered; and any desal shows up as a cost-effective, subsidized interstate swap that leaves more Colorado River water in Lake Mead without the City building or financing coastal plants. Politically, they get to keep pointing to a ~58% per-capita reduction while adding population, and to enter the post-2026 operating-rules era with their allocation and return-flow-credit regime intact.

Public record. The city became one of the first large U.S. cities to power its municipal facilities with 100% renewable energy and actively supports the Southern Nevada Water Authority's conservation programs.

Position. CRIT is a sovereign Tribal Nation whose reservation straddles the Lower Colorado River in La Paz County, Arizona and San Bernardino County, California. It holds one of the largest and most senior water entitlements on the river: a 1964 Arizona v. California decree of roughly 719,248 acre-feet/year of consumptive use, of which ~662,402 AF/yr is its Arizona mainstream allocation. That makes CRIT the single largest user of Colorado River water in Arizona and, because its rights predate most municipal and agricultural users, among the most secure in a shortage. LONGSTANDING POSITION: (1) Water sovereignty first. CRIT has fought for decades for the legal right to control its own water off-reservation, since the 1964 decree tied the water to on-reservation irrigation only. In 2019 the Tribal Council voted to seek federal legislation to allow leasing; this culminated in the Colorado River Indian Tribes Water Resiliency Act of 2022 (S.3308, enacted), which authorizes CRIT to lease, exchange, or store underground a portion of its CONSUMPTIVELY USED decreed allocation off-reservation within the Lower Basin of Arizona. Critical guardrails baked in by the Tribe itself: agreements are temporary use only (no permanent alienation of the decreed right), cannot reduce CRIT's right to use its full remaining allocation on-reservation, and water made available must come from real reductions in on-reservation consumptive use (fallowing/efficiency), not paper. (2) Active, paid conservation partner. In a 2021-2024 system conservation deal with the Arizona Dept. of Water Resources, CRIT agreed to leave 150,000 AF in Lake Mead for ~$38M (most from the state; a final ~$8M from corporates including Intel, Procter & Gamble, and Keurig Dr Pepper with Arizona operations). CRIT is repeatedly cited by Interior/ADWR and Audubon as a 'vital partner' in stabilizing Mead. (3) Rights-of-nature / stewardship framing. On Nov 6, 2025 the Tribal Council unanimously adopted a resolution recognizing the Colorado River as a living being with personhood under Tribal law ('we are tied to our water'), signaling that CRIT increasingly frames water transactions through the river's ecological needs, not just revenue. (4) Clean energy on tribal land. CRIT is launching its first agrivoltaics project (via tribal energy-finance entity Huurav / CEO David Harper, member) growing crops under solar at the reservation, part of a broader Arizona-tribe move into solar as IRA tribal clean-energy funding tightened.

On conservation. STRONGLY POSITIVE, and CRIT is arguably the template for exactly this. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the monetization pathway CRIT spent a decade fighting to unlock and already operates within: the 2022 Resiliency Act explicitly requires that off-reservation water come from real reductions in consumptive use, and CRIT has already sold 150,000 AF of verified conservation into Lake Mead for ~$38M. CRIT would be a marquee supplier and a credibility anchor for any rigorous, MRV-backed market, PROVIDED the market respects: (1) tribal sovereignty and the decree (transactions must not touch the underlying right, only temporary consumptive-use reductions); (2) that verification is done in genuine partnership, not imposed by outside auditors; (3) fair, competitive pricing that reflects the seniority/security of the water; and (4) that the Tribe, not a state or offtaker, decides how much to fallow. Reservation risk: internal equity, farmers and lessees who lose income from fallowing must be made whole, or the Tribe faces internal opposition regardless of the top-line check.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED / PERSUADABLE on this specific structure. CRIT is already moving into on-reservation solar (agrivoltaics via Huurav) and other Arizona/Southwest tribes (Gila River floating solar; Ute Mountain Ute's 270MW solar + 180MW storage feeding a Meta data center in New Mexico) are demonstrating the tribe-hosts-solar-that-serves-hyperscalers model. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water conservation aligns with CRIT's two active strategies (clean energy + paid conservation) and its sovereignty model of hosting revenue-generating infrastructure on tribal land on tribal terms. It would react positively IF: the Tribe owns or co-owns the assets and the offtake relationship (not a ground-lease-only deal that extracts value), the water funding is additive and verified, and cultural/land-use review (the personhood resolution signals heightened ecological scrutiny) is respected. It would react negatively to any structure that reads as decarbonization-as-colonization (siting solar to serve outside data-center load while giving the Tribe only rent and consuming local resources), a documented grievance pattern in California desert solar development. Net: a genuine partnership structure is a natural fit; an extractive one is a hard no.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-POSITIVE but low salience for CRIT specifically. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., augmentation supply for Lower Basin cities or a Sea of Cortez/coastal desal-for-exchange scheme) does not threaten CRIT's senior decreed rights and could relieve pressure on the system CRIT depends on, so CRIT would not oppose it and may welcome demand-side relief that raises the value/security of its water. However, CRIT is upstream of these projects and unlikely to be a direct participant; its interest is instrumental (does new supply reduce or increase pressure to raid tribal water?) rather than existential. Watch item: if a desal/reuse scheme is proposed as a SUBSTITUTE justification for reallocating or under-valuing tribal water ('we don't need to pay tribes because we'll desalinate'), CRIT would push back hard. Framed as complementary augmentation that takes pressure off the river and off tribal fallowing, it is broadly acceptable.

A win for them. A durable, self-determined outcome where CRIT (a) monetizes a portion of its senior water via verified, temporary, fairly-priced consumptive-use conservation WITHOUT ceding one drop of its decreed right or its ability to use the full allocation on-reservation; (b) makes its own farmers and lessees whole so fallowing revenue is net-additive to the community, not a wealth transfer out of it; (c) owns or co-owns any energy/infrastructure sited on tribal land and captures the offtake upside rather than collecting ground rent; and (d) sees the transactions honor the river as a living system (per the 2025 personhood resolution). In short: cash and clean-energy revenue that strengthen tribal sovereignty, fund economic diversification beyond irrigated agriculture, and demonstrably help stabilize the river they call their lifeblood, all on terms CRIT sets.

Public record. CRIT agreed to conserve 150,000 acre-feet of water over three years by fallowing farmland in exchange for payment to help maintain water levels in Lake Mead.

Position. {'recent_and_longstanding': ['Longstanding: Silk has been a charter sponsor of Change the Course (Bonneville Environmental Foundation) for ~14 years, supporting 30+ restoration projects and restoring 11.6+ billion gallons of water across the West, with the Colorado River basin as a flagship focus.', 'Colorado-specific: ~10-year collaboration with the Colorado Water Trust returned ~4.5 billion gallons / ~13,850 acre-feet to the Yampa River; Danone participated in a multi-company effort (with Coca-Cola, Intel, MLB) restoring ~500 million gallons to the 15-Mile Reach of the Colorado River near Grand Junction for endangered fish; and partners with BEF and Trout Unlimited on winter flows in the Upper Rio Grande.', 'Corporate water policy (2024 Danone Water Policy): 4R strategy (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Reclaim) deployed at 100% of production sites by 2025; ~50% water-intensity reduction target by 2030 vs 2015 baseline (reported ~61% progress); commitments to preserve/restore watersheds in high-water-stress areas by 2030; improve access to safe drinking water.', "Brand/consumer engagement: public-facing basin awareness campaigns (e.g., a Colorado River chalk-art installation in Chicago's Union Station), signaling willingness to spend brand equity on basin narrative, not just quiet philanthropy.", "Frame (Deanna Bratter, head of sustainable development): 'One Planet. One Health.' , water stewardship framed as core to brand purpose and B Corp / PBC governance."], 'notable_nuance': ['Danone sold Horizon Organic (Boulder/Broomfield-born organic dairy) to Platinum Equity in Jan 2024, reducing its direct dairy-agriculture water footprint in the region; remaining CO footprint is corporate HQ + R&D plus plant-based (Silk) and broader Danone NA brands, not a heavy consumptive water user on the river.', 'Danone globally is the #2 packaged-water company (evian/Volvic and other brands), but those are not Colorado River sourced; the CO nexus is philanthropic/brand + agricultural supply chain, not bottling withdrawals from the basin.']}

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE, likely an early validator/funder. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a near-perfect fit for Danone's existing 'volumetric water benefit' / gallons-restored model with Change the Course and the Colorado Water Trust. Danone already pays to return measured acre-feet to rivers; a market that verifies and prices real, additional consumptive-use reductions gives them auditable, defensible water-benefit accounting (exactly what Ceres and B Corp verification reward). Risk to watch: they will scrutinize additionality and MRV rigor closely because their reputation depends on the credits being real, not paper water.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY SUPPORTIVE / PERSUADABLE-LEANING-POSITIVE. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with Danone's climate + water 'One Planet, One Health' framing and its comfort with corporate co-funding coalitions (it already partners with Coca-Cola, Intel, MLB). Danone would likely welcome it IF the water funding flows to verified environmental/community benefit rather than underwriting new industrial consumptive demand. Concern: they will not want to be a brand fig-leaf for a datacenter's water draw; they'll want governance showing net-positive basin outcomes and tribal/community equity.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, with an efficiency-first caveat. Danone's own doctrine is Reduce/Reuse/Recycle/Reclaim, so large-scale water reuse maps directly onto its stated values and it would likely endorse reuse. Desalination it would view more warily on energy/carbon and marine-impact grounds given its climate commitments, and because it's far from Danone's core competency and geography. Expect verbal/coalition support and possibly demonstration co-funding, but not that Danone becomes a primary financier of desal capex.

A win for them. A verified, auditable, additional water benefit they can report against their 2030 watershed-restoration commitments and defend under Ceres benchmarking and B Corp / PBC scrutiny , ideally tied to named Colorado reaches (Yampa, 15-Mile Reach) with endangered-species / community co-benefits, plus a consumer-facing brand narrative for Silk and Danone NA. A win is measured wet acre-feet returned with clean MRV and no greenwashing risk, positioning Danone to keep its 'leading the way' water-stewardship status.

Public record. As a charter sponsor of the 'Change the Course' program, Danone and its Silk brand have helped restore over 11.6 billion gallons of water to ecosystems, starting with the Colorado River Basin.

Position. ERWSD (with its sister Upper Eagle Regional Water Authority) is a municipal water/wastewater provider in the headwaters of the Colorado River basin, serving ~50,000-55,000 peak customers from East Vail to Wolcott (Vail, Beaver Creek, Avon, Edwards, Minturn). It is the second-largest municipal water supplier in Western Colorado. Longstanding and current public positions: (1) Conservation-first. In 2026 the Board declared a Water Shortage and enacted Stage III restrictions (two-day/week outdoor watering, watering only midnight-8am/8pm-midnight), plus a tiered penalty structure targeting the top 14% of residential users who consume 45% of residential water (Tier 4 = 15% surcharge, Tier 5 = $400 fine plus escalating per-gallon charges). GM/CEO Siri Roman: 'These surcharges are not about generating revenue... Every gallon we conserve is one we don't have to draw from our reservoirs.' The district set a formal goal to cut community water use 400 acre-feet by 2026 via its Regional Water Efficiency Plan (turf conversion rebates, irrigation upgrades, AMI metering across ~10,000 accounts) and runs the valley-wide 'Live Like a Local' campaign. (2) Pro-in-basin storage. It is developing the 1,200 acre-foot off-channel Bolts Lake reservoir near Minturn (site bought for $7.5M in 2021-22; 30% design ~2025; construction possibly 2027-2029) explicitly to capture spring snowmelt, buffer drought, and boost environmental flows during low-flow periods. Roman testified to the House Natural Resources Committee (Jan 2024) in support of the Bolts Ditch Act to secure the diversion access. (3) Environmental / instream-flow protection. Repeatedly frames its mission as serving customers 'while maintaining healthy river flows' in the Eagle River and Gore Creek. Completed a $57M nutrient upgrade at the Avon WWTF (2023) and faces a ~$93M Edwards Regional WWTF upgrade to protect river water quality. (4) Data-driven, collaborative, early-action ethos. Roman: 'The writing was on the wall... we wanted to get to the decision-makers early and say the red lights are flashing.' She serves on the Colorado Water Congress Board representing the Upper Colorado River Watershed. As an Upper Basin municipal headwaters user, its structural interest aligns with Colorado / Upper Basin positions (protect senior/transmountain and in-basin municipal rights, resist Compact curtailment falling on Upper Basin users) though ERWSD has not made loud public interstate-allocation statements; its public voice is local supply resilience and conservation.

On conservation. Strongly positive / likely lead adopter. ERWSD already runs a formal Water Conservation Program, tiered penalty rates, AMI metering, and a 400 acre-foot reduction target, and its GM frames conservation as the single most important community action. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market fits their instincts IF three conditions hold: (1) it credits genuine, measured consumptive-use reductions (they have the AMI/metering to verify), not paper savings; (2) it does not expose their senior municipal water rights to speculation, permanent buy-and-dry, or downstream/Lower Basin claims on 'saved' headwaters water; and (3) revenue or flow benefits stay in-basin to support the Eagle River. Expect them to want strong anti-speculation and 'no injury to other water rights / instream flow' guardrails, consistent with Colorado water law. With those, they are a natural ally and possible demonstration site.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not a core fit, and mild skepticism likely. ERWSD is a mountain-resort municipal utility, not a large industrial/data-center load center; a hyperscaler solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive mainly as a NON-RATEPAYER funding source for their capital needs (Bolts Lake, WWTF upgrades, conservation programs) and as clean power for energy-intensive wastewater treatment. Concerns: they will scrutinize any new large consumptive water demand a data center would place on an already-stressed headwaters basin (data-center cooling water is a red flag here), and any land/visual/flow impacts in a recreation-driven economy. Persuadable-to-positive if structured as water-positive (funds conservation/storage, adds zero or negative net consumptive draw on the Eagle River) and if the district retains control of its water rights. Net-negative if it implies siting new water-hungry industrial load in their basin.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: positive and plausibly a natural next step; desalination: largely irrelevant to them. As a headwaters, high-altitude, inland district, ocean/brackish desalination has no direct application to their supply, so expect indifference or a view that desal is a Lower Basin / coastal solution that should relieve pressure on the whole system (mildly favorable framing: 'let downstream users make their own water'). Potable/non-potable REUSE is more directly relevant: they already invest heavily in advanced wastewater treatment (Avon and Edwards nutrient upgrades) and reuse of treated effluent or reclaimed water for irrigation/snowmaking could stretch their snowmelt-limited supply. They would evaluate reuse on cost, public acceptance, water-rights/return-flow obligations (reused water can reduce downstream return flows other users rely on, a real Colorado-law constraint), and river water-quality effects. Likely supportive of well-designed in-basin reuse; neutral on desal.

A win for them. A win is firm, year-round municipal water security for a system that depends almost entirely on spring snowmelt and streamflow (Brush Creek / Eagle River) with thin reservoir buffering and reliance on the Historic Users Pool at Green Mountain Reservoir, without having to keep tightening restrictions on ratepayers or raising rates. Concretely: getting Bolts Lake built and filled; funding the ~$93M Edwards nutrient upgrade and other capital without punishing rate shock; hitting the 400 acre-foot conservation target; keeping healthy instream flows to protect the fishing/rafting/ski recreation economy that underpins their tax and customer base; and being seen as the responsible, early-acting steward of Colorado River headwaters.

Public record. The district actively partners with its utility to purchase 100% renewable energy and implements advanced wastewater nutrient removal upgrades to protect river health.

Position. EDF runs a Western Water / Colorado River program explicitly framed around science- and economics-based advocacy. Longstanding position: the Basin's use structurally outstrips supply, and warming plus population growth mean the region MUST reduce its draw on the river to survive (edf.org 'Creating a more resilient Colorado River'). They push to move the Basin 'beyond crisis-driven policymaking' toward durable post-2026 operating guidelines that (a) integrate environmental stewardship into system reliability, (b) use flexible management, and (c) meaningfully include Tribal Nations and Mexico. On the May 2026 AZ/CA/NV bridge deal, EDF called it 'an important step' but temporary, and backed mandatory cuts (3.2 MAF through 2028), the Tribal water pool in Lake Mead, ICS banking, and Glen Canyon Dam protections. Their named 'what comes next' priorities include sustainable federal+state funding for permanent adaptation and 'large-scale water adaptation including groundwater access, wastewater recycling, and forest restoration.' They co-sign coalition statements (with TNC, American Rivers, Audubon, Trout Unlimited, WRA, TRCP) expressing 'deep disappointment' at states blowing the Nov 2025 deadline and calling for ~$2B in federal drought funding. In Colorado they helped pass the state Water Plan and backed Referendum DD funding. Economically literate on market design: EDF's water-market work and the Nature Sustainability research they align with show they favor legally-protected conserved-water markets (protection makes markets ~29% more cost-effective) that lease senior rights to protect flows and fish.

On conservation. STRONG SUPPORT, likely enthusiastic. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely EDF's model: they helped build the $38M+ CRIT/Arizona system-conservation deal and their aligned research argues for legally-protected conserved-water markets that are ~29% more cost-effective than unprotected ones. Conditions they will press for: rigorous measurement/verification of actual consumptive-use reduction (not paper water), legal protection so conserved water benefits the river rather than being re-diverted, avoidance of harm to disadvantaged rural communities from fallowing, and Tribal participation/benefit. Get those right and EDF is an active champion and validator.

On solar+water. SUPPORTIVE WITH DILIGENCE CONDITIONS. EDF already partners with and takes conservation funding from hyperscalers (Microsoft, Google, Intel) on the Colorado River, and its EDF+Business arm co-authored data-center sustainability due-diligence guidance urging operators to maximize clean energy and efficiency. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water conservation hits two EDF priorities at once (decarbonized new load + adaptation funding). They will want: additionality (new renewables, not claimed existing clean energy), real verified water benefit rather than offset optics, protection against the data-center load simply driving new fossil generation or new consumptive water demand, and transparency so it isn't greenwashing. Framed as 'new clean load that pays for verified river conservation,' this is a natural EDF-endorsable package.

On reuse/desal. MIXED-TO-SUPPORTIVE, reuse strongly favored over desalination. EDF explicitly named 'wastewater recycling' as one of the large-scale water adaptations it wants scaled in the Basin (May 2026 blog), so reuse/recycling is a direct ally position. Desalination they treat more cautiously: EDF's science/economics lens weighs energy intensity, brine disposal, carbon footprint, cost per acre-foot, and whether it substitutes for (rather than complements) demand reduction. Expect support for reuse and for desal only where it is genuinely additive, low-carbon-powered, and does not become an excuse to avoid cutting total consumptive use. No explicit EDF desalination position surfaced in public sources, so their exact desal stance is partly UNKNOWN and inferred from their demand-reduction-first, energy-water-conscious posture.

A win for them. A durable, science-grounded reduction in total Basin consumptive use that survives drought years, with conserved water legally protected for river health, Tribal Nations and Mexico meaningfully at the table, and stable public + private funding so adaptation is permanent rather than emergency-only. Concretely: post-2026 guidelines that bake environmental stewardship into system reliability, plus real acre-feet off the top of demand that they can point to as 'nature and people together.' A private/corporate-funded package that delivers verified conservation AND funds environmental flows lets them claim exactly the outcome they publicly champion.

Public record. EDF's published Colorado River program goals include removing barriers to water trading and replacing wasteful subsidies with incentives that promote conservation and efficiency on farms and in cities.

Position. FIDO Tech is an AI-powered non-revenue-water (NRW) / leak-detection company whose stated mission is 'a world without water scarcity.' Its public position on the Colorado River crisis is that a large, immediate, and cheap block of 'new' water already exists inside leaking distribution systems, and that AI-driven leak detection can recover it fast enough to matter. It frames leakage recovery as the most catalytic near-term lever in the over-allocated Basin (40M+ people, 7 states). Concrete public evidence: (1) Scottsdale Water (Colorado-River-supplied) deployment - mobile acoustic sensors on 293 assets over ~15 miles in ~3 weeks; FIDO AI reports ~92% detection accuracy and repairs saving ~13,000 gallons/day (~9M gallons/year cited in case studies). (2) EPCOR Phoenix, Arizona project with Microsoft. (3) Founding technology partner of 'Water United,' a Colorado River Basin coalition it co-created with Microsoft, PepsiCo, Oldcastle Infrastructure (CRH), Water Foundry and Atlantean Media, with Las Vegas Valley Water District (1.7M+ people) as first utility partner. (4) Meta-funded 10-year deployment across ~300km of Farmington, New Mexico pipeline; Microsoft-financed deployment across ~350km (EPCOR). CEO Victoria Edwards frames the corporate-funded model as 'win-win' - systemic water availability plus corporate ESG replenishment. FIDO's structural stance: conservation is real, verifiable, and monetizable; it explicitly builds volumetric water-benefit accounting (Aqua Plus, validated via Alliance for Water Stewardship) so saved gallons can be counted and claimed.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE / natural ally. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is adjacent to and validating of FIDO's core thesis: that saved water can be measured, verified, and given economic value. FIDO already operates the private analog - volumetric water-benefit accounting sold to corporates via Aqua Plus. A public, verified conservation market would (a) expand demand for exactly the measurement/verification layer FIDO provides, (b) let recovered leakage potentially qualify as a tradable/creditable saving, and (c) deepen the buyer pool beyond ESG-motivated hyperscalers into a broader market. Risk to watch: strict MRV standards for a public market could set a higher verification bar than FIDO's current AWS-validated benefit accounting, so FIDO would push to have leak-recovery recognized as eligible 'saved' water. Likely an advocate, provided leakage-recovery counts.

On solar+water. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE - this IS FIDO's existing business model. Hyperscaler-funded water is precisely how FIDO scales in the Basin today: Meta funds ~300km in Farmington (10 yrs); Microsoft finances ~350km (EPCOR) and co-created Water United; corporates buy Aqua Plus credits. A solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation would slot directly into FIDO's Aqua Plus / Water United channel and likely expand the pool of corporate dollars flowing to utility leak-recovery. FIDO would want to be the deployment/measurement partner and would welcome any structure that ties data-center/energy capital to funded water savings. Only caveat: FIDO's interest is in the WATER-FUNDING mechanism, not the energy asset per se; it is channel-agnostic about how the corporate dollars are generated as long as they fund verified savings.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-POSITIVE, not a direct beneficiary and potentially a soft competitor for the same 'new water' narrative and capital. FIDO's pitch is that leak recovery is faster and cheaper per acre-foot than large capital-intensive supply augmentation. Large-scale reuse/desalination competes for the same conservation/augmentation budgets and political attention, and desal in particular is energy- and capex-heavy - the opposite of FIDO's 'cheap water hiding in the pipes' framing. However, FIDO is unlikely to actively oppose: reuse/desal systems also have distribution networks that leak, and a water-scarce Basin that invests in all supply options is good for FIDO's addressable market. Expect FIDO to argue 'fix the leaks first / don't build expensive supply to lose it to leakage' - complementary positioning rather than opposition.

A win for them. A win for FIDO is any Basin program that (1) recognizes recovered leakage / NRW reduction as legitimate, verifiable, creditable 'new' water; (2) channels more corporate and public capital into utility conservation through the Aqua Plus / Water United model where FIDO is the deploying and measuring partner; and (3) establishes measurement/verification standards FIDO can meet and monetize. Concretely: more funded utility deployments across the Basin, hyperscaler/energy capital tied to verified water savings, and leak-recovery accepted into any formal conservation market. The ideal outcome pairs their business growth with a defensible public claim that AI leak detection materially reduced Basin water loss.

Public record. FIDO Tech's stated mission is to create a world without water scarcity, and it has launched the 'Water United' initiative in the Colorado River Basin to reduce water loss through AI-powered leak detection.

Position. Federally recognized tribe on ~24,000 acres northeast of Phoenix, at the Verde/Salt confluence. Defining political identity is water: the Nation defeated the proposed Orme Dam (confluence of Salt and Verde) after a 10-year fight, voting 144-57 by referendum in 1976 to refuse to sell land; Interior Secretary Watt killed the dam in Nov 1981. That victory is celebrated annually as Orme Dam Victory Days. The 1990 Fort McDowell Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act (amended 2006) quantified 36,350 acre-feet/year from six sources, including 4,300 AF of CAP (Colorado River) allocation, plus authority to lease up to 13,933 AF acquired via the Harquahala Valley Irrigation District. The Nation is a sophisticated, long-standing water MARKETER: it leases 4,300 AF of CAP water to the City of Phoenix through 2099 and holds contracts with Phelps Dodge; marketing authority is limited to Maricopa/Pinal/Pima counties, up to 100 years, at fair market value. Recently it has become an active Colorado River SYSTEM-CONSERVATION seller: Reclamation system-conservation agreements in 2020-2022, and IRA-funded agreements to conserve 13,933 AF in each of 2025 and 2026 (27,866 AF total). The Nation filed formal comments with Reclamation on Colorado River drought strategies and is among the 30 basin tribes engaged in the post-2026 guideline negotiations, where it aligns with the broad tribal-sovereignty position: quantify and secure tribal rights, honor federal trust obligations, and expand tribal authority to lease/market water. Its posture is pragmatic and pro-market, not preservationist: it treats its water as a monetizable asset and has repeatedly chosen paid conservation and off-reservation leasing over pure self-use.

On conservation. Strongly positive and already proven. The Nation is one of the clearest existing examples of a verified consumptive-use conservation seller: it has taken Reclamation system-conservation payments since 2020 and IRA-funded deals for 13,933 AF/yr in 2025-2026. A well-run consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in its wheelhouse and revenue-positive. Two conditions matter to them: (1) tribal water sovereignty and the right to monetize their own allocation must be respected, and the market must not become a backdoor to permanently diminish quantified tribal rights; (2) pricing must reflect fair market value (their settlement already anchors leasing to FMV). Expect them to be an eager, credible seller and a useful validator of the market's mechanics.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable and worth a direct pitch. The Nation has land, capital, an existing construction/aggregates base, and a demonstrated appetite for revenue-generating projects; a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with its diversification strategy and its identity as an economic developer. Sovereignty and land control are paramount (Orme Dam is the reason the Nation still exists), so any deal must be tribe-controlled, on tribal terms, with clear consent and benefit-sharing. Interest rises if water funding flows to tribal priorities (reliability, drought resilience, revenue) rather than only to off-reservation users. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific bundle; the risk is a structure that reads as another outsider monetizing tribal land/water.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive with low urgency. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the Lower Basin indirectly protects the value of their CAP allocation and eases pressure on the river, which they'd welcome in principle. But desal is geographically and economically remote from a Verde-confluence tribe, so it is not a priority and they will not champion it. Their main asks would be that augmentation not be used as a rationale to shortchange or delay tribal rights settlements, and that any federal augmentation spending not crowd out trust-obligation funding for tribes. Expect polite support if it's additive, indifference otherwise.

A win for them. A win is recurring, fair-market revenue from water they don't consume, WITHOUT any erosion of their quantified 1990 settlement rights or their sovereignty, plus new tribe-controlled economic development (e.g., a solar+storage project on their terms) that diversifies income beyond gaming and adds drought resilience. Concretely: durable, high-value conservation/lease payments; recognition and strengthening of tribal marketing authority in the post-2026 guidelines; federal trust obligations honored and funded; and continued protection of the Verde River and their homeland. In short, they get paid for their water leadership, keep full control of their rights and land, and turn the river crisis into an income and development opportunity rather than a threat.

Public record. After securing its water rights, the Nation has developed its own solar projects and actively leases a portion of its water allocation to the City of Phoenix.

Position. Denver-based place-based philanthropy (est. 1946, endowment ~$440M sourced from Gates Rubber Company; ~$40M/yr total giving, of which Natural Resources was $2.84M across 25 grants in 2025). Water is an explicit, longstanding strategic priority under a 'Balanced Water Management' program modeled on Colorado's own Water Plan framework. Public positions: (1) treats post-2026 Colorado River management negotiations as urgent and frames the goal as 'equitable, durable solutions to water scarcity'; (2) supports market-based, voluntary conservation, including an early (2012) pilot where irrigators were paid to forgo water so ~3,700 acre-feet could flow downstream, with explicit protection of participants' water rights; (3) prioritizes the water-land-use nexus and agricultural viability, funding buy-innovate-protect-sell / rotational-fallowing models (Palmer Land Conservancy, Colorado West Land Trust, Uncompahgre Valley ag-water protection) alongside Walton and Mighty Arrow foundations; (4) strongly emphasizes tribal water rights and inclusion (NARF Tribal Water Institute, Water and Tribes Initiative connecting ~30 basin tribes); (5) funds collaboration/intermediary capacity (Colorado Water Trust, Colorado River Sustainability Campaign, Sonoran Institute, River Network). Consistent theme: voluntary, compensated, rights-protective, collaboration-first solutions rather than mandatory curtailment.

On conservation. Strongly positive. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the near-exact instrument the foundation already funds and piloted: voluntary, compensated forbearance with rigorous quantification and water-rights protection. They would be a likely funder/convener of measurement, verification, and tribal-participation infrastructure. Two caveats they would raise: (a) it must protect senior/participant water rights and avoid permanent 'buy-and-dry' of ag communities, favoring rotational/temporary deals; (b) tribes must be able to participate and benefit on equitable terms, not be sidelined.

On solar+water. Persuadable-to-neutral, with skepticism. No public position on energy, data centers, or hyperscaler funding; this sits outside their stated Colorado natural-resources strategy, so treat as unknown/inferred. They would evaluate it on their existing lens: does new industrial water demand (data-center cooling) net-increase basin stress, and does the water-funding mechanism actually protect ag communities and tribal rights rather than enable corporate water-buying? A solar+storage build that genuinely funds verified conservation could win support; anything that reads as a hyperscaler acquiring water or greenwashing consumption would draw resistance. Alignment on clean energy/climate resilience is plausible but unproven.

On reuse/desal. Mixed/cautious, likely lower priority. Reuse fits their efficiency and demand-management leanings and could earn support where it reduces diversions in Colorado communities. Large-scale desalination is out of scope for a Colorado-focused funder (it is a Lower Basin / coastal supply-augmentation play), energy- and capital-intensive, and cuts against their preference for demand-side, collaborative, equity-centered solutions over large supply-side infrastructure. Expect interest in municipal/ag reuse pilots, indifference-to-skepticism on desal.

A win for them. A durable, replicable, equity-centered conservation model that keeps Colorado agriculture viable, restores flows, and gives tribal nations real capacity and benefit, all funded through voluntary compensated markets rather than buy-and-dry or top-down curtailment. Success looks like a verified consumptive-use market they helped seed becoming standard practice in post-2026 basin management, with their catalytic philanthropic dollars leveraging far larger public/private/corporate capital. A well-designed hyperscaler-funded conservation-plus-clean-energy program could count as a win if and only if it demonstrably reduces net basin stress and protects farming communities and tribes.

Public record. The foundation, through its Breakthrough Energy initiatives, directly invests in and advocates for clean energy technology and innovation to combat climate change.

Position. Gila River Farms is the tribal farming enterprise of the Gila River Indian Community (GRIC), an Arizona reservation south of Phoenix. It became a tribal entity on March 6, 1968, farms roughly 10,000-10,743 acres (alfalfa hay, cotton, citrus, olives), and generates about $10M/yr; independent allottee farming adds ~22,000 acres for total ag value above $25M. The Farms and its parent are inseparable from GRIC's Colorado River / CAP water position, which is arguably the most important single tribal water story on the river. GRIC holds a very large, high-priority CAP entitlement secured by the 2004 Arizona Water Settlements Act (the largest Native American water settlement in U.S. history, secured under general counsel Rodney Lewis, father of current Governor Stephen Roe Lewis). Longstanding position, framed by Gov. Lewis as 'implementing the settlement' after his father 'fought for our water rights': GRIC is water-rich by law but historically was cut off from its river for a century, so it is fiercely protective of its senior entitlement and priority AND has chosen to be a paid, voluntary conservation leader rather than a holdout. Concrete recent actions: (1) April 2023 System Conservation Implementation Agreement to leave up to 125,000 acre-feet/yr of its CAP entitlement in Lake Mead for three years at a fixed $400/acre-foot, worth up to $150M , the largest single commitment to the Lower Basin System Conservation program to date; (2) ~$107M in federal (IRA/Reclamation) infrastructure funding, including ~$64M specifically to modernize irrigation on Gila River Farms (replacing 140,000 ft of original concrete pipeline, pushing irrigation efficiency from high-60% toward 80%), ~$26M to concrete-line Blackwater canals, ~$17M for a Santan regulating reservoir; total package framed as 'up to $233M'; (3) built the first U.S. solar-over-canal project (Casa Blanca Canal, ~$5.65M IRA, 1.31 MW, cuts canal evaporation ~50%+), with plans to extend across ~18.5 miles of canal; (4) a network of managed aquifer recharge (MAR) sites and water-exchange/storage partnerships to bank water and restore the groundwater basin; (5) exploring floating solar on reservoirs. Politically, Gov. Lewis 'hasn't shied away from rejecting ideas he considers unfair' and 'won't accept a deal that's bad for Arizona,' flexing tribal political muscle in post-2026 Colorado River rules negotiations. Net: a pro-conservation, pro-payment, pro-innovation actor that nonetheless guards its priority and sovereignty hard.

On conservation. Strongly positive , this is the archetypal willing seller and the template for the whole verified-conservation-market idea. GRIC has already signed the largest fixed-price system-conservation deal on the river ($400/AF, up to 125,000 AF/yr) and publicly touts measured, verified savings (73,000+ AF over 10 years from lined canals, efficiency upgrades, solar-over-canal evaporation cuts). A well-designed, verified consumptive-use market is squarely in their wheelhouse and revenue-positive. Caveats they will insist on: (1) it must respect and not erode their senior priority or settlement entitlement , conservation must be additional and voluntary, never a backdoor to reallocate tribal water; (2) durable, adequate, escalating pricing (they will not sell cheap and have leverage to demand a premium); (3) tribal sovereignty over measurement, verification and who counts the water; (4) infrastructure co-funding so conservation doesn't just mean fallowing jobs away from tribal members. Given all that, GRIC/Gila River Farms is the single most credible anchor seller for a verified conservation market and a marquee reference case.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable and plausibly a first-mover, but on their own terms. GRIC is already a solar developer (solar-over-canal, on-reservation solar, floating-solar studies) and sits ~33 miles from Phoenix in the middle of Arizona's data-center boom, with developer interest in a Gila River data center already surfacing. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water infrastructure maps almost perfectly onto what GRIC is already doing with federal money , it would replace/augment IRA dollars with private capital and turn tribal land, sun and conserved water into a durable revenue stream. Strong fit. But expect hard sovereignty and equity terms: tribal ownership or long-term lease revenue (not just a land lease), tribal jobs and workforce training, control over how much water the datacenter itself consumes (they are keenly aware Phoenix hyperscalers dodge facility-level water disclosure), and a structure that funds THEIR water/ag resilience rather than draining it. If the water 'funded' is real, additional, and tribally governed, this is a persuadable-to-ally opportunity; if it looks like a hyperscaler extracting tribal water for cooling, they will resist.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle but secondary to their core levers, and priority-protective. GRIC's own toolkit is efficiency, canal lining, solar shading, MAR/recharge and water banking/exchanges , supply augmentation like large-scale reuse or ocean/brackish desalination is something they'd welcome basin-wide because new 'wet' water reduces pressure to cut existing (including tribal) entitlements. They would likely back reuse/desal politically as long as: (1) it is genuinely additive supply and not used as a rationale to reallocate or subordinate their settlement water; (2) costs are borne by the beneficiaries (growing cities/industry/datacenters), not socialized onto tribes; (3) any augmentation credits or exchange mechanisms respect priority. Desal specifically is distant, energy-intensive and coastal (brine, cost, out-of-state politics), so it's lower on their practical agenda than reuse and in-basin efficiency. Reuse (recycled municipal water for industry/agriculture) is more immediately relevant, especially if it frees potable/CAP water and could be exchanged. Overall: a friendly, pragmatic yes with sovereignty guardrails, but not their top priority.

A win for them. A win is durable, high-value revenue from voluntarily conserved/monetized water AND from tribal land/sun/storage, achieved WITHOUT surrendering one drop of settlement priority or sovereignty , plus modernized farm and canal infrastructure (higher irrigation efficiency, lined canals, MAR banking, solar shading) that makes Gila River Farms more resilient and profitable on less water, and tribal jobs and self-determination reinforced. Concretely: premium, escalating, multi-year conservation payments they control; private (e.g., hyperscaler) capital that funds their water and energy build-out instead of drawing water away; recognition as the national model for tribal water leadership; and a post-2026 river framework that locks in their senior entitlement. If a deal delivers cash + infrastructure + jobs + protected priority + national prestige, GRIC/Gila River Farms is an enthusiastic anchor partner.

Public record. As part of the Gila River Indian Community, it is directly benefiting from a $63.8 million federal investment to improve irrigation efficiency, projected to save 42,200 acre-feet of water over ten years.

Position. The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (GBMF) is a ~$300M/yr private science-and-conservation funder established in 2000 by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore. Its environmental conservation program aims to change how land, freshwater, and coastal marine ecosystems are managed. On the Colorado River specifically GBMF has a longstanding, documented commitment: it has funded the Colorado River Sustainability Campaign (via the New Venture Fund) through repeated multi-year grants , $1.4M (Nov 2017, GBMF7099), $2.35M (Nov 2019), and $1.75M (Sep 2023) , a sustained institutional bet on basin-wide conservation and sustainability policy. GBMF was also one of the named philanthropic funders (alongside the Walton Family Foundation, Water Funder Initiative, and Arizona Community Foundation) that closed the ~$8M gap in the landmark 2021-2022 Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) system conservation deal, which paid CRIT to forgo consumptive use and leave ~150,000 acre-feet (~49 billion gallons) in Lake Mead over three years , the largest single conservation effort in the basin at the time by both dollars and volume. Notably, Intel (Gordon Moore's company) was a corporate co-funder of that same deal, so the Moore ecosystem sits on both the philanthropic and corporate-water-stewardship sides. Overall stance: pro-conservation, pro-market/paid-conservation mechanisms, pro-tribal-and-NGO capacity, and science- and outcomes-driven rather than infrastructure-first.

On conservation. Strongly supportive , this is essentially the model GBMF already pays for. The CRIT deal it helped fund IS a verified consumptive-use conservation transaction (measured acre-feet of forgone use left in Lake Mead, paid for). A formalized, verified consumptive-use conservation market is the scaled, standardized version of GBMF's existing theory of change: pay senior/tribal/agricultural users to reduce consumptive draw, verify the savings, and bank them for system benefit. Expect enthusiastic engagement, likely willingness to fund the enabling infrastructure (measurement/verification protocols, tribal legal capacity, market design, MRV, third-party monitoring) rather than the water payments themselves. Their main scrutiny will be on additionality, verification rigor, and whether tribes/communities capture fair value and retain sovereignty rather than being locked into permanent fallowing.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but with conditions. GBMF has direct precedent for corporate co-funding of river conservation , Intel, Google, and Microsoft all put money into the CRIT deal alongside GBMF , so hyperscaler capital paying for water is not foreign or objectionable to them. A solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation aligns with their conservation-and-clean-energy sympathies. But GBMF is science- and outcomes-driven and will probe hard: does the hyperscaler load ADD net water demand (data-center cooling, chip fabs) that offsets the conservation it funds? Is the water benefit real, additional, and verified, or greenwashing tied to load growth? They would likely support a structure where the conservation funding is verified and net-positive for the river and where energy siting avoids new basin water stress. Persuadable-to-supportive if the water accounting is rigorous; skeptical if it reads as corporate cover for consumptive growth.

On reuse/desal. Mixed / lukewarm. Reuse and efficiency broadly fit GBMF's demand-management, ecosystem-first orientation and would likely draw modest support, especially potable/non-potable reuse that reduces fresh diversions. Large-scale desalination is a weaker fit: it is capital-and-energy-intensive infrastructure, historically outside GBMF's paid-conservation and NGO-capacity playbook, and carries ecological concerns (brine, marine intake, energy footprint) that a marine-and-freshwater-ecosystem funder will weigh. GBMF is more likely to fund the science, monitoring, and ecosystem-impact analysis around reuse/desal than to champion megaproject construction. Not an opponent, but not a natural lead funder for desal , treat as persuadable on reuse, skeptical on desal.

A win for them. A durable, verifiable, scalable mechanism that leaves real water in the system while strengthening (not eroding) tribal sovereignty, ecosystems, and community outcomes , turning the one-off CRIT-style paid-conservation deals they seeded into standing, credible market and policy infrastructure. Concretely: a consumptive-use conservation market with rigorous MRV and additionality; tribes and communities capturing fair value; corporate/hyperscaler capital verifiably net-positive for the river; and measurable ecosystem benefit (including delta/environmental flows). Success looks like their catalytic philanthropy having de-risked and legitimized a model that then attracts far larger corporate and public capital , the leverage multiplier a science-first foundation prizes.

Public record. The foundation provided funding for a landmark Colorado River water conservation deal with the Colorado River Indian Tribes to shore up Lake Mead.

Position. Grundfos is a Danish-owned global pump and water-solutions manufacturer that has taken an unusually forward public posture on the Colorado River. In Feb 2026 it launched 'Keep the River Running' with water advocate Mina Guli at Hoover Dam, framing the river as an economic imperative (40M people, 16M jobs, ~$1.4T annual economic activity, flows down ~20% since 2000). In April 2026 it announced a formal 'co-champion' role within the CEO-led Water Resilience Coalition (WRC) for the Colorado River Basin, pledging to accelerate investment, coordination, and practical efficiency/loss-reduction solutions. It is a founding partner of Mina Guli's 'Run the River: Colorado' (2,000-mile run beginning June 18, 2026) and co-convenes regional summits in Denver, Las Vegas, Phoenix, and LA bringing together business, utilities, farmers, Tribes, and policymakers. Group EVP/COO Ulrik Gernow: 'Keeping the Colorado River running is not only an environmental challenge, it is an economic imperative.' Longstanding corporate frame: water scarcity as solvable through efficiency, smart pumping, reuse, and treatment technology. Their advocacy is solutions-and-efficiency oriented, deliberately convening rather than taking sides in the interstate allocation fight.

On conservation. Broadly supportive but not their core sale. A verified consumptive-use conservation market reduces demand rather than adding treatment/pumping hardware, so it is not directly revenue-accretive. Grundfos would publicly endorse it as a 'practical, economically rational' measure consistent with its efficiency messaging and WRC convening role, and would likely position its metering/monitoring/smart-pump telemetry as the verification and measurement layer that makes such a market auditable. Expect endorsement plus a bid to be the measurement-and-verification technology provider, not opposition.

On solar+water. Favorable and commercially attractive. Grundfos already frames the river as an economic-competitiveness issue and courts industrial/technology customers; a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with its 'business must invest in resilience' thesis and its energy-efficient pumping value proposition (pumps are a major electricity load, so cheaper clean power plus water funding is a double win). Data centers are a fast-growing buyer of both power and water-treatment/reuse systems. Grundfos would welcome this, likely seek to supply the water-side treatment, reuse, and cooling-water pumping, and use it as a marquee proof point for its convening narrative. Watch for it wanting a seat at the table structuring the water-funding mechanism.

On reuse/desal. Strongest alignment of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination is squarely Grundfos's growth strategy: it owns RO/desal pump lines, MECO thermal+membrane desal, RO-PLUS high-recovery reuse, and the Newterra/Colubris treatment portfolio, all aimed at exactly this build-out. Grundfos would be an enthusiastic advocate and supplier. Only nuance: it would push efficiency-first framing (reuse and demand reduction before expensive ocean desal) to stay credible with environmental partners, but it profits across the whole spectrum and would back major reuse/desal programs vigorously.

A win for them. A win is: (1) the river narrative stays framed as an economic-imperative solvable by technology and investment, keeping Grundfos positioned as convener/thought-leader; (2) large public and private programs for reuse, desalination, agricultural pumping efficiency, and data-center water systems move forward, expanding their US water-treatment and pump market toward the 'double US business by 2030' goal; (3) they are designated as a preferred technology and measurement-and-verification supplier and retain a seat structuring basin-scale water investment. Essentially: durable demand for efficient water hardware plus reputational leadership, without being drawn into the zero-sum interstate allocation fight.

Public record. The company has taken a co-champion role in the Water Resilience Coalition for the Colorado River and launched the 'Keep the River Running' campaign to mobilize investment in water efficiency and infrastructure solutions.

Position. Heineken México operates its ~80-year-old Cervecería Tecate brewery inside the Rio Colorado (Colorado River) watershed in Baja California. Its longstanding public posture is that of a corporate water-stewardship leader, not a water antagonist. Under Heineken's global 'Every Drop' 2030 ambition (announced 2019) to fully balance the water it puts in its products in water-stressed areas, the Tecate plant reached 100% water balance in 2025-2026 -- roughly four years ahead of the 2030 target -- and was billed as the first Heineken plant in Latin America to fully replenish to nature the water contained in its products. From 2019-2024 it reported replenishing ~800,000 cubic meters (800 million liters) of water and, via a partnership begun in 2018 with the NGO Restauremos El Colorado A.C., improving ~83 hectares of riparian ecosystem in the Colorado delta. The plant claims the lowest water-use ratio per liter of beer of any Heineken brewery worldwide. Heineken frames the Colorado publicly as a stressed river that has not consistently reached the Gulf of California since ~1960, and positions itself as part of the solution through replenishment and restoration. Importantly, Heineken/Tecate is NOT the company at the center of the 2018-2020 Mexicali water conflict -- that was Constellation Brands, whose $1.4B Mexicali brewery was defeated by farmer/Indigenous protests and relocated to Veracruz. Heineken has largely avoided that reputational damage and instead built a stewardship narrative, though as a large industrial water user in an over-allocated basin it remains a potential target for the same activist critiques leveled at 'big beer.'

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE / early adopter. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns tightly with Heineken's existing replenishment strategy: it already pays for watershed replenishment and restoration through Restauremos El Colorado and counts verified water returned toward its 2030 balance. A credible, MRV-backed market for consumptive-use reductions would let Heineken buy verified credits to hit balance targets more efficiently and defensibly, and would validate the accounting it already publicizes. Main caveats: it will insist on rigorous, independently verified additionality (its brand depends on the numbers being real), and it will resist any framing that recasts it as a water villain that must 'buy its way out.' Best-positioned corporate to anchor an anchor-buyer or proof-of-concept role.

On solar+water. Likely NEUTRAL-TO-SUPPORTIVE, but not a natural lead. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is adjacent rather than core to a brewery's interests. Heineken would welcome new water supply/replenishment funding into its watershed and could co-brand around it, and cheaper clean power supports its own decarbonization goals. But it is a water user, not a data-center or grid developer, so it would engage as a beneficiary/partner and community-legitimacy voice rather than a driver. Possible friction if a large new industrial (datacenter) load is perceived locally as another outside actor competing for the same scarce Baja water/power -- Heineken would want assurances the water-funding is net-additive to the basin, not a PR wrapper on new consumption.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE. Large-scale reuse and desalination directly address the plant's core dependency: reliable non-aquifer water supply in a coastal/border region. Baja California (Tijuana-Tecate-Ensenada corridor) has active desalination interest, and treated-reuse water can serve industrial processes or offset withdrawals counted toward replenishment. Heineken would favor reuse/desal that reduces pressure on the stressed Colorado/Mexicali aquifer system and could participate as an offtaker or co-funder. Caveats: cost and energy intensity of desal, and reputational risk if desal is seen as enabling more extraction rather than relieving communities -- Heineken will want the community-benefit and net-basin-improvement story to be clear.

A win for them. A win is defensible, independently verified proof that Cervecería Tecate is water-positive in the Colorado watershed -- letting them credibly market the plant as fully water-balanced (achieved early), protect and expand social license in a region where 'big beer' is politically vulnerable, and de-risk long-term operations by securing reliable, non-aquifer-stressing water supply. Ideally they anchor or co-brand a basin-scale verified replenishment/conservation or reuse initiative that positions Heineken as the industry leader others are measured against, at manageable cost, while keeping capital/growth optionality (e.g., Yucatan) intact.

Public record. The Tecate brewery achieved water balance, returning to the watershed the water used in its products through reuse and restoration projects, and is committed to 100% renewable energy in its operations.

Position. Intel is a self-styled water-stewardship leader in Arizona and has taken concrete, public, longstanding positions favoring conservation, reuse, and watershed restoration rather than opposing them. Its Chandler Ocotillo campus was the first US semiconductor site to earn Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS) Platinum certification. Intel reuses up to ~75% of the water used at Ocotillo via a 12-acre onsite reclamation facility (up to ~9.1 MGD) and the Ocotillo Brine Reduction Facility (a public-private partnership with the City of Chandler treating up to ~2.8 MGD of process water for reuse). Intel funds nonprofit-led watershed restoration (21 projects in Arizona; ~10 benefiting the Colorado River watershed), reporting ~1.7B gallons restored in AZ (~1.3B in 2022, ~1.1B in 2023) and claims 'net positive water' status in Arizona plus a corporate RISE goal of global net-positive water by 2030 (definition: >100% of freshwater consumption returned/restored). Intel publicly supports the policy toolkit of reuse, recycling, and desalination, and its water strategy depends on the City of Chandler's new Reclaimed Water Interconnect Facility (completed early 2025, ~10 MGD) that enables its two-fab expansion. Caveat: critics (e.g., The Register, 2022) argue 'net positive' is partly an accounting/offset story, since restoration credits are earned elsewhere while local cooling-tower evaporative losses remain a real consumptive draw.

On conservation. Strongly positive / likely early adopter and funder. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly solves Intel's biggest reputational vulnerability: the critique that its 'net positive' restoration credits are soft accounting. Buying verified, additive consumptive-use reductions lets Intel make a rigorous, defensible claim and continue offsetting its cooling-tower evaporative losses. Intel already spends on 21 restoration projects and would likely prefer a market with real MRV over ad hoc project funding. Expect enthusiastic participation if credits are credibly additive and Colorado-River-specific.

On solar+water. Positive but as a peer/participant more than a beneficiary. Intel is itself a large power and water user expanding under CHIPS, and SRP is already building transmission (High-Tech Interconnect Project) to serve the fabs. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with Intel's clean-energy and water goals and could ease the energy+water nexus around Chandler. Intel would welcome it, may co-invest or co-locate, but is unlikely to be the lead funder since its capital is committed to fabs. Mild risk of competition for the same grid/water headroom in the Phoenix metro.

On reuse/desal. Strongly positive. Reuse is already core to Intel's model (onsite reclamation, brine reduction, Chandler RWIF), and Intel publicly supports desalination as part of Arizona's supply solution. Large-scale reuse/desal expands the municipal supply portfolio Chandler draws on, directly de-risking Intel's expansion and reducing pressure on the Colorado River. Intel is a natural advocate, offtake anchor, and potential co-funder for reuse/desal infrastructure, though it will care about cost and reliability.

A win for them. A win for Intel is secure, expandable, politically durable water supply for its ~$32B Chandler fab expansion AND a defensible, verifiable 'net positive water' claim that survives scrutiny. Concretely: cheaper/faster paths to reuse and new supply (reclaimed water, desalination-backed portfolio) so growth is not water-constrained; restoration/offset spending that is demonstrably additive and Colorado-River-linked so its ESG story holds up; and continued goodwill with Chandler, SRP, CAP, ADWR, and state policymakers who gate its permits and infrastructure.

Public record. Intel has a public goal to achieve net positive water by 2030 through conservation, reuse, and funding external water restoration projects, including ten that directly benefit the Colorado River watershed.

Position. Longstanding, well-documented public record as the Colorado River Basin's pioneer of market-based tribal water leasing for compact security and environmental flows. The Nation settled its San Juan River Basin claims via the Jicarilla Apache Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 1992, giving it ~40,000 acre-feet/year of federally reserved rights (33,500 af/y from Navajo Reservoir/Navajo River plus 6,500 af/y from the San Juan-Chama Project); some sources cite 45,000+ af/y of total settled rights across uses. The 1992 Act explicitly authorizes the Nation to lease its unused water off-reservation, and the Nation has used that authority aggressively. In 2022-2023 it signed a first-of-its-kind 10-year agreement with the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission (NMISC) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) to lease up to 20,000 af/y to benefit endangered fish in the San Juan River and shore up New Mexico's Colorado River Compact deliveries, at $88-$190/af (CPI-indexed), ~$1.76M/yr at full volume. Water administrator Daryl Vigil frames this explicitly as 'an example to the broader basin about problem-solving' and a model other tribes can replicate. Beyond leasing, Vigil is a national tribal-water figure: co-convener of the Water & Tribes Initiative since 2017, and the leading advocate for a '38 sovereigns' approach (7 states, 30 tribes, 1 federal government) with tribes as co-equal signatories on the post-2026 Colorado River operating guidelines. The Nation's core positions: (1) tribal water is real, quantified, and has been silently propping up the basin; (2) sovereign tribes must have a seat at the table; (3) creative sovereign-to-sovereign, NGO-supported market mechanisms can turn tribal water into revenue while serving environmental and compact needs. The Nation is also a leading tribal clean-energy host: it leases land to Hecate Energy for the 50 MW PNM Solar Direct field (one of the largest tribal utility-scale solar projects) and hosts the 140 MWac / 50 MW battery Shallow Basket Energy project (commercial operation August 2025), pairing land leasing with a Guzman Energy wholesale power supply agreement.

On conservation. Strongly positive and the single most natural fit. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially a standardized, basin-scale version of the Nation's own 2022 NMISC/TNC lease, which it already champions publicly as a replicable model. Expect the Nation to be an early anchor participant and vocal proponent, provided the market (1) pays a premium over the current $88-$190/af band and reflects true scarcity value, (2) preserves tribal ownership and the right to recall water for the Nation's own use (as the 1992 Act structure allows), (3) verifies real consumptive-use reduction credibly so their conservation is not double-counted or questioned, and (4) treats them as co-designers/sovereigns rather than mere sellers. Watch items: they will resist any market design that lets states or the federal government treat tribal water as a fungible pool without tribal consent, and they will want the precedent to strengthen, not weaken, the '38 sovereigns' post-2026 position.

On solar+water. Positive-leaning but conditional; likely persuadable-to-ally on this specific mechanism. The Nation is already a major tribal clean-energy host (50 MW PNM Solar Direct via Hecate, 140 MWac/50 MW Shallow Basket Energy, Guzman power agreement, NRS partnership), so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with two proven revenue lines at once (land/energy leasing plus water). They will welcome the capital and jobs and the framing of stacked benefits. Conditions: the water-funding component must deliver value to the Nation on the Nation's terms and must not become a mechanism for a hyperscaler or utility to gain claim on or pressure the Nation's water; land-use, cultural, and environmental review must be respected; and revenue and governance terms must keep the Nation as sovereign counterparty, not tenant. Skepticism is likely if the 'funds water' piece is vague or if the data-center load is framed as a new consumptive demand competing with basin conservation goals.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive, lower salience, no strong public record. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply and relieves pressure on the Colorado system is broadly consistent with the Nation's interest in basin sustainability and compact security, and could indirectly protect the value and reliability of its San Juan rights. But the Nation is inland in northern New Mexico with no coastal/desal nexus and no documented position on ocean or brackish desalination, so direct engagement is limited. A concern the Nation would likely raise: if new-supply projects are used rhetorically to deprioritize tribal water settlements, tribal inclusion, or demand-side conservation markets (their strength), they would push back. Mark this reaction as partially unknown/inferred; there is no public evidence of a specific Jicarilla position on reuse/desal.

A win for them. Diversified, durable, sovereignty-respecting revenue that replaces lost coal-era lease income while keeping the Nation in control of its water and its narrative. Concretely: a higher, more reliable price per acre-foot than the current $88-$190 band; multi-year revenue certainty; funding that supports tribal governance and regional water infrastructure (e.g., Navajo-Gallup supply project context); and national recognition/precedent-setting status as the model for tribal participation in basin markets and the post-2026 guidelines. A win also means tribes seated as co-equal sovereigns and signatories, plus stacked benefits (revenue + endangered-fish/environmental flows + clean-energy jobs and land-lease income) that let the Nation be a solution provider to the whole basin rather than a party being managed.

Public record. The Nation has a landmark agreement to lease its water to support environmental flows and water security in the Colorado River system and is actively developing large-scale solar-plus-storage projects on its land.

Position. Jordan D. Joaquin is president of the Fort Yuma Quechan Indian Tribe (first elected Dec 2018, re-elected Dec 2022). In 2022-2023 Gov. Newsom appointed him to the Colorado River Board of California, making him the FIRST tribal representative ever to sit on that board. Longstanding, consistent public stance: tribes must have a seat at the negotiating table on Colorado River management, not a 'side table.' Direct quotes: 'A century ago, we weren't at the table. We weren't even U.S. citizens at the time. But now we are. Tribes should be at the table.' / 'We will be at the table for post-2026. It's meaningful to us. It's the right thing to do.' / 'Water is very important to us... water is sacred to us. So the most meaningful thing is to be part of the negotiation at the table - not the back table, not the side table but at the table of discussion.' He is pro-partnership: 'believes in building strong partnerships with local, state, and federal agencies.' The Quechan hold SENIOR (present-perfected, pre-1964/priority) mainstem Lower Basin rights decreed via Arizona v. California; in a Lower Basin shortage Reclamation must satisfy the five decreed tribes' rights ahead of everyone else. Joaquin has actively USED conservation-for-pay as a strategic lever: he explicitly frames tribal forbearance deals as both revenue AND a way to protect the river, saying such deals 'generate income for tribes and reduce the risk of new draws on the river' and 'This is an opportunity that should not be squandered.' On solar/energy, the tribe's documented history (Palen/Imperial Valley solar litigation vs BLM) shows it is NOT anti-solar but fiercely protective of cultural resources and hostile to fast-tracked, corporate-favoring processes that marginalize the tribe. NOTE/UNKNOWN: leadership status in mid-2026 is ambiguous in sources. A June 2026 inewsource article names 'Jonathan Koteen' as Quechan president amid a contested 200 MW solar+gas AI data-center proposal and a recall effort; other 2026 sources (Inter Tribal Council of Arizona) still list Joaquin as president. Whether Joaquin remains president or was succeeded is not cleanly confirmed; treat his personal current office as unknown, but his documented positions as the tribe's water-policy voice are well established.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE - this is his proven, preferred instrument. Joaquin already championed exactly this: paid, verified consumptive-use forbearance (13,000 AF for $5.2M; MWD fallowing) that he publicly frames as income plus river protection ('reduce the risk of new draws... an opportunity that should not be squandered'). A verified consumptive-use conservation market monetizes the tribe's senior rights without permanently alienating them, respects tribal sovereignty, and pays the community. Conditions he will insist on: rigorous, tribally-trusted MEASUREMENT/verification of consumptive use; that the tribe retains the underlying right and can turn participation on/off; fair pricing benchmarked to (or above) the ~$400/AF implied by the 13,000 AF / $5.2M deal; and tribes as principals at the table, not subjects of a program designed around them. Weak/unverifiable accounting or a market that lets junior/non-tribal users buy their way past the tribes' shortage priority would flip him to skeptic.

On solar+water. PERSUADABLE-TO-FAVORABLE ON THE MODEL, but process- and legitimacy-sensitive. The tribe is ALREADY pursuing essentially this structure (a solar-plus data-center deal that funds direct member distributions), so the economic logic lands. Joaquin/tribe are not anti-solar (Palen fight was about cultural resources and unfair fast-tracking, not solar per se) and value energy sovereignty (selling power vs buying from IID). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water would be attractive IF it: (a) is genuinely low-water (storage, not gas + evaporative cooling - the current 40% gas / adjacency to a shallow water table by the river is a live concern), (b) is brought to the community transparently from the start (the current project's fatal flaw is that members felt it was hidden - denials at council meetings, a Rucci sighting, then a recall), (c) protects cultural/sacred sites and viewsheds, and (d) treats the tribe as owner/partner, not host. Get those wrong and he (or his successor/opponents like Willie White, who ran on 'more pride... than to ever be desperate for 400 bucks a month') will oppose hard. The internal split means an external partner must win the community, not just the council.

On reuse/desal. CAUTIOUSLY SUPPORTIVE / LOWER SALIENCE. No direct public statement from Joaquin on reuse or desalination was found (mark this specific reaction partly unknown). Inferring from his consistent frame: he favors partnerships and any solution that adds real 'new water' or reduces pressure/new draws on the mainstem, which protects the tribe's senior supply and the river he calls sacred. Large-scale reuse/desal that is genuinely additive (e.g., augmentation that offsets others' demand) would likely earn qualified support. Concerns: it must not become a pretext for others to expand paper demand against the tribes' priority; siting/environmental impacts near tribal lands and the river; and cost allocation. He will want tribes at the table in any basin-scale augmentation deal, same as with allocation. Confidence: LOW-MEDIUM (inferred, not directly sourced).

A win for them. A win: the Quechan are recognized and treated as a sovereign principal at the Colorado River table (post-2026 guidelines and any market/augmentation program), with their senior decreed rights fully protected in shortage. Their consumptive-use forbearance is monetized on fair, verified, tribe-controlled terms that fund the community while keeping the underlying right. Any energy/water buildout on tribal land is tribe-owned or tribe-partnered, transparently vetted by the membership, protects cultural and sacred sites, and is genuinely low-water. Net: durable revenue and self-determination without alienating water rights, selling out culture, or accepting a 'side table' seat.

Public record. As President, he has overseen the Quechan Tribe's pursuit of a 200MW solar micro-grid and waterless-cooled data center project on tribal land, demonstrating a commitment to clean infrastructure.

Position. Longstanding, ideologically consistent river-protection posture rooted in founder William C. 'Wick' Kenney's vision of 'a West where rivers run free and clean from the headwaters to the sea.' The foundation (formed 2008 by merging the Jay Kenney Foundation and the W.C. Kenney Watershed Protection Foundation, the latter established shortly before Wick's 1994 death) explicitly funded groups 'fighting to protect rivers from development, diversion, pollution, over-allocation, and dams,' distributing $7M+ over ~20 years (~$2.5M+ to ~100 river groups 1995-2013). Geographic focus: watersheds roughly west of the 100th meridian. On the Colorado specifically, the foundation stated in 2013 it expected to continue funding through the Save the Colorado Foundation (an anti-dam/anti-diversion/anti-pipeline advocacy group that opposes every new dam/diversion/pipeline in the basin) and to fund past grantees at smaller levels. That signals alignment with a preservationist, keep-rivers-flowing, reduce-consumptive-demand worldview rather than a supply-augmentation or engineered-solution worldview. No public position on water markets, reuse, or desal as such. Family shares a surname with (but is not documented as connected to) CU Boulder Colorado River scholar Doug Kenney; do not assume a link.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE, with a values caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the closest fit to this foundation's core mission: it directly reduces over-allocation and can leave water in-stream, which is exactly what they funded others to pursue. They would applaud any design that permanently retires consumptive use and dedicates saved water to the environment. Their likely skepticism: markets that merely reshuffle water among consumptive users (city buys ag water) without a net ecological gain, or that commodify water in ways that entrench withdrawal rights. Frame the market as demand destruction + in-stream dedication, with rigorous, third-party-verified reductions (their 'verified' instinct is strong), and they are an ally.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY SKEPTICAL, conditional. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is a mixed object for a rivers-run-free purist. They would like the anti-dam/anti-fossil implication of renewables and any dollars steered to river protection, but would distrust a large industrial/data-center demand driver and corporate greenwashing, and would want assurance the water it 'funds' produces a net reduction in consumptive use and real in-stream benefit rather than merely offsetting the datacenter's own new load. Winnable if the water funding is additive, verified, and dedicated to restoration/in-stream flow; opposed if it reads as license for new industrial water demand.

On reuse/desal. MIXED-TO-COOL, especially on desal. Reuse (recycling, potable reuse) fits their demand-reduction ethos reasonably well and they would likely tolerate or mildly support it as an alternative to new diversions. Large-scale desalination is a harder sell: it is a supply-augmentation megaproject with heavy energy use, brine/marine impacts, and it can be used to justify continued or expanded consumptive withdrawals upstream, which cuts against 'rivers run free.' Expect ambivalence to opposition on desal framed as 'new supply,' softening only if it is explicitly paired with binding reductions in Colorado River consumptive use.

A win for them. A measurable, permanent reduction in consumptive demand that leaves more water physically in the river, achieved WITHOUT new dams, diversions, or pipelines. Concretely: acres of ag land fallowed or shifted to lower water crops with the saved water dedicated to environmental/in-stream flow, headwaters and tributary restoration, and avoidance of new supply-side megaprojects. A 'win' is ecological (free-flowing, clean rivers) and precedent-setting, not financial return.

Public record. The foundation's 'Wick Fund' was explicitly created to fund groups fighting to protect western rivers from development, diversion, and dams, granting over $7 million for this purpose.

Position. The Las Vegas Valley Water District (LVVWD) is the largest member agency of, and is operationally merged with, the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA); on Colorado River policy it does not act independently and speaks through SNWA (GM John Entsminger; deputy GM of resources Colby Pellegrino). Longstanding public positions: (1) Aggressive demand-side conservation is the community's core strategy and its political 'high ground.' Per-capita use fell ~58% from 2002-2025 while population grew by ~876,000; SNWA set a new goal of 86 GPCD by 2035. Mandatory measures include a decorative/non-functional turf ban (no Colorado River water for unused grass in medians, HOA entrances, business centers starting 2027), the Water Smart Landscape Rebate (250M sq ft of grass removed, 217B gallons saved since 1999), pool-size limits, an evaporative-cooling moratorium, golf-course water budgets, and water-waste penalties. (2) Consumptive-use, not diversion, is the accounting frame that matters. Nevada recycles ~99% of indoor water back to Lake Mead via the Las Vegas Wash, earning return-flow credits that stretch its supply by roughly 70%; 2024 return flow was ~245,000 AF. This makes Nevada's 300,000 AF Compact allocation far larger in practice, and 2025 net consumptive use was only ~198,000 AF, ~34% under the legal cap. (3) 'Everyone must contribute regardless of priority.' Entsminger has told Interior/Reclamation the river cannot meet current use levels and every user in every sector must cut, deliberately downplaying the strict priority system that would otherwise shield senior users. (4) Nevada casts itself as the prepared, cooperative Lower Basin partner: it co-authored the Lower Basin Alternative (AZ/CA/NV) to Reclamation for post-2026 operations and the 2026 Lower Basin 3.2 MAF-through-2028 conservation package. As of Feb-June 2026, SNWA publicly warned the seven states were far from a post-2026 deal ('posturing doesn't fill the taps'; 'driest year in the history of the Colorado River').

On conservation. Strongly favorable, with a technical caveat. SNWA already pays into consumptive-use conservation markets (e.g., the Palo Verde Irrigation District fallowing partnership with Reclamation, MWD and CAP to add system water to Lake Mead) and its entire policy identity rests on measuring and rewarding consumptive-use reductions rather than diversions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is precisely the accounting philosophy Nevada has pushed basin-wide, and it lets Nevada monetize or bank savings it is structurally good at generating. Caveat: SNWA will insist the verification be rigorous (real wet-water savings, not paper credits), that it not simply enrich senior agricultural users or ICS 'profiteers' at the system's expense, and that savings become shared system water in Lake Mead rather than a private tradable windfall. Expect SNWA to be an early adopter and credibility anchor if the MRV is sound.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, transactional. Data-center load is arriving in the Southwest and any new large consumptive demand in Southern Nevada collides directly with a fixed 300,000 AF cap, so SNWA will scrutinize the water footprint of hyperscaler campuses hard and prefers air-cooled / closed-loop / reuse-fed designs. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water (conservation, reuse infrastructure, turf buyback, or purchased/created ICS) fits SNWA's 'every sector must contribute and pay' worldview and could turn a threatening new load into a net-neutral or net-positive water proposition. SNWA would engage if the deal is water-additive and verifiable, and would resist if it is greenwashing that lets a thirsty facility net-increase consumptive draw on Lake Mead. The energy-siting piece is largely outside SNWA's lane; the water-funding piece is the hook.

On reuse/desal. Very favorable and already leading on both. Reuse is Nevada's signature: near-total indoor recycling via the Las Vegas Wash and return-flow credits are the backbone of its supply, and SNWA is actively pushing to recover more highly treated wastewater used outside the valley and to limit non-recoverable consumptive uses. On desalination, SNWA does not want a plant in Nevada (landlocked); instead it champions 'paper' exchanges: fund ocean desalination (Carlsbad in Southern California, or a plant in Mexico) so that partner leaves an equivalent volume in Lake Mead for Nevada to draw, in exchange for compensation. This is a marquee SNWA policy idea, not a hypothetical. Large-scale reuse/desal that produces new wet water or exchangeable supply is squarely aligned; SNWA would want to co-design the accounting and be a funding/offtake partner rather than a bystander.

A win for them. A win keeps Las Vegas growing within a shrinking river by making new demand pay for new supply/savings and by getting the basin to adopt Nevada's consumptive-use, return-flow, and system-water framework as the norm. Concretely: rigorous verified conservation markets that reward the savings Nevada already generates; hyperscaler and other new loads that arrive water-neutral or water-positive (funding reuse, turf buyback, or created ICS); a funded desalination exchange (Carlsbad or Mexico) that leaves offsetting water in Lake Mead for Nevada; and a durable post-2026 operating agreement in which everyone cuts 'regardless of priority' so Nevada's small, well-hedged allocation and its banked >2.2 MAF are protected. Being the cited model and a rule-shaping anchor partner is itself part of the win.

Public record. As the operational arm of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, the district leads the nation's most aggressive conservation programs, paying users billions in rebates to remove turf and investing in large-scale renewable energy to power its water system.

Position. Audubon is one of the most consistent conservation voices in the Colorado River Basin, working headwaters-to-delta. Longstanding frame: 'taking care of people and their water supply IS taking care of the birds and the environment' , it positions itself as a bridge between water users, farmers, tribes, and habitat needs rather than a litigant. Core positions: (1) Demand-side reduction is the answer , 'How to Save the Colorado River? Use Less Water'; it points to AZ/CA/NV 'proving they can live with less' and frames conservation, not new supply, as the primary tool. (2) Prefers frequent, voluntary, COMPENSATED water-use reductions (esp. agricultural) over infrequent abrupt mandatory cuts; explicitly supports the federal System Conservation Pilot Program (cash for conserved water left in rivers/reservoirs). (3) Wants post-2026 operating rules that are flexible/adaptive to climate change, longer-lasting, more inclusive, consensus-based, and litigation-avoiding, with investment in basin-wide resilience. (4) Joined 70+ basin groups urging Congress for targeted federal investment tying water/food/energy security to sustaining rivers and natural systems. (5) Priority habitat: riparian forests and wetlands for Yuma Ridgway's Rail and Southwestern Willow Flycatcher; the Colorado River Delta and Cienega de Santa Clara; binational US-Mexico pulse flows (member of the Raise the River coalition, ~8,000 AF secured plus binational pledges of ~210,000 AF through 2026). (6) Runs a Salt Lake City-based Saline Lakes program (Great Salt Lake = top inland shorebird site) and helped pass the federal Saline Lake Ecosystem in the Great Basin States Program Act. (7) Backs environmental/instream-flow water markets , was a supportive party to the Nov 2025 Shoshone water rights deal (one of the largest instream-flow protections in CO history) and aligns with the Nature Sustainability 'strategic environmental water rights market' concept. Partner on a $5.5M Cocopah Tribe habitat restoration effort. Separately, Audubon's national climate/energy arm supports 'rapid and responsible' utility-scale wind and solar plus grid buildout, with strong siting conditions: avoid intact native grasslands, co-locate transmission on existing rights-of-way, use data-mapping to steer projects to lower-conflict areas, and engage developers directly.

On conservation. Strong support, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in Audubon's wheelhouse , it already champions the System Conservation Pilot Program and voluntary compensated ag reductions, and it co-sponsored/backed environmental water markets like the Shoshone instream-flow purchase. Verified, measured consumptive-use savings (not paper water) is exactly the accountability it wants. Its one hard ask: conserved water must produce real system benefit and, ideally, deliver ecological flows to rivers, the delta, and saline lakes rather than just enabling continued diversion elsewhere. Expect Audubon to want environmental/instream flow eligibility built into the market and additionality/verification safeguards.

On solar+water. Cautiously supportive, conditional on siting and on where the water goes. Audubon nationally backs rapid, responsibly-sited solar+storage and grid expansion as climate mitigation (its science warns two-thirds of North American birds face extinction under continued warming). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would appeal on both the clean-energy and the water-funding fronts. But it will apply its siting rules hard: no intact native grasslands or high-value bird habitat, co-locate transmission on existing corridors, use mapping to find low-conflict land, and engage developers early. On the water side it will ask whether the funded water reduces net basin consumptive use and supports environmental flows, versus simply underwriting new datacenter/industrial demand. Persuadable-to-supportive if siting is clean and the water benefit is real and additional.

On reuse/desal. Mixed and conditional; least natural fit of the three. Audubon's stated hierarchy is use-less-first, and it has not made reuse/desal a headline demand. It will likely tolerate or modestly favor municipal water reuse/recycling (lower energy, keeps demand off the river) but be wary of large-scale seawater desalination on energy, brine-disposal, and coastal/marine habitat grounds, and of any 'new supply' narrative that reduces pressure to cut consumptive use or that strands environmental flows. It is aware of the 2026 Reclamation MOU on desalinated/recycled water interstate swaps. Expect qualified support for reuse paired with insistence that saved river water actually stays in rivers, the delta, and saline lakes rather than backfilling growth.

A win for them. A durable, verifiable outcome where reduced consumptive use translates into secured environmental flows , measurable water reaching riparian habitat, the delta, and saline lakes, protecting Yuma Ridgway's Rail, Southwestern Willow Flycatcher, and Great Salt Lake shorebirds. Concretely: a compensated conservation/market mechanism with real additionality and an instream/environmental-flow allocation; clean-energy buildout sited to avoid bird habitat; and a consensus, litigation-free deal that strengthens post-2026 basin governance and demonstrates their 'water for birds and people' thesis. Bonus wins: new funding streams for restoration and being credited as the pragmatic partner that made a hard basin deal work.

Public record. Audubon joined over 70 groups in a letter to Congress calling for federal investment in voluntary, compensated water conservation measures in the Colorado River Basin.

Position. The Nevada Resort Association (NRA), founded 1965 and led by president/CEO Virginia Valentine, is the primary lobbying and advocacy voice for Nevada's gaming and resort industry (its largest private industry). Its longstanding public posture on the Colorado River crisis is that the Las Vegas resort economy is water-efficient and sustainable through conservation and recycling, and that resorts should NOT be scapegoated as profligate users. Core public claims, echoed at Nevada drought forums and in the industry's messaging: resorts/casinos consume roughly 5-7% of the community's water supply; hotels and casinos use about 1/10 of 1% of water available statewide while employing ~16% of the state workforce; nearly 100% of indoor water is treated and returned to Lake Mead as return-flow credits (Nevada recycles ~99% of indoor water), so the industry's true CONSUMPTIVE footprint is small. The NRA supports and takes credit for decades of partnership with the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) on conservation: turf removal, bans on new outdoor/ornamental fountains unless indoor-recycled or fed by private/nuisance groundwater rights, low-flow fixtures, and corporate reduction targets (e.g., MGM Resorts reports saving ~2 billion gallons since 2008; Caesars targets 20% per-square-foot reduction by 2035 vs 2019). At the July drought forum the industry publicly argued Las Vegas' fountains and water shows are sustainable through conservation and recycling. The NRA participates in Nevada water-policy processes and is a factor in the 2026-2027 legislative water-policy workgroup and anticipated Omnibus Water Bill. Its through-line: keep water reliability high and protect the resort brand/economy without accepting disproportionate cuts or public blame.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / LIKELY ALLY. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits the resort industry's core narrative that CONSUMPTIVE use (not gross withdrawal) is what matters, and that recycled indoor water shouldn't count against them. Resorts are already near best-in-class on consumptive intensity, so a market that pays for verified reductions rewards behavior they've invested in and lets them monetize or defend their low footprint. The NRA would welcome a framework that shifts the burden onto genuinely consumptive users (outdoor turf, agriculture, evaporative losses) rather than gross users. Caveats: they will insist the verification methodology properly credits return flows and doesn't create new metering/reporting burdens or costs on members, and they will resist any design that treats resort gross withdrawal as consumptive. Expect active support if the accounting is favorable, wary neutrality if it isn't.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY SUPPORTIVE. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure is attractive to the NRA on two fronts: (1) it de-risks the power side of resort operations (cheaper/firmer clean electricity, hedge against heat-driven cost and reliability risk) and (2) 'new money' funding water augmentation/conservation eases pressure that might otherwise fall on resorts. The main tension is COMPETITION FOR THE SAME SCARCE INPUTS: large data centers are themselves major power and (potentially) water consumers in Nevada, and the NRA will not want datacenter growth to crowd out the resort economy's water/power or to become the new 'big user' that draws down Lake Mead. So support is conditional on the deal being net-additive for water (funding reuse/augmentation, not just consuming) and not siting water-intensive cooling that competes for Colorado River supply. If structured as datacenters bringing their own solar+storage AND paying for regional water resilience, the NRA is a natural ally; if it just adds a thirsty new load, they turn skeptical.

On reuse/desal. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE. Large-scale reuse and desalination are squarely aligned with the NRA's identity and interests. Las Vegas/SNWA are already the national leader in water reuse (~99% indoor recycling, return-flow credits), and the resort industry's entire sustainability story is built on that recycling model, so it champions reuse. Desalination (especially ocean desal via a California-swap arrangement, where Nevada funds a coastal desal plant in exchange for a share of California's Colorado River allocation) is exactly the kind of supply-augmentation that grows the pie without forcing resort-sector cuts, and SNWA has long explored such swaps. The NRA would back reuse/desal financing and any supply-augmentation that protects Lake Mead levels and preserves resort water reliability. The only friction is cost allocation: the NRA will resist proposals that load desal/reuse capital costs disproportionately onto resorts rather than spreading them across all beneficiaries or using outside capital.

A win for them. A win for the NRA is: (1) continued reliable Colorado River water deliveries and a stable Lake Mead so the resort economy keeps growing; (2) formal recognition that CONSUMPTIVE use (net of return flows) is the metric, cementing that resorts are efficient and shielding members from disproportionate cuts or blame; (3) new supply and conservation paid for by OUTSIDE capital (hyperscalers, federal funds, market mechanisms, desal swaps) rather than resort-sector cost or mandate; (4) a public sustainability narrative that protects Las Vegas' brand and its signature fountains/water features; and (5) no new competitor (e.g., water-hungry data centers) crowding out resort water and power. Essentially: keep the water flowing, keep the credit for being efficient, and make someone else pay to expand the pie.

Public record. Major members like MGM Resorts and Caesars Entertainment have entered long-term power purchase agreements for large-scale solar-plus-storage projects to power their energy-intensive operations.

Position. Pronatura Noroeste A.C. is a ~35-year-old Mexican conservation NGO based in northwest Mexico (Ensenada/Baja California) whose Water and Wetlands program makes it the leading Mexican actor in Colorado River Delta restoration. Longstanding position: the Delta is entitled to a dedicated share of Colorado River water for environmental flows, secured through binational cooperation rather than litigation. It was a lead negotiator/implementer of IBWC Minute 319 (2012), which produced the March 2014 'Pulse Flow' (130 million cubic meters / ~105,000 af released from Morelos Dam over eight weeks), and of Minute 323 (2017), which committed at least 210,000 af over nine years (2017-2026) for Delta restoration and monitoring, split two-thirds government (140,000 af) and one-third NGO coalition (70,000 af). It is a founding member of the binational Raise the River coalition (with National Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy, Sonoran Institute, The Redford Center, and Restauremos el Colorado). Operationally it has cleared and planted 1,000+ acres of riparian habitat where documented bird species rose from 23 (pre-2010) to 122. Current position (2024-2026): supports 'strategic water deliveries' and pushes for a Minute 323 successor to be negotiated in parallel with the U.S. post-2026 rulemaking so environmental flows survive past the 2026 sunset. Its core stance is pro-market and pro-conservation-supply: it helped establish a water trust in Mexico that permanently acquires water rights from voluntary sellers (mostly Mexicali Valley farmers) and retires them to the river.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, and effectively a co-inventor of the model. Pronatura and Raise the River already run exactly this mechanism: since 2008 they tapped 'the market' to source restoration water, and the Colorado River Delta Water Trust buys irrigation water rights from willing Mexicali Valley sellers and retires them to the river. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays for real wet-water savings and allows a share to reach the environment is directly aligned with their theory of change and would expand their supply toolkit. Their conditions/concerns: verification must be rigorous (genuine consumptive-use reduction, not paper transfers or fallowing that shifts harm), and a portion of conserved water must be legally dedicable to environmental flows in the Delta (system-conservation savings historically stay in reservoirs to prop up elevations, not routed to the Delta). They will also watch for equity impacts on Mexicali farming communities, since they position restoration as also 'supporting local economies.'

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, transactional. As a conservation NGO, not an energy developer, they have no doctrinal stake in solar-plus-storage; their interest is entirely in the water it funds. A hyperscaler-funded buildout that reliably channels money or wet water to Delta environmental flows and habitat would be welcomed as a new, non-philanthropic funding stream that diversifies away from foundation dependence. Likely conditions: siting must avoid ecologically sensitive Delta/Upper Gulf habitat (they also work on Gulf of California and shorebird conservation), the water benefit must be additional and verifiable rather than greenwashing, and governance must respect Mexican sovereignty and binational (IBWC/CONAGUA) processes. Risk they will flag: a corporate water-offset that lets consumptive demand grow elsewhere while nominally 'funding water' could net-harm the basin. Net: open to engage, will demand that the water commitment be concrete and Delta-directed.

On reuse/desal. Mixed, conditional support leaning positive on reuse, more skeptical on desalination. They favor any measure that reduces net diversions from the river and frees water for environmental flows, so municipal/ag reuse and efficiency fit their agenda well. On large-scale desalination they will apply a conservation lens: coastal/Sea of Cortez desal raises brine-discharge and marine-habitat concerns in the Upper Gulf where they also conserve (Gulf of California, Colorado River Delta biosphere), and desal is energy-intensive. Their support hinges on (1) whether the new supply actually offsets river withdrawals and returns water to the Delta versus enabling more consumptive growth, and (2) rigorous management of brine and coastal-ecosystem impacts. They would likely support well-sited reuse and treated-water reuse readily, and support desal only where it demonstrably relieves the river and protects the marine environment.

A win for them. A durable, verified source of dedicated environmental water for the Colorado River Delta that survives the 2026 Minute 323 sunset, plus diversified non-philanthropic funding to sustain their restoration program. Concretely: a successor binational agreement (or parallel mechanism) that locks in environmental flows past 2026; a conservation market or corporate-funded stream that pays for real consumptive-use savings and legally dedicates a share to the Delta; expanded restored acreage and continued habitat/bird recovery; and preservation of the willing-seller, binational-cooperation model they helped build, with benefits shared with Mexicali communities. A win is measured in wet water reaching the river and the sea, not in dollars alone.

Public record. The organization is a key partner in the binational 'Alianza Revive el Río Colorado,' which works to secure water deliveries for habitat restoration in the Colorado River Delta.

Position. Longstanding senior water rights holder on the Lower Colorado. Under Arizona v. California the reservation holds 77,966 acre-feet/year of mainstream diversion (or water to irrigate 11,694 acres, whichever is less) with an 1884 priority date. In a Lower Basin shortage, Reclamation is obligated to satisfy the five decreed tribes' rights ahead of nearly everyone else, so the Quechan's supply is legally protected. The Tribe's public stance is pro-conservation and pro-reform: it argues the historical river-management framework 'is not working' and needs to be rethought (attorney Jay Weiner), and it frames a durable, sustainable, 'living river from headwaters to Mexico' as culturally essential. It is an active conservation participant, not a holdout: (1) a long-term forbearance agreement with Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) running through 2035 lets the Tribe elect each year to forbear up to 13,000 AF and pass it through the priority system to MWD; (2) it agreed to conserve up to ~39,000 AF through 2025 and >50,000 AF in Lake Mead across 2023-2026; (3) it contributed 13,000 AF/yr 2023-25 to stabilize Lake Mead; (4) in Dec 2024 it signed a federally backed System Conservation deal for 13,000 AF for up to \$5.2M. On governance it aligns with the 'One Voice' tribal coalition demanding that tribal inclusion be 'formal, meaningful and permanent' and complaining (with 13 other basin tribes) of inadequate consultation in post-2026 operations. Separately, the Tribe has a documented history of litigating federal projects sited near the reservation without adequate NHPA/Section 106 consultation, winning a preliminary injunction against the Imperial Valley (Tessera/Calico) solar project in 2010 over cultural-resource review failures.

On conservation. Strongly positive and already proven. The Quechan are among the most active tribal participants in paid consumptive-use conservation on the Lower Colorado: the MWD forbearance runs through 2035, and they signed a Dec 2024 System Conservation Implementation Agreement worth up to \$5.2M for 13,000 AF. A verified consumptive-use market is squarely in their revenue model. Expect them to engage constructively, but to insist on: fair/premium pricing, annual opt-in flexibility (their MWD deal lets them choose each year), verification methods that respect tribal data sovereignty, and ironclad protection that participation never erodes their senior priority date or underlying decreed entitlement. Likely one of the market's anchor sellers.

On solar+water. Genuinely persuadable but internally divided, and this is the sharpest test of the segment. Leadership is actively courting almost exactly this: a ~200 MW AI data center paired with a tribe-developed solar farm on ~1,000 acres, pitched as diversification away from threatened gaming revenue with direct per-member cash distributions. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would resonate with council leadership. But a vocal faction opposes land-intensive development next to the river over habitat, shallow-groundwater contamination, and cultural-site risks (a former councilmember: 'more pride... than to ever be desperate for 400 bucks a month'), and a leadership recall is in motion. The Tribe's litigation history (winning an injunction against a nearby solar project over skipped NHPA consultation) means any developer must front-load cultural-resource review and community process. A well-structured, low-water-cooling, solar-heavy, water-funding deal with real consultation could win; a top-down or land-scarring one will draw organized opposition.

On reuse/desal. Likely neutral-to-supportive but lower salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the Lower Basin reduces pressure on the shared system and could raise the value of the Tribe's forbeared water, which it would welcome. As a senior-priority holder the Tribe is less dependent on augmentation than junior users, so this is not a core interest. Watch two flags: (1) any desal/reuse infrastructure sited near the reservation or affecting the lower river, riverine habitat, or cultural sites would trigger the same NHPA-consultation and environmental scrutiny the Tribe applies to solar/data-center projects; (2) the Tribe will resist any framing that treats augmentation as a reason to weaken tribal priority or reduce demand for paid tribal conservation. Support is conditional on it not being used to sideline tribal rights or river-health priorities.

A win for them. A durable, sovereignty-respecting revenue stream that pays the Tribe for water it forbears and for hosting energy/water infrastructure on its own terms, without ceding its senior 1884 priority or the underlying entitlement, and without damaging culturally significant land, riverine habitat, or shallow groundwater. Concretely: multi-year, opt-in conservation payments at fair (or premium) value; formal, permanent tribal seats in post-2026 river governance; funding for on-reservation river restoration (the ~400-acre mainstem restoration project is already its largest AZ water use); and economic diversification that reduces reliance on gaming, delivered with full NHPA consultation and genuine community buy-in.

Public record. The Tribe has entered into multiple paid agreements to fallow land and conserve significant amounts of its Colorado River water to bolster Lake Mead's elevation.

Position. The Quechan Tribe (Fort Yuma Indian Reservation, straddling the California/Arizona line at the Colorado/Mexico border near Yuma) holds senior present perfected, federally-reserved mainstream Colorado River rights with an 1884 priority date, confirmed in Arizona v. California (1963), supplemental decrees (1979, 1984), and the 2006 Consolidated Final Decree. Reported entitlement figures cluster around ~77,966 acre-feet/year total (roughly 6,350 af in Arizona plus a large California allotment; sources vary). Agriculture is the economic bedrock: the Tribe leases ~11,694 of its ~45,000 reservation acres as farmland, including a ~700-acre farm leased to a non-Indian farmer, plus RV/trailer parks, a museum, and gaming (Paradise Casino). LONGSTANDING POSITION: the Tribe is an active, pragmatic conservation participant AND a fierce defender of sovereignty and the principle that it is an original steward, not a latecomer, whose consultation must be formal, meaningful and permanent. It has repeatedly monetized senior water via forbearance rather than opposing conservation: a long-term forbearance/marketing agreement with Metropolitan Water District (MWD) running through 2035 lets the Tribe elect annually to forbear up to 13,000 af (rising to ~20,000 af by 2035) into the priority system for compensation; it conserved 30,000 af in 2023 for Bureau of Reclamation compensation; and in 2025 it signed a 13,000 af system-conservation agreement to prop up Lake Mead plus a seasonal fallowing deal with MWD, helping California hit its 1.6 MAF Lake Mead goal early. It also secured funding to line the Reservation Main Canal (cutting seepage) and runs a ~400-acre MSCP/LCR habitat-restoration project that is now among the largest uses of its Arizona right. KEY SKEPTICISM (attorney Jay Weiner): the Tribe distrusts deals that only store water 'on paper' while the wet water is delivered to other users, because Quechan farmers need actual water reaching lower-basin lands. On energy: the Tribe has a documented history of opposing off-reservation utility-scale solar that threatens sacred viewsheds and cultural sites (Palen SEGS, Quartzsite/La Posa Plain), while stating renewables align with Native values. NOTABLY, as of 2026 the Tribe itself is weighing an on-reservation solar+data-center project (developer Sebastian Rucci; proposed ~60% solar / 40% natural gas) that would let it sell power directly to a data-center operator rather than buy from Imperial Irrigation District. President Jonathan Koteen framed it as 'both an opportunity and a responsibility' requiring careful stewardship of land, water, and culture; a special meeting at Paradise Casino drew 150+ members, most (including elders) opposing it over transparency, water, and cultural concerns. This shows real internal division and a hard, culturally-rooted bar on any project touching sacred sites or water.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE, with conditions. This is the scenario most aligned with the Tribe's revealed behavior: it has repeatedly and voluntarily monetized senior water through verified, compensated conservation (2023 Bor 30k af; 2025 system-conservation 13k af; MWD forbearance through 2035). A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to what they already do and profit from. CONDITIONS that decide their support: (1) verification must be genuine consumptive-use savings, not paper accounting. Attorney Jay Weiner has explicitly warned against deals that store water 'on paper' while wet water goes to others. (2) The Tribe must retain sole annual discretion to opt in or out (mirroring the MWD structure) and its underlying senior rights must be non-impaired and non-quantifiably-reduced by participation. (3) Compensation must be robust and the Tribe treated as a sovereign counterparty, not a program subject. (4) No forced fallowing that starves reservation farm lessees. Get those right and Quechan is a model participant and likely advocate.

On solar+water. MIXED / GENUINELY DIVIDED , the single most nuanced scenario for this Tribe. On paper Quechan is a strong fit: it already wants energy independence from Imperial Irrigation District and is itself entertaining an on-reservation solar+data-center project to sell power directly to an operator (developer Sebastian Rucci, ~60% solar/40% gas). Leadership (President Koteen) frames data-center/energy development as real economic opportunity. BUT the same 2026 proposal triggered intense internal opposition: 150+ members, including elders, showed up mostly opposed, citing transparency failures by council, water demands, and cultural/land stewardship. So a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water could land very well IF and only if: (1) it is sited to avoid sacred sites and viewsheds (the Tribe has killed/contested off-reservation solar at Palen and Quartzsite over exactly this), (2) it is majority renewable + storage rather than gas-heavy, (3) it is water-light or net-water-positive (data centers consuming tribal water is a live community fear), (4) governance is transparent and community-ratified from the start, not sprung on members, and (5) the Tribe holds equity/ownership and sovereignty over siting, not just a lease. Handled badly, the community will mobilize against it; handled well, it advances stated leadership goals.

On reuse/desal. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE / LOWER PRIORITY. Large-scale reuse and desalination that adds new supply to the system is broadly consistent with Quechan interests because it relieves pressure on the shared river without touching their senior rights, and the Tribe already partners on Yuma-area water-efficiency and habitat work (canal lining, MSCP restoration, and it sits adjacent to the Yuma Desalting Plant footprint / Cienega de Santa Clara dynamics near the Mexico border). Concerns to manage: (1) brine/return-flow and salinity impacts on the lower river and delta that the Tribe's culture and its 400-acre restoration depend on, (2) any use of desal/reuse as a rationale to justify curtailing senior tribal rights or to substitute 'new water' promises for wet water actually reaching the reservation (the 'paper water' distrust again), (3) meaningful consultation and benefit-sharing rather than being sited near but excluded from projects. Not a top-of-mind issue for them, but not an opponent posture either.

A win for them. A win is durable, compensated control over their own senior water and energy future without sacrificing sovereignty, wet water to reservation farms, or cultural/sacred resources. Concretely: (a) a recurring, well-priced conservation-payment revenue stream they choose annually and can exit, layered on top of non-diminished senior rights; (b) formal, permanent embedding of tribal water rights and consultation in the post-2026 operating framework so they help write the rules rather than react to them; (c) federal/partner funding that fixes real infrastructure (lined canals, on-reservation solar+storage that ends dependence on Imperial Irrigation District) and creates jobs and revenue; (d) tribally-owned or equity-held energy that lets them sell power on their terms; (e) all of it delivered through transparent, community-ratified governance and with iron-clad protection of sacred sites, viewsheds, and the river/delta ecology their identity as 'People of the River' rests on.

Public record. The tribe has actively engaged in paid conservation agreements to leave water in Lake Mead and is pursuing a 200MW solar project on its land as a key economic development strategy.

Position. Raise the River is a binational coalition of NGOs (National Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy, Pronatura Noroeste, Sonoran Institute, The Redford Center, Restauremos El Colorado; historically also EDF and NFWF) formed in 2012 to restore flowing water and riparian habitat to the Colorado River Delta in the US and Mexico. Longstanding public position: the Delta lost its connection to the Sea of Cortez due to full upstream consumptive use, and a small dedicated volume of water (less than 1 percent of annual river flow) can restore thousands of acres of wetland and cottonwood/willow/mesquite forest. They champion the binational Minute framework (Minute 319 in 2012, the 2014 pulse flow, Minute 323 which sunsets in 2026) under which the US, Mexico, and the NGO coalition each supply roughly one-third of committed environmental water (coalition share ~70,000 acre-feet over 9 years). Recent position (2024-2026): environmental flows and restoration must be protected and carried into the post-2026 successor agreement and US rulemaking; they warn that failure of the Basin states to reach consensus puts Delta restoration at risk. They frame conservation and restoration as compatible with agriculture and cooperation rather than zero-sum.

On conservation. Strongly positive. A verified, additive consumptive-use conservation market is close to their existing model (they already acquire real, saved consumptive-use water from voluntary sellers via a water trust). If the market produces verified wet water that can be dedicated to environmental flows, it directly serves their mission and could relieve their perpetual fundraising burden. Caveats they would raise: the savings must be truly additive and verified (not paper water), must not simply free up water for more upstream depletion, and any Mexicali-side purchases must be structured to avoid harming farm communities they partner with. Likely their most enthusiastically supported of the three options.

On solar+water. Cautiously positive / persuadable. New private capital that funds Delta water is attractive because their bottleneck is durable funding. They would welcome a hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout if a meaningful, contractually dedicated share of the value flows to verified environmental water for the Delta. Concerns: they will scrutinize greenwashing, want the water benefit to be real and additive rather than offset accounting, and will watch that new datacenter/solar development does not itself increase regional water and land pressure. They are comfortable partnering with corporate funders (their model already includes corporate donors), so a credible, monitored water-benefit structure could turn them into an active ally and validator.

On reuse/desal. Mixed to cautiously supportive, with conditions. Large-scale reuse and especially desalination that reduces river withdrawals could indirectly leave more water in the system for the Delta, which they favor in principle. But desalination raises concerns they care about: energy intensity/emissions, brine disposal into the Sea of Cortez (the very ecosystem they are restoring at the river's mouth), coastal and Gulf of California habitat impacts, and high cost that could crowd out cheaper conservation. Reuse is less controversial and more clearly welcome. They would support these only if paired with real reductions in consumptive use, strong environmental safeguards for the Delta and upper Gulf, and an explicit dedication of freed-up water to the environment rather than to new growth.

A win for them. A win is secured, reliable environmental water for the Delta beyond 2026 (a strong successor to Minute 323), plus a durable, diversified funding base so they are not perpetually re-raising money for water acquisition. Any mechanism that generates additional wet water or dollars that can be dedicated to Delta environmental flows, without pitting them against Mexicali Valley farmers or requiring them to fight the Basin states, is a direct win. Bonus: expanded restored acreage, reconnection of the river to the sea in more years, and formal recognition of the environment as a legitimate water user in binational and US post-2026 agreements.

Public record. The coalition's primary goal is restoring the Colorado River Delta, and it actively participated in and helped fund water conservation and habitat projects under the binational Minute 323 agreement.

Position. Restauremos el Colorado is a Mexicali-based Mexican civil association (A.C.), formally established in 2015 and operating in delta restoration since roughly 2008. It is one of six member organizations of the binational coalition Raise the River / Alianza Revive el Rio Colorado (alongside The Nature Conservancy, National Audubon Society, Sonoran Institute, Pronatura Noroeste, and The Redford Center). Its longstanding public position is that the Colorado River Delta needs dedicated environmental water and that this water should be secured through voluntary, market-price transactions with willing farmers plus commitments from the two governments. Its core operating model since ~2008 has been to buy or lease water rights at market price from Mexicali Valley farmers (land formerly in wheat/cotton) and redirect that water to instream flows and managed restoration wetlands. It actively manages roughly 7 restoration sites totaling ~540-915 hectares (the flagship El Chausse/Chausse site near Francisco Murguia is the most advanced at ~63 ha), where the coalition has planted 275,000-500,000+ native willows, cottonwoods, mesquite and palo verde. On the crisis, its consistent stance: even severe basin shortages must preserve the environmental-flow gains won under IBWC Minute 319 (2012 pulse flow) and Minute 323 (2017), and Mexico's delta must not be treated as the residual after all consumptive users are satisfied. It frames restoration as serving both nature and local communities (habitat, recreation, jobs) and works cooperatively with farmers, ejidos, communities, academia (e.g., El Colef) and both federal governments rather than adversarially.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially a scaled, rigorously-measured version of what Restauremos already does by hand -- pay willing users to forgo consumptive use and reallocate the wet water. They would welcome it IF (a) a defined share of conserved water is legally dedicated to environmental/delta flows rather than 100% recaptured by cities/agriculture, (b) 'verified consumptive use' is measured honestly (real ET/consumptive savings, not paper transfers of return flows the delta already relies on), and (c) it works on the Mexican side of the border and respects ejido/farmer rights and livelihoods. Their main worry: a market that only serves offstream users and treats the environment as a non-buyer, or that monetizes the return flows currently sustaining the estuary. Give them a seat and an environmental set-aside and they become an anchor supporter and a credible on-the-ground implementer.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / PERSUADABLE-LEANING-POSITIVE. New non-philanthropic money that funds water for the delta is attractive because their current funding is thin and donor-dependent. Solar+storage that reduces grid/water stress and bankrolls environmental water deliveries could be a durable revenue source they'd engage with. But they will scrutinize: does the datacenter/hyperscaler load itself consume scarce Mexicali/Colorado water for cooling (a net negative they would oppose)? Is the 'funds water' commitment contractually binding and additional, or greenwashing? Does the solar footprint disturb delta/desert habitat or ejido land? They would support a well-structured version where the water funding is real, additional, and delta-directed, and where the energy load is water-light. Expect them to demand transparency and a binding environmental-water covenant before endorsing.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / CAUTIOUS, the most sensitive of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination can be positive if it substitutes for freshwater diversions and frees river water for the delta, and they have partners (Audubon, Sonoran Institute) who support augmentation that leaves more water instream. BUT there is a specific, real risk they will flag: the Colorado River estuary and much of the residual delta today survive largely on agricultural return flows and treated wastewater return flows. Aggressive reuse/desal that captures and recycles those return flows upstream (e.g., diverting or reusing Mexicali/San Luis/Yuma-area wastewater and drainage, cf. long-running Cienega de Santa Clara / Yuma Desalting Plant concerns) would dry up the very flows keeping delta wetlands and the estuary alive. So their reaction is conditional: support desal/reuse that offsets fresh diversions and guarantees a protected environmental-flow floor to the delta; oppose or resist projects that recapture return flows without replacing that water for the environment. Expect them to insist on estuary/Cienega protections as a precondition.

A win for them. A durable, legally-secured, and adequately-funded flow of water to the Colorado River Delta and its estuary -- ideally a permanent environmental-water baseline written into the post-2026 binational framework, plus new non-philanthropic funding streams (conservation-market set-asides and/or energy-deal covenants) that let them expand managed restoration acreage and reconnect the river to the Sea of Cortez more reliably, while Mexicali farmers and ejidos are paid fairly and the return-flow-dependent estuary is protected. In short: more secured wet water for nature, funded by something other than annual grants, without harming the farm communities they depend on.

Public record. The organization's core mission is the restoration of the Colorado River Delta in Mexico, which directly aligns with and benefits from upstream conservation efforts that increase flows to the delta.

Position. Mexican nonprofit water trust founded 2015 (predecessor work since 2008) by founding director Yamilett Karina Carrillo-Guerrero, based in Mexicali. Mission: sustainable Colorado River water management and restoration of the delta ecosystem. Core method is a market-based one: since 2008 it purchases or leases water rights at market price from voluntary willing-seller farmers in the Mexicali Valley and dedicates that water to instream flows and wetland restoration in the delta. Longstanding public position is that a river can be restored by treating water as a tradable, purchasable resource and by paying agricultural users to convert to low-water crops, silvopasture, and fallowing. It is one of six members of the binational Raise the River coalition (with Pronatura Noroeste, Sonoran Institute, The Nature Conservancy, National Audubon Society, and The Redford Center) and a key implementer of the environmental water provisions of Minute 319 (2012) and Minute 323 (2017), including the delivery of ~210,000 acre-feet to delta restoration sites through 2026 and restoration flows along a ~17 km reach. Publicly frames itself not just as an environmental group but as a water manager working WITH farmers rather than against them. Supports binational cooperation, philanthropic co-funding (Walton Family Foundation and other funders share costs), and voluntary, compensated conservation over regulatory takings.

On conservation. Strongly positive / natural champion. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially a scaled, rigorously-measured version of what Restauremos already does: buy real, additional, verified water savings from willing agricultural sellers and redirect the wet water to a beneficial use (here, the environment). They have 15+ years of on-the-ground experience with willing-seller acquisition, farmer relationships, and low-water crop conversion. They would likely engage as an implementation partner and would push hard for two conditions: (1) that verification is genuine additionality (real fallowing/efficiency, not paper water), and (2) that farmers are actually and promptly paid at market price. The 2026 Mexicali non-payment dispute makes them acutely sensitive to conservation markets that verify savings but fail to deliver compensation down the chain.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, conditional. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would be attractive as a new, non-philanthropic revenue stream to buy delta water and fund farmer conversion, reducing their dependence on volatile grant cycles. But they would scrutinize: whether the funded water is genuinely additional and reaches the delta/environment rather than just offsetting new datacenter demand; whether Mexican farmers and delta communities share in benefits; and the land-use/ecological footprint of solar in the Mexicali Valley. Likely supportive if structured as a durable water fund with binational and community governance; skeptical if it reads as greenwashing for datacenter water use. No public position specifically on hyperscalers is on record (inferred from their model and values).

On reuse/desal. Mixed and the most sensitive of the three. Restauremos has no public position on desalination or reuse on record (marked partly unknown). Inference from their situation: large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply and takes pressure off the river is broadly consistent with their goal of keeping water in the system for the environment, and could be welcomed if some new supply is dedicated to delta restoration. But a Baja California seawater desalination plant is repeatedly floated specifically to offset Arizona's shrinking river share via cross-border exchange, and Restauremos sits directly in the delta downstream. They would be wary of: brine and coastal ecological impacts near the Gulf of California / delta estuary, desal being used to justify continued over-extraction upstream (moral hazard that undercuts conservation), and any exchange that sends 'their' delta-adjacent supply north without an environmental set-aside. Persuadable only if desal/reuse explicitly guarantees a delta environmental allocation and protects the estuary.

A win for them. A durable, diversified funding stream that lets them buy more real delta water from willing Mexicali farmers at fair market price, with payments that actually reach farmers promptly, plus a locked-in environmental water allocation to the delta (instream flows and wetlands) that survives beyond the 2026 Minute 323 window. A win also means being recognized and resourced as the trusted binational water-manager/verifier for any new conservation market or supply-augmentation deal touching the delta, and protection of the estuary from brine or extraction harms. In short: more water in the delta, farmers paid, and their willing-seller model validated and scaled.

Public record. The organization's core mission is the restoration of the Colorado River Delta through securing water for environmental flows and actively reforesting the habitat.

Position. The San Carlos Apache Tribe (~15,000 members; 1.8M-acre reservation in southeastern Arizona; Chairman Terry Rambler) sits inside the Gila/Salt watershed of the Lower Colorado River Basin and holds a firm Central Arizona Project (CAP) entitlement (12,700 AF/yr base CAP Indian delivery plus additional M&I priority water, ~57,000+ AF total after the 1992 Settlement Act and 1999 Settlement Agreement). Its longstanding, revealed position is that water is a sovereign economic asset to be monetized and stewarded, not merely used on-reservation. It has repeatedly leased CAP water to Arizona cities and industry: a 100-year lease of up to 5,925 AF/yr to the Town of Gilbert for a one-time $31.2M (2019), plus prior long-term leases to Scottsdale (~12,500 AF) and Phelps Dodge/Freeport (~14,000 AF). On the Colorado River crisis specifically, the Tribe has moved decisively toward COMPENSATED CONSERVATION: it signed a system-conservation agreement with the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation investing up to ~$12M) to leave an additional ~30,000 AF in Lake Mead, and in December 2024 it EXTENDED that agreement (alongside the Quechan Tribe) as part of a broader >$43.7M federal tribal-conservation package funded by the IRA/BIL. It has publicly backed passage of the (then-pending) ~$5B federal tribal water settlement legislation. Chairman Rambler frames every water decision as 'prudent exercise of the Tribe's sovereign control over its water rights.' Separately, the Tribe is in a live drought crisis: it declared a state of emergency as reservation cattle died off, and in 2024 agreed to bring its water/wastewater systems into EPA compliance, underscoring acute on-reservation supply and infrastructure stress. Note it did NOT sign the Gila River CUFA (Consumptive Use and Forbearance Agreement) that bound other parties, and its counsel has litigated aggressively over Gila-adjacent wells, so it guards its water sovereignty hard and will not cede quantification leverage cheaply.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE / likely early participant. This is the single best-fit lever for this Tribe. It has already voluntarily entered AND extended paid system-conservation agreements to leave ~30,000 AF in Lake Mead for ~$12M+ in federal money, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is not a hypothetical to them but an existing revenue line they would scale. Conditions for a yes: (a) payments flow to the Tribe as a sovereign, not through a state intermediary; (b) participation is explicitly non-precedential and does not waive, cap, or prejudice unquantified Gila/CAP claims; (c) the Tribe controls which and how much water it forbears each year; (d) verification/MRV is transparent and doesn't expose the Tribe to clawback if hydrology shifts. Meet those and they are an anchor supplier of conserved consumptive use.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE / persuadable-to-ally, contingent on terms. The Tribe already leases water to industry and monetizes assets, and it has large land holdings and a drought-driven need for both revenue and reliable power/water infrastructure, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive IN PRINCIPLE. But it will treat this as a sovereignty and land-use decision, not a favor: expect demands for tribal ownership or equity (not just a ground lease), local hiring/benefit, cultural and sacred-site protections (this Tribe has a strong record of protecting sacred sites, e.g. Oak Flat), and a hard requirement that the 'funds water' piece delivers WET water or on-reservation water/wastewater infrastructure the Tribe controls, not just abstract offsets. If the water benefit is real and the deal respects sovereignty and sacred land, they are gettable; if it reads as an outside developer extracting land/water, they will resist.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-FAVORABLE, low-salience. As an inland Gila/Salt-basin tribe far from the coast, large-scale desalination is not a direct fit and doesn't threaten its interests; it would view basin-scale reuse/desal favorably to the extent it augments the overall Lower Basin supply and eases pressure to cut CAP deliveries (which protects the value of its own CAP entitlement and leases). It is unlikely to lead or fund such projects and will be indifferent to siting debates unless a project touches its land, watershed, or sacred sites. Main ask if engaged: that new augmentation supply not be used as a rationale to devalue or reallocate senior tribal CAP water.

A win for them. A win is durable, sovereignty-preserving MONETIZATION of water plus real on-reservation water security: (1) a recurring, tribally-controlled revenue stream from verified consumptive-use conservation that scales beyond one-off federal deals and does not waive or cap unquantified Gila/CAP claims; (2) federal/market dollars that fund the Tribe's own water and wastewater infrastructure into EPA compliance and harden it against drought (fixing the crisis that killed cattle and triggered the state of emergency); (3) if energy is in scope, tribal ownership/equity in solar+storage on tribal terms with sacred-site protection and local jobs; (4) recognition and quantification of its water rights that strengthens rather than erodes its leverage in post-2026 Colorado River negotiations. In short: get paid for saving water, get its own water fixed, and keep full sovereign control of the asset.

Public record. The Tribe has actively pursued and received funding for multiple solar microgrid projects on its reservation and is upgrading its wastewater treatment facilities to support water reuse.

Position. Founded 1990; ~$3-4M annual revenue nonprofit (FY2024 revenue $3.99M, expenses $4.34M, net assets $3.6M; ~62% contributions, ~34% program services, minimal government grants). Runs a Colorado River Delta restoration program (20+ years) and municipal water-planning programs (Growing Water Smart, Water Secure Communities with Colorado CWCB; Resilient Communities and Watersheds joint program with Lincoln Institute of Land Policy). Longstanding public position: the Colorado River is over-appropriated and climate-stressed, and restoring environmental flows to the Delta is both feasible and worth dedicated water. Anchor member of the binational Raise the River coalition (with TNC, National Audubon, EDF, Pronatura Noroeste, Restauremos el Colorado, The Redford Center). Co-founder (2008) of the Colorado River Delta Water Trust, which BUYS water rights on the open market from Mexicali-valley farmers and dedicates them to the river. Publicly championed the 2014 pulse flow (>100,000 AF through Morelos Dam, river reached the sea for first time in a decade) and Minute 319/323 binational agreements. Under Minute 323, Raise the River committed to deliver 70,000 AF (1/3 of the 210,000 AF total) of restoration water over 9 years and to more than double restored riparian habitat (~1,300 additional acres). Reported >1,000 acres restored, estuarine channel dredging (10.4 km), and rising freshwater-seawater connectivity (12 days in 2012 to 172 days in 2018). On the U.S. municipal side, they advocate integrated land-and-water planning and conservation to close the supply-demand gap; submitted a supportive letter to Arizona WIFA and won a $1.6M WIFA grant for Santa Cruz River restoration.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, and arguably the single most credentialed NGO endorser of this mechanism in the basin. Sonoran Institute co-founded the Colorado River Delta Water Trust specifically to buy consumptive-use water rights on the open market and dedicate the saved water to environmental flows , a verified consumptive-use conservation market is their existing operating model, scaled up. They would want: rigorous, independently verified consumptive-use accounting (they know thin/paper water discredits restoration); willing-seller/voluntary structure protecting farming communities (Mexicali-valley precedent); and an explicit carve-out or eligibility for environmental/instream dedication so conserved water can legally reach the Delta and Basin ecosystems rather than only backfilling other consumers. Persuadable to enthusiastic champion if the market can route verified savings to environmental flows.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable but conditional. They are not an energy organization and have no anti-development posture; funding for water restoration is exactly what they need, and a solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be an attractive new revenue channel for Delta and municipal work. Their concerns would be additionality and siting: does the water funding create NEW dedicated environmental/community water or just greenwash a data-center's own consumptive draw; is the datacenter's direct and cooling water use net-negative for the basin; and is solar siting compatible with habitat and Growing-Water-Smart land-use principles. Persuadable to supportive if the deal is structured so the water benefit is verified, additional, and ideally reaches the environment, with transparent accounting of the hyperscaler's own footprint.

On reuse/desal. Generally supportive of reuse; more nuanced on large-scale desal. Their whole thesis is closing the supply-demand gap so that water is left for both communities and ecosystems, and reuse fits their integrated-planning, demand-reduction philosophy well. Large ocean/brackish desalination they would weigh against ecological cost (Sea of Cortez / Upper Gulf of California estuary they work to restore is directly downstream of Gulf desal proposals), energy/carbon intensity, brine disposal, and the risk that a big new supply undercuts conservation urgency. Likely to back reuse readily and to engage constructively-but-skeptically on desal, pushing for environmental safeguards and for any 'new water' to be paired with real conservation rather than replacing it.

A win for them. A durable, verified pathway that dedicates real (additional, independently accounted) water to Colorado River Delta and Basin ecosystems and to community resilience , plus a stable funding stream for restoration and their planning programs , without harming willing agricultural sellers or the estuary they are rebuilding. Concretely: a conservation market or hyperscaler-funded structure that they can point to as delivering measurable acre-feet to the environment and measurable restored acres, extending the Minute 323 / Water Trust model rather than displacing it.

Public record. The institute actively works to guide large-scale solar development to low-conflict areas and advocates for policies that protect and restore Arizona's rivers.

Position. Sonoran Institute is a Tucson-founded (1990) conservation NGO whose Colorado River Delta Program runs binational habitat restoration in the Mexicali Valley and delta. Longstanding position: the Delta was sacrificed as the river's overallocated tail, and dedicated environmental water plus active riparian restoration can bring it back. Concrete record: 20+ years in the delta; secured a 1,200-acre land concession from the Mexican government (2008) and built Laguna Grande, now the largest dense stand of native riparian habitat on the Mexican reach; planted 200,000+ of ~230,000 native cottonwoods/willows and restored 700+ of ~1,000 restored acres; long-term goal of 30,000 acres. They co-founded and anchor the Raise the River coalition (six US/Mexico NGOs) and the Colorado River Delta Water Trust (with Pronatura Noroeste and EDF), which buys/leases consumptive water rights to put base flows back in the channel. They championed the 2014 Minute 319 pulse flow (100,000+ AF through Morelos Dam, first flow to reach the Gulf in a decade, ~16% vegetation increase) and Minute 323 (2017), the 9-year binational deal that locked in shared shortage rules plus committed water and funding for delta restoration, with deliveries continuing (env water starting May 2021; strategic deliveries in 2024). Their frame treats the environment as a legitimate water user that must be provisioned by agreement and by purchased water, not left as leftover flow. On post-2026 guidelines they want the environmental/Mexican delta commitments carried forward and not eroded by deeper shortage.

On conservation. Strongly positive, with a caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to their existing Water Trust model (buy/lease saved consumptive water and redirect it), so they would likely welcome it as a scaled, credible source of environmental water and a way to lower transaction cost and verification risk on acquisitions. Caveat: they will insist that some verified saved water is actually dedicated to the environment and the Delta rather than fully recaptured for consumptive users, and that verification is rigorous enough to avoid paper water. Persuadable-to-ally on design if a share is earmarked for instream/delta use.

On solar+water. Cautiously positive if the water funding is real, additive, and reaches the Delta/environment. They are a restoration and water-buyer, not an energy developer, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive mainly as a new, non-philanthropic funding stream for the Water Trust and restoration. Expect scrutiny: they will want the water benefit to be genuinely new (not accounting), to include the Mexican delta reach, and to avoid siting/habitat harm in sensitive riparian or Gulf areas. Persuadable-leaning-ally.

On reuse/desal. Conditionally supportive but the most scrutinized of the three. Reuse and desalination can free up Colorado River water that could benefit the Delta and reduce pressure to raid environmental flows, which they would welcome in principle. But they will flag brine/discharge impacts on the Upper Gulf of California and delta estuary, energy footprint, and the risk that new supply simply enables more consumptive use with nothing dedicated to the environment. Support is contingent on environmental safeguards and an explicit share of freed-up or produced water reaching the Delta.

A win for them. More secured environmental water reaching the Delta channel and Gulf, a well-funded and replenished Water Trust, and expansion toward the 30,000-acre restoration goal, all locked into the post-2026 binational framework so gains survive deeper basin shortage.

Public record. The organization was a key non-governmental partner in negotiating and implementing Minute 323, a binational agreement focused on habitat restoration and environmental flows in the delta.

Position. TNC runs a dedicated Colorado River Basin program (Program Director Celene Hawkins) and is one of the most active NGO players in the crisis. Longstanding positions, grounded in their own public statements: (1) The basin needs 'long-term solutions, not temporary steps that only buy us a few more months' and durable post-2026 operating guidelines that build in environmental stewardship, flexibility, Tribal inclusion, and binational cooperation with Mexico. (2) Demand reduction / large-scale conservation is their core lever. TNC pioneered voluntary, compensated water transactions (ranch fallowing on the San Miguel, rotational fallowing on the Price River in eastern Utah, CSU fallowing research) and market-based demand management. TNC co-authored 2025 research (Nature Sustainability, with UW/Stanford) on a strategic environmental water-rights market to reallocate consumptive use and restore low-flow fish habitat at least cost. (3) They co-led the coalition (cities, farmers, utilities, businesses, conservationists) calling for $2B+ in federal drought funding. (4) On supply augmentation they are cautious: TNC's public framing is that supply-side fixes like desalination temporarily alleviate scarcity while encouraging unsustainable demand and carrying high social/economic/environmental costs, and should be a last resort after conservation, efficiency, stormwater capture, and reuse. (5) Their Clean Energy Transition / 'Power of Place' / Site Renewables Right work pushes clean energy sited to avoid conflict with water, wildlife, and communities (3Cs: climate, conservation, community). They publicly noted with concern the state impasse when basin states failed to reach a Reclamation-deadline consensus. Their vision: enough water in rivers and aquifers for native fish, birds, and wildlife alongside resilient urban and rural economies including agriculture.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, and likely a leading partner or even architect. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially TNC's own thesis: they authored peer-reviewed work on a strategic environmental water-rights market, they already run compensated fallowing/transaction programs, and they have the return-flow and ecological-benefit methodologies to verify and target transactions. Their main conditions would be rigorous additionality/verification (avoid paper water and double-counting of return flows), legal protection ('shepherding') so conserved water actually reaches the environment rather than being re-diverted downstream, senior-rights participation, and durable ecological benefit rather than one-off dry-year buys. They would want Tribal Nations included as full participants, not excluded.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, not automatic. TNC supports a rapid, nature-positive, just clean-energy transition and has purpose-built tools (Site Renewables Right, Power of Place) to steer solar/storage onto low-conflict land. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation aligns with their 3Cs framing IF the solar is sited to avoid habitat/water/wildlife conflict and the water funding flows into verified conservation rather than new consumptive demand. Their skepticism will focus on: (a) net new data-center water and energy load in an over-allocated basin, (b) whether 'funds water' means real conserved consumptive use with additionality or just PR offsets, and (c) siting quality. Frame it as demand reduction plus low-conflict clean energy and they lean in; frame it as license to add hyperscaler load and they push back.

On reuse/desal. Split. TNC actively favors water reuse/recycling, stormwater capture, and efficiency as the preferred, lower-cost, lower-energy tier and would support large-scale reuse. On desalination they are publicly cautious to skeptical: their stated view is desal is a last resort with high social, economic, and environmental (energy, brine) costs that can entrench unsustainable demand, to be pursued only after conservation, efficiency, and recycling are exhausted. Expect endorsement of reuse-forward projects and conditional-to-oppositional reaction to desal-heavy augmentation unless it is paired with strong demand management and brine/energy safeguards.

A win for them. A win for TNC is durable, verifiable water back in rivers and aquifers (measurable environmental flows, restored low-flow fish habitat) achieved through voluntary compensated demand reduction rather than new supply that entrenches demand, embedded in the post-2026 operating guidelines with permanent legal protection for conserved water, meaningful Tribal participation, and federal/private funding that sustains the conservation pipeline. Bonus wins: a scalable, credible consumptive-use market they helped design, and clean energy sited without new water/wildlife conflict. It lets them show their market-and-collaboration thesis works at basin scale.

Public record. TNC's Colorado River Program actively develops and funds innovative water-sharing agreements, such as leasing water from the Jicarilla Apache Nation to increase flows for endangered fish.

Position. TRCP is a national hunter-angler conservation nonprofit whose Colorado River program frames the river crisis around sustaining fish, wildlife, and the hunting/fishing economy that depends on healthy flows. Longstanding and recent public positions: (1) Urges a negotiated, collaborative post-2026 management framework among Basin states, Tribal Nations, and the federal government that 'strengthens long-term reliability for water users while sustaining the fish and wildlife resources that hunters and anglers depend on' (TRCP, Feb 2026). (2) Co-endorses the 'Cooperative Conservation Alternative' submitted to Reclamation alongside Western Resource Advocates, Audubon, The Nature Conservancy, Trout Unlimited, American Rivers, and EDF, which proposes a 'Conservation Reserve' framework to move and store conserved water 'wherever it is needed most,' incentivize conservation, stabilize the system, and preserve environmental flows/river connectivity (delta flows, Cienega de Santa Clara). (3) Explicitly backs flexible tools to conserve and store water for multi-benefit uses including fish and wildlife. (4) Points to irrigation/agriculture as the dominant consumptive use and pushes Farm Bill conservation programs (RCPP, EQIP), WaterSMART, and legislation (Water for Conservation and Farming Act, STREAM Act) to fund more efficient irrigation and drought resilience. (5) Publicly supports 'water storage, recycling, and desalination' as part of the supply solution set, paired with nature-based infrastructure that retains water on the landscape. (6) On energy: TRCP is wary of poorly sited utility-scale solar on public lands because facilities are high-fenced, exclude other uses across thousands of acres, and can sever big-game migration corridors; it published 2024 solar-siting guidelines and says 'wildlife and solar can coexist' with careful siting.

On conservation. Strongly supportive. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the mechanism TRCP already champions via the Conservation Reserve in the Cooperative Conservation Alternative. It would back it provided conserved water can be directed to environmental flows and fish/wildlife benefit (not just re-diverted to consumptive users), that verification/accounting is rigorous (real 'wet' water, additionality), and that it does not dry up riparian habitat or shift harm onto rivers. Likely to press for a share of conserved water reserved for the river itself and for corridor/wetland co-benefits.

On solar+water. Persuadable-to-cautious. TRCP supports renewable buildout in principle and says wildlife and solar can coexist, and a project that also funds water conservation is attractive on the water side. But it will scrutinize siting hard: utility-scale solar+storage that fences off thousands of acres or crosses big-game migration corridors and winter range triggers its core habitat objection. Reaction hinges on location (disturbed/brownfield/degraded land vs intact habitat), corridor avoidance, and enforceable mitigation. Frame the water funding as durable and tied to environmental flows, and site per TRCP's 2024 solar-siting guidelines, and it becomes a supporter; site it in migration corridors and it opposes.

On reuse/desal. Supportive. TRCP has publicly named 'water storage, recycling, and desalination' as part of the solution set to sustain aquatic habitat. It would welcome large-scale reuse/desal as supply that can relieve pressure on the river, with the caveat that new supply must actually reduce river depletions (offset diversions / leave water instream) rather than enable new demand, and that intake/brine/energy footprints avoid harming aquatic and coastal habitat. Watch for concerns about energy demand of desal feeding back into the solar-siting question.

A win for them. A durable, verified outcome where conserved or new water measurably improves Colorado River flows, riparian/wetland habitat, and migration-corridor connectivity, sustaining huntable and fishable wildlife populations, delivered through a negotiated Basin-wide framework rather than crisis cuts. A win is water reliably left in the river and its habitats (delta flows, connectivity), renewable energy sited so it does not fragment big-game corridors, and continued/expanded federal conservation funding, all with their coalition and hunter-angler base credibly at the table.

Public record. TRCP explicitly advocates for federal investment in water conservation, efficiency, recycling, and desalination to sustain healthy habitat for fish and wildlife in the Colorado River Basin.

Position. Trout Unlimited (TU) is a ~$50M/yr national coldwater-fisheries conservation nonprofit (501(c)(3), HQ Arlington VA) with a large chapter/member base and a dedicated Colorado River Program. Longstanding public posture on the river crisis: (1) The supply-demand imbalance is real and structural, and the fix is voluntary, compensated, temporary reductions in consumptive use plus on-the-ground watershed and irrigation-efficiency work that leaves more water instream for fish. (2) TU was an early operational champion of the 2014 System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP) and of Upper Basin demand management, publicly calling system conservation 'part of the solution' for bolstering flows and water supply, and it has itself raised money to pay ranchers/farmers to forego diversions and to study crop and streamflow impacts. (3) In May 2026 TU joined a 70+ member basin coalition (with TNC, cities, farmers, utilities, Tribes) urging Congress for at least $2B in federal drought funding, explicitly pairing near-term bridge money with a durable long-term federal mechanism for voluntary conservation. (4) TU has secured $117M+ in federal funding for Colorado River work and runs projects: 60+ miles of stream reconnection/fish passage, 30+ miles of beaver-dam-analogue restoration, irrigation-infrastructure upgrades, water-rights transactions. (5) On infrastructure it favors reallocating or expanding existing reservoirs over building new dams ('cheaper, faster, smarter'), but is 'not opposed to new storage' and supports water reuse and flexible ag-to-municipal sharing, including small-scale storage. (6) On energy siting, TU is pro-clean-energy but insists solar avoid high-value fish habitat: it flagged that BLM's preferred solar plan opens 22M acres with ~2M acres overlapping trout/salmon habitat, documented sediment blowouts from stream-crossing solar cabling, urges siting on previously disturbed land, and backs the Public Lands Renewable Energy Development Act (PLREDA) to steer projects to low-impact sites and route project revenue to fish/wildlife.

On conservation. Strongly favorable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the mechanism TU has advocated and operationalized for a decade (SCPP, demand management, its own paid-fallowing pilots). TU would likely be an active ally and potential implementation partner. Two conditions it will press on: (a) the water conserved must produce real, additional, measured instream/streamflow benefit (TU already funds research on crop and streamflow impacts, so it will scrutinize verification and additionality and guard against paper-water or shortfalls that never reach the stream), and (b) deals must be voluntary and equitable to water-rights holders, protecting ag communities from being hollowed out. If verification is credible and Tribal/ag equity is respected, TU is close to a natural champion.

On solar+water. Persuadable-to-favorable but conditional, and the most scrutiny-prone of the three. TU supports clean energy in principle and backs PLREDA, but it has an explicit, documented track record of opposing solar siting that harms trout/salmon habitat (BLM 22M-acre plan critique, stream-crossing sediment blowouts, insistence on previously disturbed land). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water conservation could win TU support if the water funding is real and durable and the physical build avoids high-value coldwater habitat and streams. TU will react to two things independently: the siting/footprint (must avoid fish-bearing waters, use disturbed land, follow smart-siting/permitting norms) and the water benefit (must be verified instream benefit, not offset optics). Expect TU to want conservation easements, revenue-to-habitat provisions PLREDA-style, and a hard line against dewatering or warming streams. Corporate water 'replenishment' claims will be checked for additionality.

On reuse/desal. Favorable toward reuse/recycling, more cautious on large-scale desalination. TU explicitly supports water reuse and recycling as part of the solution (its leadership lists 'water recycling and reuse programs' alongside watershed health and voluntary conservation as tools to fund and scale). Municipal reuse that reduces fresh diversions is aligned with keeping water instream, so TU is an ally on reuse. On large-scale desalination TU has little public position on record (mark this specific stance UNKNOWN); by analogy to its energy-siting posture, TU would likely evaluate desal on its footprint and energy/brine impacts, its effect on relieving pressure on river diversions, and whether it is used to justify continued over-allocation. TU would probably be neutral-to-cautiously-supportive if desal genuinely offsets river withdrawals and avoids coastal/aquatic habitat harm, but would resist it being used as a license to keep draining rivers.

A win for them. A win for TU is durable, scaled funding for voluntary compensated conservation that produces verified, additional instream flow and cooler, cleaner water for native and wild trout, achieved without hollowing out ag communities or Tribal water users. Concretely: a long-term federal or blended funding mechanism (their stated $2B ask plus a durable channel); credible verification that conserved consumptive use actually shows up as streamflow; energy/water buildouts sited off high-value fish habitat with revenue routed back to fish/wildlife (PLREDA-style); and reuse/recycling scaled so cities lean less on river diversions. They also win reputationally by being the pragmatic convener that brought farmers, cities, utilities, Tribes, and conservationists to the same table.

Public record. TU has explicitly and repeatedly advocated for federally funded, voluntary, and compensated water conservation programs to restore ecological health to the Colorado River system.

Position. UABC's Instituto de Ingeniería (Mexicali) is the leading Mexican-side academic voice on the lower Colorado River and the overexploited Mexicali Valley aquifer. Longstanding technical positions, grounded in its own peer-reviewed work: (1) The Mexicali Valley aquifer is officially overexploited (CONAGUA-declared) and Colorado River flow to Mexico has fallen after 25+ years of basin drought, so the region must 'do more with less' (Rector Palafox / CIAGUABC director Jorge Ramírez Hernández, Sept 2024). (2) Alternative supplies , treated-wastewater reuse and desalination , must be developed; CIAGUABC explicitly frames reuse and desalination as necessary 'alternative sources.' (3) In its flagship WEAP-style allocation study (Hernández-Cruz et al., 2023, J. Water Resources Planning & Management), the group models the whole Mexican subsystem , Irrigation District DR-014, Mexicali, San Luis Río Colorado, Tecate, Tijuana-Rosarito, Ensenada , and finds agriculture (DR-014) is the lowest-priority user and thus first and hardest hit by cuts; it identifies ag-to-urban transfers, water-use efficiency, wastewater reuse, and desalination as the prime strategies to shore up coastal-zone supply. (4) It co-runs the binational environmental Pulse Flow / base-flow restoration work (Minute 319/323 lineage) with IBWC/CILA, CONAGUA, CICESE, Pronatura Noroeste, monitoring flows Morelos Dam→Carranza. (5) It runs managed-aquifer-recharge and reclaimed-water infiltration research and the Programa Hídrico Regional 2020-2024 for CONAGUA's Peninsula basin organism. Overall posture: pro-science, pro-conservation, pro-alternative-supply, and protective of the delta ecosystem and of Mexicali Valley farmers who bear the brunt of cuts.

On conservation. Supportive / likely ally. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns squarely with its 'more with less' framing and its published finding that efficiency and reallocation are prime levers. UABC would want to provide the measurement, verification, and hydrologic modeling , this is exactly its WEAP/allocation and field-monitoring competence, and a natural grant/consulting role. Caveat: they will scrutinize baselines and MRV rigor (return-flow accounting, aquifer effects) and will be protective that a market doesn't simply strip DR-014 farmers of livelihood or dry up the delta without compensation. Engage them as the independent technical verifier and they become a strong endorser.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested; persuadable-to-supportive if water benefits are real and measured. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure (reuse plants, MAR, desalination, canal lining, monitoring) fits their alternative-supply agenda and could fund CIAGUABC research, instrumentation, and students. They would push to be the neutral scientific evaluator of the water co-benefit and would resist greenwashing , insisting the water funding be additional, verifiable, and equitably distributed to ag and delta uses, not just to coastal cities or the data-center's own needs. Concerns: energy-water nexus tradeoffs, groundwater/land impacts of large solar, and that binational siting respects CILA/IBWC processes.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive , this is their explicit stated priority. CIAGUABC and the Rector have publicly named reuse and desalination as necessary alternative sources, and the 2023 allocation paper ranks wastewater reuse and desalination among the top strategies for the coastal zone (Tijuana-Rosarito-Ensenada). The Institute already runs reclaimed-water infiltration / managed-aquifer-recharge research and has proposed swapping treated wastewater into agriculture to free wells for domestic use. They would want to lead feasibility, salinity/brine-management, and monitoring work (note their salinity-trend and brine/ZLD interests). Main cautions: cost, energy intensity, and brine disposal , they'll want these engineered and studied, not hand-waved.

A win for them. A win is (1) UABC/CIAGUABC positioned as the credible, independent binational science authority on lower-basin water , funded, instrumented, and cited; (2) durable research funding and student/PhD pipelines tied to real projects (reuse, desalination, MAR, conservation-market MRV); (3) measurable relief for the overexploited Mexicali Valley aquifer and sustained environmental/base flows to the Colorado River delta; (4) their published strategies (efficiency, reuse, desalination, equitable reallocation) actually adopted in policy, with DR-014 farmers protected rather than simply cut. In short: science-led, equitable, binational solutions that keep both the aquifer and the delta viable , with UABC as the trusted technical broker.

Public record. The university's engineering institute actively researches and promotes renewable energy and desalination as solutions to regional water and energy challenges, including installing a large solar array on its own campus.

Position. WRA is a Boulder, CO-based conservation-focused environmental law and policy nonprofit (founded 1989, EIN 84-1113831) working across the Interior West. On the Colorado River crisis its longstanding and current positions are: (1) proactive, data-driven reservoir management that adjusts deliveries based on basin-wide storage and actual flows instead of waiting for Lake Mead/Powell to hit emergency levels; (2) a 'Conservation Reserve' / flexible 'conservation pool' -- a water savings account letting users voluntarily conserve water and bank it, movable between Powell and Mead, to stabilize the system and benefit river health; (3) the 'Cooperative Conservation Alternative,' a joint proposal WRA and six other conservation groups submitted to the Bureau of Reclamation for post-2026 operating guidelines, prioritizing stabilizing storage, mandatory mitigation/environmental stewardship in future operations, protecting Cienega de Santa Clara / Delta flows / river connectivity, and building parallel resilience processes; (4) a demand for a meaningful, timely seat at the table for Tribes alongside the seven basin states and Reclamation. On supply/demand tools: WRA champions water reuse -- it helped secure Colorado's first-in-the-nation direct potable reuse (DPR) regulation and backed Denver Water's recycled-water demonstration plant -- and treats reuse as relieving pressure on rivers. It is implicitly skeptical of ocean desalination, noting desal needs 3-10x more energy than recycled water, mostly fossil-generated. It supports demand management / paid voluntary conservation that compensates ag water-rights holders for temporary reductions without forfeiting rights. Its Energy & Water Nexus and Clean Energy programs stress that renewables (wind, solar PV, geothermal) consume negligible water vs. thermal plants (basin power plants consume ~167,000 AF/yr), so clean energy can free up 'new' water. Its July 2025 report 'Data Center Impacts in the West' argues Interior West utilities forecast >50% load growth in a decade largely from data centers, and that strong state policies must require data centers to fund clean energy and sustainable water use and not shift costs onto residential ratepayers.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, likely a co-designer. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps almost exactly onto WRA's own Conservation Reserve / flexible conservation pool concept and its endorsement of compensated, voluntary demand management for ag users. Their support is conditional on integrity: they will insist that conserved water is real (verified consumptive-use reduction, not paper water or shifted use), that savings measurably benefit river health and flows rather than merely enabling new consumption, that Tribes participate on equal footing, and that vulnerable ag communities are not coerced or hollowed out. Design the verification, additionality, and river-benefit provisions to their standard and they become an active advocate and validator.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable if structured to their terms; potentially skeptical if not. This lands squarely inside WRA's July 2025 data-center policy work. They explicitly want data centers/hyperscalers to fund clean energy and sustainable water rather than pushing costs onto residential ratepayers, and they favor tariffs/mechanisms letting large loads pay for or own clean-energy resources. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation is close to their stated ideal -- but they will scrutinize: is the water funding real conservation that benefits rivers (vs. buying political cover for a large new consumptive load)? Are residential ratepayers protected? Is the clean energy additional and not just greenwashing thermal load growth? Is water use at the data centers themselves minimized? Meet those and they are an ally; ignore them and they become a vocal regulatory critic in IRP and PUC dockets.

On reuse/desal. Split. Reuse: enthusiastic. Water reuse (especially direct potable reuse) is one of WRA's signature policy wins and a core plank -- they see it as relieving pressure on rivers and creating supply without new diversions. Large-scale reuse will get strong, active support. Desalination: skeptical to cool. WRA frames ocean desal as energy-intensive (3-10x more energy than recycled water, largely fossil-powered) and implicitly a last resort behind conservation and reuse. They are unlikely to oppose desal outright but will treat it as lower priority, will demand it be paired with conservation and powered by clean energy, and will resist framing that positions desal as a substitute for demand reduction. Brackish/inland desal tied to reuse fares better with them than coastal ocean desal.

A win for them. A win is a durable, verifiable outcome that improves river health and system stability while protecting people. Concretely: a real consumptive-use conservation market with airtight verification and additionality whose savings demonstrably reach the river and stabilize Powell/Mead; expanded reuse/DPR displacing new diversions; large new loads (data centers) financing genuinely additional clean energy and real water conservation with residential ratepayers held harmless; Tribes seated as equal decision-makers; and post-2026 Colorado River operating rules that bake in proactive, storage-based management and mandatory environmental mitigation. If a proposal lets WRA point to measured acre-feet returned to the system, protected flows/habitat, and equitable process, that is their win -- and they will publicly champion it.

Public record. WRA publishes reports and advocates for policies promoting a combination of agricultural water conservation, expanded rooftop and utility-scale solar, and municipal water efficiency to address Colorado River water shortages.

Position. Xylem is the largest pure-play water-technology company in the world (~$9.0B 2025 revenue, ~$5.2B from the US). It sells the picks-and-shovels of every supply-side and efficiency-side answer to the Colorado River crisis: pumps, smart meters (Sensus), leak-detection (acoustic fiber-optic monitoring, e.g. 21 miles across Tucson Water's Colorado River delivery pipelines), UV/ozone/membrane treatment, reverse-osmosis desalination systems with energy-recovery, and municipal wastewater reuse/recycling trains (ultrafiltration + UV, oxidation-enhanced biologically active filtration). Its longstanding public posture is that reuse, efficiency, and non-revenue-water reduction are the fastest, cheapest levers for drought resilience, and it actively lobbies for the federal funding that pays its customers. In 2025 it disclosed lobbying (~$230K/quarter) explicitly on smart-water adoption, SRF (Clean Water/Drinking Water State Revolving Funds) and water-recycling program funding, and tax incentives for reuse; its Senior Director of Government & Industry Relations publicly endorsed the bipartisan Advancing Water Reuse Act (federal tax credit for industrial reuse investment). Xylem is a vocal beneficiary/advocate of the IIJA infrastructure funding for utilities. It does not take positions on interstate allocation/law-of-the-river politics; its interest is that dollars flow into hardware and that scarcity drives demand for efficiency and new-supply technology.

On conservation. Mildly-to-moderately positive, but the most muted of the three. A verified consumptive-use conservation market reduces demand for new-supply hardware (its desal/reuse lines) at the margin, BUT verification is a metering/measurement/telemetry problem, which is squarely Xylem's Sensus + smart-water franchise. Xylem would pitch itself as the measurement-and-verification (M&V) backbone: you cannot pay for verified conserved consumptive use without accurate, tamper-evident, remotely-read flow and soil/ET data. Expect Xylem to support it publicly (consistent with its efficiency-first advocacy) and to position for the metering/analytics buildout, while privately preferring interventions that also drive treatment/pumping capex.

On solar+water. Strongly positive and the highest-leverage fit for Xylem's current growth story. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water simultaneously (a) creates data-center load Xylem already sells cooling-water treatment and closed-loop systems into, and (b) creates a new pool of private capital funding municipal water projects (reuse, desal, leak reduction) that Xylem's equipment fulfills. It converts Xylem's two fastest-growing themes (data centers + water reuse) into one financed package. Xylem would be an enthusiastic technology partner and reference vendor, and could co-market the 'net water positive data center' narrative it already uses.

On reuse/desal. Strongly positive; this is the most direct revenue event of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination are core Xylem product lines (membrane/RO with energy recovery, UV, ozone, ultrafiltration, advanced biological treatment, high-lift pumping). A basin-scale reuse/desal program is essentially a multi-year order book for Xylem. It already lobbies for reuse tax incentives and federal funding. The only nuance: on desal Xylem is a systems/component supplier, not the plant developer, so it wins as a supplier regardless of which EPC/developer leads; on potable reuse it is a strong prime-eligible treatment-train vendor. Expect vocal support and active BD.

A win for them. A durable, funded pipeline of Southwest water projects that pulls through Xylem hardware and software: metering/M&V contracts for a conservation market, cooling-water and closed-loop treatment scope for hyperscaler campuses, and treatment-train orders for reuse and desal plants. A win also includes the policy wins they already lobby for (sustained SRF/water-recycling funding, reuse tax credits) being attached to any basin program, so that public and private capital both convert into Xylem backlog. In short: they win when scarcity is met with capex on deployable technology rather than with allocation cuts alone.

Public record. The company's entire business model is selling water technology, and it has a public goal to enable its customers to reduce global water demand by at least 2 billion cubic meters by 2030.

Position. Ak-Chin is an O'odham/Pee-Posh community in Pinal County, Arizona, whose identity and economy are built on farming ('Ak-Chin' refers to arroyo-mouth flood-water agriculture). Its longstanding position: a secure, permanent water supply is existential. The tribe holds one of the earliest and strongest federal Indian water rights settlements. The 1978 Ak-Chin settlement (first federal reserved-rights settlement implemented) and the 1984 Settlement Act (P.L. 98-530) entitle the Community to a permanent supply of not less than 75,000 acre-feet/year of CAP Colorado River water delivered from CAP main project works, with total entitlement up to ~108,300 afa and a floor around 72,000 afa. Critically, its first 50,000 AF is Priority 3 ('Yuma Mesa') water, the HIGHEST priority in CAP, and the next 25,000 AF is Indian Priority water (second highest) -- so Ak-Chin sits at the top of the CAP curtailment stack and is largely insulated from the ag-pool cuts that devastated other Pinal County farmers under the 2019 DCP. Chairman Gabriel Lopez: 'water is life... we are going to be here for a long time with the grateful water settlement and the CAP water that is provided to us.' Farm Manager Damian Murrieta: the Community 'continues to fight for a stable water supply because it is a consistent economic source.' The tribe frames farming as culture AND commerce ('it's in our blood that we're farmers'). In post-2026 Colorado River negotiations, Ak-Chin is one of the 30 basin tribes; the broad tribal position (via NARF, Water & Tribes Initiative, and comment letters) is that any new operating guidelines must (1) protect settled/senior tribal priority, (2) fund tribes for voluntary forbearance/conservation, and (3) NOT convert forbearance of undeveloped rights into an uncompensated 'contribution.' Ak-Chin submitted comments to Reclamation on the 7.D process (basin management strategies).

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / OPPORTUNISTIC, with conditions. Ak-Chin has senior CAP priority AND explicit congressional authority to lease/monetize water, plus a demonstrated appetite for it (Del Webb/Anthem lease, Anthem municipal supply). A verified consumptive-use conservation market that PAYS the tribe to fallow acreage or lease conserved water is directly aligned with how Ak-Chin already operates. Two hard conditions: (1) the market must treat forbearance as compensated and voluntary and must NOT set a precedent that erodes their settled priority or converts unused rights into an uncompensated 'contribution' (this is the explicit basin-tribe red line). (2) Fallowing conflicts with the cultural centrality of farming ('it's in our blood') and with farming as a jobs/identity anchor, so a market that lets them lease WITHOUT dismantling the farm (e.g., efficiency-derived savings via drip/sprinkler double-cropping, or partial rotational fallow) is far more sellable than a buyout that ends farming. Expect Ak-Chin to want tribal sovereignty over verification/measurement and price-setting, not a federal or state-imposed formula.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED, mixed. Ak-Chin is a sophisticated commercial developer (casino resort, golf, retail, Santa Cruz commerce) with developable land near the Phoenix metro data-center corridor and existing municipal-lease experience (Anthem). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water infrastructure (canal lining, drip conversion, the water/wastewater reclamation upgrades they are already pursuing with Carollo) or funds a water-quality fix for their salinization problem would be attractive -- it monetizes land and solves their real pain (quality, not quantity). Risks/frictions: sovereignty over siting and revenue terms, protection of prime farmland (they will not pave the farm), and wariness of any structure that ties their senior water to someone else's data-center load. Persuadable if the water funding is real, tribally controlled, and additive to farming rather than a substitute.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, low direct stake. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the basin RELIEVES pressure on CAP and protects the value of Ak-Chin's senior entitlement and its leasable surplus -- generally good for them. They already run a Water Reclamation Facility and are investing in water/wastewater capital improvements, so on-reservation reuse is culturally and operationally consistent. They are unlikely to lead or heavily fund basin-scale desal (coastal, capital-intensive, far from Pinal County), and will resist any framing that says 'new augmentation supply means senior tribal users should take cuts.' Neutral-to-positive; not a mobilizing issue for them unless it is paired with cost allocations that touch tribal water.

A win for them. A durable, sovereign-controlled outcome where their senior CAP priority and settlement are untouchable, their farming legacy continues, and their surplus/conserved water becomes a reliable, well-priced revenue stream. Concretely: (1) post-2026 guidelines that explicitly protect settled tribal priority and pay for voluntary forbearance without eroding rights; (2) a verified conservation/lease market they control the measurement and pricing of, generating cash while keeping the farm running via efficiency (drip/sprinkler/double-crop) rather than shutdown; (3) resolution or funding of the water-quality/salinization problem so yields and salt-sensitive crops recover; (4) capital for their water/wastewater and reclamation upgrades. In short: farming stays, water quality improves, and unused water pays -- all on tribal terms.

Public record. The Community actively uses its water rights for its large agricultural enterprise and has a history of leasing water, indicating a willingness to engage in market-based solutions, but its priority remains its own economic development.

Position. ABCWUA is New Mexico's largest municipal water utility (~660,000 people, Albuquerque + Bernalillo County). It is a Colorado River basin stakeholder indirectly: roughly 70% of its drinking-water supply is imported Colorado River water via the federal San Juan-Chama Project, treated at the Drinking Water Project on the Rio Grande (operational 2008, ~$400M in infrastructure). New Mexico holds a San Juan-Chama allotment carved from its Upper Basin Colorado River Compact apportionment. Longstanding public position, formalized in the 'Water 2120: Securing Our Water Future' 100-year plan: aggressively manage the aquifer as a savings account (drawdown reduction), lean on conservation, and expand reuse and aquifer storage & recovery (ASR). ABCWUA is a national conservation success story: per-capita use fell from ~250 GPCD (1987-1993 baseline) to ~125 GPCD in CY2024 (~50% cut) with a 25% larger population, and a stated goal of 110 GPCD by 2037. Groundwater pumping fell from 128,000 AFY (1990) to ~41,000 AFY (2015). On the crisis itself, ABCWUA does not sit at the Colorado River seven-state negotiating table (that is New Mexico's state negotiator, now Tanya Trujillo, who replaced Estevan Lopez in 2026) but is acutely exposed downstream of those outcomes. San Juan-Chama hit a record-low allocation in 2025 (down ~69% from full supply; Heron Reservoir at ~7% full, lowest since 1971), and the Rio Grande has repeatedly threatened to go dry through Albuquerque. ABCWUA publicly frames water security through supply diversification, reuse, and demand management rather than through Compact-allocation politics. It is a One Water / US Water Alliance member, signaling openness to integrated, reuse-forward approaches.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, but with a demand-side caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is philosophically aligned with ABCWUA's entire identity (measurable, verified demand reduction is what they have done for 30 years). They would likely support a rigorous, well-verified market as an Upper Basin tool and might participate on the supply/sell side if unused San Juan-Chama water could be monetized or protected. Caveat: ABCWUA has already captured most of the easy per-capita savings (down to ~125 GPCD), so a market that expects deep new municipal conservation from them has limited runway. They are more valuable as a credibility/verification partner and as a buyer hedge than as a large new seller. Persuadable-to-ally on this if the accounting is airtight and it protects their import supply.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical, and protective of ratepayers. Cheap solar+storage that also funds water infrastructure is attractive because treatment and pumping (Drinking Water Project, reuse, any future desal) are energy-intensive, and New Mexico is courting data centers. ABCWUA would welcome outside capital that de-risks capital-heavy supply projects and lowers energy cost per acre-foot. But they will scrutinize: (1) whether hyperscaler load competes with residents for scarce water, given they husband the aquifer; (2) governance and who bears stranded-asset risk; (3) whether the water funding is durable or a one-time sweetener. Given the AA+ balance sheet, they do not need a rescue, so the pitch must be genuinely additive, not a bailout. Persuadable if water-neutral or water-positive and if resident supply is firewalled.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned of the three. Reuse is already core doctrine: Water 2120 explicitly calls for reuse for irrigation and indirect potable reuse, and they run operating reuse (industrial effluent to parks/golf in the Northeast Heights, reclaimed wastewater for irrigation in the Southeast) plus Bear Canyon ASR. They would strongly welcome capital and technology that scale reuse toward potable. On desalination, the Albuquerque Basin holds deep brackish groundwater flagged as technically feasible, and New Mexico's 2025 Strategic Water Supply Act (brackish-only, $40M fund; produced water dropped) creates a policy tailwind. ABCWUA is likely a willing partner on brackish desal if energy cost and brine disposal pencil out, which links directly to the solar+storage offer. Likely ally on this axis.

A win for them. A win is durable supply security that reduces exposure to a shrinking San Juan-Chama / Colorado River import while holding rates and bond strength (AA+ S&P / Aa2 Moody's) intact. Concretely: new firm supply blocks (reuse, ASR recharge, or affordable brackish desal) that let them keep the aquifer savings account growing, meet 110 GPCD, and avoid a forced supply gap if imported allocations keep falling. Bonus wins: outside capital that de-risks capital-intensive supply projects, and cheaper energy for water treatment/pumping so reuse and desal pencil out.

Public record. ABCWUA has a long-standing policy of aggressive water conservation and has implemented multiple large-scale water reuse projects to manage its reliance on Colorado River water from the San Juan-Chama Project.

Position. Raise the River / Alianza Revive el Río Colorado is a binational coalition of six U.S. and Mexican conservation NGOs (The Nature Conservancy, National Audubon Society, Sonoran Institute, Pronatura Noroeste, Restauremos el Colorado, and The Redford Center), operating since 2012 to restore the Colorado River Delta. Their core, longstanding position is that a small share of the river's flow (they frame it as less than 1% of annual flow) can reconnect the river to the Sea of Cortez and restore riparian/estuary habitat. Concrete positions on the crisis: (1) Environmental water for the delta must be secured and protected in any post-2026 binational framework. They are central implementers of Minute 323 (2017-2026), under which 210,000 acre-feet was pledged for environmental flows split three ways among the U.S., Mexico, and NGOs, with the coalition providing the NGO third and matching funds. (2) They actively support and USE market-based, willing-seller water acquisition: their Colorado River Delta Water Trust in Mexico permanently buys irrigation water rights from voluntary sellers (mostly Mexicali Valley farmers) and dedicates them to the river. They have secured on the order of thousands of acre-feet this way plus ~500+ hectares restored and ~1 million native trees planted. (3) They frame restoration as benefiting all water users, not competing with them ('a more secure water future for Colorado River water users'), and they emphasize that increasing incoming freshwater is the most effective way to reduce delta salinity. (4) Their entire operating model depends on the continuation of binational cooperation (a Minute 323 successor / Minute 330-type agreement) past the 2026 sunset. Coalition members (Restauremos, Walton Family Foundation partners) were active in negotiating the environmental component of Minute 323, including the binational desalination work group.

On conservation. Strongly favorable, with a verification caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is closest to their existing playbook , their Colorado River Delta Water Trust already buys and retires willing-seller consumptive-use water rights and dedicates the saved water to the delta. They would embrace a rigorous market that measures real consumptive-use savings (avoiding paper-water problems) IF a share of the conserved water is contractually and permanently dedicated to environmental/delta flows rather than freed up entirely for other diversions. Their main asks: additionality and permanence, willing-seller structure that protects Mexicali Valley farming communities, and an explicit environmental water carve-out. Best positioned as an ally on this lever.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, conditional and skeptical. They are a water/habitat restoration coalition, not an energy group, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout is outside their core mission and they have no public position on datacenter energy. They would judge it almost entirely on the water side: does the 'also funds water' component deliver net-new, permanent wet water to the delta, and does the datacenter's own water/energy footprint (cooling, siting near the delta or Sea of Cortez) threaten the ecosystem? If corporate money credibly funds their water trust or environmental-flow commitments with no strings that compromise the delta, they could be won as a funding partner. If it looks like greenwashing, or if the compute/energy load creates new consumptive demand competing with the river, expect wariness or opposition. Persuadable, not a natural ally.

On reuse/desal. Mixed to skeptical, especially on desalination. Reuse/recycling that returns or frees water for the delta they would likely support in principle, consistent with their 'more incoming freshwater' framing. Large-scale desalination is the sensitive one: their coalition engaged the Minute 323 Binational Desalination Work Group and the 2020 Sea of Cortez desalination study, so they are inside that conversation, but the broader delta/Gulf conservation community (including allied Mexican voices) has raised serious concerns about Sea of Cortez desal , brine discharge harming seagrass, reefs, and the upper Gulf's endangered biodiversity, plus intake entrainment. They would oppose any desal sited or discharging in a way that harms the delta estuary or upper Gulf of California, and would resist framing desal as a substitute for delivering real river flows to the delta. Support is conditional on desal being additive, sited away from sensitive Gulf/estuary habitat, and paired with (not replacing) environmental flows.

A win for them. A win is durable, legally secured environmental water reaching the Colorado River Delta and its estuary through and beyond 2026 , a successor to Minute 323 that locks in (ideally expands) the NGO/binational environmental-flow commitment, plus new, additional, permanent water dedications acquired from willing sellers that they can channel through their water trust. Secondarily: reliable multi-year funding for restoration, monitoring, and water acquisition; expanded restored habitat acreage (their stated targets moved from ~1,000 toward ~4,300 acres); and measurable ecological recovery (birds, native forest, river-to-sea connectivity) that validates the 'small flow, big impact' thesis.

Public record. The organization's core mission is implementing and advocating for binational agreements like Minute 323, which uses funded, cooperative projects to create environmental water flows for delta restoration.

Position. AWS (Amazon) is one of the largest and fastest-growing data-center developers in Arizona, drawing on a state whose Colorado River allocation entered a Tier 1 shortage on Jan 1, 2025. Its longstanding public position is a corporate-sustainability frame: pledge to be 'water positive' in data centers by 2030 (returning more water than consumed), 7x-more-water-efficient-than-industry claims, and status as the world's largest corporate buyer of renewable energy (20+ GW globally, solar-plus-storage projects in AZ/CA including Bellefield). In water-stressed Phoenix it emphasizes air-cooled/closed-loop designs that 'use water only when we need to' and expanded use of recycled wastewater (targeting 120 US sites). AWS does NOT take explicit public positions on Colorado River allocation policy, cuts, or a conservation market; it stays in the voluntary-stewardship lane. Critics counter that (a) the water-positive goal excludes power-plant water (3-10x on-site use), (b) a leaked document alleged Amazon hid much of its true water use, and (c) the AI buildout is accelerating demand. The defining recent event: Tucson City Council voted 7-0 in Aug 2025 to reject the AWS-linked 'Project Blue' 290-acre campus (would have been the city's biggest water user, ~2,000 acre-feet/yr) after intense community organizing; AWS reportedly walked away as end user and a builder is now pursuing an air-cooled version powered via a Tucson Electric Power/Arizona Corporation Commission-approved plan.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market lets AWS convert its large capital base and 'water positive' brand into audited, permanent offsets it can point to when siting new campuses. It fits Amazon's existing model of buying replenishment credits and its preference for market/procurement solutions over regulatory caps. Risks it will resist: any design that treats data centers as a disfavored buyer class, forces disclosure of full power-plant water, or caps its growth. Best framed as a credible license-to-operate tool, not a cap.

On solar+water. Strong fit and most likely to lead. This mirrors AWS's actual strategy: it is already the world's largest corporate renewable buyer with AZ solar-plus-storage, and it needs firm clean power for AI load. A bundled hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water lets AWS solve its two binding constraints (power and water/social license) in one branded package. Highest-probability 'yes' of the three, especially if it can anchor or co-fund and claim additionality.

On reuse/desal. Supportive but as buyer/funder, not operator. AWS already leans on recycled wastewater for cooling and touts groundwater-recharge programs, so large-scale reuse aligns directly with its playbook and reduces potable/river draw. Desalination is more distant (coastal, energy-intensive, long timeline) but AWS could fund it as offset supply or as part of an energy+water bundle. Expect enthusiasm for reuse near its campuses and conditional, PR-friendly participation in desal financing rather than direct ownership.

A win for them. A win is durable, low-friction license to build AI/cloud capacity in the arid Southwest: campuses that clear local approval because water is verifiably net-neutral-or-positive (including power-plant water), firm clean power secured via solar+storage they helped fund, and a defensible sustainability narrative that survives leaks and audits. Concretely, it looks like an approved AZ campus where AWS is the anchor buyer of both conservation credits and clean firm power, no repeat of a 7-0 rejection, and a replicable template it can point to nationally.

Public record. AWS has a corporate goal to be water-positive by 2030, is expanding its use of recycled water for data center cooling, and is a major corporate buyer of renewable energy, including large solar-plus-storage projects in Arizona.

Position. Chairwoman of the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) since 2020, the first woman to lead the Tribal Council (Council member 2013-2020). CRIT holds some of the most senior, powerful water rights in the basin: a decreed diversion right of up to ~719,248 acre-feet from the Colorado River, roughly one-third of Arizona's mainstem allocation, ~23% of Arizona's entitlement and nearly 10% of the entire Lower Basin. Flores's signature achievement is the fight to lease/market a portion of that consumptively-used allocation off-reservation. She championed the CRIT Water Resiliency Act (S.3308, sponsors Kelly and Sinema), signed into law by Biden in January 2023, which authorizes CRIT to lease, exchange, and store its water within Arizona's Lower Basin; the state settlement documents were signed with Interior Secretary Haaland and Gov. Hobbs on April 26, 2024. She frames leasing as sovereignty plus drought relief plus revenue: 'CRIT is able to help Arizona get through this drought, while being fairly compensated for our water,' with proceeds earmarked to repair CRIT's aging irrigation system and fund tribal government/services. Emphasizes CRIT as a conservation leader (kept 200,000+ acre-feet in Lake Mead via the Drought Contingency Plan, participates in farmland fallowing). Insists tribes must sit at the table as equals in the Post-2026 operating-guidelines renegotiation: 'there can be no real or doable solutions without the full and active engagement of tribal nations, who account for over 25% of the adjudicated water in this basin,' and 'we've been left out of the discussions... left out of when plans are developed.' In November 2025 she and the Council granted the Colorado River legal personhood under tribal law, treating it as a living being. Note carefully: her framing is LEASE, not sell. She has publicly stressed the tribe leases rather than permanently alienates water rights.

On conservation. Strongly favorable, likely an anchor supporter. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the mechanism CRIT already pioneered and lobbied into federal law: they have kept 200,000+ AF in Lake Mead and fallow farmland for compensation. Flores's own words ('fairly compensated for our water') map directly onto a paid, verified consumptive-use market. Conditions: verification must credit CRIT's senior priority and not erode the underlying right; CRIT must be a market participant/price-setter, not a price-taker; and revenue must flow to the tribe, not intermediaries. Expect her to want tribal water leasing treated on par with (or ahead of) non-tribal transactions and to resist any market design that caps tribal participation or forces permanent alienation.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, conditional. CRIT already diversifies into renewable energy and infrastructure and controls ~300,000 acres, so a solar+storage buildout that also funds water is structurally attractive: it diversifies the economy beyond farming/casino and can bankroll irrigation repair. But two red lines. First, if the deal is really a vehicle for a hyperscaler to secure CRIT's water for data centers, expect strong resistance unless water use is a compensated LEASE that leaves the decreed right intact. Second, sovereignty and siting: development must be tribally led (equity/ownership, not just a ground lease) and consistent with the river-personhood ethic. Framed as tribal-owned generation + a water-lease revenue stream that funds tribal priorities, she is a plausible yes; framed as an outside hyperscaler taking water and putting panels on tribal land, she is a likely no.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but largely indirect for CRIT specifically. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply or offsets Lower Basin demand reduces pressure on the mainstem and could raise the value/negotiating leverage of CRIT's senior water and its lease market, which she would welcome. She is unlikely to oppose augmentation. However CRIT is upstream/mainstem agricultural, not a coastal desal beneficiary, so this is not core to her agenda; her engagement hinges on whether augmentation is used as an excuse to sideline tribes from Post-2026 talks or to devalue conservation/leasing. Watch for concern that costly augmentation could be used to justify NOT compensating tribal conservation. Ecological framing (river personhood, habitat) means she will scrutinize environmental and energy footprint of desal.

A win for them. A win for Flores is durable, well-compensated, tribally-controlled use of CRIT's senior water that (a) funds irrigation-infrastructure repair and diversifies the tribal economy beyond agriculture and the BlueWater casino, (b) cements CRIT's seat as a sovereign co-decider in Post-2026 operations rather than an afterthought, (c) preserves the underlying decreed right and senior priority (lease, never sell), and (d) is consistent with the river-as-living-being ethic she has codified. Recurring lease/conservation revenue plus a formal negotiating seat is the double win.

Public record. As Chairwoman of the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT), she led efforts to pass federal legislation allowing the tribe to lease its conserved water, providing drought relief for Arizona and economic opportunities for the tribe.

Position. American Rivers is a national (Washington DC-headquartered) river-conservation and restoration nonprofit (~$53M FY2025 revenue) with a substantial, staffed Colorado River / Southwest program led by Southwest Regional Director Matt Rice out of Colorado. Longstanding public position: the Colorado River is over-allocated ('demand exceeds supply') due to 'decades of wasteful water management,' and the basin is 'ground zero for the climate and water crisis.' It has named the Colorado River #1 on its annual America's Most Endangered Rivers list repeatedly (2024, 2025, and #1 in 2026), using that megaphone to pressure the seven Basin States, the federal government, Tribal Nations, and Mexico to reach an urgent post-2026 operating agreement. On solutions it is explicitly pro-conservation and pro-efficiency, not anti-use: it endorses (via its own reports and partner Western Resource Advocates' '4.4 MAF' framework) municipal conservation, municipal water RE-USE, voluntary/compensated agricultural efficiency and water banking (~1.0 MAF, keeping farmland in production, not permanent buy-and-dry), renewable energy expansion, and evaporation/dust-on-snow and invasive-plant (tamarisk) reductions. In 2026 it co-signed a joint statement (with EDF, The Nature Conservancy, Trout Unlimited, Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, and Western Resource Advocates) urging that new post-2026 guidelines 'provide greater predictability, integrate environmental stewardship into overall system reliability, incorporate flexible management strategies, and meaningfully include sovereign Tribal Nations,' backed by 'sustained investment in proven solutions - large-scale water conservation, infrastructure modernization, watershed and forest health, and broader water-reliability initiatives.' It holds one of two Environmental Representative seats on the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program Technical Work Group, giving it direct standing on Lake Powell / Glen Canyon Dam operations and a strong institutional interest in environmental/in-stream flows and Grand Canyon ecological values.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE, conditionally. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns directly with their endorsed 'voluntary, compensated' agricultural efficiency + water banking (~1.0 MAF) and demand-management framing, and with the Upper/Lower Basin compensated-conservation programs they already reference approvingly. Their conditions: it must measure true consumptive-use savings (they explicitly distinguish real reductions from paper water and 'wasteful management'), be voluntary and avoid permanent buy-and-dry / permanent fallowing of farm communities, include Tribal Nations meaningfully, and ideally dedicate a defined share of conserved water to the environment / in-stream flows rather than freeing it all for renewed depletion. Rigorous MMV plus an environmental set-aside converts them from persuadable to ally; a market that just reshuffles diversions or enables new growth would draw skepticism.

On solar+water. MIXED / CAUTIOUSLY OPEN, their least-defined stance (partly unknown). They list 'escalating renewable energy' among the five basin water-saving levers (renewables use far less water than thermal generation), so a solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation could appeal on both energy and funding grounds - and they have flagged that federal (IRA) conservation money will dry up, so a durable private funding stream is attractive. But American Rivers has no strong public record on data centers or hyperscaler-financed deals, so treat specifics as unknown. Risk flags they would raise: whether a hyperscaler's own new water/energy load is net-additive demand on a stressed basin (greenwashing concern), land/habitat and river impacts of large solar siting, and whether 'funds water' means verified consumptive-use reduction with an environmental share or just a PR offset. Persuadable if the water funding is additive, verified, environment-benefiting, and the compute load's own water footprint is honestly accounted; wary if it reads as buying social license for new depletion.

On reuse/desal. SPLIT: strongly PRO-REUSE, CAUTIOUS/SKEPTICAL on large-scale desalination. Municipal water re-use is explicitly one of their endorsed core solutions (and consistent with 'infrastructure modernization' and low-energy recycled-water supply), so they would actively champion large-scale reuse/recycling that reduces fresh Colorado River draw. Desalination is a different matter: as a river-conservation and climate group they tend to view seawater/brackish desal as energy-intensive, high-cost, ecologically fraught (brine, intake harm, carbon) and a last resort rather than a substitute for demand reduction. They co-sign coalitions urging conservation-first hierarchies. Expect endorsement of reuse, conditional-to-skeptical engagement on desal (acceptable only as a complement after conservation/reuse, with strong environmental safeguards, honest energy/carbon accounting, and no crowding-out of demand management).

A win for them. A win is measurable, durable, verified reduction in consumptive use that leaves more water physically in the river and in Powell/Mead - achieved through voluntary, compensated means that do NOT permanently dry up farmland or communities - plus an explicit, enforceable share of any saved or new water dedicated to environmental/in-stream flows and river health. Institutionally, a win is a post-2026 framework that bakes in environmental stewardship, Tribal inclusion, flexibility, and 'sustained investment in proven solutions,' and lets American Rivers credibly claim it moved the basin off crisis. Secondary win: new funding streams for conservation/reuse/watershed work that survive after IRA/federal money dries up (a stated worry of theirs).

Public record. As a national river-conservation nonprofit with a major Colorado River focus, its entire public posture is aligned with conservation, restoration, and sustainable management, making it a natural ally.

Position. {'recent_and_longstanding': ["Longstanding: exists to protect and improve the economic viability of Arizona cotton producers; mission language includes promoting 'sound environmental policies' and protecting Arizona 'air, water, and land resources' (self-described, azcottongrowers.org / CauseIQ).", 'Longstanding defensive frame on water: cotton is defended not on virtue but on efficiency gains. The industry line (echoed by ACGA and National Cotton Council) is that Western cotton per-acre water use has fallen 50-60% through managed/drip irrigation and improved seed varieties.', "Members are the acknowledged 'losers' of Arizona's water priority stack: Central Arizona (Pinal/Maricopa) growers hold the most junior CAP priority and were first cut. Colorado River farm deliveries to Pinal were effectively zeroed out beginning with the 2022 Tier 1 / 2023 deeper shortage cuts under the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan.", 'Revealed position: rather than fight the cuts head-on, the sector accepted a state/CAP/federal deal (~$22.5M state+CAP, potential ~$25M federal) to build groundwater wells and infrastructure to replace lost CAP water, plus large-scale fallowing (crop-insurance-failure acreage in Pinal+Maricopa jumped to ~41,278 acres in 2022 and ~58,617 acres in 2023).', "Current advocacy energy (2025-2026) is on federal farm safety-net and trade, not river politics: One Big Beautiful Bill Act, disaster relief, Buying American Cotton Act, PAC activity (their News & Issues page). Colorado River appears only obliquely as 'water constraints.'", 'Sector is exploring water-import and supply-augmentation deals: an affiliated Central Arizona irrigation district (CAIDD) signed a July 2026 MOU with Cadiz to buy up to 10,000 AF/yr from a California (Mojave) groundwater bank at ~$850/AF for 50 years, signaling appetite to pay for new firm supply rather than simply shrink.'], 'notable_absences_or_unknowns': ['UNKNOWN: no public, named ACGA position paper specifically on the post-2026 Colorado River operating guidelines, Lower Basin cutback allocation, or a consumptive-use conservation market. Their public issue pages are silent on the river specifically. Positions here are inferred from member behavior, the parent National Cotton Council, and Arizona Farm Bureau.', 'UNKNOWN: exact current membership count and acreage represented (not disclosed).', "UNKNOWN: ACGA's explicit stance on farmland-to-solar conversion, though it is happening at scale on member-adjacent land (20,000+ acres converted around Coolidge/Eloy)."]}

A win for them. A dignified, well-capitalized exit or downsizing from cotton on their own terms: (1) new, reliable income per acre (conservation payments and/or solar/storage ground leases) that beats a 65-cent cotton crop; (2) protection of their water entitlements and CAP priority so participating in conservation or transfer does not mean permanent forfeiture; (3) capital and firm supply (groundwater infrastructure, imported/augmented water) so the farms that keep farming can survive; (4) preservation of rural Pinal's economy and tax base through the transition rather than abandonment; and (5) being treated as a solution provider that supplies verified basin water savings, not as the villain of the shortage.

Public record. The association's primary mission is the economic viability of its members; it would likely support paid conservation if the compensation outweighs the costs of fallowing, but oppose uncompensated cuts.

Position. ADWR is Arizona's lead state water agency and its Colorado River negotiator, run by longtime director Tom Buschatzke under Gov. Katie Hobbs. Longstanding position: defend Arizona's supply (esp. the junior-priority Central Arizona Project / CAP allocation) while accepting shared, structured cuts to keep Lake Mead and Lake Powell from crashing. Arizona already lives under Tier 1 shortage (a ~512,000 AF / ~30% cut to CAP supply for 2025). In the post-2026 guidelines fight, ADWR aligns with the Lower Basin proposal that offered graduated cuts (Arizona ~27%, Nevada ~17%, California ~10%) and Buschatzke's three stated requirements: (1) a Powell release curve that keeps Lake Mead relatively stable, (2) substantial use of water stored above Lake Powell, and (3) real Upper Basin use reductions in drought. Core grievance: Upper Division states refusing any firm delivery cutbacks. After the Feb 14, 2026 Interior deadline passed with no seven-state deal, Reclamation floated five alternatives (all of which hit CAP hard) and a 'no-deal' federal path that could cut Arizona up to 77% , worse than any other state. As of mid-2026 Buschatzke is working behind the scenes to avoid 'extremely draconian' cuts ahead of expected late-July federal rules. ADWR also drives augmentation: Assured Water Supply rules (2024 Phoenix AMA model now blocks new groundwater-based determinations), backing WIFA's Long-Term Water Augmentation Fund and Sea of Cortez desalination/importation concepts, and administering federally-funded system-conservation payments.

On conservation. Positive-to-strongly-favorable. Compensated, verified consumptive-use conservation is already Arizona's preferred tool: the state pledged its own $40M into System Water and champions federally-funded conservation (Buschatzke has touted $450M+ in federal conservation money and pushed to unlock frozen IRA funds). A rigorously measured, additive, consumptive-use (not just paper 'wet water') market that Reclamation credits toward Lake Mead elevation is squarely in their wheelhouse. Caveats they will raise: additionality and verification (no double-counting return flows), who pays long-term after federal dollars dry up, and that conservation must complement , not replace , Upper Basin cuts. They will resist any market that lets other states or the Upper Basin claim Arizona-funded savings.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but skeptical. ADWR is squeezed between a data-center gold rush and a groundwater freeze, and it knows new power plants (not just cooling) could quadruple water use , so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also finances water supply/reuse could turn a liability into a bargaining chip. They will welcome private capital that creates firm supply (offsetting the WIFA funding shortfall) and reduces thermoelectric water demand. Skepticism: they will not let data centers buy their way around Assured Water Supply rules, they will scrutinize whether 'funds water' means real new wet water or just offsets/credits, and they will want the water benefit to accrue to Arizona/CAP, not exported. Deliverability and enforceable, long-duration commitments matter more than pledges.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, realistic about cost and time. ADWR/WIFA are actively pursuing large-scale reuse and Sea of Cortez desalination (Puerto Peñasco / IDE, Acciona-Fengate, EPCOR proposals) as core augmentation , reuse and reclaimed water are politically easy and near-term. Desal they treat as a longer-horizon, expensive ($2,000-3,000/AF), binational, environmentally fraught (totoaba/vaquita, brine) option, made harder by the WIFA fund being swept down to ~$376M. They will back reuse/desal that is credibly financed (private or federal), delivers firm Arizona supply, and doesn't distract from the immediate 2026 negotiation. A privately-funded reuse/desal package that closes their funding gap would be very attractive.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 operating framework that keeps Lake Mead stable and CAP water flowing, avoids the ~77% federal 'no-deal' cut, forces the Upper Basin to share drought pain, and unlocks new firm supply (conservation savings, reuse, or affordable importation/desal) plus federal money so Arizona isn't the state that gives up the most for the least. Politically: Buschatzke and Hobbs delivering 'Arizona held the line and secured the state's water future' without triggering a losing Supreme Court fight.

Public record. Facing significant cuts as a junior rights holder, ADWR has been a principal architect of programs to pay users for conservation and is actively leading efforts to augment supply through large-scale water reuse and binational desalination projects.

Position. The Arizona Farm Bureau Federation (AZFB, "the Voice of Arizona Agriculture") is the state's largest farm-and-ranch membership organization and the leading political voice for Arizona agriculture on Colorado River and water policy. Its longstanding and current positions, grounded in its own advocacy pages and articles: (1) Protect existing water rights and priority. AZFB is deeply engaged in Post-2026 Colorado River Operations and insists 'existing rights be respected and that we keep our eye on any new and "creative" attempts at bypassing those rights' (President-era statements from Stefanie Smallhouse). Prior-appropriation seniority (Yuma/priority-3 on-river rights) is treated as sacrosanct. (2) Agriculture should not bear the burden alone. Core message: 'just as everyone has an interest in water management, everyone has a role and responsibility to play in its conservation' , agriculture should not be the only sector cut. Ag uses ~70% of Arizona's water and AZFB frames augmentation as taking 'that target off the back of agricultural water users.' (3) Conservation record + 'most crop per drop.' AZFB repeatedly notes Arizona ag 'uses the same amount of water today as it did in 1957' yet produces far more via drip irrigation and precision farming, and that 'our conservation record far outpaces many other uses in the state.' Any mandatory conservation program for agriculture 'must be economically, agronomically and technically feasible.' (4) Local control + skepticism of transfers out of ag. Official water policy: 'Water transfers should be transparent, consider all community impacts and be subject to local control'; 'No government policy should be used to interfere with agricultural use of water, as long as a source of water is available.' AZFB-aligned voices argue fallowing 'doesn't actually conserve water! It just transfers the water somewhere else for someone else to use' and that ag water savings should stay in agriculture to grow more food. (5) Pro-augmentation/new supply. AZFB celebrated SB1740/SB1220-era funding as a 'truly historic investment,' backing desalination and new long-term supplies precisely because new water relieves pressure on ag allocations. (6) Food security framing. Current President John Boelts (Yuma vegetable grower): 'We need water to stay in the hands of agriculture so that we can keep food abundant and affordable.' AZFB rejects zero-sum framing of ag vs. cities/industry. (7) On data centers / hyperscalers. AZFB's own 2026 article downplays data-center cooling water (~2,777 acre-feet, <1% of the state portfolio) and calls for 'continued innovation, transparency, and collaboration across all water users' , signaling it does not yet see hyperscalers as an adversary and is open to shared solutions, while implicitly resisting any narrative that ag is the water hog. Note on gaps: AZFB has NO clearly documented public position specifically on hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-that-also-funds-water, on agrivoltaics as an organization, or on a verified consumptive-use (as opposed to fallowing) conservation market. Those reactions below are informed inferences from adjacent, well-documented positions, not direct quotes.

On conservation. Cautiously persuadable , conditionally supportive if designed right, hostile if not. AZFB backed a fallowing bill (HB2366) when it had 'broad support from all industry stakeholders,' and Arizona already has statutory protection letting users conserve up to 10 years without forfeiting rights , so a VERIFIED, VOLUNTARY, COMPENSATED consumptive-use market is within their acceptable zone IF three conditions hold: (1) rights are legally protected from forfeiture/erosion; (2) compensation clears their economics (they publicly call federal $330-$400/AF offers too low against $1,200-$2,200/AF land value); (3) it is voluntary and farmer-elective, not mandated. The friction points: AZFB's aligned voices argue conservation savings 'should be used by agriculture' not shipped to cities, and warn that rapid/haphazard fallowing devastates rural economies and input suppliers. A true consumptive-use (deficit-irrigation / crop-switch / efficiency) market that reduces actual depletion WITHOUT permanent buy-and-dry, and keeps value in the ag community, is far more palatable to them than fallowing-for-transfer. Verification cuts both ways: they will like that it stops paper conservation, but will resist any measurement regime that ratchets down their baseline rights.

On solar+water. Likely neutral-to-positive, and a genuine opening , but with guardrails. AZFB's own 2026 messaging treats data centers as a tiny water user (<1% of the portfolio) and calls for 'collaboration across all water users' rather than attacking hyperscalers, so it is not predisposed to oppose them. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water maps directly onto AZFB's strongest existing argument: new/augmented supply that 'takes the target off the back of agricultural water users.' Expect support IF the deal (a) adds water or funds augmentation/efficiency rather than buying ag's existing water away, (b) keeps farmers whole on their rights, and (c) ideally routes lease revenue or shade/agrivoltaic co-benefits to farm operations. Watch-outs: AZFB has no formal agrivoltaics position and its members are split (Pinal farmers have questioned large-scale solar-on-farmland compatibility), and it will resist any structure where tech/energy money is used to permanently retire ag water. Frame it as 'industry pays to make more water for everyone, farms included,' not 'industry buys farm water.'

On reuse/desal. Most clearly positive , this is where AZFB is already on record supportive. It praised SB1740-era desalination/augmentation funding as a 'truly historic investment' and its official water policy backs 'augmentation efforts...where those efforts enhance supplies without negatively impacting another area.' Large-scale reuse and desalination create NEW water, which is exactly AZFB's preferred path because it relieves pressure on ag allocations without forcing ag cuts. Expect AZFB to be an ally on reuse/desal in principle. Conditions/caveats they will attach: cost and who pays (ag should not be assessed for supplies that mainly serve cities/industry), no impairment of existing rights or other basins ('without negatively impacting another area'), local control, and a fair share of new supply flowing to agriculture rather than exclusively to municipal/industrial growth. Desalination's energy cost and Mexico/Sea-of-Cortez logistics are practical hurdles they will note but not oppose.

A win for them. A win for AZFB: Arizona ag keeps its senior Colorado River and grandfathered rights intact and un-eroded through Post-2026; farmers who choose to reduce use are paid well above their forgone crop margin (their own benchmark cites $1,200-$2,200/acre-foot land value vs. federal offers of $330-$400/acre-foot, which they consider inadequate) and face no forfeiture risk; conserved water and/or its economic value stays anchored in the ag economy and rural counties rather than being permanently transferred to cities or industry; new augmentation supply (desal/reuse/energy-funded water) materially takes cuts 'off the back' of agriculture; and any program is voluntary, locally controlled, and structured so Yuma/Pinal farm operations, input suppliers, and farm labor keep working. Bottom line: food production stays 'abundant and affordable,' ag is treated as a partner in the solution rather than the designated bill-payer, and participating farmers come out financially ahead.

Public record. The Bureau's policy supports land use planning at the local level and compensation for devaluation, indicating they could be persuaded on paid conservation or solar development if it provides economic benefits to farmers and respects property rights.

Position. The Arizona Power Authority (APA) is a body corporate and politic of the State of Arizona, created by statute in 1944 (rooted in the federal Boulder Canyon Project Act of 1928) to receive and allocate Arizona's contractual share of Hoover Dam hydropower. It is governed by a five-member commission and markets roughly 409 MW of Hoover power on a wholesale basis to ~70 non-retail customers: Indian tribes (Ak-Chin, Hualapai, Aha Macav/Fort Mojave), electric cooperatives (Graham County, Mohave, Navopache, Trico), irrigation and electrical districts, cities and towns (Phoenix, Tucson, Flagstaff, Scottsdale, Tempe), Salt River Project, and the Central Arizona Water Conservancy District (CAWCD/CAP). Its longstanding public position is that cheap, reliable federal hydropower from the Colorado River underpins low-cost water and power delivery across Arizona, including CAP canal repayment costs. Recently, executive director Jordy Fuentes has been unusually candid that the crisis is existential for hydropower: he has stated the resource 'in both the upper basin and the lower basin is absolutely in trouble and directly related to drought,' that declining Lake Mead levels have already forced APA to raise customer rates ~19% since 2019, and that rates could 'triple' if Lake Mead drops below elevation 1,035 feet, where 12 of Hoover's 17 turbines cannot operate and generating capacity is cut ~70%. Hoover generation is already down ~48% since 2000. APA does not advocate against Colorado River conservation; its posture is defensive protection of its members' access to affordable power as the physical basis of that power erodes. APA has backed federal fixes (e.g., the Help Hoover Dam Act, H.R. 3158/S. 1570, to free ~$45M in the Colorado River Dam Fund for O&M) and has publicly welcomed rural renewable buildouts (Fuentes praised AEPCO's USDA New ERA solar projects as benefiting drought-hit rural Southwest communities).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to neutral. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that keeps more water in Lake Mead directly benefits APA by preserving reservoir head and Hoover generating capacity, which is the single variable driving its rate crisis. APA does not hold consumptive water rights, so it neither gains nor loses an allocation and has no turf to defend against such a market. Its interest is instrumental: anything that slows or reverses Mead's decline protects its product. It would likely support conservation that demonstrably raises or stabilizes elevation, while staying agnostic on the market's internal water-rights mechanics. Caveat: APA has not publicly staked out a position on conservation markets specifically, so this is inferred from its exposure rather than stated (mark partially unknown).

On solar+water. Most aligned option and the strongest persuadable hook. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water squarely addresses APA's two pain points: it can supply affordable replacement/firming power to APA's members (co-ops, tribes, districts) as Hoover output falls, and the water-funding component can help stabilize the reservoir head that APA depends on. APA has already publicly welcomed analogous rural renewable projects (Fuentes praised AEPCO's USDA New ERA solar+storage work for drought-hit rural communities; peer co-ops like Lincoln County Power District are diversifying via solar+battery projects such as Apache Solar II). APA would engage constructively provided the power reaches its wholesale members at competitive cost and does not require them to shoulder new interconnection or transmission burdens. This is where to concentrate the pitch.

On reuse/desal. Supportive but more distant. Large-scale reuse and desalination reduce Lower Basin dependence on the Colorado River, which over the long run helps keep Lake Mead higher and protects Hoover head, indirectly benefiting APA. The complication is that desalination and advanced reuse are extremely energy-intensive, so they add electrical load in a region APA serves. That is a double-edged sword: it could raise demand for the affordable power APA can no longer reliably supply from Hoover, but it also creates a larger market for firmed replacement generation. APA would likely be a quiet supporter rather than a champion, and its reaction hinges on who pays for the energy those plants consume. No public APA position on reuse/desal exists, so this is inferred (mark unknown).

A win for them. A win for APA is affordable, reliable replacement or firming power that lets its wholesale members (tribes, rural co-ops, irrigation/electrical districts, cities, CAP, SRP) hold rates down as Hoover generation declines, ideally paired with anything that stabilizes Lake Mead's elevation (and thus preserves Hoover head and generation) or that reduces CAP's pumping energy cost. Concretely: capacity/energy contracts priced competitively with historic Hoover power, storage/firming that shields small co-ops from $1,000/MWh peak spikes, and federal or third-party dollars that offset O&M and canal-repayment burdens so those fixed costs are not passed to members as rate hikes.

Public record. The APA's primary mandate is securing low-cost hydropower from Hoover Dam, making it an ally of conservation that keeps Lake Mead high but potentially an opponent to large solar projects if they threaten hydropower's market.

Position. Aurora Water is the municipal water utility for the City of Aurora, Colorado (Denver's third-largest municipality), serving ~400,000 people. It is a Front Range transbasin diverter: its surface supply comes from three basins - South Platte (~50%), Colorado (~25%), and Arkansas (~25%). Roughly a quarter of Aurora's water is Colorado River Basin water diverted out of the Eagle River headwaters via the jointly-owned (with Colorado Springs) Homestake system, so Aurora is structurally dependent on continued Upper Basin transmountain diversions. Longstanding positions: (1) supply diversification and firming - it targets keeping >30 months of demand in storage across 13 reservoirs as a drought buffer; (2) aggressive pursuit of new Colorado River-basin storage, most notably the controversial proposed Whitney/Homestake Creek reservoir in Eagle County wilderness-adjacent land (opposed by Western Slope/conservation interests) and a new Park County (Wild Horse) reservoir; (3) reuse leadership - its $700M Prairie Waters Project (online 2010, up to ~10 MGD, largest potable reuse system in Colorado) reuses South Platte return flows, and it partners in the WISE regional reuse-sharing agreement with Denver Water and South Metro entities; (4) demand management - a formal Water Shortage Response Plan, nonfunctional-turf ban for new development, and a GRIP turf-buyback rebate ($3/sqft). In 2026 it declared Stage 1 drought restrictions (April 7), targeting ~20% cuts, with strict enforcement (warnings then $250 fines, AMI metering, shutoff authority). Reservoirs sat ~58% full in spring 2026, ~10% below normal, with runoff projected below the 2002 record-drought level. Spokesperson framing ('Kentucky Bluegrass is just not going to be a human right') signals a utility publicly normalizing permanent demand reduction. Net posture on the river crisis: it acknowledges the historic drought and asks residents to conserve so it does not have to pull more from the Colorado, but it simultaneously defends and seeks to expand its Upper Basin diversion rights - a classic conflicted diverter.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-eager, and a strong candidate early adopter. Aurora already runs paid demand-reduction (GRIP turf buyback at $3/sqft, WEEG-funded turf transformation), enforces restrictions, and publicly frames permanent demand cuts as inevitable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits its worldview and could let it monetize or credit reductions and firm supply without building contentious new Colorado River storage. Caveat: as a diverter it will scrutinize how a consumptive-use market interacts with Colorado water law, transbasin diversion rights, and whether saved water is protected against being appropriated by others (the 'shepherding' problem). It would want assurance that participation does not erode its senior rights or its ability to keep diverting Homestake water. Persuadable-positive if the market credits municipal reuse/turf reductions and protects diversion rights.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not a natural first mover. Aurora sits in the Denver metro, a growing data-center corridor, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could appeal as a way to offload capital cost of reuse expansion, new storage, or advanced treatment onto a deep-pocketed partner. It would weigh this against (a) added large industrial water demand from data centers competing for the same scarce supply, and (b) political optics of prioritizing hyperscaler load during resident drought restrictions. Reaction depends heavily on whether the deal is net-water-positive for Aurora's system and whether it comes with firm, non-consumptive commitments. Persuadable if structured as water-positive; skeptical if it looks like subsidizing new industrial demand on a stressed basin.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable on reuse - this is Aurora's core identity and competitive advantage. It built Prairie Waters (largest potable reuse in Colorado) and leads WISE; large-scale reuse expansion aligns directly with its strategy and would likely find Aurora an enthusiastic partner or model utility. Desalination is less directly relevant to an inland Front Range utility (no brackish/ocean source at scale), but Aurora would be interested in advanced treatment, brine management, and any 'new water' that reduces pressure on its Colorado River diversions. Overall: reuse = ally-level enthusiasm; desal = interested observer, mainly for the treatment-technology and supply-augmentation angle.

A win for them. A win is firmer, more drought-resilient supply that reduces their exposure to Colorado River curtailment WITHOUT requiring them to fight losing permitting battles over new Upper Basin storage, and without eroding their existing senior diversion rights. Concretely: (a) a conservation market that lets them bank/credit reuse and turf reductions as protected 'new' firm yield; (b) third-party (e.g., hyperscaler) capital that funds reuse/storage/advanced-treatment expansion so ratepayers and tap fees don't bear the full cost; (c) recognition and reward for being a reuse leader rather than being lumped in with the Front Range diversion villains in basin politics. The ideal outcome for Aurora is to grow its service population and firm its portfolio while credibly telling residents and the Western Slope that it is reducing, not increasing, pressure on the Colorado River.

Public record. Aurora Water operates the extensive Prairie Waters potable reuse system and offers robust conservation rebate programs, including for grass replacement.

Position. {'longstanding': "Ag water use can be cut sharply via soil-microbiome/nano technology rather than fallowing. Frames itself as a 'climate-smart' drought solution aligned with Utah state innovation priorities. Advocates compensating farmers for water they save (financial incentives for conservation achievements).", 'recent': 'Continues to market 70% water-reduction claims and expand (Idaho, Ukraine, Israel via Utah Tech START AgriTech). Leans on Gov. Cox letter of support, a $1M Utah Institute for Land, Water & Air grant, and 2023 Utah Business Innovation Award as validation.', 'colorado_river_specific': "No direct public position located on Colorado River law-of-the-river, Lake Powell/Mead operations, or basin allocation. Engagement is indirect: their market grows as basin ag-conservation pressure (DOI's ~1 MAF conservation calls) rises."}

On conservation. Strongly favorable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to their explicit ask (pay farmers for saved water). It would convert their product's water savings into a cash return for the farmer, sharpening the sales pitch. Caveat: measurement/verification (MRV) becomes decisive. They would push hard for soil-amendment-driven savings to be a creditable, verifiable pathway, and could be threatened if the market only credits fallowing or metered diversion cuts and not agronomic efficiency gains.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but peripheral. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water doesn't touch their core ag-input business directly. They would welcome any new pool of money that pays for on-farm water savings and might seek to be a funded 'water-tech' vendor within such a program, but they have no stake in the energy side and no evident position on hyperscaler datacenter water demand.

On reuse/desal. Mixed / mildly wary. Large-scale reuse and desalination expand supply and compete with the 'demand-reduction' framing that Bactelife sells. If new supply eases scarcity, willingness-to-pay for on-farm efficiency could soften. They are unlikely to oppose it publicly, but it is not aligned with their interest the way a conservation-payment market is. They would prefer efficiency/demand-side framing be funded alongside any supply build.

A win for them. A conservation market (or hyperscaler-funded water pool) that (1) credits agronomic efficiency gains, not just fallowing, (2) uses a verification standard their product can satisfy, and (3) routes real dollars to farmers who adopt water-saving inputs. Concretely: their product becomes a qualifying, reimbursable pathway to earn conservation payments, expanding adoption across irrigated basin acreage.

Public record. As a company whose business model is based on selling technology to reduce agricultural water use, its commercial interests are directly aligned with a conservation agenda.

Position. Bard Water District operates and maintains the Bard Unit of the Reservation Division of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Yuma Project on the lower Colorado River in Imperial County, CA (near Winterhaven), bordering Yuma, AZ. It serves roughly 15,000+ irrigable acres (Bard Unit ~7,120 acres of patented private land opened to settlers in 1910; the adjacent Indian Unit ~7,556 acres is Quechan reservation allotment land). Water is diverted via the All-American Canal / Yuma Main Canal system (originally Laguna Dam). CRITICAL LEVERAGE FACT: the Yuma Project Reservation Division holds among the MOST SENIOR agricultural rights on the entire river. Under California's 1931 Seven Party Agreement it sits in Priority 2 (Yuma Project), junior only to PVID's Priority 1 and senior to IID/Coachella (Priority 3) and Metropolitan (Priorities 4-5). Its underlying present perfected rights trace to ~1901 appropriations. This makes Bard nearly uncuttable in a priority-based shortage and gives it disproportionate weight relative to its small size. Longstanding practical posture: a small, low-profile ag district focused on O&M of aging delivery/drainage infrastructure, growing high-value winter produce (lettuce, other vegetables) plus dates, wheat, cotton, hay, melons. RECENT REVEALED POSITION: Bard has been an active, willing PAID conservation partner, not an obstructionist. In Dec 2019 it signed a landmark 7-year seasonal land-fallowing deal with Metropolitan Water District (MWD): farmers paid ~$452/acre to idle fields April 1-July 31, capped at 3,000 fallowed acres, up to ~$1.4M/yr; conserved water goes to MWD urban use or is banked in Lake Mead. In 2023-2024 Bard signed federal system-conservation agreements (via Reclamation's Lower Colorado River Basin System Conservation & Efficiency Program, in partnership with MWD) to conserve up to 17,100 AF through 2024-2026 for ~$6.8M. Bard has explicitly framed these payments as funding needed irrigation-system modernization and replacement of aging infrastructure (e.g., its Five Gates Improvement Project). Net: Bard treats conservation-for-cash as compatible with its interests when it protects the underlying senior right and funds capital needs.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / participate on favorable terms. Bard has already demonstrated by revealed behavior that it will sell conserved consumptive use through a verified, measured, compensated program (the MWD seasonal fallowing and the Reclamation system-conservation deals are exactly this model). A verified consumptive-use conservation MARKET is a natural extension and arguably better for Bard than one-off bilateral deals: as a very senior, high-value-per-AF right holder it is a premium seller and would want price discovery, verified/measured savings (protects it from over-delivery), and durable protection that selling water does NOT erode its priority date or PPR (the classic 'use it or lose it' / abandonment fear is the main objection to manage). Expect Bard to want: transparent MWRM-style measurement, seasonal/temporary (not permanent) transfers to preserve the land and the right, generous pricing reflecting winter-vegetable opportunity cost, and coordination with the Quechan Indian Unit. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN but not a natural first mover. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive to Bard mainly as (a) a new, non-Reclamation, non-MWD revenue stream that can capitalize its infrastructure backlog, and (b) potential lease income on marginal or fallowed acreage (solar on idled land pairs well with its existing seasonal-fallowing practice). Concerns: Bard is a working agricultural district whose identity and tax/economic base is farming; large-scale solar conversion of prime winter-produce ground would be resisted if it displaces high-value cropping or threatens the community's ag character. Siting on already-fallowed or drainage-impaired parcels, or district-edge land, would be far more palatable. It would also scrutinize how 'funds water' is structured and whether it touches or risks the senior right. Persuadable, deal-structure dependent, lower priority interest than straight conservation payments.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY FAVORABLE, low direct stake. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., ocean or brackish desal, urban recycling, salinity/drainage-water treatment) reduces demand pressure on the river from junior urban users (MWD, San Diego), which indirectly RELIEVES political pressure on senior ag holders like Bard to give up water. Bard has no urban supply role and would not fund or operate such projects, so it has little skin in the game. A locally relevant angle: the Yuma area already has drainage/salinity management infrastructure (the region's agricultural drainage and the nearby Yuma Desalting Plant context); brackish/drainage-water reuse that improves canal water quality or creates new supply without touching Bard's diversion would be viewed positively. Not an opponent, but not an advocate. Mostly indifferent unless it lowers pressure on its own right or improves delivered water quality.

A win for them. A win for Bard is durable, well-priced revenue that funds its irrigation and drainage infrastructure renewal WITHOUT weakening its senior water right, without permanently converting productive farmland, and without fracturing its relationship with MWD, Reclamation, or the Quechan. Concretely: a verified consumptive-use conservation arrangement that pays a premium reflecting high-value winter-vegetable opportunity cost, is temporary/seasonal (fallowing, not permanent forbearance), explicitly preserves its Priority 2 standing and present perfected right, keeps the farming community intact, and delivers predictable multi-year cash it can bond against for capital projects like the Five Gates upgrade. Being seen as a good-faith river steward while still protecting seniority is the ideal political outcome.

Public record. The district has a long-standing paid seasonal fallowing program with the Metropolitan Water District and the Bureau of Reclamation to conserve Colorado River water for urban and system needs.

Position. Battle Born Venture is Nevada's state-sponsored venture capital program, created in 2013 and operating since 2014. It is funded through the U.S. Treasury's State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI), overseen by the Governor's Office of Economic Development (GOED), and operated by the nonprofit Nevada Battle Born Growth Escalator, Inc. It manages roughly a $113M fund and has invested in ~70 Nevada startups. It is officially sector-agnostic (excluding only gambling, alcohol, cannabis, firearms, real estate, investment firms, and lenders), but GOED-affiliated materials list 'water' among target industries, and BBV has made a concrete water-tech bet: it co-invested (with Desert Forge Ventures) in the $4M seed round of WAVR Technologies, a UNLV spinout doing hydrogel-based atmospheric water harvesting aimed at 'arid and water-stressed regions.' BBV takes NO explicit public position on Colorado River allocation, the Lower Basin shortage, Lake Mead levels, or interstate water policy. Its stance on the river crisis is implicit and economic-development-framed: Nevada faces structural water scarcity ('river and aquifer supplies are insufficient to support continuing growth'), and the state's answer is to commercialize water-saving/water-producing technology and keep those companies domiciled in Nevada. BBV sits inside a broader GOED water-innovation stack (WaterStart public-private partnership with SNWA/DRI, the Nevada Knowledge Fund) whose stated priorities are membrane alternatives, leak detection, and high-efficiency cooling. WaterStart's leadership frames Nevada as a 'first adopter' globally recognized for extreme water conservation, which is the closest thing to a river-crisis worldview in BBV's orbit. Longstanding posture: pro-innovation, pro-growth, technology-optimist, jurisdiction-loyal to Nevada; not an advocacy or policy actor.

On conservation. Broadly favorable but mostly neutral-to-mildly-positive as an institution. A verified consumptive-use conservation market doesn't directly buy the technology BBV funds, but it validates BBV's core thesis that water has real, tradable economic value in the basin and rewards efficiency, which strengthens the business case for water-saving startups in its pipeline. BBV would likely welcome it as market-formation that makes its portfolio companies' value propositions (produce/save quantifiable acre-feet) more monetizable. It would not lobby for or against it; policy advocacy is outside its charter. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis if the market creates measurable demand its portfolio can serve.

On solar+water. Most enthusiastic reaction of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns perfectly with GOED/BBV's listed sectors (energy AND water), Nevada's data-center growth ambitions, and BBV's clean-energy-adjacent portfolio logic. WAVR itself markets that its systems 'can be energized by renewable sources,' so a solar+storage+water package is directly complementary to BBV's water-tech bets. BBV would see this as new co-investment surface (energy startups, water-treatment startups serving data centers) and as economic-development validation for the state. Likely an ally on this axis, subject to the standard caveat that BBV invests in companies, not projects, so its enthusiasm shows up as pipeline interest rather than direct capital into the buildout.

On reuse/desal. Favorable in principle, with a Nevada-specific nuance. Nevada already leads on water reuse (Las Vegas returns treated wastewater to Lake Mead for return-flow credits), so reuse tech is squarely inside BBV's/GOED's comfort zone and its stated priority around membrane alternatives and treatment. Large-scale desalination is more distant for landlocked Nevada, but the state has explored funding ocean desal elsewhere (e.g., proposals to fund California/Mexico desal in exchange for river water). BBV would view reuse/desal innovation as investable water-tech and a source of Nevada-domiciled startups, but its enthusiasm is strongest where the tech is deployable in-state (reuse, treatment, atmospheric harvesting) rather than coastal megaprojects it can't fund or site. Persuadable-to-ally, leaning ally on reuse.

A win for them. A win is a growing pipeline of fundable, Nevada-domiciled water and energy startups that scale, generate revenue and jobs in-state, and eventually exit, proving that Nevada's scarcity constraint is an economic-development asset rather than only a liability. Concretely: more WAVR-style successes (revenue, pilots, follow-on capital, ideally an exit), a self-sustaining water/clean-energy innovation cluster around WaterStart/UNLV/DRI, and BBV credited as an early backer. Any Colorado River intervention that expands the market for Nevada water-tech (conservation markets that price efficiency, hyperscaler capital that funds water alongside energy, reuse/desal deployment that needs treatment tech) is a win because it deepens BBV's deal flow and mandate. The losing scenario is a river-driven Southern Nevada economic contraction that dries up startup formation.

Public record. As a state-sponsored venture capital program, its focus is on investment returns, but there is no public record of its specific position on water conservation, solar, or reuse projects.

Position. No independent, longstanding public position on the Colorado River crisis. As an SNWA member agency operated by LVVWD, BBWD inherits SNWA's posture: aggressive urban conservation (decorative-turf ban, $5/sq ft turf-removal rebates, prohibition on Colorado-River irrigation of nonfunctional turf on non-single-family properties after Jan 1, 2027), and a per-capita-use reduction of 58% (2002-2025). BBWD's own recent public statements are almost entirely operational, not policy: (1) a de facto development moratorium in Laughlin because the system has only ~6M gallons of storage against a ~10.5M-gallon requirement (short ~4M gallons), so LVVWD told developers the system cannot support significant new growth until more storage is built; (2) a push for federal money to fix that, resulting in $29M in the Water Resources Development Act (HR 8812, passed House July 2024) championed by Reps. Susie Lee and Dina Titus for two new 2M-gallon storage tanks; (3) a proposed rate increase (~7.1%/yr for 5 years, extending to 10 years if a ~$9M tank is added) to fund ~$9.7M in aging-infrastructure repairs, with a public-comment period that ran through Aug 31, 2025. The through-line: BBWD frames its constraint as local storage/infrastructure, not river allocation. Laughlin sits downstream of Davis Dam and is a straightforward consumptive user, unlike Las Vegas whose supply is stretched by return-flow credits to Lake Mead; Laughlin water largely does not return upstream of the accounting point.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive in principle because BBWD is a small, capital-starved consumptive user that could monetize modest system savings to help fund its ~$9.7M infrastructure backlog and storage gap. But BBWD does not set its own policy; SNWA and Clark County would drive participation, and Nevada's small 300 KAF apportionment plus its reliance on return-flow credits makes the state protective of every acre-foot. Laughlin's tourism-driven demand and thin conservation headroom (it lacks Las Vegas's large decorative-turf base to convert) limit how much it could sell. Likely reaction: interested if payments flow to the local system and participation is voluntary and additive, deferential to SNWA on the mechanism, wary of anything that could be read as permanently ceding allocation or capping growth in an already growth-constrained town.

On solar+water. Most positive of the three, if structured right. BBWD's binding constraint is capital, not water rights: it needs storage tanks and infrastructure money it currently gets from ratepayers and one-off federal grants. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps directly onto its actual pain (the $29M/two-tank storage gap and the development moratorium). Laughlin already has an energy-and-tourism economy and available desert land near the river, so a datacenter-anchored energy+water package could be framed as ending the moratorium and stabilizing rates. Risk/reservations: a hyperscaler datacenter is itself a large new water and power load in a shortage basin, which cuts against SNWA's conservation narrative and Nevada's tight apportionment; the deal must be net-water-positive and clearly funded, not a new consumptive draw. Persuadable-to-ally on this if the water funding is real and the incremental water demand is offset or behind-the-meter.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-skeptical in the near term. Reuse is structurally less useful to Laughlin than to Las Vegas: SNWA's whole model runs on return-flow credits (treated wastewater returned to Lake Mead for credit), and Laughlin's small, downstream, single-source system has limited reuse infrastructure and a tourism load that is hard to close-loop. Large-scale desalination is a state/basin-level play (coastal partnerships, augmentation for the Lower Basin) far outside a ~7,500-person district's balance sheet; BBWD would neither fund nor lead it. Likely reaction: supportive in the abstract as basin supply augmentation that eases pressure on Nevada's apportionment, but not an early adopter or funder, and focused instead on getting its storage and pipes paid for. Marked lower-conviction because BBWD has made no public statement on reuse/desal specifically.

A win for them. A win for BBWD is outside capital that (1) closes the ~4M-gallon storage gap and ends the Laughlin development moratorium, (2) funds the ~$9.7M aging-infrastructure backlog without further burdening a ~7,500-person ratebase, and (3) stabilizes or lowers water rates. Secondarily, a deal that unlocks growth (new connections, casino/resort or datacenter load) while staying credibly inside SNWA's conservation framework and Nevada's tight Colorado River apportionment. In short: paid-for storage and pipes, a lifted moratorium, rate relief, and room to grow, achieved without picking a fight over allocation.

Public record. As a member agency of the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA), its position aligns with SNWA's aggressive pursuit of all conservation and water supply options, including paying for conservation, extensive water reuse, and exploring desalination exchanges.

Position. Boulder City is a small municipal utility (pop. ~15,000) that owns and operates its own electric, water, sewer, and refuse services, and is one of seven member agencies of the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA). It is a water minnow but an energy-land whale. Its own Colorado River footprint is tiny: roughly 18,000 acre-feet allocated for the original ~31-square-mile townsite when SNWA formed, and it received no additional water allocation after buying the ~107,400-acre Eldorado Valley from the federal government in 1995. On the river crisis, Boulder City has no independent policy voice; it follows SNWA's line and defers to SNWA as the wholesale resource manager. It adopted an SNWA-aligned Drought Plan on Sept. 17, 2003, focused on cutting consumptive (outdoor) use. It has executed the standard Southern Nevada conservation playbook: turf removal (Council approved removing 721,000 sq ft of grass at the municipal golf course in Aug 2022), drought-tolerant landscaping in parks, and irrigation upgrades. Its distinctive, longstanding public position is about ENERGY LAND, not water: since ~2004 it has actively marketed the Eldorado Valley for utility-scale solar and now battery storage, leasing ~11,765 acres for energy development and, in May 2024, unanimously amending its master plan and zoning to allow battery energy storage. It hosts major projects (Boulder Solar 1/150 MW cluster, Townsite Solar ~1,000 acres + 90 MW storage, Boulder Solar III 127.9 MW solar + 127.9 MW/511.6 MWh storage via 174 Power Global, in service ~June 2027) and issued RFP 2025-21 for more BESS/solar sites (due Feb 11, 2026).

On conservation. Mildly-to-moderately favorable, but as a follower not a driver. SNWA already runs a consumptive-use conservation market logic internally (it pays $45 per 1,000 gallons of consumptive use conserved annually via its Water Efficient Technologies program and prices consumptive savings at a premium because that water is not otherwise recovered by return-flow credits). A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Nevada's existing worldview cleanly, so Boulder City would not resist it and could participate at the margin (its own turf-removal/outdoor savings). But Boulder City's consumptive volumes are small, so the upside to the city is limited; it will take its cue from SNWA on any basin-wide market design. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis, low intensity.

On solar+water. This is the offer most aligned to Boulder City's revealed priorities and where it is closest to a true ally. The city's business model IS leasing Eldorado Valley land for hyperscaler-adjacent solar+storage; a data-center/hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water would let Boulder City monetize the exact asset it already sells (energy-zoned desert land) while giving it a water-positive story to bring to SNWA and residents. It has the zoning (783+ acres rezoned/available, master plan amended for BESS in 2024) and an open BESS RFP, so it is transaction-ready. Caveats that make it persuadable rather than automatic: (1) the city guards the fiscal reliability of lease revenue and will scrutinize any deal that ties its ~35%-of-budget land income to water obligations or new liabilities; (2) any structure that increases on-site WATER consumption (panel washing, cooling) in the desert cuts against SNWA's consumptive-use ethos and would draw pushback; (3) it will not front-run SNWA on water commitments. Frame the water funding as additive revenue plus reduced consumptive draw and this is a strong yes.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, low agency in practice. Reuse is Southern Nevada's crown jewel: SNWA already recycles ~99% of indoor water and earns return-flow credits that stretch Nevada's supply ~70%, so Boulder City is culturally pro-reuse and would welcome large-scale reuse expansion. Desalination is a live Nevada strategy too (Nevada has long pursued ocean-desal-for-exchange deals to firm its Lower Basin supply), so the city would not oppose it. But Boulder City is a wholesale-water taker, not a builder of reuse/desal infrastructure; it neither funds nor operates these at scale and would defer entirely to SNWA and the state on financing and siting. Reaction: passive ally, will endorse whatever SNWA champions; will care mainly if a project needs Eldorado Valley land or affects its energy-lease economics.

A win for them. A win is durable, diversified lease revenue from the Eldorado Valley that preserves or grows the ~35% of the city budget currently funded by energy leases, keeping property taxes lowest-in-Nevada and services intact without growth or gaming. Ideally that revenue comes from a marquee hyperscaler-anchored solar+storage project that is water-neutral or water-positive, giving Boulder City a defensible 'we help fund the river's fix' narrative with SNWA and voters, plus construction/tax-base activity, while keeping the city a follower (low political risk) on contentious basin-wide water allocation fights.

Public record. The city is actively pursuing wastewater reuse options, including for irrigation or return to Lake Mead, and has dedicated over 17,000 acres to solar energy resource zones.

Position. The BIA is not a self-interested water user; it is the federal trustee charged with protecting and improving the trust assets of American Indian tribes, including tribal Colorado River water rights and BIA-operated irrigation and delivery infrastructure. Its longstanding public position is fiduciary: uphold the federal trust responsibility, support tribes in quantifying and securing senior rights (many pre-1922 Compact), and provide technical, factual, and funding support for Indian water rights settlements (35+ congressional settlements since 1978). Operationally the BIA owns and operates major delivery systems in trust for tribes, notably the ~80,000-acre Colorado River Indian Irrigation Project (CRIP) near Poston, AZ, held in trust for the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT). The consistent through-line in DOI/BIA public actions is: tribes were excluded from the 1922 Compact and must now have a meaningful seat in post-2026 operating guidelines; tribal rights (22 tribes hold roughly 3.2 MAF/yr, ~25% of basin supply) must be honored even where they remain 'paper water' unbacked by delivery infrastructure; and federal funding (e.g., the ~$2.5B water-delivery and ~$1.7B settlement funds in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law) should convert paper rights to wet water. Interior under Secretary Haaland moved to restore tribal authority to adopt their own water codes, signaling deference to tribal self-determination. The BIA does not publicly stake out market/desal/energy positions of its own; it filters everything through the trust duty and tribal consent.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but consent- and equity-gated. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive to the BIA ONLY if it works for tribal beneficiaries and does not impair trust rights. Precedent is favorable: CRIT fallowed ~1,600 acres to bank ~8,500 AF (2016), then pledged 50,000 AF/yr for three years starting 2020 for ~$38M, and Congress authorized CRIT off-reservation leasing (Biden signed Jan 2023, up to ~150,000 AF/yr), all requiring reductions in consumptive use. The BIA would back a market that lets tribes monetize senior rights and fund their own infrastructure. But it will insist on three guardrails: (1) tribal consent and self-determination (tribes decide, BIA facilitates, no coerced fallowing); (2) no forfeiture/'use-it-or-lose-it' penalty for undeveloped rights, the core equity flaw that already excludes Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute from Bucket-2 style funds requiring water to be used before it can be conserved; (3) protection of paper-water tribes so they can be paid to NOT develop, not just to fallow existing use. Verified accounting cuts both ways: BIA wants rigor that protects tribal credit but not a verification regime that disqualifies tribes lacking gauges/infrastructure. Net: persuadable-to-ally IF the market pays tribes for undeveloped rights and routes revenue to tribal control.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-interested, but strictly derivative of tribal benefit and consent. The BIA has no institutional stance on hyperscaler-funded solar+storage; it already runs Colorado River Agency electrical services and would evaluate any energy+water buildout through the trust lens and tribal sovereignty. Upside it would recognize: reservations along the river have land, senior water, and solar resource; a buildout that pays for tribal water infrastructure (delivery pipes, canal lining, the mothballed settlement pumps) directly advances the trust mission and reduces BIA's own deferred-maintenance and appropriations dependency. Concerns it would raise: (1) tribal land and water cannot be committed without tribal government consent and often congressional/Secretarial approval given trust-land status; (2) leasing of trust land/water triggers federal review (NEPA, BIA right-of-way and lease approvals) that the BIA itself administers, so it is gatekeeper as much as beneficiary; (3) it will resist any structure that lets a corporate financier capture tribal water value or lock tribes into disadvantageous long-term terms. Verdict: persuadable. The BIA is a facilitator/approver here, not a decision-maker; win the tribes and structure benefits to flow to them, and the BIA becomes an enabling trustee rather than an obstacle.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, secondary to trust priorities, and fiscally wary. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the basin is broadly welcome to the BIA because augmentation reduces pressure to cut existing users, including tribes with undelivered paper rights. It aligns with the trust interest in not having tribal allocations squeezed by scarcity. But the BIA's realistic reaction is muted for three reasons: (1) desal/reuse is capital-heavy and slow, and the BIA's beneficiaries need delivery infrastructure to their existing senior rights FIRST, so it would prioritize wet-water settlement funding over new-supply megaprojects; (2) it will insist that augmentation not become a rationale to deprioritize or 'buy out' unfulfilled tribal rights ('new water solves it, so tribes can wait'); (3) coastal desal and marine outfall projects raise tribal cultural, fishing, and sacred-site concerns for coastal tribes, so BIA would demand tribal consultation on siting. Overall: mild ally on augmentation as a category, but it will not spend political capital on desal ahead of settlements and delivery infrastructure, and it will guard against augmentation being used to dilute tribal claims.

A win for them. A win for the BIA is fulfilling the trust responsibility with less friction and less fiscal strain: converting tribal 'paper water' into 'wet water' by getting delivery infrastructure built and funded (settlement pumps running, canals lined, CRIP modernized or title-transferred to CRIT on tribal terms). Concretely: (a) tribes gain durable revenue streams from compensated conservation and leasing that fund their own water systems, reducing BIA's appropriations dependency and deferred-maintenance backlog; (b) major settlements (above all the ~$5B Northeastern Arizona settlement) get funded and implemented rather than stalled by state resistance to off-reservation leasing; (c) tribes secure a real seat in post-2026 guidelines so future federal decisions are consultation-clean and litigation-proof, shrinking BIA breach-of-trust exposure; (d) any conservation-market or augmentation regime explicitly protects undeveloped senior rights (no forfeiture penalty) and lets paper-water tribes be paid without first having to divert. In short: tribal self-determination advanced, trust assets protected and delivered, funding secured, and the BIA seen by its beneficiaries as an effective trustee rather than the agency that let their water stay locked on paper.

Public record. The BIA actively promotes and funds tribal climate resilience, including water conservation, and facilitates renewable energy development on tribal lands through regulations and funding from the IRA and BIL.

Position. The BLM is the Department of the Interior agency that manages ~245 million acres of federal surface land, much of it in the arid Colorado River Basin (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming). Its role in the river crisis is real but secondary and indirect: the Bureau of Reclamation, not BLM, runs the dams, reservoirs (Powell/Mead), and the interstate allocation/shortage machinery that dominates the crisis. BLM's water footprint is instead land-side: it manages riparian corridors, springs, wetlands, and grazing allotments across the basin, and it files for and holds water rights under state law. In Colorado, BLM explicitly 'files applications for water rights with the State of Colorado' and formulates instream-flow protection recommendations to the Colorado Water Conservation Board (BLM Colorado water program page). Its water rights on public land are frequently junior (many tied to relatively recent federal or beneficial-use dates), which limits their weight in a prior-appropriation shortage. Longstanding position: multiple-use and sustained-yield management under FLPMA, balancing grazing, recreation, conservation, energy, and downstream water quality. Recent posture is dominated by an energy pivot. Under Biden, BLM finalized the 2024 Western Solar Plan (Record of Decision Dec 20, 2024), making ~31-32 million acres across 11 western states available for utility-scale solar applications, steering development toward disturbed lands and near transmission and away from sensitive areas. Under the 2025-2026 Trump 'energy dominance' agenda, BLM ended 'preferential treatment' for wind and solar, moved to rescind the intermittent-energy rule, opened 13.1M more acres to coal, and ran record geothermal lease sales -- but the Western Solar Plan's acreage framework remains in place and solar/geothermal siting on BLM land continues. BLM has not staked out a distinct public position on consumptive-use conservation markets, reuse, or desalination; those sit outside its core mandate.

On conservation. Mildly supportive but largely a bystander. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is aimed at allocation holders (irrigators, cities, tribes, states) -- BLM is not a major consumptive user and holds no large tradable Colorado River entitlement, so it is neither a natural buyer nor seller at scale. Where it engages: its junior instream-flow and riparian interests benefit if a robust market keeps more water in-channel, and BLM/CWCB-style acquisition of senior rights to bolster environmental flows is a model it already understands and endorses in Colorado. It would likely welcome a credible, verified market as good for the riparian resources it manages, but would not lead or fund it. Neutral-to-positive, low intensity.

On solar+water. Most consequential and most contested for BLM, and the clearest engagement lever. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout would predominantly site on exactly the BLM Western Solar Plan acreage BLM has already designated for solar, and the current administration's energy-dominance framing makes BLM eager to permit large energy projects and to book leasing revenue. That is strong tailwind. The 'also funds water' feature is a genuine sweetener: it directly answers the groundwater/endangered-species objections (Amargosa/Devils Hole) that NPS, FWS, tribes, and conservation groups raise against BLM solar, and it helps BLM meet FLPMA multiple-use and riparian-health obligations without new appropriations. Risks that make it persuadable rather than a lock: NEPA/PEIS mitigation requirements, tribal cultural-landscape concerns (BLM is spending ~$2.4M studying renewable-energy impacts on Colorado River Basin ancestral lands), water-for-construction/cooling draws in closed basins, and litigation from conservation groups. Net: strongly interested if the project sites on designated solar zones, minimizes on-site water use, and the water funding is verifiable and tied to habitat/instream outcomes BLM can point to.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously neutral, engaged mainly as a land/right-of-way gatekeeper rather than an advocate. Large-scale reuse and desalination are Reclamation-, state-, and utility-driven; BLM's stake is that pipelines, intake/outfall corridors, brine-disposal sites, and associated transmission would likely cross or sit on public land, requiring rights-of-way and NEPA review. BLM would evaluate such projects through multiple-use and habitat lenses: supportive where they relieve pressure on the groundwater and riparian systems it manages, wary where brine disposal, land disturbance, or endangered-species/desert-tortoise/pupfish impacts are involved. Desal specifically is coastal/inland-brackish and mostly off BLM's core basin footprint except for conveyance corridors. Expect case-by-case permitting posture, not a policy position. Neutral, low-to-moderate intensity.

A win for them. A win for BLM is a project on public land that advances the administration's energy-development and revenue goals AND lets the agency demonstrably meet its FLPMA multiple-use and riparian/habitat obligations at the same time -- solar+storage sited in already-designated zones, generating lease revenue and jobs, while the paired water funding measurably improves the groundwater, springs, wetlands, and instream flows BLM manages and defuses the endangered-species and tribal-cultural objections that normally trigger litigation and delay. In short: fast, defensible permitting that produces energy revenue and better watershed/habitat outcomes on the same acres, with tribal consultation handled and NEPA risk minimized, so BLM can claim both an energy win and a conservation win without spending new appropriations or picking a fight with either the White House or the conservation and tribal communities.

Public record. The agency has established designated leasing areas and competitive processes to spur and streamline the development of utility-scale solar energy on public lands in the West.

Position. Reclamation is not a stakeholder competing for water; it is the federal referee, banker, and dam operator of the whole system, and its 'position' is institutional: keep the reservoirs off critical elevations and keep water and power flowing under the Law of the River. As the Interior Secretary's operating arm, Reclamation is watermaster of the Lower Basin (Boulder Canyon Project Act 1928; Arizona v. California 1963), the sole contracting authority for Lower Basin deliveries, and owner-operator of Hoover and Glen Canyon dams. Its longstanding public posture through the crisis has been 'states first, federal backstop second': push the seven basin states to a consensus, and only impose federal cuts if they fail. Acting Commissioner Scott Cameron (Reclamation has had no Senate-confirmed commissioner since Jan 2025) has flown West roughly every other week since April 2026 pressing for a deal. Reclamation's recent concrete actions define its stance: it stood up the IRA-funded Lower Colorado River Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program (part of ~$4B) to PAY users for voluntary consumptive-use reductions (the 2023 deal: 3.0 MAF Lower Basin conservation to 2026, 2.3 MAF federally compensated at set $/AF prices); it set annual operating tiers (2026 conditions announced Aug 2025); and in Jan 2026 it published the Post-2026 DEIS with four action alternatives (public comment closed Mar 2, 2026, ~18,000+ submissions), planning a preferred alternative in summer 2026 as the 2007 Interim Guidelines, 2019 DCPs, and Minute agreements all expire end of 2026. Notably, three of four DEIS alternatives need Congress, and all action alternatives cut supplies further, without compensation, if the states do not agree. Reclamation is procedurally neutral among the states by design but is the entity that will pull the trigger on unilateral cuts if October passes with no deal.

On conservation. Strongly favorable, this is Reclamation's own existing tool. It literally built and funds the Lower Colorado River Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program to pay users for voluntary consumptive-use reductions at set $/AF prices, and it structured the 2023 Lower Basin deal (2.3 MAF federally compensated) around exactly this mechanism. A rigorously verified consumptive-use market is close to ideal for Reclamation because it converts painful mandatory cuts into voluntary, paid, measurable water it can bank in Lake Mead and count against operating tiers, and it strengthens the administrative record. The two things Reclamation will insist on: (1) verification and additionality credible enough to survive audit and litigation (real wet water, not paper water or double-counting), and (2) a durable funding source, ideally not solely its own dwindling IRA money. If a private/third-party market brings its own capital and hands Reclamation credibly-measured conserved water, Reclamation is an enthusiastic partner and verifier. It will be wary of markets that move water between users without net system benefit, or that create windfalls it cannot defend publicly.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, with a split reaction. On the energy side, Reclamation operates the dams whose hydropower is prized precisely because it is firm and dispatchable, and it and WAPA have tapped that hydro to backstop grid emergencies; new hyperscaler-driven load and any structure that reduces stress on scarce hydro (or firms the grid with solar+storage) is broadly consistent with its mission, though grid marketing sits with WAPA, not Reclamation. On the water side, Reclamation will welcome private capital that funds conservation and augmentation because its own money is finite. The make-or-break question for Reclamation is whether the 'funds water' half is real, verified, additional wet water it can bank, and whether the new data-center load competes for the same river water and power it must protect. It will scrutinize: does this net-reduce consumptive use or just relocate it; does it keep reservoirs above power pool; and can it be documented in the NEPA/operations record. A structure where a hyperscaler carries the capital for solar+storage AND delivers verified conserved/augmented water, with Reclamation as verifier and the grid piece run through WAPA, is attractive. A vague ESG-flavored pledge is not, and Reclamation will not bend delivery or reservoir-protection duties to accommodate new load.

On reuse/desal. Supportive and institutionally aligned, this is squarely within Reclamation's augmentation mandate. Reclamation runs the Title XVI Water Reclamation and Reuse Program, the Desalination Construction Program, and the new Large-Scale Water Recycling program under WaterSMART, and IIJA gave it dedicated money (~$1B reuse, ~$250M desal) to co-fund exactly these projects. Large-scale reuse/desal that reduces draws on the Colorado is welcome because it is one of the few ways to grow the pie rather than fight over a shrinking one, easing the delivery and reservoir pressure Reclamation is legally on the hook for. Its posture is co-funder, feasibility-vetter, and permitter rather than owner: it will push local/state/tribal partners to carry the project and match funds, and it will apply hard-nosed feasibility, cost per acre-foot, energy intensity, and NEPA/permitting scrutiny. Reclamation is realistic that mega-desal (e.g. Sea of Cortez, $5B-class) is expensive, slow, and energy-hungry, and that reuse inside service areas is faster and cheaper. It favors projects with clear delivery/exchange mechanics, secured local cost share, and demonstrable net new supply to the system, and it will not front the bulk of the capital itself.

A win for them. A win is anything that lets Reclamation keep the reservoirs off critical elevations and honor deliveries WITHOUT having to impose unilateral, litigation-bait cuts, and without exhausting its limited (largely IRA/IIJA) money. Concretely: (a) new, verified, additional wet water in the system, whether from voluntary compensated conservation it can measure and bank, or from augmentation (reuse/desal) that reduces draws on the river; (b) a path that keeps Powell above ~3,490 ft minimum power pool and Mead generating, protecting the hydropower revenue that funds dam operations and basin programs; (c) private or third-party capital (hyperscaler, philanthropic, state) that funds conservation and augmentation so Reclamation is not the sole payer; and (d) durable, consensus-backed arrangements that survive NEPA and the courts and outlast the expiring 2007/2019/Minute framework. The best single outcome for Reclamation is a states-plus-private structure that manufactures new supply and paid conservation at scale, letting the federal government be the verifier and backstop rather than the party that has to force painful cuts and defend them in litigation.

Public record. Reclamation is the federal agency directly administering the multi-billion dollar programs to pay for water conservation, fund water reuse and desalination, and pilot solar-over-canal projects.

Position. Reclamation is not a river user but the federal water master of the Lower Colorado (Secretary of the Interior is watermaster below Lees Ferry) and the operator of Glen Canyon, Hoover, Davis, and Parker dams. Its longstanding public position is institutional and process-driven, not advocacy: keep the system's 'critical infrastructure' and 40M+ people supplied, protect Lake Powell/Lake Mead from dropping below minimum power pool and dead pool, meet the 1944 Mexico Treaty, and honor the Law of the River. Its consistent posture is to push the seven Basin States to reach a consensus operating framework and to codify that consensus through NEPA rather than impose a federal solution -- but to be 'prepared to act' if the states fail. This played out in the 2023-2024 near-term SEIS (settled by a May 2024 seven-state/Lower-Basin consensus, 3.0 MAF of conservation with 2.3 MAF federally compensated at ~$400/AF via $4.0B of IRA drought funds) and again in the Post-2026 process: Reclamation opened NEPA in Oct 2023, released five/six alternatives (Nov 2024-Jan 2025), issued the Draft EIS Jan 9-16, 2026, took >18,000 comments through March 2, 2026, and signaled it would 'determine operations' itself in summer 2026 if states still had no deal (as of April 2026 they did not). On conservation and augmentation Reclamation is structurally favorable by mandate: it runs the System Conservation Implementation Agreements (18 short-term deals, ~321,000 AF into Lake Mead through 2026) and the Lower Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program (paying to reduce consumptive use with a history of use), and it is the primary federal funder of reuse and desalination through WaterSMART / Title XVI, the Desalination Construction Program, and the Large-Scale Water Recycling Program (>$3.4B WaterSMART since 2010 leveraging ~$8.96B non-federal). Under the Trump administration (2025-2026) the posture tilted toward faster, more directive federal action and tighter grant control (some Colorado funding delayed then partly released, ~$47M in May 2026); Ted Cooke was nominated as Commissioner to steer the negotiations.

On conservation. Strongly favorable -- Reclamation already IS the buyer and administrator of exactly this. It runs the System Conservation Implementation Agreements and the Lower Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program, both of which pay water users to reduce consumptive use with a recent history of use, and it built the 2024 near-term deal around 2.3 MAF of compensated conservation at ~$400/AF. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive precisely because Reclamation's chronic weakness in these programs is MEASUREMENT and additionality -- proving the saved water is real, additional, and actually reaches Lake Mead/Powell rather than being paper water or re-diverted downstream. A credible verification layer that lets conserved AF count reliably against shortage tiers and show up as reservoir elevation is a direct upgrade to tools it already deploys. Reclamation would engage on: rigor of measurement, whether the market can scale beyond short-term agreements into the post-2026 framework, federal cost per AF, and legal defensibility. Watch-outs: it will insist the market not undercut the Law of the River priority system or become a vehicle for one basin to offload cuts, and post-2025 it is cost-sensitive about how much federal money underwrites the payments.

On solar+water. Interested but through a specific lens -- Reclamation cares about this less as a water user and more as the hydropower operator and system manager. The hook is that Glen Canyon and Hoover hydropower revenue funds dam O&M and basin programs and is eroding as reservoirs drop; a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that firms basin power or offsets lost hydro revenue, AND channels funding into verified conservation or augmentation, hits Reclamation where it actually hurts. It would engage on: whether the structure adds real system water (its only true currency), whether private/hyperscaler capital reduces the federal funding burden it is now politically constrained on, and whether new data-center load competes for the same scarce Colorado River water and grid it must protect. Reclamation is not the electricity offtaker (that is WAPA/the utilities and users like CAP), so it will want a role that fits its mandate -- e.g., proceeds or conserved water flowing to system storage or to programs it funds. Make-or-break: the 'also funds water' component must be measurable wet water or verified reduced consumption, not a marketing wrapper, and any new load must not deepen the deficit it manages.

On reuse/desal. Favorable and already institutionally committed -- Reclamation is the federal government's primary funder and technical sponsor of reuse and desalination. Through WaterSMART it runs Title XVI (reuse/recycling under $500M projects), the Desalination Construction Program (brackish and ocean), and the Large-Scale Water Recycling Program (>$500M projects), having put >$3.4B into ~2,445 projects since 2010 with ~$8.96B non-federal match, and it explicitly frames augmentation as a way to relieve pressure on the river. A large-scale reuse/desal buildout that creates genuinely new supply and reduces call on Powell/Mead is squarely in its mission and can plug into existing funding and feasibility pathways. It will be hard-nosed on the same things a good program officer always is: total project cost and $/AF, energy intensity (especially anything that adds load near a stressed grid), NEPA/environmental compliance, delivery and exchange mechanics (e.g., Mexico-delivered desal exchanged for Colorado River water under Minutes 319/323), and cost-share so the federal government is not carrying disproportionate capital. Post-2025 grant-timing and budget uncertainty is a real caveat: the appetite is structural, but the federal check may be slower or smaller than in the IRA era, so private/hyperscaler capital that reduces the federal ask is a plus.

A win for them. A win is anything that lets Reclamation keep the system operable and the reservoirs above power pool WITHOUT having to impose a contested unilateral cut that triggers litigation and a Compact-call crisis. Concretely: (a) additional, verified, durable system water in Powell/Mead that buys elevation and time; (b) a tool that helps the seven states (or at least the Lower Basin) converge so Reclamation can ratify consensus rather than choose winners; (c) new supply (reuse/desal/augmentation) or reduced consumptive use that shrinks the structural deficit it is managing; and (d) solutions that protect Glen Canyon and Hoover hydropower generation, since that revenue funds dam O&M and basin environmental programs. The cleanest single win: a legally clean, measurable, largely non-federally-funded mechanism that raises or holds reservoir elevations and can be dropped straight into the post-2026 operating guidelines and Record of Decision.

Public record. Reclamation is actively funding and implementing large-scale water conservation agreements, water reuse projects, and desalination research to protect the Colorado River system.

Position. CVC DIF is the infrastructure arm of global PE firm CVC Capital Partners (Netherlands-based, ~EUR19B AUM). In Nov 2024 it entered the Arizona regulated water/wastewater market by acquiring JW Water Holdings (~10 utilities, ~9,000 customers) plus a portfolio of eight regulated water/wastewater utilities from real-estate developer Ed Robson (rooted in Pima Utility Co., founded 1972), together ~18 utilities and ~49,500 service connections, all consolidated under the JW Water banner (~50,000+ customers). Funded via DIF Infrastructure VII (~EUR4.4B/$5B final close). CVC DIF has NO public position on the Colorado River crisis itself. Its revealed stance is a financial/operational one: consolidate fragmented small AZ water/wastewater utilities into a scaled, regulated rate base and earn a regulated return. It positions itself publicly as a long-term infrastructure owner that makes capital investments to improve reliability of small/medium systems. It is a rate-regulated monopoly operator subject to the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC), so it litigates value through rate cases, not through basin water-policy advocacy. It has drawn public criticism (Arizona Capitol Times op-ed, Jan 2026) that post-acquisition Picacho-area operating expenses would rise ~$1.4M (~57%) and extract ~$2M/yr operating profit (~35% margin), i.e., ratepayers financing acquisition premiums, PE margins, and international-investor returns rather than water itself.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive-to-persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is less relevant to a retail wastewater/water utility than to an ag or wholesale rights holder, but CVC DIF benefits if such a market frees up firm supply that lets its utilities add connections (its growth engine) or lets it monetize saved water. Risk it would raise: anything that caps or claws back the supply certificates underpinning its rate base or growth. Likely neutral-to-positive if the market is voluntary, protects utility supply reliability, and is compatible with ACC cost recovery.

On solar+water. Positive / natural counterparty. As an infrastructure PE owner of AZ water and wastewater assets, CVC DIF is exactly the kind of platform that could host or partner on a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-plus-water buildout, especially near its Robson/master-planned community systems and any datacenter load in Arizona. A structure where hyperscaler capital funds new water supply, reuse, or resilience upgrades maps directly onto its model of third-party-funded capital improvements that grow rate base without pure ratepayer burden. Main friction: ensuring the ACC lets it earn on or recover these investments, and avoiding optics of subsidizing datacenters on residents' backs.

On reuse/desal. Most strategically aligned option. Large-scale reuse and (to a lesser degree) desalination create new firm supply that directly de-risks its utilities' growth and reliability thesis, and reuse/advanced-treatment capex is precisely the kind of rate-based infrastructure investment a regulated PE owner wants to deploy and earn on. As a wastewater owner, CVC DIF sits on the feedstock for potable/non-potable reuse. Caveat: it will be disciplined on cost and only pursue projects with a clear regulated-return and recovery path; desal's high capex and distance from its central-AZ footprint make reuse the more likely fit than ocean desal.

A win for them. A structure where new firm water supply (reuse first, hyperscaler-funded supply second, conservation-market-freed supply third) de-risks and expands their AZ growth roll-up, is delivered as ACC-recoverable capital they earn a regulated return on, is financed substantially by third-party/anchor capital rather than residential ratepayers (defusing the 'PE gouging' narrative), and improves the reliability story that supports a clean, well-valued exit at the end of the DIF VII hold.

Public record. CVC's infrastructure fund (CVC DIF) acquired 18 water and wastewater utilities in Arizona, stating a commitment to invest in critical infrastructure for safe and dependable service.

Position. DWR is California's statewide water planning, financing, and operations agency, not the state's Colorado River negotiator. On the river itself, California is formally represented by the Colorado River Board of California (CRB, chaired by JB Hamby) and the Natural Resources Agency (Secretary Wade Crowfoot); DWR Director Karla Nemeth sits inside that same Natural Resources Agency structure. DWR's leverage over the river is INDIRECT but material through three channels: (1) it plans, builds, operates, and finances the State Water Project (SWP), the 705-mile system that delivers ~half of Metropolitan Water District's non-Colorado imported supply, so SWP reliability and Colorado River reliability are substitutes; (2) it runs the state grant programs (Prop 1 water desalination grants, recycled water, IRWM, climate-resilience funding) that fund the local supply diversification which reduces Colorado River demand; (3) it is the state technical/planning authority on desalination and reuse (2024 statewide desalination siting report). Longstanding public stance: conservation-first, supply diversification, and climate adaptation ('Making Conservation a California Way of Life,' AB 1668/SB 606, targeting ~400,000+ AF of urban savings by 2030, with compliance beginning 2027). On the river crisis, the state's official line (via CRB/CNRA, aligned with DWR) is that California will contribute real, verifiable water savings, that its Colorado use is at its lowest since 1949 (urban agencies cut imported demand ~50% since 2000, partly via >350,000 AF/yr of recycled water), and that any post-2026 framework must have transparent, verifiable accounting and hydrology-based, all-basin shared reductions; California has offered ~1.25 MAF in annual Lower Basin reductions.

On conservation. Favorable to strongly favorable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a near-perfect fit with DWR's core doctrine: conservation-first, verifiable accounting, and demand reduction as the cheapest new supply. It aligns with the state's public insistence on 'transparent and verifiable accounting for conserved water' and with the Making Conservation a Way of Life framework. Caveats DWR would raise: (1) it is not the contracting party for Colorado water, so the market must be structured with MWD/IID/CRB, with DWR as a technical/verification and possibly funding partner rather than the buyer; (2) it will want measurement, monitoring, and anti-double-counting rigor consistent with its accounting posture; (3) it will be wary of any structure that undercuts the agricultural-to-urban transfer politics in the Imperial/Coachella Valleys, which are CRB/IID turf. Net: DWR is a natural technical and credibility ally for a rigorous conservation market, not the decision-maker on river allocations.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, with turf and governance caveats. DWR runs 5 SWP power plants and 24 pumping plants and is itself a large power user/generator, so it understands energy-water coupling and would see value in a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water supply. It would most plausibly engage where the water dollars flow into things DWR already champions: recycled water, brackish/ocean desalination pilots (its Prop 1 desal program), groundwater recharge, and SWP resilience. Concerns: (1) DWR will insist any private/hyperscaler financing conform to state procurement, water-right, and environmental-review (CEQA) rules and not create de facto private control of public supply; (2) it will scrutinize the energy-load and cooling-water demand of the data centers themselves as new stressors; (3) river-specific benefits still route through CRB/MWD, so DWR's role is enabling infrastructure and grants, not river accounting. Persuadable if framed as co-funding the diversification and resilience portfolio DWR is already trying to finance amid the Delta tunnel funding crisis.

On reuse/desal. Most favorable of the three; this is squarely DWR's lane. DWR is the state's planning authority on desalination (2024 statewide report identifying future desal plants for reliability goals) and a direct funder (>$82M Prop 1 desal grants to 20 projects; $6M and other rounds). It publicly credits recycled water (>350,000 AF/yr) as a pillar of California's reduced Colorado footprint. Large-scale reuse/desalination directly advances DWR's mission of local supply diversification that reduces reliance on both the Colorado River and the stressed SWP, and it dovetails with the Reclamation-brokered interstate exchange MOU (desalinated/recycled water swaps involving MWD, SDCWA, SNWA, Arizona). DWR caveats: cost, energy intensity, and brine/environmental permitting; it will push for pilots and cost-share rather than blank endorsement, and it will want reuse prioritized where energy and siting pencil out. This is the clearest place DWR moves from persuadable to active partner.

A win for them. A win for DWR is any structure that firms up California's water reliability and reduces Colorado River (and SWP) dependence WITHOUT DWR having to shoulder the full capital burden or fight another Delta-tunnel-style financing and legal battle. Concretely: outside capital (hyperscaler or market) co-funding the recycled water, desalination, recharge, and conservation portfolio DWR is already trying to build; a conservation-accounting standard rigorous enough to survive scrutiny and be credited toward California's basin commitments; and demonstrable progress on the state's stated goals (lowest Colorado use since 1949, ~400,000+ AF urban savings by 2030, >350,000 AF/yr recycled) that lets DWR and the administration show climate-resilient supply diversification while other financing avenues (Delta bonds) stall.

Public record. DWR has secured multiple power purchase agreements for over 280 MW of large-scale solar to power the State Water Project and is a key partner in the Project Nexus solar-over-canals pilot.

Position. California Water Service Group (NYSE: CWT), parent of Cal Water, is a regulated, investor-owned water utility holding company serving ~2 million people across 100+ California communities (Chico to the Palos Verdes Peninsula) plus subsidiaries in Hawaii, New Mexico, Texas, and Washington. It is NOT a direct Colorado River rights-holder and takes no public position on Law-of-the-River allocation politics or interstate basin negotiations. Its Colorado River exposure is INDIRECT and modest: several Southern California districts (e.g., East Los Angeles, Dominguez, Palos Verdes) buy wholesale water from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD), whose supply blends Colorado River water and State Water Project water. Most Cal Water supply is local groundwater and local surface water, not imported Colorado River water. Public posture is operational, not political: a 'customer-first,' conservation-forward drought/resilience strategy (supply diversification, storage, interconnections, backup power, tiered conservation rates, individual customer water budgets, drought credit banking, native-plant 'Plant Local' rebate programs). It delivered ~2.6 billion gallons of recycled water in 2025 and invested a record ~$517M in system infrastructure. It assumes water scarcity, wildfire, and extreme weather are structural, not one-off. Longstanding regulatory position: strong advocate of revenue decoupling via the Water Revenue Adjustment Mechanism (WRAM), which breaks the link between water sales volume and revenue so conservation does not erode its earnings.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-neutral, from a utility-buyer rather than seller vantage. A verified consumptive-use conservation market mostly touches agricultural and large-entitlement holders and MWD, not a decoupled retail water utility. Cal Water's earnings are protected by WRAM, so it does not lose money when its own customers conserve, and it already runs conservation rebate/budget programs it recovers in rates. Where it cares: if a robust basin conservation market stabilizes MWD's Colorado River supply and moderates wholesale purchased-water cost/volatility for its SoCal districts, that is a modest positive. It would want assurance that market costs are not passed through to retail customers in ways that trigger affordability pushback (a live CPUC concern) or that the market does not impair supply reliability. Verdict: mild ally on conservation-as-reliability, indifferent on conservation-as-allocation-politics.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not a natural anchor customer. As a regulated retail water utility, Cal Water is a water supplier, not a large water buyer for data centers, and CPUC rules constrain how it can enter unregulated ventures or cross-subsidize. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure is attractive to the degree it (a) lowers its own energy costs / provides backup power (it already lists backup power as a resilience priority), (b) capitalizes supply projects (recycling, treatment, interconnections) it would otherwise fund through rate base, or (c) strengthens reliability in its districts. It would scrutinize regulatory treatment, ratepayer benefit, and whether third-party capital complements or competes with its rate-base growth model (its earnings come from investing capital itself, so external funding of assets it would rather own-and-earn-on could be a mild negative). Verdict: persuadable if structured as a partner/offtake or grant that improves reliability without eroding rate-base returns.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned of the three options. Cal Water already operates recycled-water delivery (~2.6B gallons in 2025) and treats supply diversification and drought resilience as core strategy, and every treatment/reuse asset it builds enters rate base and earns a regulated return. Large-scale reuse and desalination directly fit its 'diversify away from imported/scarce supply' thesis and reduce dependence on MWD/Colorado River wholesale water in its SoCal districts. Constraints it will raise: capital cost recovery and CPUC approval, energy intensity of desal, affordability impact on low-income customers, and permitting. Verdict: likely ally, especially where reuse/desal can be rate-based and framed as reliability + PFAS-era supply security.

A win for them. A win is improved long-term supply reliability and reduced dependence on scarce imported Colorado River water in their Southern California districts, achieved through rate-base-eligible investment (recycling, desal, treatment, interconnections) that grows earnings under their decoupled model, protects affordability for low-income customers before the CPUC, and de-risks purchased-water cost volatility. Bonus wins: outside capital (hyperscaler/grant) that funds resilience without eroding their return-on-capital model, and conservation mechanisms that stabilize MWD wholesale supply. They want to be seen as a proactive, customer-first resilience leader, not as a party to basin allocation fights.

Public record. As an investor-owned utility, CWT's actions are driven by regulatory requirements and shareholder value, making them persuadable on conservation and new infrastructure if it aligns with their business model and state mandates.

Position. CWA is a 1,300-member, all-volunteer grassroots ag-advocacy organization founded in 1975 in the Coachella Valley itself (founders Cherry Ishimatsu, Corky Larson, Jeri Taylor, Beverly Sfingi). Its stated purpose is to 'speak on behalf of agriculture in an intelligent, informative, direct and truthful manner,' keep members informed on ag legislation, improve the public image of farmers, and advocate on local/state/federal issues plus ag literacy in schools. It is an educational/advocacy voice, not a water rights holder or water agency. NO CHAPTER-SPECIFIC PUBLIC POSITION on the Colorado River crisis, conservation markets, or any specific allocation deal could be found (marked partially unknown). Its longstanding posture is inferable and consistent across CWA: pro-agriculture, defends farmers' access to water and their water rights, frames ag as a $3B+ regional economic engine and food-security asset, and pushes back on narratives that scapegoat farmers for water use. The chapter operates inside the Coachella Valley Water District (CVWD) service area, whose growers hold senior, legally guaranteed Colorado River priority rights delivered via the 123-mile Coachella Canal to ~78,000 acres of high-value farmland (winter vegetables, peppers, dates, table grapes, citrus). CVWD growers have already conserved 118,000+ acre-feet since 2022, cut water use 20%+, and participate in the CVWD Colorado River Water Conservation Program (started 1 July 2024, runs to 31 Dec 2026, pays $340/acre-foot of verified reduction, Reclamation-funded). CWA-CV's likely alignment tracks CVWD and the California Farm Water Coalition: conservation is acceptable if it is voluntary, compensated, and does not permanently strip senior rights or drive farmland out of production.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with what CVWD growers already do voluntarily under the $340/AF program, and CWA's messaging ('farmers are good stewards, they've already cut 20%+') maps cleanly onto a market that PAYS farmers for verified savings rather than mandating cuts. Likely support IF: participation is voluntary, compensation is fair and durable, verification is transparent and not weaponized to challenge underlying rights, and savings do not become a lever to permanently reallocate senior Coachella rights away from ag. Would turn hostile if the 'market' is a soft mandate, underprices water, or is a mechanism to retire farmland. Best used as a validator/amplifier, not a decision-maker.

On solar+water. Mixed, and the most persuadable lever. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could be attractive IF the water benefit flows to keeping farmland productive (recycled water, canal efficiency, storage like CVWD's Mid-Canal project, groundwater replenishment) rather than to buying out/fallowing farms to free up water for data centers. CWA-CV will be wary of any framing that trades irrigated farmland for solar acreage or that positions tech load as a competing claimant on Colorado River water. Frame it as farmers-plus-infrastructure (dual-use, revenue diversification, funded reuse that reduces river draw) and it becomes persuadable-to-ally; frame it as land conversion or a new industrial water demand and it becomes opposition. Note: solar-on-farmland is a known regional sensitivity; lead with water funded FOR agriculture.

On reuse/desal. Favorable. Reuse and new-supply projects are the least threatening option because they ADD water rather than reallocating senior ag rights. CVWD is already expanding its Thermal Water Reclamation Plant with a $39M Reclamation grant to deliver recycled water for ag irrigation (projected 33,600 AF of Colorado River water conserved 2029-2058). CWA-CV would likely welcome large-scale reuse/desal framed as protecting farm supply and reducing pressure to cut deliveries. Caveats: cost/who pays, energy footprint, and any implication that new supply justifies stripping existing senior rights. Strongest natural-ally position of the three options.

A win for them. A durable future for Coachella Valley agriculture: senior Colorado River priority rights protected, farms staying in production and profitable, and any conservation done voluntarily and well-compensated. A win looks like new/reused water supply and funded efficiency that RELIEVES pressure on deliveries (so farmers are not asked to cut deeper), farmers positioned as recognized water stewards and food producers rather than scapegoats, and the chapter itself elevated as the credible community voice and ag-literacy partner in whatever program moves forward. Diversified, farmer-friendly revenue (compensated conservation, dual-use solar that funds ag water) that strengthens rather than displaces the farm economy.

Public record. As a grassroots agricultural advocacy organization in a major agricultural region dependent on Colorado River water, they are likely engaged in conservation discussions, but no specific public record on these exact issues was found.

Position. As Reclamation Commissioner, Touton was the face of the federal government's crisis-era Colorado River posture. Her signature act was the June 14, 2022 Senate Energy and Natural Resources testimony demanding the seven basin states conserve 2-4 million acre-feet in 2023 and giving them a ~60-day ultimatum, threatening unilateral federal action if they failed. That established her as a believer that (a) the system is structurally over-allocated and consumptive use must physically fall, and (b) the federal government will backstop with hard cuts if states cannot self-organize. She simultaneously championed the carrot side: she architected deployment of the Inflation Reduction Act's $4B in drought funding to PAY water users (farmers, cities, tribes) for verified, voluntary consumptive-use reductions via the Lower Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program and the Upper Basin System Conservation Pilot Program. Her consistent framing was that SCPP-style compensated conservation is 'not buy-and-dry' but a flexibility tool that keeps water rights intact. On supply, she and Secretary Haaland repeatedly vowed 'every viable option' is on the table for post-2026, signaling openness to augmentation (reuse, desal, efficiency) alongside demand cuts. She is a consensus-builder by reputation, credited with convening the unprecedented Federal-Tribal-State forum (30 tribes + 7 states), and she secured ~$13B in western water infrastructure investment. Longstanding through-line: science-based, money-follows-conservation, feds-as-backstop, tribes-and-ag-at-the-table.

On conservation. Strongly favorable, and arguably the single stakeholder most predisposed to a verified consumptive-use conservation market. This IS her model: she built the federal machinery that pays for quantified, verified consumptive-use reductions (SCPP, LB System Conservation and Efficiency Program) and repeatedly stressed 'verified/quantifiable consumptive use' and 'not buy-and-dry, rights stay intact.' A market that pays for verified consumptive-use savings is a natural extension and scaling of her IRA-era programs. Her likely critiques would be technical and legitimacy-focused, not oppositional: rigorous measurement and verification (avoid paper water / phantom savings), tribal inclusion and equity, and durability of the funding source now that federal IRA money is politically fragile. A privately or hyperscaler-funded market that removes reliance on year-to-year federal appropriations could actually appeal to her precisely because it de-risks the funding fragility that hit her programs in 2025.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but rigor-demanding, and this is where she is genuinely persuadable rather than pre-sold. She is not an energy-siting or datacenter expert, so a solar+storage buildout is outside her core lane. What resonates: a private-capital mechanism that funds water conservation without waiting on Congress directly addresses the funding-durability wound of 2025. What she will interrogate: whether the water benefit is real and additional (verified consumptive-use reduction, not accounting), whether it competes with or crowds out agricultural and tribal water, the water footprint of the datacenters/cooling themselves (she will not accept a scheme that funds conservation while the load center consumes basin water), and whether tribes and disadvantaged communities share the benefit. Frame it as 'private capital replacing fragile federal appropriations to buy verified consumptive-use reductions, with tribal co-benefit,' and she becomes a credible validator. Frame it as a datacenter land-and-water grab and she turns skeptical.

On reuse/desal. Open and constructive. She and Haaland explicitly kept 'every viable option' on the table for post-2026, and Reclamation under and after her advanced reuse/desal exploration (e.g., the multi-agency MOU on desalinated/recycled water interstate exchanges). She treats augmentation as a legitimate complement to demand reduction, not a substitute for it. Her caveats are the standard federal-realist ones: cost, energy intensity, timeline (augmentation is slow and will not solve the near-term 2027 shortfall), brine/environmental impacts, and the danger that big supply promises become an excuse to avoid the demand cuts she believes are physically unavoidable. She would support reuse/desal as part of a portfolio but would push hard against anyone using it to argue the basin can grow its way out without cutting consumptive use.

A win for them. A win for Touton is her crisis-era model surviving and scaling beyond her tenure: verified, compensated consumptive-use conservation becoming the durable, funded backbone of the post-2026 operating regime, with tribes and agriculture kept whole and at the table, and with a funding source robust enough to survive political swings (which private/hyperscaler capital could provide). Being the credible expert who helped design or bless that mechanism vindicates the 2022 ultimatum and the IRA programs as the right call. Secondary win: a portfolio approach where augmentation (reuse/desal) is additive but demand reduction remains real, proving the basin can be stabilized without collapse and without abandoning the equity commitments that define her legacy.

Public record. As Reclamation Commissioner, she has overseen the investment of billions from the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law into paid system conservation, large-scale water recycling, and desalination projects throughout the basin.

Position. Carlene Yellowhair is Tribal President of the San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe (served 2016-2020; re-elected March 3, 2025). The San Juan Southern Paiute are the only federally recognized tribe in Arizona without a reservation, with a homeland in northern Arizona and southern Utah near Tuba City and Navajo Mountain. Her defining public position is that the Colorado River crisis, for her people, is fundamentally about basic water access and unmet rights, not abstract basin management: 'For far too long, our people have lived without the most basic necessity of life: water.' Many tribal households still lack indoor plumbing, electricity, and piped water, relying on hauled water and distant wells. She champions the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act, a tri-tribal settlement (with the Navajo Nation and Hopi Tribe) that would, for the first time, secure federal Colorado River water rights for the tribe, ratify the 2000 treaty creating a ~5,100-acre southern reservation near Tuba City plus a ~300-acre northern area near Navajo Mountain, and fund infrastructure. Her longstanding frame is sovereignty, homeland, and equitable representation: the tribe has been historically dispossessed and marginalized in resource-management discussions, and settlement is about land, self-determination, and cultural survival, not just water volume. On implementation she is explicit about hard infrastructure: 'We need real infrastructure - pipelines, storage, treatment facilities - so our children drink clean water at home, not from a tank hauled miles away.' As of mid-2026 the settlement is stalled: Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming (Upper Basin) oppose codification, partly over fears that Navajo/Hopi water leasing to Phoenix-area buyers sets a precedent letting the highest bidder buy tribal water, and over basin-accounting disputes. Tribal leverage rests on holding among the most senior, largely unquantified claims on the river; basin tribes are estimated to hold rights to at least a quarter of the river's flow.

On conservation. Cautiously open but not a natural fit in the near term. A verified consumptive-use conservation market presumes an existing quantified allocation to conserve and monetize - which the San Juan Southern Paiute do not yet have. Until the settlement secures a paper right and delivery infrastructure, Yellowhair would view a conservation market as premature and potentially another mechanism that rewards large existing users (who took 'stolen' tribal water for a century) while her people still haul water. She would likely support the principle if and only if it (a) recognizes and pays for senior/unquantified tribal rights first, (b) does not let leasing/markets become a lever for outside buyers to strip tribal water (the exact fear driving Upper Basin opposition), and (c) channels revenue into tribal infrastructure. Framed as 'first quantify and fund your right, then you hold a tradable asset,' she is persuadable; framed as basin-wide belt-tightening before her people have taps, she resists.

On solar+water. Potentially the most directly appealing of the three, if structured to serve the tribe. Many Paiute households lack both water AND electricity, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps onto two of her explicit unmet needs at once. She would react favorably if the deal (a) sites generation/benefits on or for the tribe with real tribal ownership or revenue share and hiring, (b) funds the pipelines/storage/treatment she has named as the priority, and (c) respects sovereignty and cultural/land concerns rather than treating tribal land as a cheap host. She would be wary of extractive framings where a datacenter's water and power needs come first and the tribe gets token benefits - given the century-long grievance of others profiting from tribal water. High upside, contingent on genuine benefit-sharing and consent.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-cautiously-favorable but lower salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the basin could ease the zero-sum pressure that makes states fight tribal settlements, which indirectly helps her. But desal/reuse are distant, capital-heavy, and coastal/urban-oriented; they do not directly put a tap in a Paiute home. She would support them as basin supply augmentation only if paired with a firm commitment that new supply does not become an excuse to further defer or shrink tribal allocations, and if some benefit reaches remote northern-Arizona communities. Not an issue she is likely to lead on, but unlikely to oppose.

A win for them. Congressional ratification of the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act: a legally secured, federally funded Colorado River allocation; creation of the San Juan Southern Paiute reservation (Tuba City southern area plus Navajo Mountain northern area) codifying the 2000 treaty; and built-and-operating infrastructure so every Paiute household has clean piped water and electricity instead of hauled tanks. A win means her people move from being the tribe without a reservation and without water to a recognized homeland with water security, tribal-owned or tribal-benefiting energy and water systems, jobs, and durable sovereignty - achieved without opening tribal water to outside buyers.

Public record. As President of the San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe, her public focus is on securing basic water infrastructure and rights for her tribe through the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act.

Position. The Center, housed in USU's Quinney College of Natural Resources and directed by Jack Schmidt (former chief of USGS's Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center), is one of the most influential science voices in the basin. Its longstanding, well-documented position: the river is structurally over-allocated, aridification/climate change is permanently shrinking supply, and there is no 'extra' water in the system. Its 'Future of the Colorado River' white paper series (Fill Mead First, water-resource modeling, future hydrology, alternative management paradigms) concludes that reservoir-operations tweaks cannot solve the ~1.2-1.5 MAF structural deficit and that permanent demand reduction is the only realistic path. Schmidt states agriculture drives >half of basin consumptive use (M&I only ~18%) and that 'the bulk of cutbacks has to come from agriculture,' warning 'Draconian steps' will be needed. The Center advocates decisions grounded in science rather than law/economics/politics, and treats the river as both commodity and ecosystem. Schmidt is publicly skeptical of supply-side augmentation, calling desalination not 'cost-effective or realistic' and unable to be 'implemented quickly enough,' arguing the focus 'should be on limiting demand and reallocating water.'

On conservation. Supportive-to-enthusiastic, but demanding on verification. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely aligned with the Center's core thesis that permanent demand reduction (especially from agriculture) is the only durable fix. Schmidt has explicitly framed reallocation and using-less as the answer. The Center would scrutinize measurement/verification rigor (consumptive use vs. diversion, evapotranspiration accounting, return-flow effects, permanence vs. temporary fallowing) and would likely be a credible validator if the methodology is sound. Their main critique risk: markets that pay for paper water or non-additional 'savings' rather than real, measured wet-water reductions.

On solar+water. Cautiously neutral-to-skeptical, evaluated on net consumptive water math. The Center is agnostic about who funds solutions but rigorous about whether they reduce actual consumptive use. Solar+storage that displaces water-cooled thermal generation could be viewed favorably on the energy side, but any datacenter/hyperscaler load raises the Center's central alarm about new demand. They would ask: does the water funding buy verified permanent consumptive-use reduction, or does it merely offset new industrial water draw? If it nets to real basin-scale reduction and is measured, persuadable to supportive; if it is greenwashing that adds M&I load, expect a skeptical published critique.

On reuse/desal. Skeptical of large-scale desalination; more open to reuse. Schmidt is on record that desalination is not cost-effective, not realistic at system scale, and too slow to matter for the post-2026 crisis, and that there is no 'extra' water. He would likely characterize desal as a distraction from the harder demand-reduction work. Municipal water reuse/recycling sits better with the Center because it stretches existing supply and reduces net demand, but the Center would still frame reuse as a supplement, not a substitute for cutting agricultural consumptive use. Overall the more supply-side and capital-intensive the pitch, the more resistance.

A win for them. A win is science-grounded policy: real, measured, permanent demand reduction adopted in post-2026 operations, with their research shaping the outcome and their independence intact. Concretely, seeing a verified consumptive-use market or reuse program that demonstrably shrinks basin demand, validated by rigorous accounting they helped design or vet, and being cited as the analytical authority behind it. They win by being proven right that demand management, not augmentation, is the answer, and by having influenced a durable, quantifiable reduction.

Public record. The Center, led by Jack Schmidt, consistently advocates for policy changes to balance water consumption with supply, explicitly analyzing the overuse of the Colorado River.

Position. CAP is the Colorado River's structurally most-exposed large user: authorized in 1968 as the last major diversion, its ~1.5 MAF/yr entitlement holds the JUNIOR priority in the Lower Basin, meaning CAP absorbs Lower Basin shortages first. Its longstanding public position is therefore existential defense of that supply. Under a 2025 Tier 1 shortage, CAP lost ~512,000 AF (~30% of its normal supply). GM Brenda Burman (Jan 2026) called deeper federal cuts 'devastating,' and her consistent line is that reductions 'need to be shared by all' basin states, not borne by Arizona alone. CAP has structured its own internal priority pool system (Excess/Ag pools cut first, then NIA, protecting M&I and Tribal pools) to push pain onto agriculture and buy time for cities. On solutions, CAP is explicitly market- and augmentation-friendly by institutional DNA: its CAGRD subsidiary acquires replenishment water through 'voluntary, market-based transactions'; CAP has run voluntary compensated conservation (system conservation to prop up Lake Mead, e.g. ~356,000 AF voluntary in 2023 on top of mandatory cuts); and CAP has actively studied binational Sea of Cortez desalination via Minutes 319/323 as an augmentation path. It also frames its story around growth (Phoenix/Tucson/Pinal) so any tool that preserves supply for that growth is welcome.

On conservation. Favorable, likely an active buyer/partner. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in CAP's existing playbook: it already runs voluntary compensated system conservation to prop up Lake Mead and its CAGRD explicitly acquires water via voluntary market transactions. CAP would welcome a rigorously measured, additional, and compensated market IF (a) verification is credible enough to count against shortage tiers / earn Lake Mead credit, (b) it is genuinely voluntary and does not become a lever for imposing more mandatory cuts on Arizona, and (c) Arizona is not the only party paying or fallowing. Watch-outs: CAP will resist a market that mainly monetizes senior California/Imperial rights while Arizona still eats the junior-priority cuts, and it will want assurance the conserved water benefits system storage, not just another user.

On solar+water. Most likely the strongest hook of the three. CAP is Arizona's single largest power consumer with a large, volatile pumping-energy bill and a fresh post-Navajo appetite for cheap firm renewables (it already signed solar PPAs at ~half the coal cost). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that lowers or firms CAP's pumping power AND channels funding to water (augmentation or conservation) hits two exposures at once. CAP would engage seriously on: firm/dispatchable power to run pumps through peak-summer deliveries, price certainty vs. volatile market energy, and a structure where the data-center/hyperscaler carries the capital so CAP avoids new ratepayer/property-tax burden. Caveats: CAP will scrutinize whether new data-center load competes for the same water and grid it needs, and whether 'funds water' is real wet water or just PR. Reliability for canal pumping is non-negotiable, so storage/firming is the make-or-break detail.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, cautious on cost and control. CAP has already co-studied binational Sea of Cortez desalination (Minutes 319/323) and augmentation is consistent with its supply-security mission, so large-scale reuse/desal that produces new supply for Arizona is welcomed as a way to stop fighting only over a shrinking river. But CAP will be hard-nosed on the economics ($5.5B-class desal proposals, ~$/AF far above current CAP water), on energy intensity (desal adds load to an entity already straining on power), on who pays and who controls the resulting supply, and on delivery/exchange mechanics (e.g., Mexico-delivered desal in exchange for Colorado River water). It will favor projects where CAP or Arizona secures firm entitlement to the new water and does not shoulder disproportionate capital or power cost. Reuse inside the service area is lower-friction than a mega-desal megaproject.

A win for them. A win is any tool that (a) reduces the depth or probability of cuts to CAP's junior-priority Colorado River supply, especially the M&I and Tribal pools, so Phoenix/Tucson/Pinal growth and Tribal settlements stay whole; (b) is voluntary, compensated, and market-based rather than a mandatory federal haircut on Arizona alone; (c) lowers or stabilizes CAP's large, volatile pumping-power bill; and (d) creates NEW wet water (augmentation/reuse/desal) so Arizona is not fighting only over a shrinking pie. The strongest single win: firm, affordable, low-carbon power for the CAP canal PLUS new supply, delivered without CAP taking on the balance-sheet or ratepayer/property-tax burden it currently shoulders (CAP put ~75% of recent conservation costs onto Pima/Maricopa/Pinal property taxes).

Public record. CAP has entered into long-term power purchase agreements for solar energy but has concluded that covering its canals with solar panels is currently inefficient and too costly.

Position. {'recent_and_longstanding': ['No public statements on the interstate Colorado River crisis, the post-2026 operating guidelines, or Upper/Lower Basin allocation. As a small retail district it operates far below the level where basin positions get taken; searches surface only operational notices, not policy advocacy. (marked unknown / not public)', "Water supply: District states most of its water comes from Blue Mesa Reservoir, treated by Project 7 Water Authority. This ties Chipeta's raw-water reliability to the Gunnison Basin / Aspinall Unit, which is a recurring source of emergency releases to prop up Lake Powell. (chipetawater.org general information page)", 'Operational/financial posture: Board passed a $0.25/1,000-gallon rate increase at the Dec 10, 2025 meeting, effective Jan 1, 2026 (monthly minimum to $23.25), stacked on top of Project 7 wholesale increases, explicitly to build capital for aging-infrastructure upgrades (some ~1960s asbestos-cement pipe still in service). Longstanding pattern of passing through Project 7 wholesale cost increases. (chipetawater.org)', "Drought awareness: District has posted a dedicated 'Drought Management 2026' notice/PDF on its website and disclaims any guarantee of water availability for firefighting, signaling it treats 2026 supply as constrained, consistent with regional forecasts of record drought and possible Blue Mesa emergency releases. (chipetawater.org homepage / drought-management-2026 page)"]}

On conservation. Cautiously positive but marginal. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates mostly at the level of senior agricultural and municipal rights holders (Uncompahgre Valley irrigators, larger municipalities, Project 7), not a small domestic retailer like Chipeta that holds no marketable senior consumptive rights. Chipeta would likely welcome anything that stabilizes Blue Mesa/Gunnison storage and reduces the pressure that drives Project 7 wholesale cost increases, but it is a beneficiary and observer, not a seller. It has little to trade and little capacity to administer a market. Reaction: supportive-neutral, low-engagement; wants reliability upstream, not a new program to run.

On solar+water. Persuadable, interest-driven. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps directly onto Chipeta's single biggest pain point: capital for aging-pipe replacement and Project 7 treatment-plant upgrades that it is currently funding through resented rate increases. Grant or low-cost capital that offsets those upgrades would be attractive. Caveats that make it merely persuadable rather than an ally: (1) a ~36-sq-mi rural mesa district is a small, unlikely host for large hyperscaler load; (2) any new large water demand in the Gunnison/Uncompahgre basin would be viewed warily by the district's own ratepayers and neighboring ag interests; (3) the district lacks staff to negotiate or manage a complex deal. Reaction: open if the water-funding component is real, direct, and lowers ratepayer burden, skeptical if it implies new consumptive demand on its already-stressed source.

On reuse/desal. Low relevance, mild support. Large-scale reuse/desalination is geographically and economically distant from an inland high-desert domestic district whose supply is surface water from Blue Mesa; desal is not a plausible local option, and Chipeta is too small to sponsor reuse infrastructure. It would be a passive beneficiary if basin-scale reuse (e.g., Lower Basin) reduced the call on Upper Basin storage and eased pressure on Blue Mesa releases. Reaction: broadly supportive in principle, no capacity or incentive to lead or fund; effectively a non-actor on this option.

A win for them. A win is boring and concrete: reliable, affordable treated water from Project 7/Blue Mesa year over year, and outside capital that funds their aging-infrastructure and treatment-plant upgrades so they can stop stacking rate increases on a small ratepayer base. Anything that stabilizes Gunnison Basin storage (reducing the odds their source is drained for downstream Powell obligations) and that lowers or offsets Project 7 wholesale costs is a direct win. They do not need a seat at the compact table; they need supply security and rate relief.

Public record. The district has not taken a public position on basin-wide conservation or clean energy issues, so it is considered persuadable due to the absence of stated opposition.

Position. Chuck Cullom (Charles Cullom) has been Executive Director of the Upper Colorado River Commission (UCRC) since January 2022, representing the four Upper Division States (CO, NM, UT, WY). He is a 30-year Colorado River veteran who spent the prior two decades on the Lower Basin side as Colorado River Programs Manager for the Central Arizona Project (CAP), where he ran drought strategy and binational (US-Mexico) conservation and desalination work. That cross-basin history makes him unusually fluent in both basins' interests. LONGSTANDING / CORE POSITIONS: (1) The Upper Basin is a use-as-you-go, hydrology-limited basin that never got its full 1922 Compact apportionment and should not bear mandatory cuts to bail out the over-built Lower Basin. He frames Upper Basin actions as 'going beyond the obligations in the 1922 Compact' and rejects being told to 'shrink': 'For someone to come and tell you, You need to shrink, would be antithetical, anathema to what you were promised in 1922.' (2) Crisis is real and severe: 'We have depleted the storage in those reservoirs to the brink of being empty... We are overspending our bank account and the bank account is almost empty.' (3) The Upper Basin's answer is verifiable, voluntary, compensated, supply-BASED (living within actual runoff) management, NOT open-ended demand management or mandatory curtailment. His flagship instrument is the System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP), which pays willing Upper Basin water users to fallow / reduce consumption (~USD 45M paid across 2023-24, ~USD 29M in 2024). He treats rising SCPP participation as proof-of-concept success. (4) On 2026/post-2026 operating rules he insists new rules track current hydrology, not historical allocations, and has repeatedly rejected Lower Basin proposals as insufficient: 'The Lower Basin proposal for the operation of Lake Powell is insufficient and continues a crisis cycle, both for Lake Powell and for Lake Mead,' and warned proposed Mead flexibilities 'will accelerate the decline in Lake Mead and cause adverse impacts upstream.' (5) He wants negotiated compromise over litigation but has signaled the Upper Basin will not concede its legal position: threatening 'only one way to solve a problem' removes incentive to compromise. (6) On NEW SUPPLY: from his CAP/binational years he has direct desalination and augmentation experience (US-Mexico Sea of Cortez / Pacific desal concepts, Yuma) and has said augmentation 'might be used in the future,' with an open question over whether it serves sustainability/reliability of the existing system or enables new growth. UCRC's own 2025 messaging, however, is pointedly demand-side and contains no augmentation/desal/reuse commitments.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / most-aligned of the three. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the SCPP scaled up and made rigorous, which is already his signature program. He will care intensely about the words 'verified' and 'consumptive-use' because the Upper Basin's credibility problem is measurement/verification of saved water and shepherding it downstream. He will engage IF: (a) participation stays voluntary and compensated (no mandatory curtailment), (b) it does not create a legal precedent that Upper Basin users must give up water, (c) saved water accounting is transparent and defensible, and (d) it is framed as Upper Basin 'real action' that shames the Lower Basin into reciprocal cuts. Risk he will raise: a market that lets the Lower Basin buy Upper Basin water cheaply could be spun as the Upper Basin subsidizing Lower Basin overuse, and Upper Basin ranchers (e.g., Green River, WY) are wary. Net: warm, but only within the voluntary/verified/no-precedent frame.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / PERSUADABLE but not his native turf. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive to him mainly as a NEW MONEY source that pays for conservation/augmentation without federal dependence or forcing Upper Basin cuts. Because his SCPP relies on soft federal funding that could dry up, a private, durable funding stream for compensated conservation or new supply is a genuine draw. Concerns he will raise: (1) datacenter/hyperscaler load is itself a new consumptive water and power demand in the basin, so he will want net-water-positive accounting, not greenwashing; (2) it must not become a vehicle for enabling new growth that increases basin demand (his stated worry about augmentation); (3) it must respect state water law and the compact framework and route through the states, not around them. Persuadable if pitched as private capital that funds verified Upper Basin conservation/augmentation and reduces reliance on curtailment.

On reuse/desal. INTELLECTUALLY RECEPTIVE, INSTITUTIONALLY CAUTIOUS. This is where his personal background is strongest: he ran binational desalination concept work at CAP and briefed augmentation committees, so he understands large-scale reuse/desal technically and does not dismiss it. He has said augmentation 'might be used in the future.' BUT two frictions: (1) desalination physically benefits the Lower Basin / coastal exchange far more than the landlocked Upper Basin, so he will ask 'what does the Upper Basin get?' and resist any deal where the Upper Basin gives up water now in exchange for Lower Basin desal 'someday'; (2) UCRC's current public posture is deliberately demand-side and contains zero desal/reuse commitments, signaling the four states are not ready to hang the negotiation on expensive, slow, unbuilt supply. He will treat large-scale reuse/desal as a legitimate long-run tool but not a substitute for near-term Lower Basin demand reduction, and will be wary of it being used to delay Lower Basin cuts.

A win for them. A post-2026 operating framework that (1) protects the Upper Basin's 1922 Compact apportionment and avoids mandatory Upper Basin curtailment, (2) forces the Lower Basin to make real, quantified demand reductions rather than pushing the burden upstream, (3) gives the Upper Basin a durable, verifiable, well-funded conservation toolkit (scaled SCPP with credible saved-water accounting) that does NOT depend on year-to-year federal appropriations, and (4) adds new supply (augmentation/desal/reuse or new private/hyperscaler funding) as upside that reduces basin-wide risk without conceding the compact fight or enabling uncontrolled new growth. A win lets him show the four states he defended their rights while delivering 'real action,' avoids the litigation the Upper Basin fears, and stabilizes Powell/Mead.

Public record. As UCRC Executive Director, he has publicly led the effort to restart the System Conservation Pilot Program, a compensated conservation plan, but has expressed caution about its scale and the need to prevent profiteering.

Position. ABCWUA is New Mexico's largest water utility (~607,000 people served, ~$170M+ annual operating budget) and is an Upper Basin Colorado River water user by an unusual route: it does not sit on the Colorado River mainstem but imports part of New Mexico's Colorado River apportionment via the San Juan-Chama Project, a transbasin tunnel that moves San Juan (Colorado Basin) water into the Rio Chama/Rio Grande. Its 2008 San Juan-Chama Drinking Water Project (>$400M) ended sole reliance on an overdrafted aquifer. Longstanding public position: conjunctive management (surface + groundwater), treating the aquifer as a 'savings account' drought reserve. It is a nationally recognized conservation leader, cutting per-capita use from ~250 GPCD (1987-93) to ~127-128 GPCD by 2021, hitting the 150 GPCD target three years early, with a 110 GPCD by 2037 goal in its Water 2120 100-year plan. Water 2120 explicitly leans on non-potable reuse, indirect potable reuse, and aquifer storage and recovery (ASR). It is a party to the 2005 Rio Grande silvery minnow ESA settlement, leases San Juan-Chama water for environmental flows, and permanently dedicated 30,000 AF of Abiquiu storage for an environmental pool. Public messaging in 2025 (spokesman David Morris): 'We're not in a crisis in terms of drinking water supply,' framing groundwater as a buffer while acknowledging San Juan-Chama deliveries hit an all-time low (NM users got less than a third of allotment in 2025). It is not a front-line negotiator on post-2026 guidelines (New Mexico's negotiator is Tanya Trujillo at the Upper Colorado River Commission), but its supply reliability is directly exposed to Upper Basin hydrology and any post-2026 curtailment framework.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to supportive as a potential seller/participant, with guardrails. ABCWUA already has deep conservation infrastructure, verified metering, and a documented history of leasing San Juan-Chama water for environmental flows, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is conceptually familiar and could monetize water it conserves or free up compliance flexibility. But it will resist anything that (a) forces it to permanently retire hard-won conservation savings for downstream (Lower Basin) benefit without compensation, (b) complicates its Rio Grande / silvery minnow obligations, or (c) is framed as Albuquerque 'giving up' New Mexico's apportionment. It would want NM State Engineer / Upper Colorado River Commission alignment, clear anti-injury protections for the Middle Rio Grande, and assurance that participation is voluntary and additive to its own plan. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific instrument if structured as Upper-Basin-controlled and protective of in-state flows.

On solar+water. Interested but wary, and sensitive to optics. New Mexico is a live data-center battleground (Meta/Facebook Los Lunas, Project Jupiter), and public concern over data-center water use is high. ABCWUA itself is not the Los Lunas provider, so it is somewhat insulated, but it operates in the same aquifer/Rio Grande system and shares the political heat. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would appeal to ABCWUA if the water dollars flow into its actual priorities (reuse, ASR, treatment, watershed/environmental-pool restoration, leak reduction) rather than into new consumptive demand. It will be skeptical of 'net water positive' / 200%-restoration claims (Meta's model) unless verified and locally additive. Energy angle is secondary to it (it buys power, doesn't sell it) but cheaper firm clean power lowers its large pumping/treatment energy bill. Persuadable if the deal is structured so the data-center load does not compete with municipal supply and the water funding is ratepayer-protective and verifiable.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned option. Reuse is already core doctrine: Water 2120 names non-potable reuse and indirect potable reuse as pillars, and ABCWUA runs operating reuse projects (Northeast Heights industrial effluent and Southeast reclaimed wastewater for turf/parks/golf) plus ASR. Large-scale reuse expansion is a natural fit and a likely ally position, especially if it reduces dependence on shrinking San Juan-Chama deliveries. Desalination is more marginal for Albuquerque specifically (inland, limited brackish access, brine-disposal and energy cost), though New Mexico has statewide brackish-desal interest; ABCWUA would treat desal as a longer-horizon, cost-and-energy-gated supplement rather than a near-term move. Net: strong ally on reuse, neutral-to-cautious on desal.

A win for them. A win is a more reliable, lower-cost path off shrinking San Juan-Chama imports without drawing down the aquifer reserve or raising rates: outside capital (hyperscaler or market) that funds reuse expansion, ASR, leak/loss reduction, and Rio Grande environmental-pool/watershed restoration; a verified conservation market they can participate in voluntarily and get paid for while keeping in-state flow protections; and post-2026 rules that don't impose disproportionate Upper Basin curtailment on New Mexico's apportionment. Concretely: hit 110 GPCD by 2037, grow reuse/ASR as drought-proof supply, hold or improve bond ratings, and keep drinking-water security messaging intact ('not in a crisis') while shielding the silvery minnow / Middle Rio Grande obligations.

Public record. ABCWUA is installing a large solar carport array at its San Juan Chama Water Treatment Plant to offset energy use and has extensive water conservation and rebate programs, including for xeriscaping and smart irrigation.

Position. Anaheim Public Utilities is a municipal retail water utility (~360,000 residents plus the Disneyland/convention economy) whose Colorado River exposure is real but INDIRECT and SHRINKING. Anaheim buys imported water wholesale from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD), whose imported supply is split between the Colorado River Aqueduct and the State Water Project, so only roughly half of Anaheim's imported purchases trace to the Colorado River. Imported water is a minority of Anaheim's mix: the city meets ~77-85% of demand from local Orange County groundwater (managed/replenished by OCWD) and only ~15-30% from MWD (historically cited as 70/30 groundwater/import, more recently ~80/20). Anaheim's stated 25-year plan is to push groundwater to 80-85% as OCWD's Groundwater Replenishment System (GWRS, now 130 MGD, world's largest potable-reuse plant) expands, i.e., its explicit trajectory is AWAY from imported (and therefore Colorado River) water. Notably, Anaheim is one of only three Orange County cities (with Santa Ana and Fullerton) that is a DIRECT MWD member agency with its own MWD board seat (Director Stephen J. Faessel) rather than going through MWDOC, so it participates directly in MWD's Colorado River / imported-supply governance and Colorado River committee discussions. Anaheim's operative public position is regional supply reliability and local self-sufficiency through reuse/groundwater, cost-containment on rising imported-water bills, and drought resilience, rather than any direct Colorado River water-rights advocacy.

On conservation. Mildly favorable but largely indirect; Anaheim is a bystander-beneficiary, not a natural counterparty. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates upstream of Anaheim, at the MWD / basin-states level, not at a retail muni that holds no Colorado River entitlement to sell. Anaheim benefits only if such a market keeps MWD's Colorado River supply more secure and its wholesale rates more stable, which it would welcome. Anaheim itself is more likely to participate on the demand side (its own conservation/efficiency mandates, already baked into its rate formula) and to value GWRS reuse as its 'conservation.' It would support a credible, well-verified market in principle as a MWD member voter, but would resist any structure that raised MWD assessments or Anaheim's pass-through costs to fund payments to senior users elsewhere, and it has little direct water to contribute.

On solar+water. Potentially the most resonant of the three, because Anaheim is a COMBINED electric-and-water municipal utility. Anaheim Public Utilities runs its own electric system, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout speaks to both halves of its business: cheaper/firmer power for its electric customers AND water pumping/treatment energy (energy cost is an explicit line in its Water Commodity Adjustment), plus a funding stream for local water supply. Anaheim would engage seriously if the structure (i) lowers or firms its electric supply cost, (ii) funds real wet local supply (reuse/groundwater/treatment) rather than PR, and (iii) puts the capital on the developer/hyperscaler, not Anaheim's balance sheet or ratepayers. Caveats: Anaheim is a dense urban service area with limited land for utility-scale solar, and new large data-center load could compete for its own grid capacity and water, so it will scrutinize local siting, grid impact, and whether the water benefit actually reaches Anaheim or only the broader MWD pool.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly favorable, this is Anaheim's core strategy. Anaheim is a committed GWRS participant and its entire long-range plan leans on OCWD potable reuse (world's largest, 130 MGD) to raise local supply to ~80-85% and cut imported dependence. More reuse, especially anything that expands GWRS-style recharge or adds recycled supply Anaheim can use, is a direct win and lowers its Colorado River exposure. Desalination: cautious to lukewarm. Orange County's ocean-desal history (the Huntington Beach/Poseidon project) is politically fraught and was criticized as merely swapping existing supply for costly private water without adding net local supply; Anaheim is inland with no coastline, so seawater desal is a regional MWD-level question for it, and it will judge any mega-desal on $/AF versus its cheap groundwater and reuse, on who bears the capital, and on energy intensity (relevant to it as an electric utility). Net: enthusiastic on reuse, skeptical and cost-driven on large desal.

A win for them. A win is (a) lower and more predictable imported-water cost passed through MWD, so Anaheim can hold retail rates for households and its tourism/commercial base; (b) continued expansion of drought-proof LOCAL supply (GWRS reuse, groundwater treatment/PFAS cleanup) that lets Anaheim keep cutting its dependence on imported and thus Colorado River water; (c) reliability of the MWD imported backstop for the ~15-30% it still needs, especially the east/south Anaheim areas served primarily by imported water; and (d) not being asked to shoulder new capital or ratepayer burden for basin-scale fixes it did not create. The cleanest single win: someone else's capital funds new regional supply or reuse that reduces MWD's Colorado River draw and stabilizes wholesale rates, without Anaheim taking on debt or a rate increase.

Public record. The utility has a state-mandated goal of 60% renewable energy by 2030 and offers customers a voluntary 100% green power program.

Position. Arvada is a Front Range municipality that gets about 75% of its water from Denver Water's North System, which includes the Moffat Collection System that diverts Fraser River (Colorado River tributary) water through the Moffat Tunnel to Gross Reservoir. The remaining ~25% comes from its own Clear Creek and Ralston Creek rights (Arvada and Ralston reservoirs). It is therefore a consumer-of-Colorado-River-water city, not a basin-management authority. Its public posture is pragmatic reliability-and-conservation, not river-policy advocacy: it follows Denver Water's drought staging contractually (declared Stage 1 mandatory 2-day/week watering restrictions effective April 15, 2026 amid record-low snowpack), runs conservation programs (lawn-replacement and low-water garden incentives via a Resource Central partnership, recycled-water splash pads), and is investing in supply security. It has entered a financial-participation agreement with Denver Water to buy into the Gross Reservoir expansion in exchange for additional supply sufficient to meet buildout needs, and in 2025 bought land for a $315M new water treatment plant (target 2030) to replace the aging Ralston plant. Officials (e.g., infrastructure communications manager Katie Patterson) frame Arvada as being in a 'really good position' with a diversified/blended supply relative to neighbors like Lakewood and Wheat Ridge that lean almost entirely on Denver Water. No evidence of Arvada taking public positions on interstate Colorado River allocation, the post-2026 guidelines, or Lower Basin cuts; it operates one step removed, via Denver Water.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-interested. Arvada already runs demand-side conservation (turf replacement, low-water gardens, recycled water) and follows Denver Water drought staging, so it is culturally aligned with treating water as scarce and paying to save it. A verified consumptive-use conservation market would appeal if it (a) offered a cheaper or lower-risk supply hedge than buying more Gross yield or building the $315M plant on schedule, and (b) let Arvada or Denver Water monetize/acquire saved consumptive use to firm up buildout supply. Caveats: as a mostly-Denver-Water city, Arvada would likely act through Denver Water and Colorado's system rather than transact directly, and Colorado (Upper Basin) water-rights law and 'no injury' rules make consumptive-use accounting contentious. So: warm in principle, but its participation is gated by Denver Water and state water-court mechanics, not a unilateral yes.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not a natural anchor buyer. Arvada is a residential/suburban provider, not a large industrial or data-center water user, so it has little direct hyperscaler load to leverage. It would evaluate a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-that-also-funds-water offer purely on whether the water dollars reduce its own supply cost or risk (e.g., subsidizing reuse, buying down the treatment plant, or firming Gross-dependent supply). Concerns: it will not want data-center demand competing for the same Front Range Colorado River supply it is fighting to secure, and it will be wary of tying municipal water security to a private tech buildout. Persuadable if structured as new/independent water (reuse, efficiency) that nets positive for Arvada ratepayers, skeptical if it is just another straw on the same stressed system.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned of the three. Arvada already uses recycled water operationally and sits in a state (Colorado) actively pushing potable and non-potable reuse to close the supply-demand gap; nearby Colorado Springs runs direct potable reuse. Large-scale reuse fits Arvada's stated strategy of long-term planning plus a new treatment plant and would create drought-proof local supply that reduces dependence on litigated Colorado River diversions. It would likely support reuse strongly if capital and regulatory cost are manageable, especially blended with the 2030 plant. Desalination is largely irrelevant to an inland Front Range city (no marine source; brackish groundwater desal is niche) and would draw little interest except as a component of advanced reuse treatment. Bottom line: reuse = strong yes; desal = mostly N/A.

A win for them. A win for Arvada is firm, litigation-proof supply to buildout at a cost its ratepayers can bear, with less dependence on contested Colorado River diversions. Concretely: (1) an alternative or supplement to Gross-expansion yield that survives whatever the 10th Circuit decides, (2) local drought-proof reuse capacity that pairs with the 2030 treatment plant and reduces reliance on Denver Water's Moffat system, and (3) cost offsets (grants, hyperscaler or market dollars) that soften the $315M plant and rate/SDC increases. If a conservation market or reuse-plus-funding structure delivers reliable supply while trimming ratepayer cost and legal risk, Arvada can credibly claim it kept its 'really good position' through the drought.

Public record. The city has a 2019 Water Conservation Plan, an Energy Action Plan, is pursuing SolSmart designation for solar-friendly policies, and offers residents programs for lawn replacement and water-wise landscaping.

Position. Avondale is a West Valley Phoenix suburb (~90,000 residents, 41 sq mi) and an AMWUA member. It holds a CAP subcontract of ~5,416 AF/yr of Colorado River water, roughly 30% of its renewable supply; the rest is SRP Salt/Verde surface water (~7,000 AF/yr) plus groundwater and 100%-recharged effluent. Its CAP water is largely recharged (Hieroglyphic Mountain, McDowell, Crystal Gardens wetlands, NAUSP) and recovered as groundwater, with a $9M interconnection completed Jan 2021 letting Phoenix treat and deliver a portion of Avondale's CAP water directly into its distribution system. In its Sept 8, 2022 post-2026 letter to Reclamation (Water Resources Manager Jennifer Davidson and PW Director Kirk Beaty), Avondale explicitly adopted the AMWUA municipal platform: (1) manage the system for reliability over maximized diversions and address the Lower Basin structural deficit; (2) incorporate climate-change/aridification science and drop wet-hydrology bias from Reclamation modeling; (3) 'Shortage Sharing Must be Equitable and Basin-wide' - all users plus Mexico share reductions; (4) 'Post-2026 Operations Should Provide Flexibility for Shortage Mitigation such as augmentation, exchanges, and conservation'; (5) create a Basin-wide Municipal Sector Committee; (6) continue collaboration/consultation with states, Tribes, Mexico, NGOs. It called near-term supply uncertainty 'unacceptable' and stressed that new supplies/infrastructure need time, financing, and Council approval. Longstanding posture: aggressive supply diversification, 100% wastewater and reclaimed-water recharge, a 100-year ADWR Designation of Assured Water Supply, and active conservation (xeriscape/smart-irrigation/rain-barrel rebates, pool-removal workshops). Issued a Drought Stage 1 declaration and won AZ Water Association awards for its planning.

On conservation. Favorable-to-supportive. Avondale explicitly listed conservation and exchanges among the flexibility tools it wants preserved in post-2026 operations, and it already runs rebate/conservation programs. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits its stated preference for 'flexibility for shortage mitigation.' Caveat: as a buyer/participant it will scrutinize cost, verified additionality, and whether the market protects (not erodes) municipal priority. It will not want a market that lets agricultural or upstream users monetize savings while cities still bear cuts, and it insists shortage sharing be 'equitable and Basin-wide.' Persuadable to enthusiastic if the market is credible, MRCWD/ICS-compatible, and priced within a small-city budget.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested / persuadable. Avondale sits in metro Phoenix's data-center and industrial corridor and serves industrial customers, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could offset its concern that 'new supplies and infrastructure require considerable time and financing' plus Council approval. A deal that finances augmentation, recharge, or reuse capacity for the city would be attractive. Concerns: net water demand of the data centers themselves (cooling), equity/optics of a private tech buyer securing water while residents conserve, and control over the resulting supply. Would want the water benefit to be additive and city-controlled, not a mechanism for a large new consumptive load.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive of reuse; supportive-but-secondary on desalination. Avondale already recharges 100% of its wastewater and reclaimed water and runs multiple recharge/wetland facilities, so scaling advanced reuse (including potable reuse) is a natural extension of its existing strategy and low political risk. It named augmentation explicitly as a desired tool. Large-scale desalination (e.g., a Sea of Cortez / statewide augmentation project) it would back as basin-scale augmentation via AMWUA, but as a small inland city it is a downstream beneficiary, not a driver, and will care about the delivered cost and how the capital is shared. Reuse is its wheelhouse; desal is a 'yes, at the state level' vote.

A win for them. A win is durable supply certainty at a small-city-affordable cost: locked-in reliability of their ~30% Colorado River share (or a firm, financed replacement), reduced draw on the finite aquifer their CAP exchange currently stresses, and outside capital that shortens the time/financing/Council lead time for new supply, recharge, or reuse infrastructure. Concretely - a conservation-market or hyperscaler-funded structure that lets Avondale bank/secure additional renewable supply and expand recharge/potable-reuse capacity while keeping municipal priority intact and shortage burdens shared equitably basin-wide, so the city can keep meeting its 100-year Assured Water Supply obligation and support continued growth without rate shocks.

Public record. The city has implemented an incentive-based water conservation program for residents and is a partner in a large-scale battery energy storage facility.

Position. No public position statement on Colorado River water allocation or the river crisis could be found. Banning is a small municipal electric utility (Banning Electric Utility, BEU), publicly owned since 1922, serving ~13,110 retail customers over ~22 sq mi with a ~51 MW summer peak. Its connection to the Colorado River is NOT as a water user but as a federal hydropower allottee: it holds a Boulder Canyon Project / Hoover Dam power entitlement of 0.0442% of Hoover output, vested by contract through 2067 under the Hoover Power Allocation Act of 2011 (current terms began Oct 1, 2017). Its portfolio is otherwise diverse and heavily renewable (~75-80% renewable, driven by a 20-yr COSO Geothermal contract that began Jan 2022, plus SCPPA geothermal in Imperial County, nuclear, solar, landfill-gas, and wholesale market purchases to cover summer peaking). Renewable share is expected to drop toward ~70% by 2027 as resource mix changes. As an SCPPA member (11 munis + 1 irrigation district JPA), its river-policy voice is effectively exercised collectively through SCPPA, not independently. Longstanding public posture is pro-clean-energy and RPS-compliant (met/exceeded RPS Compliance Periods 1 and 2), but silent on basin water politics.

On conservation. Largely neutral-to-mildly-favorable but indirect. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not touch BEU's business directly (it uses no Colorado River water). Its interest is purely second-order: anything that keeps water in Lake Mead sustains reservoir elevation and therefore preserves Hoover generating capacity and BEU's cheap federal hydropower entitlement. They would not oppose it and would quietly benefit, but would not spend political capital or money on it. Persuadable-to-supportive if framed as reservoir-elevation protection for hydropower, indifferent otherwise.

On solar+water. Most likely positive and the strongest engagement hook. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses BEU's actual problem: it can backfill eroding Hoover firm capacity with clean generation that protects their renewable portfolio and shields ratepayers from summer-peak market exposure, while the water-funding component props up Lake Mead elevation and thus their hydropower entitlement. As a small utility with limited balance sheet, externally financed firm-clean capacity is attractive. Caveats: they will scrutinize cost vs. current below-market Hoover power, deliverability to their 51 MW peak, and integration through SCPPA procurement. Persuadable leaning ally on this specific offer.

On reuse/desal. Indifferent-to-neutral, with a small indirect upside. Large-scale reuse/desalination reduces Colorado River consumptive demand and can support reservoir levels (helping Hoover output), which BEU passively benefits from. But desal/reuse is energy-intensive; to the extent it raises regional wholesale power demand and prices, it could modestly worsen BEU's summer-peak market purchase costs, a mild negative. Net: not their fight, no strong reaction expected either way. Unknown whether they have considered it at all.

A win for them. A win is cheap, firm, reliable replacement power that protects Banning ratepayers from summer-peak price spikes as the Hoover hydropower entitlement erodes, ideally clean generation that also keeps their ~70-80% renewable portfolio intact without a rate shock. Secondarily, any mechanism that props up Lake Mead elevation (and thus preserves their Hoover capacity and its below-market cost) is a passive win they benefit from without having to act.

Public record. No public position on Colorado River water allocation, paid conservation, or large-scale solar could be found.

Position. Blythe is a small (~12,500 residents) incorporated city in the Palo Verde Valley of eastern Riverside County, sitting on the Colorado River. It is not itself a Colorado River contractor; its water context is defined almost entirely by the surrounding Palo Verde Irrigation District (PVID), which holds California's MOST SENIOR Colorado River rights (priority dating to Thomas Blythe's 1877 filing) and diverts at the Palo Verde Diversion Dam ~9 miles NE of town. Blythe's economy is agriculture, retail/services, recreation, and nearby state prisons. Its longstanding, deeply felt public position is grievance about land fallowing: since the 2004-2005 PVID-MWD Land Management, Crop Rotation and Water Supply Program (running to 2040), Metropolitan Water District of Southern California pays PVID farmers to idle up to ~29-35% of valley farmland (~26,000+ acres) and ship the saved water to coastal cities. MWD is now the largest single landowner inside PVID. Local leaders say fallowing 'gutted the farm economy,' erased farm jobs, and hollowed out Blythe's downtown and ag heritage, even with per-acre cash payments and the MWD-funded Palo Verde Valley Community Improvement Fund (PVVCIF) plus a $6M community development fund meant to offset losses. PVID itself sued MWD in 2017 (Riverside County Superior Court) alleging MWD's parcel leases exceeded the 29% cap and violated CEQA, harming the region's environment and economy. In a June 8, 2021 Blythe City Council meeting, Vice Mayor DeConinck reported MWD was pushing to raise the fallowing allocation (from ~25% up to ~50%) to prop up Lake Mead, treated by the council as a threat to the local economy. Separately, the council is wrestling with the OTHER post-ag land use: solar. ~11,000 acres of solar are already built on the Palo Verde Mesa (Blythe Solar Power Project, Blythe Mesa Solar), and the council passed a temporary moratorium on new commercial solar within city limits to control scale/siting and protect its Colorado River Corridor specific plan. Net: Blythe experiences the river crisis as an EXTRACTION problem, where its water and land are converted into someone else's supply and someone else's power, and it is left managing the economic hole. It wants conservation and land-conversion dollars to actually rebuild the local tax base and jobs, not just flow through to farmers and coastal utilities.

On conservation. Cautiously negative to skeptical, and the single most sensitive item. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is, from Blythe's chair, fallowing 2.0 unless designed differently. Twenty years of PVID-MWD fallowing is exactly a consumptive-use conservation transaction, and the city's settled verdict is that it paid farmers while gutting the town's jobs, businesses, and ag heritage. Blythe will support a conservation market ONLY if it (a) favors deficit/partial-season irrigation over long-term full fallowing (the city has seen the Imperial deficit-irrigation model praised as less economically damaging, and that model is built on 20 years of Blythe-area research), (b) caps the share of land idled, and (c) routes a defined slice of revenue into permanent local economic development and municipal coffers, not a pass-through mitigation fund. A market that just makes idling farmland more liquid and lucrative will be read as accelerating the hollowing-out and will draw council opposition and lobbying through PVID.

On solar+water. Most positive of the three, and the natural persuasion wedge, if structured for local benefit. Blythe already hosts ~11,000 acres of mesa solar and sees post-ag land conversion to energy as the obvious economic future, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with where the tax base is already heading. BUT the council's solar moratorium signals it will not accept sprawling, low-benefit projects that consume land and viewshed while leaving few permanent jobs and modest county lease fees. To win Blythe, such a project must deliver permanent O&M jobs, meaningful host-community fees/property tax to the CITY (not just the county or BLM), local hiring, and it must respect the Colorado River Corridor specific plan and city siting authority. The 'also funds water' component is attractive if the water benefit is framed as strengthening the local/regional supply and economy rather than exporting yet more Blythe water to the coast. Framed right, this is where Blythe flips from persuadable to ally.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but low-salience; largely someone else's project. Large-scale reuse/desalination that augments supply for coastal California could indirectly RELIEVE pressure on Blythe by reducing MWD's appetite to fallow more Palo Verde farmland for Colorado River water, which the city would welcome. But desal/reuse plants are coastal and Blythe captures little direct local benefit unless a facility or its construction/operations footprint lands in or near the valley (unlikely). Blythe will not oppose it and may cite it rhetorically ('build new supply instead of taking ours'), but it is not a mobilizing issue for the city and offers little to trade. Support is conditional and rhetorical rather than active.

A win for them. A win is diversification of Blythe's economy so it no longer swings on how much farmland MWD chooses to idle: durable local jobs and municipal tax/fee revenue that replace the ag payroll fallowing took away, plus a real say in siting so land conversion (solar, storage, reuse) happens on Blythe's terms and inside its corridor plan. Concretely: permanent operations employment, local hiring/training pipelines, host-community fees and property-tax base large enough to fund city services, and community-benefit agreements that lock those in. Secondarily, being treated as a decision-maker at the table rather than a downstream casualty of PVID-MWD deals.

Public record. The city is located within the Palo Verde Irrigation District, which has a long-standing program paying farmers to fallow land and transfer conserved water, and is near several large-scale solar projects on public land.

Position. Boulder is a Front Range municipality that depends on the Colorado River indirectly, via transmountain diversion rather than a direct in-basin allocation. About two-thirds of its supply comes from local Boulder Creek watersheds (Middle and North Boulder Creek, feeding Barker and Silver Lake reservoirs); the remaining ~one-third is imported across the Continental Divide from the Colorado River headwaters through the Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) and Windy Gap projects operated by Northern Water. Boulder holds roughly 16,800 acre-feet of C-BT allocation (delivered at Northern Water's annual quota, ~70-80% of face value). Longstanding public posture is supply diversification and conservation-as-resilience rather than engagement with interstate allocation politics: the city frames its Colorado River exposure as a managed risk it hedges by leaning on the Boulder Creek basin when west-slope deliveries fall. Recent positions (2026): entered Drought Watch April 2026 amid extreme drought (basin snowpack at 25-32% of normal, Middle Boulder Creek snowpack melting out ~6 weeks early), asking for a voluntary ~10% reduction; adopted a daytime watering prohibition (no lawn irrigation 10am-6pm, May 1-Sept 30, approved Jan 2026), twice-weekly watering guidance, and shutoff-nozzle/leak rules. The city runs a standing Water Conservation Program (efficient fixtures, waterwise landscaping, irrigation upgrades) and a Water Resource Recovery Facility that treats wastewater and recovers biosolids and renewable natural gas. Boulder has published no clear public position on the post-2026 operating guidelines, interstate cuts, or Upper/Lower Basin negotiations - it treats those as outside its lane. Boulder County (distinct from the city but overlapping politically) is also the host county for Denver Water's contested Gross Reservoir expansion, a transmountain-diversion storage project Boulder-area environmental interests have long fought.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-neutral, but as a participant hedging its own supply rather than as a seller. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Boulder's conservation-first identity and technocratic culture; the city already targets voluntary reductions and demand hardening. Its most likely interest is buying firmed/verified supply or paying into conservation that protects the transmountain third of its portfolio, or partnering to credit the savings it already achieves. Boulder has little surplus consumptive use to sell (it's demand-constrained, not a large ag user), so it is a demand-side/participant, not a supply-side seller. Verification and additionality rigor will appeal to its data-driven staff; watch for concern that a market could be a backdoor to justify more diversion.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but skeptical and values-sensitive. Boulder is climate-forward and would welcome solar+storage and a funding mechanism that reduces water stress, but its electorate is wary of large corporate/data-center actors and of anything perceived as enabling more water extraction to power growth. The pitch must foreground the water-funding and decarbonization benefit and be explicit that it does not expand transmountain diversion. Framed as hyperscaler capital de-risking municipal water while advancing clean energy, it is persuadable; framed as a data-center water/energy play, it draws opposition. Expect due-diligence questions on who controls the water and whether it locks in demand growth.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly aligned and the most natural fit. Boulder already operates a Water Resource Recovery Facility and treats sustainability as a brand; large-scale reuse that stretches existing supplies without new diversion matches its identity and reduces its Colorado River exposure directly. Expect genuine interest, subject to cost, water-quality, and Boulder Creek instream-flow/ecological concerns (its discharge supports the creek). Desalination: largely irrelevant to Boulder - it is an inland Front Range city with no brackish/ocean source, so ocean desal is not applicable and only inland brackish concentrate management would matter at the margins. Net: enthusiastic on reuse, indifferent-to-skeptical on desal.

A win for them. A win is firming Boulder's water supply against Colorado River / C-BT delivery shortfalls without expanding transmountain diversion or raising rates in a way that provokes its conservation-minded electorate - i.e., avoiding mandatory restrictions and demand-driven crises through supply reliability plus conservation. Concretely: a hedge that protects the one-third of supply exposed to Colorado River cuts, credit or recognition for conservation leadership, and a path that aligns with its climate/sustainability brand. Reuse and efficiency that stretch existing supplies (letting them do more with the same water) are natural wins; anything that lets them claim climate leadership while quietly de-risking the west-slope third of their portfolio lands well.

Public record. Boulder's Climate Action Plan targets 100% renewable electricity by 2030 and the city actively promotes water conservation programs like lawn replacement, though it has opted out of graywater reuse citing implementation costs.

Position. Boulder City is a small (~15,000-resident) municipal purveyor and an SNWA member agency drawing on Nevada's Lower Basin allocation of 300,000 AF/yr (the smallest of the three Lower Basin states). Its public identity is built on conservation-by-constraint: voters passed a Controlled Growth Ordinance in 1979 capping annual residential/hotel building permits, and the city charter bans gaming , it markets itself as a small, low-growth town, 'Home of Hoover Dam and Lake Mead.' On the river crisis it does not act as an independent policy voice; it follows SNWA's line and implements SNWA rules (Year-Round Mandatory Seasonal Schedule, the 2003 Drought Plan, turf-removal/rebate programs, and the 2024-2029 Joint Water Conservation Plan). Its most distinctive, publicly-documented river fact is a liability: it is the ONLY SNWA/Lake Mead partner agency that does not return its treated wastewater to Lake Mead for return-flow credits. Roughly 1.2-1.5 million gallons/day of effluent goes to evaporation ponds (some reused for solar-site and quarry dust control), water that is simply lost rather than earning Nevada return-flow credit that would stretch the state's allocation. SNWA is running a feasibility study (pipeline to Lake Mead vs. injection well vs. in-city irrigation) that could recover 800+ AF/yr; a ~$980K federal grant (via Rep. Dina Titus) is a first step, but SNWA says full infrastructure is 'years out' and costs tens-to-hundreds of millions. Separately, the city is in a high-profile 2026 fight over energy/data-center land use: it earns ~$17M/yr (~35% of its budget) from solar leases on ~11,000+ acres in the Eldorado Valley, and a Nov 3 2026 ballot (Question 1) asks voters whether to let the Council consider data-center leases. A proposed 170 MW 'Townsite Solar 2' AI data center would consume 600,000+ gallons/day of the city's effluent; the Planning Commission voted 6-1 against, a change.org petition drew 6,200+ signatures, and residents frame data centers as a threat to the town's identity.

On conservation. Broadly favorable but as a follower, not a leader. As an SNWA member agency, Boulder City already implements compensated/mandatory conservation (turf rebates, seasonal schedules, drought plan) and Southern Nevada's whole model is consumptive-use discipline plus recycling credits, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is philosophically aligned. It is unlikely to be a large independent seller , it is small and its biggest 'conserved water' opportunity is not fallowing but recovering the wastewater it currently evaporates. The most credible market hook for Boulder City is one that credits/monetizes recovered reuse water (the 800+ AF/yr it now loses) rather than demand cuts on a town already under a growth cap. Expect it to defer to SNWA and the Colorado River Commission of Nevada on how any market plugs into Nevada's allocation and intentionally-created-surplus/credit accounting.

On solar+water. The most double-edged of the three , potentially the strongest hook AND the current flashpoint. Boulder City is already the region's premier solar-lease landlord (~11,000 acres, ~$17M/yr, ~35% of budget) and is structurally eager for high-value energy uses of Eldorado Valley land. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water aligns with both its revenue dependence and its wastewater-recycling need, and could be extremely attractive IF structured to avoid the data-center backlash. Critical caveats grounded in the live fight: the proposed 170 MW Townsite Solar 2 AI data center , which would draw 600,000+ gallons/day of the city's effluent and stress the grid , drew a 6-1 Planning Commission 'no,' a 6,200+ signature petition, and a Nov 2026 ballot question, precisely because it pairs big power with big water and threatens the town's identity. So the make-or-break is water: a package that delivers solar+storage revenue while REDUCING net consumptive water use (e.g., funding the reuse/recharge fix, using dry-cooling, not competing for the effluent residents want returned to Lake Mead) could flip persuadable-to-ally; one that adds a large new water draw walks straight into an organized 'no.'

On reuse/desal. Most clearly favorable of the three , reuse is Boulder City's single best, already-endorsed opportunity. The city, SNWA, Rep. Titus, and local editorial voices all publicly back building infrastructure to stop wasting 1.2-1.5 MGD to evaporation and instead earn return-flow credits; SNWA's feasibility study explicitly evaluates a Lake Mead pipeline, an injection/recharge well, and in-city irrigation to recover 800+ AF/yr. A large-scale reuse initiative that funds or accelerates this is close to an unqualified win for Boulder City. Constraints are cost and pace: SNWA calls it 'years out' and pegs infrastructure at tens-to-hundreds of millions against a small municipal budget, so outside capital and SNWA coordination are decisive. Desalination proper is remote from Boulder City's own operations (that is an SNWA/basin-scale and binational question), so it would view desal supportively-in-principle through the SNWA lens rather than as a local project.

A win for them. A win is: (1) turning the daily wastewater-to-evaporation loss into recovered, credited water , the reuse/recharge infrastructure SNWA is studying , so Boulder City stops being the lone Lake Mead user that gives nothing back and helps stretch Nevada's 300 KAF allocation; ideally with outside capital covering the tens-to-hundreds of millions rather than the city's small budget or ratepayers; (2) protecting and growing the ~$17M/yr Eldorado Valley energy-lease revenue that funds ~35% of the budget, WITHOUT triggering the water/power/identity backlash now surrounding the data-center vote; and (3) preserving the small-town, controlled-growth, Lake-Mead-gateway identity residents are mobilizing to defend. The strongest single win pairs new lease revenue with a project that funds or delivers the wastewater-recycling fix , revenue up, water waste down, no new consumptive draw, no threat to the town's character.

Public record. The city has dedicated thousands of acres of public land to large-scale solar energy generation to fund city services and is actively working with the Southern Nevada Water Authority on wastewater reuse options.

Position. Bullhead City is an on-river Arizona municipality in Mohave County (Tri-state area opposite Laughlin, NV) that is almost entirely dependent on the Colorado River mainstem. It holds a favorable Lower Basin priority: an original Bureau of Reclamation entitlement (~15,210 AF, tracing to a 1982 Mohave County contract for 10,000 AF transferred to the city in 1985) that it grew to roughly 29,149 AF/yr by buying up allocations from Kingman and Cibola-area (La Paz County) farmers in the 1990s-early 2000s. Its water is high-priority mainstem 4th-priority/present-perfected-class water, senior to the Central Arizona Project. Its longstanding, consistent public position is fierce opposition to any transfer of Colorado River mainstem water off-river to central Arizona. The City Council passed Resolution 2019R-49 (opposing transfer of ~2,913 AF of 4th-priority water from GSC Farms / Cibola Valley to the Town of Queen Creek) and Resolution 2020R-45 (opposing the ADWR-recommended transfer of GSC Farms 4th-priority water to Queen Creek, demanding the Secretary of Interior deny it and require a full NEPA EIS and ESA review). In Feb 2023 the Council joined (up to $3,000) an amicus brief supporting the Mohave County / La Paz County / City of Yuma lawsuit seeking injunctive relief against BOR's approval of the Queen Creek transfer. Its framing: transfers from smaller river communities to metro areas that have alternative supplies set a bad precedent, threaten rural Arizona's economic future, and endanger habitat in the five lower-river national wildlife refuges; it repeatedly cites Mohave County's USDA disaster-drought designations and Reclamation 'hot spot' designation. On the Post-2026 operating guidelines, Bullhead City aligns with Mohave County (represented by Clark Hill), which objects to any priority-based cut scheme that would load the bulk of future shortage onto Arizona 4th-priority on-river holders like Bullhead City and Lake Havasu City, and prefers a percentage-of-use-based cut alternative as least onerous. On conservation, the city has an adopted Water Conservation Plan (2022 update) with phased municipal-code drought restrictions (voluntary at Tier 1 escalating to mandatory bans on fountains, misting, driveway/car washing at Tier 2), turf-replacement rebates, smart-irrigation and efficiency incentives, and aquifer injection/recharge. Utilities Director Mark Clark has publicly acknowledged 'at some point, we may be required to reduce our water usage,' but the Tier 1 shortage did not immediately affect the city because of its senior priority.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive to neutral, with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is broadly compatible with how Bullhead City already thinks: it runs a formal conservation plan, offers turf-buyback rebates, and values keeping water in the system. It could welcome a mechanism that lets senior on-river users be compensated for verified reductions and that keeps saved water on the mainstem or in Lake Mead. Two hard conditions: (1) the market must NOT become a vehicle for permanently moving water off-river to central Arizona or metro buyers, which the city has fought repeatedly and would read as the same threat as the Queen Creek transfers; and (2) senior/present-perfected priority must be protected, not diluted, so the city is a potential seller-on-its-own-terms, not a source to be raided. Framed as protecting rural on-river holders and rewarding real conservation, it is a persuadable yes; framed as enabling transfers to the CAP service area, it is a hard no.

On solar+water. Likely interested / persuadable, an economic-development opening. Bullhead City is growth-oriented, needs jobs and tax base beyond gaming/tourism, and sits in a high-solar-resource region. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure (recharge, efficiency, reuse, drought-proofing) could be attractive: new investment, construction and permanent jobs, and outside money paying for water resilience the city would otherwise fund itself. Concerns to manage: it will scrutinize the water footprint of any large data-center/industrial load (it does not want a new consumptive user competing for its scarce mainstem allocation), land/siting and desert-habitat impacts, and whether promised water funding is real and durable rather than a one-time sweetener. If the deal is net-water-positive for the city and does not encumber its Colorado River entitlement, expect openness; if the compute load itself is a large new water draw, expect resistance.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, especially reuse/recharge; desalination interest is real but secondary and cost-sensitive. The city already practices aquifer injection/recharge and efficiency, so large-scale reuse fits its existing playbook and lets it stretch its mainstem allocation without buying more or cutting the tourism economy. It would favor reuse/augmentation that adds supply to the system and relieves pressure to raid on-river 4th-priority water, which is exactly the outcome it wants politically. On desalination (e.g., ocean desal or brackish groundwater with an exchange for Colorado River water), it would likely support Arizona/Lower Basin augmentation that increases the total pie and protects its priority, but as a small city it is highly sensitive to cost, rate impacts on residents, and who pays. It will want augmentation funded regionally/federally rather than on the backs of small rural ratepayers.

A win for them. A durable, funded outcome where Bullhead City keeps its senior Colorado River priority intact, its ~29,149 AF entitlement is not eroded or transferred off-river, and its river-dependent tourism/gaming economy stays viable. Concretely: (1) the Post-2026 rules distribute shortage by percentage-of-use rather than dumping cuts on Arizona 4th-priority on-river holders; (2) any conservation market or transfer respects priority and does not enable metro/CAP buyers to strip rural on-river water; (3) outside money (hyperscaler, reuse/recharge, federal augmentation) pays for the city's water resilience and brings jobs, so residents and ratepayers are protected; and (4) precedent is set that rural on-river communities are compensated partners, not sacrifice zones. A win lets the city say it defended local water and grew the economy without raising rates or losing its river.

Public record. The city has participated in paid Colorado River conservation pilot programs and actively promotes water conservation through rebates for turf removal and efficient appliances, funded by its water resource fees.

Position. BWP frames itself around supply diversification, conservation and recycled/reuse water rather than river-basin politics. Longstanding positions: (1) it publicly acknowledges that it is 100% dependent on imported MWD water sourced partly from the Colorado River and that climate change and unpredictable drought cycles complicate long-term supply planning; (2) it aggressively promotes conservation ('we all must do our part to help sustain water supplies,' per AGM of Sustainability Jeannine Edwards) and is in Stage III of its Sustainable Water Use Ordinance, including drought-triggered outdoor irrigation bans; (3) it treats recycled water as core strategy, produces ~4 MGD, requires recycled water for large landscape/industrial uses, runs the Magnolia Power Project (first power plant in the world on 100% recycled water) and the EcoCampus; (4) it is actively pursuing supply drought-proofing via a potable reuse facility to capture the ~4.2 MGD of recycled water currently discharged to the ocean (would 'drought-proof' ~12.5% of supply) and has sought federal Reclamation WaterSMART funding for potable-reuse planning and desalination study. BWP is a member agency inside MWD's structure and generally aligns with MWD messaging (e.g., 'make conservation a way of life'). It has no public record of taking sides in Upper/Lower Basin allocation fights, DCP/post-2026 guidelines negotiations, or interstate litigation; its public stance is local self-reliance and cost containment, not basin governance.

On conservation. Likely supportive but cautious. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates mostly at the wholesale/agricultural and MWD level, not at a small retail municipal buyer like Burbank. BWP would welcome anything that improves Colorado River reliability and slows MWD wholesale rate increases, since imported-water cost is its single biggest driver. It would be receptive to participating on the demand side (its own conservation and recycled-water offsets already function as verified reductions of MWD purchases) and could see a market as validating investments it is already making. Caution: BWP has little water it can 'sell' into such a market (it has no direct river right and already runs near its groundwater credit ceiling), so the upside is indirect (cheaper/steadier MWD water) rather than a revenue stream. Persuadable-to-ally on this if framed as cost relief.

On solar+water. Potentially very interested. BWP is a combined electric-and-water municipal utility with its own generation (Magnolia Power Project, EcoCampus) and an active sustainability/clean-energy identity, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water fits both halves of its mission. It faces capital pressure on both a $35M-class potable reuse project and aging pipe replacement, so outside financing that offsets ratepayer increases (the thing it is politically most sensitive to) is attractive. Burbank also hosts significant commercial/studio and potential data-center-adjacent load, making it a plausible host or offtaker. Reaction depends on control and rate structure: as a municipal utility that values local control and 100% recycled-water/green credentials, it will want the deal to strengthen (not bypass) its own system and to visibly hold down water and power rates. Persuadable, leaning positive, if the water-funding component is real and reduces its imported-water dependence.

On reuse/desal. Strongly aligned; this is already BWP's declared strategy. It is pursuing a potable reuse facility (~$35M advanced water purification) to use 100% of its recycled water and drought-proof ~12.5% of supply, has sought Reclamation WaterSMART funds, and has publicly floated desalination using deep-ocean-water technology. Large-scale regional reuse/desal (e.g., Pure Water Los Angeles, MWD-scale programs) that reduces reliance on the Colorado River Aqueduct directly serves its interest in supply reliability and cost stability. Main concerns would be cost allocation (who pays, and whether it raises MWD wholesale rates in the near term), energy intensity of desal (relevant to it as the power utility too), and preserving local control over its own recycled-water assets. Clear ally on reuse; supportive-but-cost-sensitive on desal.

A win for them. A win for BWP is cheaper, more reliable water that lets them slow or avoid the next round of double-digit ratepayer increases while keeping local control and their green/recycled-water leadership. Concretely: (1) outside capital that funds their ~$35M potable reuse facility and aging-pipe replacement without raising Burbank rates; (2) anything that stabilizes or lowers MWD wholesale imported-water costs (which a verified basin conservation market or large regional reuse/desal could do); (3) new firm local supply that reduces their 100% Colorado-River/SWP import dependence and shrinks their exposure to drought-driven irrigation bans; (4) for the hyperscaler concept, a structure where large new load co-finances water and clean-energy infrastructure that BWP owns or benefits from, reinforcing its combined utility mission. The deliverable they can sell to their Council and ratepayers is 'more drought-proof supply, rate relief, and continued sustainability leadership.'

Public record. Actively developing local solar-plus-storage, water reuse, and has signed an agreement for a subsea desalination project to diversify its water supply.

Position. Cerritos runs its own small municipal potable water utility (PWSID CA1910019) serving ~50,000 residents in southeast Los Angeles County. Its public, consistent posture is self-reliance on local groundwater: in 2024 three deep wells (640-1,000 ft) into the Central Groundwater Basin supplied ~2.32 billion gallons, or 100% of potable drinking water. Metropolitan Water District (MWD) imported water, which blends Colorado River and State Water Project supply, is held only as a standby/emergency backup connection, not a routine source. The city is a long-standing water-reuse pioneer: since 1988 it has run an 80+ mile purple-pipe recycled-water system (from LACSD's Los Coyotes Water Reclamation Plant) irrigating 200+ acres of parks, medians, schools, a college, a cemetery, freeway landscaping and the Cerritos Towne Center, and it publicly touts ~815 million gallons of potable water saved. The Central Basin it draws from is replenished by the Water Replenishment District of Southern California (WRD) using imported, recycled and stormwater. So Cerritos' identity is 'local groundwater + aggressive reuse,' with the Colorado River sitting several steps upstream (via WRD replenishment purchases and the MWD backup). No public record found of Cerritos taking an explicit position on Colorado River basin negotiations, cuts, or interstate allocation; its public statements are operational (rates, wells, recycling) not policy-facing on the river crisis. Mark that policy stance as unknown.

On conservation. Likely mildly positive but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates mostly at the level of large Colorado River rights-holders and MWD, not a groundwater-based retail city. Cerritos already conserves aggressively (100% groundwater potable, extensive recycling) so it has little marketable consumptive Colorado River use of its own to sell. It would view such a market favorably if it eases MWD/WRD cost pressure or rewards the recycled-water offsets it has invested in for decades, but it is a taker of the outcome, not a shaper. Persuadable-to-supportive if framed as protecting the affordability of its WRD replenishment and MWD backup; indifferent if framed abstractly. Confidence moderate.

On solar+water. Likely cautiously interested but not a natural anchor partner. Cerritos is a small residential/commercial city, not a data-center or generation host, and its water need is modest and largely met. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could appeal directly to its real pain point: paying for ~$23M in aging pipe/equipment repairs without another 76% rate shock to angry ratepayers. If such a program offered capital for well rehabilitation, recycled-water expansion, or replenishment financing, Cerritos could be persuadable. But it would scrutinize local siting, control, and any strings, and it lacks the land/load profile that makes a city a priority host. Reaction depends heavily on whether dollars flow to its infrastructure backlog. Confidence low-to-moderate; no public statements exist.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly favorable and on-brand. Cerritos is one of the earliest and most extensive recycled-water cities in LA County (purple pipe since 1988, 200+ acres, ~815M gal saved), so large-scale reuse expansion aligns with a 35-year track record and its self-image; it would likely champion regional reuse (e.g., LACSD/Central Basin, WRD advanced-treatment replenishment like potable reuse for the basin) if costs are shared and it retains local control. Desalination: neutral-to-skeptical. Cerritos is inland with no coastal intake and no desal need given ample groundwater; desal matters only insofar as it frees up MWD/Colorado River supply regionally and affects imported-water rates it pays indirectly. It would support desal as a regional supply-diversification play but not fund or host it. Confidence moderate-to-high on reuse, moderate on desal.

A win for them. A win for Cerritos is affordable, reliable local supply with minimal rate pain: their groundwater basin stays healthy and adequately replenished at stable WRD assessments, their MWD emergency backup stays available and not price-shocked, and outside capital (state grants, hyperscaler-funded water infrastructure, or regional reuse cost-sharing) helps retire the $23M-plus infrastructure backlog so they avoid another ~76% ratepayer increase. Extending their recycled-water leadership (more purple-pipe or advanced-treatment replenishment) with shared funding, while keeping local control of their wells and system, is the outcome they would celebrate.

Public record. The city has operated a comprehensive recycled water program since 1978, which now saves approximately 815 million gallons of potable water annually by irrigating parks, schools, and commercial properties.

Position. {'summary': "Chandler is a ~280,000-person East Valley Phoenix suburb and one of the most water-planning-forward cities in Arizona. Its core public position is that 'careful planning and diverse water supplies have prepared us for the Colorado River shortage' - it markets itself as ready, not panicked. Chandler draws roughly 37% of its drinking water from the Colorado River via the Central Arizona Project (CAP), ~57% from the Salt/Verde rivers (SRP), and only ~6% from groundwater, and it has banked over 500,000 acre-feet in its aquifer as a drought buffer. It runs an aggressive reuse program ('every drop used twice'), has a certified 100-year assured water supply, and has cut per-capita use ~24% since 2015. Politically, Chandler leadership has pushed back on federal proposals to cut Arizona's river allocation: Mayor Hartke co-signed a letter urging Reclamation to reconsider proposed cuts, arguing reductions would harm Arizona's semiconductor manufacturing base.", 'longstanding': "Chandler has planned for surface-water shortage for decades and built a diversified portfolio deliberately: CAP Colorado River contracts (including high-priority M&I water it bought from the Gila River Indian Community roughly a decade ago, partly to secure Intel's expansion), SRP Salt/Verde deliveries, groundwater wells (now ~32 active), and an extensive reclaimed-water system serving 400+ direct-use customers (golf, landscape, industry). It has long framed itself as a 'retention basin' that harvests stormwater and recharges aquifers ('water savings accounts'). Chandler's identity is tied to being a manufacturing/tech hub (Intel Ocotillo campus, Microchip), so its water strategy has always been about guaranteeing large-industrial supply reliability, not just residential demand.", 'recent': "In Sept 2025 Chandler moved to Stage 2 mandatory conservation reflecting SRP cuts plus Colorado River Tier 2 restrictions. In 2024 it completed a new Reclaimed Water Interconnect Facility (RWIF, membrane treatment) to treat SRP/CAP water and recharge aquifers, and is spending ~$45M on new water facilities. In March 2026 it announced a well-system expansion aided by a $1M federal grant to further diversify as 'the Colorado River gets less reliable' (Mayor Hartke: 'This diversification is essential to ensuring stability in the face of drought and the growing demands on the Colorado River'). Notably, Chandler's City Council UNANIMOUSLY rejected a proposed ~422,000 sq ft data center (Active Infrastructure) despite lobbying by former Sen. Sinema - a signal it will trade away marginal high-water/high-energy growth to protect its supply and existing industrial base. It is bracing for possible cuts starting 2027 when the post-2026 interim guidelines expire and the seven basin states remain deadlocked."}

A win for them. A win = Chandler keeps its 100-year assured supply intact through the post-2026 cliff, protects its Colorado River / CAP share, and safeguards its semiconductor and manufacturing base - while adding new firm, verified supply (reuse, banked water, market-acquired conservation) without absorbing arbitrary top-down cuts. Concretely: (1) a verified consumptive-use market it can use to buy or bank reliability and defend M&I priority; (2) funding/partnership that scales its reuse and advanced-treatment lead (it becomes the regional model and gets capital for it); (3) an energy+water structure that firms its supply and power with outside capital and does NOT import high-water data-center load into the city. Chandler gets to remain the East Valley's 'we planned for this' city - reliable, industry-friendly, water-secure - and to be pointed to as the template, not the cautionary tale.

Public record. The city has a robust water conservation rebate program for residents and businesses, has invested over $34 million in solar installations at city facilities, and operates a major water reuse partnership with Intel.

Position. {'summary': "Colton is a small full-service municipal utility in San Bernardino County (~20,400 electric customers; the oldest muni electric in the county, serving since 1895) that provides electric, water, and wastewater. Its Colorado River nexus is almost entirely on the ELECTRICITY side, not water supply. Colton takes 100% of its drinking water from local Bunker Hill Basin groundwater (10 wells, ~120+ miles of mains) and explicitly states it plans to keep doing so, so it has NO direct Colorado River water-supply dependence. On power, Colton is a member of the Southern California Public Power Authority (SCPPA) and receives federal Hoover Dam / Boulder Canyon Project hydropower plus a share of Palo Verde nuclear (Arizona) and, historically, coal from San Juan and the Intermountain Power Project (IPP) in Utah. So the river shows up in Colton's portfolio as cheap federal hydro allocation and as thermal generation whose cooling water sits in the basin's political orbit.", 'longstanding': "Colton's durable posture is a low-cost, reliability-first municipal utility protecting a rate advantage (its residents pay ~40% under investor-owned utilities and ~30% under the state average). It has leaned on cheap legacy baseload (Hoover hydro, Palo Verde, San Juan/IPP coal) and SCPPA joint-action to keep costs down. Its 2017 Integrated Resource Plan and SCPPA membership commit it to the region-wide transition off coal (San Juan retirement; IPP repowering from 1,800 MW coal to an 840 MW gas/hydrogen-capable plant), so it is institutionally aligned with decarbonization but primarily as a cost-and-compliance follower of SCPPA, not a policy leader. On water it has consistently framed itself as blessed with a huge local aquifer (Bunker Hill Basin holds 3M+ acre-feet) and therefore insulated from the imported-water and Colorado River fights that dominate coastal Southern California.", 'recent': 'Colton has been financially stressed on the electric side: a 2016-2021 rate freeze left a ~$24M utility deficit, power costs jumped ~$17M in a single year, and it imposed an 8.5 cent/kWh Power Cost Adjustment in April 2023. As of 2025-2026 it is stabilizing - the PCA was cut to 4 cents on July 1 2025 and slated to zero in Oct 2025, with modest base-rate revenue adjustments (3.0% FY2026 tapering to 1.0% FY2029). No public statement was found of Colton taking any explicit position on Colorado River allocation, Lower Basin cuts, or the post-2026 operating guidelines. Its recent bandwidth is consumed by rate stabilization and the SCPPA-led coal-to-clean transition, not basin water politics.'}

A win for them. A win for Colton is cheaper, more stable power and protected local water at no new cost to its ratepayers. Concretely: (1) access to low-cost hyperscaler-funded solar+storage capacity (preferably via SCPPA) that lets it retire or de-risk expensive legacy baseload and hold its rate advantage while the PCA stays at zero; (2) outside capital for recycled-water and groundwater-recharge at its RIX/tertiary system that reinforces Bunker Hill Basin self-sufficiency; and (3) staying a reliability-first, low-cost muni that never has to touch the Colorado River for water and treats the river only as a hydro asset. It gets rate relief and supply security, and it is spared becoming a party to basin water fights it has no reason to enter.

Position. The City of Delta is a small Western Slope municipal utility (~9,000-10,000 residents, Delta County seat) sitting at the confluence of the Gunnison and Uncompahgre rivers, both tributaries of the Colorado. It is a full-service municipal utility (water, wastewater, municipal electric, refuse) drawing surface supply from the Gunnison/Uncompahgre system within the Upper Colorado River Basin (Water Division No. 4, Gunnison Basin). Delta itself has published little direct, city-level public position on the Colorado River crisis; its interests are represented collectively through the Gunnison Basin Roundtable, the Colorado River Water Conservation District (which spans Delta County), and the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District. Those bodies define Delta's de facto stance: (1) alignment with the Upper Basin argument that headwater users should not bear mandatory cuts because they never used their full 1922 Compact apportionment; (2) support for conservation only if it is temporary, voluntary, and compensated (demand management), not permanent buy-and-dry of ag land; (3) strong protection of senior Colorado water rights and wariness of 'use it or lose it' erosion. Delta is agriculture-dependent (Delta County has 250,000+ acres of farmland; the federal Uncompahgre Project irrigates 76,000+ acres via the Gunnison Tunnel), so the city's political economy is tied to protecting irrigated agriculture as much as municipal supply. Note: the 'one city' that offered water into the System Conservation Pilot Program in the widely cited 2024 round was Pueblo Water, NOT Delta, so Delta should not be assumed to have voluntarily offered supply.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits the Upper Basin/River District doctrine Delta aligns with: temporary, voluntary, compensated reductions rather than permanent buy-and-dry. Rigorous measurement (e.g., the LI-710 evapotranspiration sensing used in the local System Conservation Pilot Program work) addresses the region's core fear that 'paper' conservation gets double-counted or becomes a backdoor to permanent curtailment. Delta and its ag neighbors would want ironclad protection of water-right priority, assurance that participation cannot be used to prove non-use ('use it or lose it'), and that dollars flow to local users, not out of the basin. The River District's stated line (efficiency and temporary programs yes, permanent retirement of ag land no) predicts Delta's posture. Sell it as a revenue tool that keeps water rights intact.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical; persuadable with the right structure. Delta is a rare municipality that already runs its own electric utility plus an independent power plant, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure is more legible to Delta than to most water-only utilities. Upside they would weigh: outside capital for treatment/storage/reuse they cannot self-fund, plus potential municipal-electric and local tax/jobs benefits, plus economic diversification for a farm-dependent county. Skepticism they would raise: data-center water and power demand as a NEW consumptive load on an already-stressed Gunnison system; whether the 'funds water' commitment is durable and locally controlled or a one-time sweetener; grid interconnection and whether cheap hyperscaler power actually reaches ratepayers vs. the campus. Frame it as demand-neutral or demand-reducing (power the pumps/treatment, fund reuse) and locally governed, and Delta leans in.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: favorable and the strongest fit. Potable/non-potable reuse and wastewater recycling let Delta stretch existing decreed rights without seeking new appropriations or triggering compact fights, and Delta already operates the wastewater plant, so reuse is an incremental, grant-fundable upgrade. This is likely their preferred 'new water' path. Desalination: largely not applicable and low priority. Delta is an inland freshwater/surface system with no brackish or seawater source at scale; large-scale desal is geographically irrelevant to them except possibly small brackish-groundwater or ag-drainage salinity treatment (the Lower Gunnison Basin has a federal salinity-control interest). Treat desal as a Lower Basin solution Delta is neutral-to-indifferent about, and lead with reuse.

A win for them. A durable, locally-governed deal that (a) brings outside capital (hyperscaler and/or state/federal cost-share) to fund reuse, storage, and treatment upgrades Delta cannot finance on its own; (b) creates a compensated, verified, TEMPORARY conservation revenue stream that leaves senior water rights fully intact and cannot be used to prove non-use; (c) protects the irrigated-agriculture base of Delta County rather than retiring it; and (d) ideally leverages Delta's existing municipal electric utility so cheaper clean power lowers pumping/treatment costs and ratepayer bills. Success looks like Delta being a demonstration site that keeps its water, strengthens its balance sheet, and diversifies its economy, all without ceding Compact/legal ground the Upper Basin is fighting to hold.

Public record. As a small municipal utility on the Western Slope, the city has not been a vocal participant in basin-wide policy debates, making its position on these specific programs largely undefined.

Position. Durango is a small municipal water provider in the Colorado River Basin (Upper Basin, San Juan/Animas sub-basin) that has moved from complacency to acute concern. Its supply comes primarily from the Florida River (gravity-fed 9 miles to the 267 acre-foot / ~74M-gallon Terminal Reservoir near Fort Lewis College) with the Animas River as a pumped backup from the Santa Rita Park intake. Longstanding posture was 'wait-and-see' / kicking the can: an engineering study concluded the city should connect to Lake Nighthorse (Animas-La Plata Project federal reservoir, ~123,541 acre-feet) via one of three pipeline routes, but the pipeline stayed a paper concept for years. That posture broke in 2026. On April 10, 2026 the City Manager declared a Stage 1 Water Shortage/Drought condition after Southwest Colorado snowpack hit the lowest on record (~13% of normal; snow water equivalent under 3 inches vs a 30-year average of ~18 inches). A city-commissioned study documented a ~19.7% decline in average annual precipitation in the Florida watershed since the late 1980s and up to ~35.7% runoff decline. City officials (e.g., assistant finance director Jarrod Biggs) now publicly pair infrastructure with conservation ('when we talk about a pipeline, we also have to talk about conservation') and are fast-tracking the Lake Nighthorse regional pipeline plus a new water treatment plant, targeting ~5-year completion. Durango is a water-security-first, supply-augmentation-and-conservation actor, not a visible participant in basin-scale compact/allocation politics (that is carried by Colorado's state engineer, the Colorado River District, and the Southwestern Water Conservation District).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but with reservations. Durango has explicitly embraced conservation as a co-equal pillar with the pipeline and declared Stage 1 restrictions, so demand-side and market-based tools align with its stated direction. A verified consumptive-use conservation market could be attractive if it helps fund or de-risk its supply gap and rewards the aggressive conservation it is already imposing on residents. Caveats: as a small junior-ish municipal user dependent on direct flow with almost no storage, Durango is wary of any market that lets larger/senior users monetize savings while leaving Durango exposed in dry years, or that complicates its ability to firm up Lake Nighthorse deliveries. Reaction hinges on whether the market treats municipal drinking-water reliability as protected and whether Durango can be a buyer of security rather than only a seller of curtailment. Persuadable, needs to see it strengthens rather than trades away its supply.

On solar+water. Likely interested, given its \$100M funding gap and the pumped-water energy cost of Animas supply. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps onto two real Durango needs at once: capital for the Lake Nighthorse pipeline/treatment plant and cheaper/cleaner energy to run pumping. Durango is a progressive, sustainability-minded municipality, so clean-energy framing is a plus. Concerns: a data-center-scale load arriving in a water-short San Juan basin raises the specter of a large new consumptive/energy demand competing with the city and tribes for scarce water and grid capacity, and Durango would scrutinize whether 'funds water' is real, durable, and locally controlled rather than a headline. Persuadable-to-favorable if the water funding is concrete, ratepayer-protective, and the project's own water footprint is small or offset.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: plausibly favorable and locally relevant; desalination: largely irrelevant. Durango's Santa Rita Water Reclamation Facility treats ~1.7 MGD and currently discharges treated effluent to the Animas River (Modified Johannesburg process, ~99% TSS/CBOD removal). Colorado has a Direct Potable Reuse rule, and reuse is gaining attention in the drought era, so a reuse push could add a drought-resilient supply wedge the city currently forgoes. Barriers: capital cost stacked on top of the \$100M pipeline program, advanced-treatment complexity for a small utility, and Animas River return-flow / downstream water-rights obligations that constrain how much effluent Durango can legally capture and reuse rather than return to the river. Large-scale desalination is not applicable to an inland high-desert headwaters city with no brackish/ocean source. Persuadable on reuse if cost-shared and rights-compatible; indifferent on desal.

A win for them. A win is closing the reliability gap without breaking ratepayers: financed and de-risked access to Lake Nighthorse (pipeline + new treatment plant) delivering a firm multi-week-to-multi-month drought buffer well beyond today's ~10-30 days, funded substantially by outside/third-party capital, grants, or a partner rather than local water bills alone. Secondary wins: a durable conservation program that residents accept, a locally controlled clean-energy/water arrangement that also cuts Animas pumping cost, and optionally a reuse wedge that adds drought-proof supply, all achieved without surrendering water rights, harming Animas return-flow obligations, or triggering conflict with the Southern Ute / Ute Mountain Ute tribes or the post-2026 basin operating framework.

Public record. Durango has adopted a formal Sustainability Plan with goals for 100% renewable electricity and a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, while also promoting water conservation and resilience.

Position. Farmington is an Upper Basin municipality on the San Juan River (a Colorado River tributary) at the confluence with the Animas River, drawing its drinking water from Lake Farmington, which is refilled from the Animas and San Juan. It is a member of the San Juan Water Commission (with Aztec, Bloomfield, and San Juan County), the regional body created in 1986 to protect existing and future San Juan-basin water rights. New Mexico holds only 11.25% of the Upper Basin's apportionment under the 1948 Upper Colorado River Basin Compact, and the Upper Basin's longstanding negotiating posture (which Farmington sits inside) is that it already uses far less than its legal share, that Lower Basin overuse and California/Arizona demand are the root of the crisis, and that mandatory conservation should not fall on Upper Basin users who never took their full allocation. Farmington's own public actions on the crisis have been local and defensive rather than rhetorical: it has repeatedly enacted Stage 1 Water Shortage Advisories (e.g., 2018, 2020, 2021) asking residents to cut use ~10% when low snowpack and low Animas flows (as low as ~7% of normal) prevent Lake Farmington from refilling, and its Drought Management Plan restricts the city to the Penny Lane river pump during river-flow rotations administered by the NM Office of the State Engineer. Just as defining as water, though, is energy: Farmington runs its own municipal electric utility (Farmington Electric Utility System) and owns the 32 MW hydroelectric plant at Navajo Dam, and the city's identity and budget were built on Four Corners fossil energy. The closure of the San Juan Generating Station (Units retired 2022, stacks demolished 2024) and San Juan Mine gutted the local economy, and Farmington's failed bid (with Enchant Energy) to keep the plant alive via carbon capture shows a city that will take large, unconventional bets to preserve its energy-anchored economy. It is now actively pivoting toward solar-plus-storage (a 4 MW / 12 MWh FEUS project), a Four Corners clean-hydrogen-hub aspiration, and broader energy-and-data economic diversification.

On conservation. Cautiously interested but wary of the framing. A verified, voluntary, compensated consumptive-use conservation market could appeal to Farmington and the San Juan Water Commission IF it lets the Upper Basin monetize water it is not fully consuming (New Mexico uses well under its 11.25% share) rather than being cast as a mandatory haircut. Because the city is cash-strapped after the coal collapse, compensated conservation that pays San Juan-basin rights-holders is more attractive than in a wealthier district. The hard watch-outs: Farmington will resist anything that (a) implies the Upper Basin is an overuser that must fallow to bail out the Lower Basin, (b) permanently retires San Juan-basin municipal or agricultural water it may want for future industrial/energy growth, or (c) sets a precedent for mandatory upstream curtailment in the post-2026 rules. Verification and additionality matter less to Farmington than sovereignty over its own basin water and the political optics of not being the one asked to give.

On solar+water. This is by far the strongest hook. Farmington is almost purpose-built to want it: it owns a municipal electric utility, retains transmission, substations, and a trained energy workforce from the shuttered San Juan Generating Station, and is desperate for a replacement tax base and jobs after the coal collapse. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits its core need (large capital investment and long-term energy jobs at or near the old coal site) while the water funding defuses the one constraint that could otherwise block big new load. Farmington has already shown appetite for exactly this class of project (its own solar+storage build, a Four Corners hydrogen-hub push, and the San Juan College School of Energy pipeline), and regional New Mexico data-center/energy megaprojects are actively being courted. Expect strong engagement, with Farmington wanting to be a co-developer or offtake partner through FEUS, not just a host. Caveats it will press: firm/reliable power for its own utility and residents (not just the data center), local hiring and tax capture rather than a fly-in project, and assurance the 'funds water' piece is real wet water or real supply security for San Juan municipal users, not a PR line. New industrial water demand competing with its own drought-stressed municipal supply is the risk it will scrutinize hardest.

On reuse/desal. Supportive of reuse, largely indifferent to desalination. Farmington is far inland and upstream, so large-scale ocean or brackish desalination is geographically and economically remote from its interests and would mostly matter to it as a Lower Basin augmentation option that relieves pressure to curtail the Upper Basin (a welcome externality, not a project it would host). Reuse is different and genuinely on-mission: the Four Corners region is already exploring treated-wastewater and reclaimed-water reuse tied to hydrogen and industrial energy projects (e.g., wastewater-to-hydrogen models elsewhere in New Mexico), and Farmington operates its own wastewater/NPDES-permitted system that could feed reuse for new energy or data-center load. The city would likely favor reuse that stretches its existing supply and enables industrial growth without new river withdrawals, especially if paired with energy investment. It will be cost- and control-conscious (who pays, who owns the water), but reuse inside its own service area is low-friction and consistent with its diversification strategy; a distant mega-desal project is neither a threat nor a priority.

A win for them. A win for Farmington is anything that converts the region's remaining assets (a trained energy workforce, existing transmission and substations left by the coal plant, sunshine, gas, and its own municipal utility and water rights) into a durable replacement for the tax base and jobs it lost when San Juan Generating Station closed, WITHOUT requiring the city or the San Juan basin to give up water it considers legally and economically its own. Concretely: new capital investment and long-term jobs landing at or near the old coal site; firm, affordable power for FEUS and for new industrial/data load; a defensible narrative that Farmington solved its own transition rather than being sacrificed for downstream states; and a water arrangement that protects San Juan Water Commission municipal supply and, ideally, monetizes or beneficially uses water the Upper Basin is not fully consuming rather than being told to conserve for others. A hyperscaler or federal-anchored energy+water project that reuses the coal-plant transmission, employs School of Energy graduates, and pays into the local tax base is close to an ideal win.

Public record. Farmington has a multi-stage water conservation plan with voluntary and mandatory restrictions based on drought severity, aiming for an initial 10% savings.

Position. Fort Collins is a Front Range municipal utility that is structurally dependent on Colorado River water without sitting on the river itself. Roughly 50-70% of its treated water supply comes from the Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) transbasin diversion via Horsetooth Reservoir / Soldier Canyon (about 65% as of 2014); the balance comes from native Cache la Poudre River rights. That makes it an Upper Basin, West-Slope-water-importing user whose interests align with Colorado/Upper Basin positions (protect existing transbasin rights, resist mandatory curtailment framed as coming out of Front Range municipal supply) even though it is physically in the South Platte basin. It is one of the most aggressive municipal water-conservation programs in the West: a four-decade conservation track record, a 2015 Water Efficiency Plan target of 130 GPCD by 2030 that it already beat in 2023, and ~42% lower per-capita use than 2000. It is simultaneously a supply-hardening actor: it is pursuing the Halligan Water Supply Project (enlarging Halligan Reservoir on the North Fork Poudre by ~8,200 AF, from ~6,400 to ~14,600 AF, ~$300M+ total, construction slated to start ~2027) explicitly for drought security and future demand. On the Colorado River crisis specifically, the city has issued few standalone basin-policy statements; its posture shows up operationally. In May 2026, amid record heat and low snowpack, City Manager Kelly DiMartino declared a voluntary 'water shortage watch' (limit outdoor watering to two days/week, no watering 10am-6pm), citing both Poudre and Colorado River supply conditions, and saying the watch could help avoid mandatory restrictions in 2026 and 2027. Fort Collins is also a climate/clean-energy leader: it committed in 2018 to 100% renewable electricity by 2030 and buys power through Platte River Power Authority, giving it strong political alignment with clean-energy solutions.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE / early adopter, with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Fort Collins' identity as a four-decade conservation leader and its interest in monetizing or leveraging its efficiency. It could be a seller of verified savings (it has already driven per-capita use down ~42% since 2000 and beaten its 130 GPCD goal) or a supporter as a way to create system-wide slack that reduces its own Compact-call risk. Concerns it will raise: (a) additionality and 'buy-and-dry' optics for Front Range ag it might otherwise acquire; (b) whether a municipal utility that has already conserved deeply gets fairly credited (the 'conservation penalty' problem) versus junior/wasteful users who have more paper savings to sell; (c) that the market not become a backdoor for reallocating its C-BT supply. Engage it as a design partner and reference case, not just a buyer.

On solar+water. Likely the MOST RECEPTIVE of the three options, and a natural pilot host. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns tightly with Fort Collins' stated 100% renewable electricity by 2030 goal and its PRPA power relationship, and with its need for non-rate-payer capital to fund things like Halligan or reuse. Data-center water demand is a live concern in Colorado, so a structure where hyperscaler load pays for water supply/efficiency (rather than competing for it) is exactly the framing that converts a threat into a funder. Watch-outs it will press on: PRPA is the actual generation entity (Fort Collins does not own generation), so any clean-energy deal must route through PRPA governance; the city will insist the water dollars be new/additive and not simply offset new data-center water draw; and it will want local benefit (rates, resilience, jobs) not just a badge. High-value engagement target.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: MODERATELY SUPPORTIVE and probably the more actionable large-supply option for them. Fort Collins already runs strong reclamation (Drake and Mulberry facilities, NACWA Platinum performers) and uses graywater/non-potable reuse for parks and large landscapes, and has commissioned an on-site reuse feasibility study. Potable reuse is not yet policy but is a plausible next hedge given supply stress; expect interest if capital and regulatory pathways are provided, tempered by cost, public acceptance, and the legal complexity of reusing transbasin (C-BT) return flows (which carry reuse-to-extinction rights) versus native Poudre water (single-use). Desalination: LOW RELEVANCE / likely skeptical. Fort Collins is an inland Front Range city with no obvious brackish/ocean source; ocean desal is geographically irrelevant and it would view large desal mainly as a Lower Basin supply-augmentation story that, at best, indirectly relieves basin pressure. Frame desal to them only as system-level relief, not a local project.

A win for them. A win is drought and supply security that does not force mandatory restrictions on residents or blow up rates: firmed-up supply (storage, reuse, or purchased verified savings) plus outside capital that funds resilience without raising ratepayer costs, while letting them keep and protect their C-BT/transbasin supply and their conservation-leader reputation. Concretely: getting Halligan and/or a potable-reuse pathway funded and permitted, a hyperscaler/clean-energy deal that pays for water and advances the 100%-renewable goal through PRPA, and a seat designing any conservation market so that decades of prior efficiency are credited rather than penalized. Avoiding the 2027 mandatory-restriction scenario is the near-term win they have already named publicly.

Public record. The city's power provider, Platte River Power Authority, has a goal for a 100% noncarbon energy mix by 2030, and the city itself has a formal goal of 100% renewable electricity by 2030.

Position. Fort Morgan is a small (~11,500-12,000 pop.) northeastern Colorado municipal water utility whose imported supply is almost entirely Colorado River water moved across the Continental Divide. It began delivering Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) water from Carter Lake via the Southern Water Supply Project (SWSP) pipeline in December 2000, after its historic South Platte alluvial-aquifer supply became too mineral- and ag-chemical-laden to rely on. The City owns ~5,137 C-BT shares and leases ~2,712 more (from Riverside Irrigation District and Morgan County Quality Water District); its SWSP pipeline capacity is ~6.1 MGD. It is one of ~15 participants in Northern Water's Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP), buying shares for ~3,600 AF of firm yield delivered via Glade Reservoir and the South Platte Water Conservation Project (construction beginning 2026 after a $100M March 2025 settlement). Fort Morgan has no public record of taking a basin-politics stance in the interstate Colorado River crisis (post-2026 guidelines, Upper/Lower Basin fight). Its public 'position' is operational and local: secure clean, firm municipal supply for a growing, meat-packing- and ag-anchored town (Cargill plant is a major water/economic driver), meet Colorado's post-2025 statutory 'duty to serve' new housing, and diversify away from single-source dependence. It adopted a Water Conservation Plan (originally 2008) and Morgan County-area providers moved to voluntary use reductions under severe drought in 2026. It is a customer/beneficiary of the transmountain system, not a river-policy principal.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but as a beneficiary, not a seller. Fort Morgan has no large consumptive-use right to fallow and monetize (it is a municipal buyer, not an irrigation-rights holder), so it is unlikely to be a supplier into a consumptive-use conservation market. Its interest is defensive: a credible, verified market that keeps senior/agricultural water in the system and reduces the odds or depth of a compact call would protect its junior transmountain supply, which it would welcome. It could also participate on the demand side via its own conservation plan and drought-year voluntary reductions (already happening in 2026). Watch-out: it will resist any 'market' framing that implies municipalities like it should give up firm yield or pay more for water it already struggles to afford. Net: a supportive bystander that benefits if the market shores up the system, indifferent-to-wary if it becomes another cost.

On solar+water. Likely the most tangible hook of the three, but only if the water benefit is real and local. Fort Morgan runs energy-intensive water and wastewater treatment plants and buys a share of pumped, treated transmountain water, so cheaper/firmer power that lowers plant operating cost is directly useful to a small rate base. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water would appeal if the water dollars reduce its NISP/treatment cost or add firm yield in NE Colorado, and if new data-center load does not compete for the same scarce South Platte/transmountain supply or crowd its grid. Caveats: Fort Morgan is small and would not host or negotiate a hyperscaler deal alone; it would look to Northern Water, Morgan County, and the state. It will also be wary that a big new industrial water/power user upstream worsens, rather than eases, its own supply and compact-call risk. Make the water benefit concrete, local, and additive, and route the deal through the regional operators.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: genuinely interested and the more relevant of the two. Fort Morgan already treats degraded, mineral-heavy water and Colorado's reuse framework (CDPHE Reclaimed Water Program) plus new potable-reuse rules make municipal reuse a credible path to stretch its firm supply and cut single-source dependence. Non-potable and eventual potable reuse of its own wastewater is a plausible, right-sized win for a town this size, especially paired with capital help. Desalination: largely irrelevant to it directly (inland NE Colorado, no ocean access), except brackish-groundwater desal of its tainted alluvial aquifer, which could partially rehabilitate its abandoned native supply if someone else funds the high energy/brine-disposal cost. It will not lead or fund a large-scale desal program and will judge any such megaproject purely on whether it yields cheaper firm water for Fort Morgan. Net: reuse = actionable and welcomed; ocean desal = not applicable; brackish-aquifer desal = interesting only if fully funded.

A win for them. A win is more firm, clean municipal water at a price a small town can bear, plus insulation from the two things that scare a junior transmountain user: (1) a Colorado River Compact call curtailing its post-1922 C-BT/Windy Gap-derived supply, and (2) rate shock from NISP and treatment costs. Concretely: additional firm yield or storage that reduces reliance on any single source; capital or grant support that lowers the household rate impact of NISP/Glade; drought-year backstop supply; and cheaper power/treatment for its water and wastewater plants. Anything that lets Fort Morgan keep serving Cargill and new housing under the state duty-to-serve mandate, without a compact call or a rate revolt, is a win.

Public record. The city's primary water security strategy has been securing ownership of water rights through the Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP), but it also promotes conservation to its residents.

Position. Gallup is a small (~pop. 22K) Navajo Nation bordertown and municipal water+electric provider in McKinley County with NO surface water and NO nearby river. For 120+ years it has pumped extremely deep (up to ~3,000 ft) confined-aquifer groundwater; water levels have fallen ~200 ft in a decade, 30 of 45+ historic wells are permanently dead, and only ~15 remain. Its longstanding, consistent public position: groundwater is exhausting and the only durable fix is imported San Juan River (Colorado River Basin) surface water via the federally authorized Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Project (NGWSP), for which Gallup is a settlement signatory entitled to up to 7,500 acre-feet/year. Gallup thus sits INSIDE the Colorado River Basin as a future beneficiary, not a historic user. Its 2025 posture is one of acute frustration and financial alarm: Reclamation missed its contractual 12/31/2024 delivery deadline, the project slipped to ~2029-2030, and Gallup says it has paid $58.6M+ toward NGWSP 'and has not received a single drop of water,' facing ~$10M/year in Reclamation bills for ~5 more years it 'cannot afford.' It runs an aggressive, state-cited conservation program (turf-to-artificial, xeriscaping, main replacement) and has reused treated wastewater for golf-course/irrigation since 1960, now expanding non-potable reuse to bridge the delay. On the energy side, Gallup owns the 3rd-largest municipal electric utility in NM (~11,000 accounts) and in 2018 hosted a 9.8 MW Standard Solar farm (~10% of city load, city-owned land, PPA-financed, ~$785K savings/8 yrs) advocated by the local Sustainable Gallup Board. So it has a demonstrated appetite for third-party-financed solar and for reuse.

On conservation. Mildly-to-moderately positive but not a natural buyer. Gallup is a demand-side, not a market, player: it is already a conservation exemplar and its problem is having too LITTLE water to sell, not surplus consumptive use to monetize. A verified consumptive-use conservation market chiefly helps SENIOR agricultural/industrial rights holders and large users generate credits; Gallup has almost nothing to conserve-and-sell and could even fear such markets bid up regional water it needs. It would engage constructively IF the market's revenue could be routed to fund NGWSP cost relief or if it could be a BUYER of firmed supply, but as designed it reads as neutral-to-skeptical. Persuadable only if paired with a benefit stream to municipal buyers.

On solar+water. Most positive of the three, and the strongest wedge. Gallup has already done the template: city-owned land, PPA-financed utility-scale solar via a private developer, championed locally. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water directly addresses its #1 pain (a ~$10M/yr water bill it says it cannot pay). As a municipal electric utility with abundant high-solar-resource land near I-40 and existing interconnection experience, Gallup can host generation and capture lease/PPA/host-fee revenue, then earmark it to NGWSP payments or well/pipe capital. Caveats it will raise: any large new load (a data center) must not draw down its scarce groundwater, and Navajo Nation/McKinley County equities must be respected. Frame as 'energy revenue that pays your water bill, with zero net new groundwater draw' and Gallup is a likely champion.

On reuse/desal. Positive on reuse, cautious on desal. Reuse is already Gallup policy and identity (effluent reuse since 1960; actively expanding non-potable reuse to bridge the NGWSP delay), so funding/scaling advanced reuse aligns perfectly and is low-friction. Large-scale desalination is a weaker fit: Gallup is a high-desert inland city with no seawater and limited brackish groundwater volumes, and its aquifers are being drawn down rather than offering a desal feedstock; brine disposal and the energy cost of desal at 6,500 ft elevation are hard. It would welcome brackish-groundwater treatment or reuse capital that stretches existing supply, but is unlikely to see coastal-style desal as relevant. Net: fund reuse, treat desal as niche.

A win for them. A win is financial survival of the NGWSP obligation without gutting their water/wastewater system: a durable revenue stream (hyperscaler solar+storage host fees / PPA / dedicated fund) large enough to cover a meaningful share of the ~$10M/yr Reclamation bills and to capitalize the $6M deep wells and cast-iron main replacement, so they can bridge to San Juan surface water in ~2029-2030 without rate shocks to a low-income Navajo-bordertown ratepayer base. Concretely: San Juan surface water actually delivered on a firm schedule, replacement wells funded, aging pipe replaced, reuse expanded, AND a new energy-revenue line that de-risks the whole thing, with Gallup positioned as the regional water/energy hub for surrounding communities under its JPA, all without new groundwater depletion.

Public record. Facing dwindling groundwater, the city has a long-standing wastewater reuse program, an aggressive conservation program, and has partnered to build a 9.8 MW solar farm on city land to power its municipal utility.

Position. GWP is a municipal retail utility serving ~200k people in Glendale, CA. It is NOT a Colorado River rights holder or a Basin negotiating party. It is a downstream retail buyer: one of the 13 founding member agencies of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD, 1928), and its Colorado River exposure is entirely indirect through MWD. GWP purchases roughly 60-70% of its potable water from MWD (delivered via the Colorado River Aqueduct and the State Water Project), with the remaining ~30-40% from local groundwater (Verdugo/San Fernando basins) plus ~6-7% recycled water. On the river crisis specifically, GWP has no public advocacy position on allocations, the 2026/post-2026 operating guidelines, or Upper/Lower Basin politics; its public voice is about local supply reliability, not Basin governance. Longstanding revealed position: aggressive demand management plus local supply diversification. It moved to Mandatory Conservation in Aug 2020 and escalated to Phase III of its Water Conservation Ordinance in Feb 2022 (2-day/week outdoor watering) in lockstep with MWD's Apr 2022 shortage emergency declaration; reported ~12% YoY cuts and ~500M gallons saved. Its 2025-2045 Water Master Plan and a state-grant-funded ($200k) Recycled Water Master Plan center on cutting reliance on imported water by expanding recycled water (including studying potable reuse) and protecting groundwater, explicitly framed by import-supply risk (drought + a quake severing imported-water aqueducts for 3-6 months). Stated posture: 'continue partnership with state and regional water providers to diversify local supplies and improve long-term resilience.' Net: a conservation-and-local-supply pragmatist, quiet on Basin allocation fights.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but with limited direct upside. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates at the Basin/large-rights-holder scale; GWP has no Colorado River right to enroll, so it cannot directly monetize. Its interest is derivative: anything that keeps MWD's Colorado River deliveries stable and slows wholesale rate increases is welcome. GWP would view a credible conservation market favorably as a system-reliability mechanism (it already runs a demand-management program and would appreciate rigorous measurement/verification, which mirrors its own metering-and-savings tracking). It would not champion it publicly and would defer to MWD as its representative in Basin dealings. Low salience, mild positive.

On solar+water. Most likely engagement point, because GWP is a combined water AND power utility (municipal electric + SCPPA member, recently coal-free). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto two things GWP already does: procuring clean power (it has run clean-energy RFPs/IRP work) and needing capital for local water supply (recycled water/potable reuse) that it currently can't fully fund. GWP could be a genuine partner or offtaker if the structure fits a municipal utility (rate impact, governance, ratepayer benefit). Caveats: as a small muni it is risk-averse and procurement-bound (public RFP, council approval, prevailing-wage/CEQA), so a bespoke hyperscaler deal must be structured to survive municipal process. Data-center load in/near its service area could also strain its own grid, so framing matters. Net: warmest reception of the three, especially if the water-funding piece de-risks its recycled-water capital plan.

On reuse/desal. Strong fit on the reuse half; weak/indifferent on desal. Reuse is already GWP's stated strategy: it co-owns the LA-Glendale Water Reclamation Plant, is expanding recycled water (+~400 AF/yr planned projects), and is studying potable reuse in its Recycled Water Master Plan. External capital or a program that accelerates advanced recycled water / potable reuse would be very welcome and aligns with its Master Plan and grant-seeking. Large-scale ocean desalination is essentially irrelevant to GWP directly (inland utility, no coastline, no desal infrastructure); it would only matter as an MWD-level regional supply that could ease import pressure, so GWP would be a passive beneficiary at most. Net: enthusiastic on reuse, neutral on desal.

A win for them. A funded, ratepayer-protective path to reduce imported-water dependence and stabilize rates without a big rate shock: outside capital (ideally hyperscaler/clean-energy-linked) that accelerates their recycled-water and potable-reuse projects and hardens local supply against drought and seismic import cuts, plus clean, affordable power for their electric system. Concretely, a win is closing the funding gap on their Recycled Water Master Plan projects and demonstrating measurable reduction in MWD purchases while keeping bills stable, delivered through a structure their city council can approve.

Public record. The utility is actively expanding its clean energy portfolio through a city-owned solar development program to install solar systems on municipal properties.

Position. Glendale is a West Valley municipal water provider (~250k residents) with a deliberately diversified portfolio, which makes it pragmatic rather than ideological on the river crisis. Roughly 40% of its supply is Colorado River water, of which ~22% of total supply arrives via the Central Arizona Project (CAP); ~62% comes from the Salt and Verde Rivers via Salt River Project (SRP), ~7-9% is reclaimed/effluent, and ~9% is groundwater. It holds ~55,000 AF/yr from SRP, up to 27,000 AF of New Conservation Space stored in Roosevelt Lake, ~7,500 AF groundwater, and produces ~15,000-18,000 AF/yr of effluent. Longstanding public posture: build resilience and redundancy through a robust, diversified portfolio, aggressive groundwater banking (it claims ~4.5 years of recharged water saved in the aquifer via Long-Term Storage Credits, earned partly by extinguishing irrigation rights), and reuse. Recent posture is proactive-conservationist within the existing legal framework: Glendale's Council signed a System Conservation Implementation Agreement with the Bureau of Reclamation and the Central Arizona Water Conservation District to leave up to ~7,000 AF/yr of its CAP water in Lake Mead over three years (~21,000 AF total, up to ~30% of its CAP allocation and ~17% of annual citywide use), compensated at $400/AF under Inflation Reduction Act funding, with proceeds earmarked for water infrastructure. It adopted a 2022 Drought Management Plan, targets a voluntary ~5% use reduction without mandatory customer restrictions, and is pursuing advanced water purification (direct potable reuse of effluent) and studying a Bartlett Dam expansion on the Verde. Under 2026 Tier 1 shortage, Glendale and West Valley CAP users reported no cut to actual deliveries this year, insulating it near-term. It is not a public combatant in interstate/basin allocation fights; its voice is operational and infrastructure-focused.

On conservation. Likely supportive and an early adopter. Glendale has already voluntarily entered a paid, verified system-conservation deal ($400/AF, up to 7,000 AF/yr) and explicitly used the proceeds for infrastructure, so a well-designed consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in its demonstrated comfort zone. It will engage where three conditions hold: (1) payments are credible and tied to verified consumptive-use savings rather than paper reductions, (2) participation is voluntary and does not compromise M&I reliability or trigger customer restrictions, and (3) it retains its banked credits and portfolio flexibility. Watch-outs: it will resist any market design that erodes its Long-Term Storage Credits, its SRP entitlements, or its ability to firm supplies, and it will want price durability rather than one-off IRA-style funding it cannot plan around.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but with conditions; persuadable rather than automatically favorable. Glendale sits in the West Valley data-center corridor, so it feels both the demand pressure and the political heat (neighbors Phoenix, Mesa, Avondale have imposed data-center water caps and supplemental-supply requirements). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would appeal if the water funding is real and additive (new supply, reuse, or infrastructure capital) rather than a license to consume scarce river water. It would want assurances the deal reduces net water demand or brings new wet water/recharge, aligns with its reuse and infrastructure priorities, and does not politically expose the city as subsidizing industrial water use during shortage. Energy cost relief is a secondary but genuine draw given rising utility capital needs. Expect it to negotiate hard on who bears reliability and rate risk.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable on reuse; conditionally open on desalination. Reuse is already core strategy: Glendale runs effluent recharge/reuse programs (West and Arrowhead plants) and is actively pursuing advanced water purification for direct potable reuse, aligned with Arizona's 2025 AWP/DPR rules. Large-scale reuse funding would accelerate work it already wants to do and it would welcome capital that de-risks the rate impact. Desalination (e.g., a statewide/binational augmentation project feeding the CAP system) it would support in principle as basin-scale new supply, but as an inland city it benefits only indirectly, will scrutinize cost allocation and its share of the bill, and will prioritize local reuse and banking it controls over distant desal it does not.

A win for them. A win is measurably stronger long-term water security and reliability without punishing ratepayers: durable funding (not one-off) that offsets the ~$418M capital burden and softens the 13.3% rate increases; new or firmed supply through advanced water purification / direct potable reuse and expanded recharge that they own and control; preserved and growing Long-Term Storage Credits and banked groundwater; and continued shielding of M&I deliveries so customers see no mandatory restrictions. Politically, a win lets Council show constituents that Glendale monetized conservation and attracted outside capital (federal or private/hyperscaler) to build resilience while keeping bills as low as possible and keeping the city's diversified, redundant portfolio intact.

Public record. Glendale's drought management plan relies on a diversified portfolio including reclaimed water and conservation rebates, showing a pragmatic focus on securing its own water supply rather than a basin-wide ideological stance.

Position. Goodyear is a fast-growing West Valley Phoenix suburb and an AMWUA member city that frames itself as managing a 'diverse and resilient' multi-source water portfolio to enable continued growth. Its supply mix: ~16,000 AF/yr Central Arizona Project (Colorado River) allocation, ~13,191 AF/yr of high-priority 'native' groundwater from the West Salt River Valley sub-basin (naturally very high TDS, roughly one-third seawater salinity), and A+ reclaimed water. Publicly it acknowledges the Colorado River is 'serious and worsening due to historic drought, climate change, and over-allocation,' but stresses that because of its water-rights priority it faced no immediate cuts under Arizona's Tier 1 shortage. Longstanding posture is infrastructure-and-growth-forward rather than crisis-restriction: it spent ~$110M on a Phase I pipeline (via an SRP-canal agreement) to physically 'bring its CAP water home' to a new Surface Water Treatment Plant, is expanding treatment/wastewater capacity, adding PFAS treatment, and actively evaluating direct potable reuse (DPR)/advanced water purification. It has not taken a loud advocacy stance in Basin-wide allocation fights; it works through AMWUA and ADWR/CAP channels. Mayor Joe Pizzillo and staff have publicly defended raising utility rates (~5.8-5.9%/yr under the 2026 four-year plan) as necessary to fund this infrastructure.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, conditional. As a junior-but-protected CAP M&I user, Goodyear benefits if a verified consumptive-use conservation market keeps Lake Mead/Powell elevations up and delays the shortage tiers that would eventually cut municipal CAP supply. A market that pays agricultural or other high-volume users to fallow/reduce consumptive use is broadly aligned with AMWUA-city interests. But Goodyear will scrutinize (a) that conservation is 'verified' and additional (not paper water) so it does not undermine the reliability of its own stored/recharged Colorado River credits, and (b) that a market does not become a mechanism for others to monetize water at the expense of municipal priority rights. It is unlikely to be a seller of its own municipal supply given its growth needs. Expect engagement as a supportive buyer/beneficiary and system-reliability advocate rather than a leader.

On solar+water. Most receptive of the three, because Goodyear has already lived this model. It negotiated a hyperscaler (Microsoft) into directly funding city water/wastewater infrastructure ($36M of a $90M plant expansion) as the price of hosting data centers, and pushed water-intensive cooling toward zero-water/air-cooled designs. A structured hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water infrastructure maps almost exactly onto Goodyear's demonstrated playbook: it wants the tax base, jobs, and capital contributions, but only if the deal internalizes the water and grid costs rather than externalizing them onto ratepayers. Goodyear would likely be an early, willing pilot host, provided the water-funding component is real and enforceable and does not increase net potable draw on its constrained supply. Watch-outs: it will insist water contributions offset actual system impact, and it is wary of high-TDS/reuse economics that make on-site water recycling cost-prohibitive.

On reuse/desal. Strongly interested in reuse; more skeptical on desalination economics. Goodyear already runs A+ reclaimed water and is actively evaluating DPR/advanced water purification as a next supply, so large-scale reuse aligns directly with its strategy and it would welcome outside capital or regional partnerships that de-risk DPR (regulatory path in AZ still maturing as of late 2025). Desalination is a harder sell: its own groundwater is brackish/high-TDS and the city has publicly said treating/recycling that water is 'cost prohibitive,' which cuts both ways. It signals genuine need for a brackish-desal solution but also sensitivity to cost and brine/energy burden. Ocean or large-basin desal (e.g., imported/augmentation schemes) would interest Goodyear only if someone else carries the capital and energy cost and it yields firm, affordable M&I supply. Reuse: ally. Desal: persuadable, cost-gated.

A win for them. A win is firm, affordable, growth-enabling water supply secured with someone else's capital: hyperscaler- or investor-funded water/wastewater/reuse infrastructure that lets Goodyear keep adding rooftops and high-value industrial load without another round of ratepayer increases and without deepening exposure to Colorado River cuts. Concretely: expanded DPR/reuse capacity and treatment funded by data-center or energy partners, upstream conservation that keeps CAP deliveries reliable and delays M&I shortage tiers, and a deal it can showcase (like the Microsoft agreement) as proof it is managing a resilient portfolio responsibly. Protecting the priority and value of its existing Colorado River rights and CAP infrastructure is non-negotiable.

Public record. The city publicly states it is a leader in water management, operating the largest municipal desalination facility in the state and actively expanding its water reclamation and reuse capacity to support growth.

Position. Grand Junction is a Western Slope, Upper Basin municipality in the Grand Valley, where the Gunnison meets the Colorado. Its core, longstanding posture is Western Slope water protectionism: keep water in the basin of origin, guard against Front Range transmountain diversions and against 'buy-and-dry' of senior Grand Valley agriculture, and preserve the priority (prior-appropriation) system that shields the region's senior agricultural rights. The city sources primarily from the Kannah Creek / Grand Mesa watershed (~16,200 AF), with contract Colorado River water via Clifton Water (~2,485 AF) and ~13,000+ AF of Gunnison River rights it is now moving to develop. As a MUNICIPAL provider, however, its own rights are relatively junior and 'most likely vulnerable to cuts from curtailment' in a compact call, which creates a split identity: aligned with senior ag against outside diverters, but exposed itself to priority-based curtailment. Recent record: on Stage 1 / voluntary conservation in 2026 amid the worst forecast drought on record (Colorado at Cameo ~40% of normal, Gunnison ~34%, Kannah Creek snowpack ~41% of the 35-yr average); reservoir storage ~1.75 yrs at full. It works through a regional bloc (Ute Water, Clifton Water, Grand Valley irrigation companies) and defers politically to the Colorado River Water Conservation District ('the River District') and Ute Water GM Greg Williams on basin negotiations. It backs a negotiated Upper/Lower Basin demand-management mechanism 'without establishing delivery obligations,' and it is wary of System Conservation / fallowing programs after Grand Valley irrigators reported those programs harmed the local ag economy. Innovation-forward on the supply-stretching side: 2022 graywater ordinance, active conservation-rebate programs, and the Persigo WWTP (12.5 MGD, region's largest) with Colorado's first biogas-to-vehicle RNG project and biosolids reuse.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but scarred. Grand Junction supports a negotiated demand-management mechanism in principle and its bloc has already delivered voluntary cuts (Grand Valley irrigators reportedly reduced use up to ~25%). A VERIFIED, accurately-measured consumptive-use market answers two of its stated grievances about prior System Conservation Pilot / fallowing efforts: poor measurement/verification of actual savings and uncompensated damage to the local ag economy. Key conditions for buy-in: (1) rigorous, transparent quantification so paid savings are real wet water and not shuffled paper, (2) protection against permanent buy-and-dry of Grand Valley ag and against conserved water being 'picked up' downstream by Front Range transmountain diverters rather than benefiting the basin of origin, (3) fair, ongoing compensation to irrigators, not one-time deals that hollow out farm economies. Sell it as a tool that keeps Western Slope water and farmland whole while giving the city curtailment insurance; frame it wrong (as a pipeline for exporting Grand Valley water east) and they oppose.

On solar+water. Interested and plausibly a strong fit, with guardrails. Grand Junction / Mesa County is actively courting energy and tech economic development (GJEP), sits on a 230kV transmission backbone and 10-gig broadband, hosts utility-scale solar (SolarGen / Nannie Blain 150-acre park, ~$55M impact) and has a deep solar-heritage identity (original SERI/NREL site, Atlasta). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure hits the city's jobs-and-tax-base goals AND could underwrite the Gunnison diversion / Kannah augmentation it must otherwise fund on ratepayers. Real frictions: (1) Mesa County imposed a 2024 solar moratorium to write land-use rules, so siting must respect local zoning and ag-land protection; (2) any data-center load raises the local water-consumption question in a basin already at record lows, so the deal must be net water-POSITIVE for the region (reuse/closed-loop cooling, funded conservation), not a new consumptive straw; (3) they will insist water benefits stay in-basin. Structured as 'you fund our water security, we host your load,' this is their most attractive option of the three.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly favorable and already in motion. The city runs Persigo (region's largest WWTP, 12.5 MGD) with Colorado's first biogas-to-RNG project and biosolids reuse, passed a 2022 graywater ordinance, and runs conservation rebates , it clearly views supply-stretching and reuse as core strategy. Indirect/potable reuse expansion and effluent reuse for irrigation or industrial (e.g., data-center) cooling would be welcomed if funded, because it adds firm local supply without touching contested river rights or triggering curtailment. Desalination: low direct relevance and low enthusiasm as a local solution , Grand Junction is an inland headwaters community with no brackish/ocean feedstock, so desal is not a supply tool for them. They would view large-scale coastal/Lower-Basin desal favorably only insofar as it augments Lower Basin supply and relieves pressure on the compact system (and thus their curtailment risk), i.e., as someone else's lever that helps them, not their own project.

A win for them. A win: firm, affordable long-term municipal supply (funded Gunnison diversion and Kannah Creek augmentation) that removes their ~15-year supply-gap and curtailment risk WITHOUT raising rates or selling out Grand Valley agriculture; conserved/traded water and any new economic-development load that keep water and farmland in the basin of origin rather than exporting either to the Front Range; verified, fairly-compensated conservation that protects irrigators as ongoing partners; and new tax base and jobs (solar+storage, tech) layered on top of, not at the expense of, their water security. In short: keep the Grand Valley whole (farms, flows, economy), lock in the city's supply, and let someone else's capital pay for it.

Public record. The city's council adopted a Sustainability and Adaptation Plan in July 2024 that includes strategies for water conservation, energy stewardship, and fostering energy independence.

Position. Greeley is one of Colorado's oldest and most sophisticated municipal water-rights holders (its 1870s irrigation-colony roots make it a senior South Platte appropriator) and simultaneously one of the Front Range's most Colorado-River-dependent cities. It owns more Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) units than any other municipal provider, was one of the six original cities behind the 1980s Windy Gap Project, and is a participant in the Windy Gap Firming Project / Chimney Hollow Reservoir (allocated ~4,400 acre-feet/year once online). It is also a participant in Northern Water's Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP/Glade). Publicly, Greeley frames itself as a conservation leader (2022 Water Efficiency Plan, ~20% per-capita use reduction while population grew, robust rebate/turf programs) AND as a supply-security builder pursuing every storage bucket it can (Windy Gap firming, NISP, six Poudre mountain reservoirs, and the Terry Ranch non-tributary aquifer storage project near the Wyoming line). Its revealed longstanding position on the river crisis is defensive supply diversification rather than public advocacy: it does not lead compact-negotiation rhetoric, but its infrastructure choices (especially Terry Ranch, a ~1.2M acre-foot non-tributary aquifer explicitly NOT connected to Colorado River surface flows) read as a deliberate hedge against Colorado River curtailment. Its West Slope-facing posture is quieter than Denver Water or Aurora, but it is a classic Front Range transmountain diverter whose growth depends on moving Colorado River water east.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-favorable, with conditions. Greeley already brands itself as a top-tier Colorado conservation program and has real efficiency gains to show, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with its self-image and could let it monetize or offset. But Greeley's exposure is on the transmountain-DIVERSION side (importing Colorado River water east), not on West Slope consumptive irrigation it could easily fallow. So it engages a consumptive-use market more as a demand-management / reliability tool and a potential funding mechanism than as a seller. The persuadable lever: show that verified conservation credits can be used to firm its junior Windy Gap supply or reduce compact-call exposure. It will insist on airtight measurement/verification (it is technically sophisticated and litigation-aware, per its Terry Ranch aquifer-protection and Colorado water-court posture) and on assurance that participating does not impair its senior South Platte or C-BT rights.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, plausibly a strong fit. Greeley/Weld County is an energy-and-industry corridor (oil, gas, agriculture, and growing data-center/industrial load interest along northern I-25/Wyoming border), and Greeley is actively building expensive water infrastructure it must finance from a growing but rate-sensitive customer base. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses its two constraints at once: capital for supply projects (Terry Ranch buildout, Chimney Hollow/NISP cost overruns) and low-carbon power. Persuadable because it needs outside capital and has land/siting adjacency near Terry Ranch. Cautions it will raise: it will not trade away water-rights control or aquifer integrity (it fought to protect Terry Ranch groundwater from neighboring pumpers), it will scrutinize who controls the water produced and on what terms, and any deal must survive Colorado water court and its risk-averse council. Frame the offer as non-dilutive capital that firms EXISTING Greeley supply rather than creating a competing new demand for Colorado River water.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly favorable and already directionally committed. Greeley operates non-potable systems (Poudre Ponds, expanding to ~3,000 af non-potable storage) and Colorado's Water Plan flags potable reuse as central to closing the supply gap; a reuse buildout fits Greeley's diversification-and-independence strategy and reduces reliance on curtailment-exposed Windy Gap water. Reuse is one of the few new-supply options that does not add Colorado River risk, which Greeley values highly. Desalination: less directly relevant (landlocked, no seawater), but brackish/non-tributary groundwater treatment is squarely in-frame given Terry Ranch is a deep aquifer play that likely needs treatment. So Greeley is a natural early adopter of reuse and inland brackish treatment, especially if capital is subsidized. It will want cost-per-acre-foot competitiveness versus its existing storage buckets and regulatory clarity on potable-reuse permitting.

A win for them. A win for Greeley is supply certainty for a fast-growing city at lower capital and political cost, with its junior Windy Gap exposure firmed against a compact call and its senior rights untouched. Concretely: outside (hyperscaler/subsidized) capital that offsets Terry Ranch buildout and Chimney Hollow/NISP cost overruns so Greeley ratepayers absorb less; new firm supply from reuse and non-tributary/brackish treatment that reduces dependence on curtailment-exposed transmountain water; and a verified conservation/consumptive-use mechanism that gives it a defensible, monetizable reliability hedge. The deal must leave Greeley in full control of its water rights and aquifer, survive Colorado water court and council scrutiny, and be defensible to its customers as protecting affordable, reliable water for growth. If the offer lets Greeley say it secured decades of water without a rate shock and without betting the city on the Colorado River, it will move.

Public record. The city has one of Colorado's most robust water conservation programs, offering a wide range of rebates and services for indoor and outdoor water efficiency.

Position. Henderson is Nevada's second-largest city and a retail/municipal water purveyor inside the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) member-agency structure. It does not hold its own Colorado River entitlement; SNWA treats and wholesales Colorado River water (~90% of Southern Nevada supply, drawn from Lake Mead) and Henderson delivers it to customers. Its public posture tracks SNWA's regional line rather than an independent negotiating voice: aggressive conservation as the core strategy for living within a shrinking allocation. Longstanding positions: (1) Henderson adopted, jointly with SNWA, a water conservation plan targeting 86 gallons per capita per day by 2029 (down from ~89 in 2023), and reported a ~5.85% cut in consumptive use in 2023; (2) it enforces the 2021 Nevada ban on Colorado-River-fed nonfunctional turf and runs incentive programs (Water Efficient Technologies / WET) with SNWA; (3) it is a national leader in wastewater reuse and return-flow credits. Henderson's Kurt R. Segler / Water Reclamation Facility was expanded via a ~$100M upgrade to ~44 MGD (from 32 MGD); it reuses ~30% of reclaimed water locally (golf courses, cemetery, medians) and returns ~70% to Lake Mead via the Las Vegas Wash. This return-flow credit mechanism lets Nevada withdraw more than its 300,000 acre-foot consumptive cap so long as returns keep net consumptive use at/under 300 KAF. Most recent and consequential move: in 2026 Henderson introduced a 180-day moratorium (pause on conditional-use permits) on new data centers, becoming the first Southern Nevada local government to do so, citing water and energy strain. Its lone existing data center (Google) used 404M+ gallons in 2024 that is evaporated in cooling and is NOT reclaimable, i.e. it breaks the reuse loop Henderson depends on.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / likely ally on this axis. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with Henderson's identity: it already measures and reduces consumptive use, enforces turf bans, and runs metered incentive programs. Because Henderson's value comes from return-flow credits (only consumptive use counts against the cap), a market priced on verified CONSUMPTIVE use is conceptually native to how Nevada already accounts for water. It could monetize Henderson's high reuse rate. Caveats: Henderson would want the market's measurement/verification methodology to recognize return-flow credits the same way SNWA's accounting does, and it would defer to SNWA as the regional entitlement-holder on whether/how a member agency participates. Risk it flags: a market that treats gross diversions rather than net consumptive use would penalize its reuse advantage.

On solar+water. MIXED-to-SKEPTICAL, and the most revealing axis. Henderson just moved to PAUSE data centers over exactly the water/energy strain a hyperscaler buildout implies, and its existing Google facility's evaporative cooling consumes non-reclaimable water that breaks its reuse loop. So a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water would be received with conditional interest but real suspicion. The 'also funds water' hook is the persuadable lever: if the package (a) uses closed-loop / air-cooled / non-potable cooling so it does not add consumptive Colorado River draw, and (b) directs funding into reuse infrastructure, conservation retrofits, or offsetting consumptive-use credits, it could flip Henderson from moratorium posture to partner. Absent those guarantees, Henderson reads hyperscaler water demand as a net drain on the very credit system it depends on, and the solar+storage energy benefit does not offset a consumptive-water problem. Mark: persuadable but currently defensive.

On reuse/desal. REUSE: strongly supportive / already a leader. Henderson is arguably the strongest reuse actor in the basin at municipal scale, so large-scale reuse expansion is directly in its wheelhouse and it would welcome funding/policy that scales return-flow credits and direct potable reuse. DESALINATION: interested but as a regional/SNWA-scale play, not a Henderson project. SNWA has long explored ocean-desalination exchange concepts (funding coastal desal elsewhere in exchange for Colorado River water). Henderson would support desal that adds firm supply or protects Lake Mead levels, but it is a downstream beneficiary, not a lead sponsor, and inland brine/energy costs make local desal impractical. Net: reuse = enthusiastic; desal = supportive-by-proxy through SNWA.

A win for them. A win for Henderson is being able to keep growing its residential/commercial tax base without adding net consumptive Colorado River draw, while protecting the return-flow credit accounting that underpins Nevada's supply headroom. Concretely: (1) new large loads (data centers, industry) that use non-potable / closed-loop cooling so they do not break the reuse loop or trigger political blowback; (2) outside capital that funds reuse expansion and conservation retrofits so ratepayers do not carry the full cost of the next plant upgrade; (3) a conservation/credit market that monetizes its high reuse rate rather than penalizing gross diversions; (4) durable post-2026 rules that continue to honor return-flow credits. Let Henderson lift its moratorium on its own terms by showing the growth it fears can be made water-neutral.

Public record. The city actively supplements SNWA's turf replacement rebate program and recently completed a $100 million upgrade to its water reclamation facility to increase water recycling and return flow credits to Lake Mead.

Position. LONGSTANDING / STRUCTURAL: Lakewood does not operate as a unified water utility. Supply is delivered through roughly 20 independent special districts (largest: Consolidated Mutual Water Company, Green Mountain Water & Sanitation District serving ~18,500 homes, plus Bancroft-Clover, Willowbrook, Bear Creek, Bonvue, and others). The City of Lakewood's own municipal water/sewer utility serves only ~7,000 residents. This fragmented structure predates the city's 1969 incorporation and means Lakewood has no consolidated water policy voice and no independent Colorado River position of record. Most districts purchase treated water from Denver Water and mirror Denver Water's rates and rules. Denver Water's largest treatment plant (Marston) and operations sit physically in/near Lakewood. RECENT (2026): On March 27, 2026 Lakewood declared a Stage 1 drought, adopting the same restrictions Denver Water implemented effective March 25, 2026 (in effect through April 30, 2027). This includes a 2-day/week watering schedule (even addresses Sun/Thu, odd Wed/Sat, no watering 10am-6pm), a 20% reduction ask, Denver Water drought surcharges ($1.10/1,000 gal Tier 2, $2.20/1,000 gal Tier 3 outdoor), and escalating fines (warning, then $250, then $500). The city framed the direct rate impact on its ~7,000 municipal customers as limited but uncertain. A May 2026 Colorado Politics feature ('Tapped') cast Jefferson County cities as taking 'divergent paths on water' and highlighted Lakewood's hands-off, district-dependent posture versus more proactive neighbors. DISTRICT-LEVEL POLITICS: At the Green Mountain W&SD, a 'Responsible Water Now' slate campaigns on capping new taps to protect existing-customer supply and hold rates low, with an explicit principle that current customers should not have to cut use to enable new development. This is growth-vs-supply tension at the retail level, distinct from any basin-scale conservation stance. No public record found of a Lakewood City Council resolution, statement, or lobbying position on Colorado River Compact implementation, demand management, Lower Basin cuts, or Upper Basin negotiations. Mark as largely absent from basin-scale policy.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / OPPORTUNISTIC, but a follower not a driver. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates at the water-rights-holder scale (Denver Water, ditch companies, West Slope irrigators, the state, CWCB, the Upper Colorado River Commission). Lakewood holds few if any marketable senior consumptive-use rights of its own, so it is not a natural seller. It benefits if such a market stabilizes Denver Water's supply and moderates the odds of deep involuntary cuts reaching Front Range taps. Individual districts (Consolidated Mutual, which owns Clear Creek/Lena Gulch surface rights) could in theory participate, but municipal reuse-to-fallowing plumbing is thin. Expect passive endorsement, not capital or leadership. Selling point: framed as insurance for Denver Water reliability, not as Lakewood having to give anything up.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / PERSUADABLE IF LOCAL BENEFIT IS CONCRETE. Lakewood has active municipal sustainability initiatives and a climate/energy posture that makes clean solar+storage politically comfortable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure or conservation would be attractive if it lowers ratepayer costs or funds district-level reuse/efficiency without ceding land-use control. Frictions: Lakewood is land-constrained and built-out (limited siting for large solar), water for datacenter cooling is a live third-rail in Colorado, and the city's fragmented water governance makes it hard to direct a single 'water fund' to one utility. Best fit is a distributed/rooftop-plus-storage framing with water-efficiency retrofits, not a large greenfield datacenter campus inside the city. Persuadable, but needs a named local dollar figure and no new consumptive water demand.

On reuse/desal. REUSE: FAVORABLE IN PRINCIPLE, CONSTRAINED IN PRACTICE. Colorado now permits direct potable reuse (DPR rule) and Denver Water runs the state's largest recycled-water system; the state recycles only ~3.6% of treated wastewater, so headroom is large. Lakewood-area districts could benefit from non-potable and eventually potable reuse, and Denver Water's recycled system already serves parts of the metro. But return-flow/water-rights law and the fragmented district structure limit what Lakewood can do independently; most reuse leverage sits with Denver Water and larger districts. Expect support for reuse framed as stretching existing supply. DESALINATION: LOW RELEVANCE / MOSTLY NEUTRAL. Lakewood is a landlocked Front Range city with no brackish or ocean source and no obvious desal role; large-scale desal reads as a distant, expensive Lower Basin/coastal solution. Would support only if it demonstrably relieves basin-wide pressure on the transmountain supply it depends on, otherwise indifferent.

A win for them. A win for Lakewood is reliable, affordable water for its residents and districts without the city having to build new supply, take on debt, or cede land-use control, plus visible sustainability credit. Concretely: (a) reduced probability that Colorado River / transmountain shortfalls force deep involuntary cuts or large surcharges onto Lakewood taps; (b) stable-to-lower wholesale water costs passed through from Denver Water; (c) outside capital (hyperscaler or conservation-market dollars) funding district-level reuse and efficiency so existing customers do not have to absorb the cost of resilience or of new growth; (d) a clean-energy/sustainability narrative the Council can own; (e) preservation of the 'current customers first' principle that dominates district politics. The ideal offer lets Lakewood be a supportive, low-cost reference partner and beneficiary rather than a funder or a rights-ceding principal.

Public record. The city's sustainability plan includes a goal to reduce municipal GHG emissions to net zero by 2050 and it has already invested in its first self-owned solar arrays and implemented water conservation measures.

Position. Longmont is a Front Range (Upper Basin) municipal transmountain-diversion user whose public posture is supply-firming and reliability, not river-crisis advocacy. Its Colorado River tie is foundational and longstanding: in summer 1967 Longmont Mayor Ralph Price filed the original Windy Gap water rights on the Colorado River as trustee for a six-city coalition (Boulder, Estes Park, Fort Collins, Greeley, Longmont, Loveland), making Longmont a literal founder of the Windy Gap Project. Today roughly one-third of Longmont's raw water supply comes from the Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) and Windy Gap projects, delivered from Grand County (Colorado/Fraser River headwaters) through the Adams Tunnel to Carter Lake and the St. Vrain Supply Canal; the balance is native St. Vrain Creek water. Its defining recent position is a large capital bet on firming that transmountain supply: Longmont is a participant in the Windy Gap Firming Project / Chimney Hollow Reservoir (90,000 AF total storage for 12 participants, ~30,000 AF/yr firm yield), subscribing 8,000 AF of capacity for itself. Longmont's public documents (Raw Water Master Plan Update 2024, 2025-2026 Water Supply & Water Shortage Implementation Plan) frame the crisis in terms of firming, drought-management triggers, and closing a future supply-demand gap through storage and eventually reuse, rather than in terms of basin-wide cuts. Longmont's Windy Gap water is a junior, post-Compact (1967-priority) transmountain right, so it sits at the exposed end of any Upper Basin compact-call scenario. Longmont acknowledges reuse and potable-reuse as part of Colorado's long-term toolkit but has not itself been a leading reuse operator.

On conservation. Cautiously interested but not a natural first mover. Longmont's Colorado River water is transmountain and, once imported, is native-supply-augmenting; a consumptive-use conservation market that pays Upper Basin (including transmountain municipal) users to reduce depletions could be attractive IF it is genuinely voluntary, compensated, and does not compromise the firm yield Longmont just paid heavily to secure via Chimney Hollow. Its likely stance mirrors most Front Range providers: supportive of a rigorously measured, additional, verified market as a demand-management tool and a hedge against a compact call, but wary of any structure that could become a lever to curtail junior transmountain rights, or that monetizes ag/senior water in ways that inflate the already-surging Front Range water market it must buy into. Longmont would probably prefer to participate through Northern Water and the state (CWCB) rather than transact directly, and would want assurance that conserved water protects system/compact obligations rather than simply freeing supply for another diverter.

On solar+water. Plausibly favorable but secondary to its core water concerns. Longmont runs its own municipal electric utility (Longmont Power & Communications) and buys wholesale power through Platte River Power Authority (PRPA) - which is itself a Chimney Hollow participant - so cheap, firm solar+storage that also funds water touches two things Longmont cares about: power cost/reliability and raw-water capital it is straining to fund via rate hikes and debt. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that channels money into firming, reuse, or Colorado River supply protection would be welcomed mainly as a way to offset the ratepayer burden it is currently carrying. Caveats: Longmont will scrutinize whether new data-center load competes for Front Range water and grid, whether the water funding is real wet water, and whether the deal fits within its PRPA wholesale-power relationship. Because Longmont is a smaller, municipally run utility, it is more likely a beneficiary/partner in a regional structure (via PRPA/Northern Water) than the anchor host of a hyperscaler campus.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: supportive in principle and directionally aligned with its own planning, but an early-stage adopter rather than a leader. Longmont's Windy Gap water is legally reusable transmountain supply, which makes potable/non-potable reuse a logical long-term tool to stretch its one-third Colorado River leg and close its supply-demand gap; its own documents cite widespread potable reuse and Colorado's direct-potable-reuse work (PureWater Colorado) as important to closing the future gap. Expect genuine interest in reuse of its reusable transmountain effluent, gated by cost, treatment capital (already a rate pressure), and regulatory readiness. Desalination: largely irrelevant to Longmont directly. As an inland Front Range city ~1,000+ miles from the coast, ocean desal is not a supply option for it; it would view large-scale desal only abstractly, as a Lower Basin augmentation that might relieve system-wide pressure and reduce compact-call risk on its transmountain supply. Its actionable interest is reuse and firming, not desal.

A win for them. A win is anything that (a) protects the reliability of Longmont's transmountain Windy Gap/C-BT supply against curtailment or a Colorado River compact call, since a junior 1967 transmountain right is squarely in the firing line; (b) firms or augments supply to close its projected supply-demand gap without forcing Longmont to buy ever-more-expensive C-BT units or agricultural water on a surging Front Range market; (c) holds down the ratepayer and developer-fee burden it is already absorbing to pay for Chimney Hollow and treatment/storage capital; and (d) lets Longmont act inside its existing Northern Water / participant-coalition structures rather than taking on new standalone risk. The strongest single win: a durable, affordable source of additional firm water (via reuse, augmentation, or protected Colorado River supply) that reduces its exposure to a compact call and to Front Range water-price inflation without a large new rate shock.

Public record. The city has a 100% renewable electricity goal by 2030 and promotes water conservation internally, but its public stance focuses on local supply reliability rather than basin-wide paid conservation for Lake Mead.

Position. Mesa is Arizona's third-largest city (~510k) and a heavy Colorado River dependent: CAP/Colorado River supplies roughly half of its municipal water, with the balance from SRP (Salt/Verde) surface water and groundwater; it holds a 100-Year Assured Water Supply designation from ADWR. Longstanding public posture is pragmatic supply-diversification and self-help rather than public conflict over cuts. It activated its Water Shortage Management Plan (Stage One 'Water Watch,' later Stage Two under the Tier 2 CAP shortage / ~21% CAP cut), imposing voluntary then tightened conservation, distributing 22,000+ conservation kits in Q1 2026 and running turf-rebate programs (~$2/sq ft). Its signature move is the ~$180M, 10.5-mile Central Mesa Reuse Pipeline: Mesa sends reclaimed water to the Gila River Indian Community (10 gal reclaimed for every 8 gal of CAP rights, ~30,000 AF target) in exchange for Colorado River supply , an exchange/reuse model, not open-market purchase. Mesa was an early industrial-demand regulator: its 2019 Large Customer Sustainable Water Allowance ordinance caps big commercial/industrial users to a water budget and forces them to 'bring their own water' (acquire long-term storage credits and turn them over to the city). Large users have already supplied ~7,800 AF of additional supplies. City also pursues supply augmentation: new wells (~$6M each), the multi-city Bartlett Dam raise feasibility study, and watershed forest-thinning. Mayor Mark Freeman frames all of this as building 'the right water portfolio' for resiliency to build-out (30-40 yr horizon). Mesa is simultaneously one of Arizona's hottest data-center markets (Google ~4 MGD facility, Apple, Meta/Facebook, EdgeCore, CyrusOne, Digital Realty, NTT, EdgeConneX; Edged opened a zero-water AI facility in Mesa), so it is directly living the water-vs-datacenter tension its ordinance was built to manage.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE-with-conditions of a verified consumptive-use conservation market. Mesa already operates on exactly this logic , it monetizes/exchanges conserved reclaimed water (the GRIC deal), it forces large users to buy long-term storage credits, and it recharges ~8,000 AF/yr. A market that lets it monetize verified conservation, or buy verified saved consumptive use to firm its portfolio, fits its existing playbook. Conditions: it will insist on rigorous ADWR-grade verification/accounting (it guards its 100-year designation and credit integrity), protection against paper-water over-allocation (an issue it and ASU researchers already flag), and that market activity not undercut its priority CAP entitlement. It will resist any framing that treats municipal M&I as the payer-of-last-resort while ag holders profit without real wet-water savings.

On solar+water. Likely INTERESTED but hard-nosed. Mesa is already the arena where hyperscalers must 'bring their own water' , so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage package that ALSO funds water augmentation or offsets is highly aligned with its ordinance and with its stated need for additional portfolio supplies. Mesa has demonstrated appetite for water-neutral/zero-water designs (Edged) and for making big users pay for their footprint. It would welcome private capital funding reuse, recharge credits, or new supply, and cheap firm clean power helps energy-intensive treatment/pumping and reuse. Caveats: Mesa will want the water contribution to be real, permanent, and additional (not accounting sleight-of-hand), delivered on the city's terms and credited to the city, with no erosion of its rate base or control. Anything that looks like a datacenter buying its way past the cap without net-new wet water gets pushback.

On reuse/desal. Strongly PRO-REUSE; cautiously OPEN on desalination. Reuse is core identity: near-total wastewater reuse, four reclamation plants, the reuse-for-CAP exchange, and active recharge. It will champion large-scale reuse and likely potable-reuse/AWP expansion (Arizona has >$1.5B in AWP/DPR projects statewide) as the most controllable augmentation lever. Desalination is viewed as a longer-horizon state/regional play , Mesa is inland, so it benefits only through statewide augmentation (ADWR's WIFA-backed desal pre-development proposals, Sea of Cortez / brackish concepts) that adds to the system pool it draws from. It would support desal as a portfolio-diversifier if someone else carries the conveyance cost and it improves overall CAP/system reliability, but it is not going to lead or self-fund coastal desal.

A win for them. A win for Mesa is a firmer, more diversified, lower-risk water portfolio that protects its 100-Year Assured Water Supply and lets it keep saying yes to growth (data centers + housing) without residential rationing or big rate shocks. Concretely: net-new verified supply or conservation credited to the city; large industrial users self-funding their water footprint plus a margin; cheaper firm clean power to run reuse/treatment; and defensible ADWR-grade accounting. It wants to be seen as the pragmatic model city that solved the water-vs-datacenter tension, not as a place that ran short.

Public record. The city offers its residents and HOAs significant financial incentives, up to $50,000 for commercial properties, to convert grass to low-water-use xeriscape, directly paying for water conservation.

Position. No published basin-crisis 'position paper'; Needles operates at the level of survival and reliability, not compact politics. Documented facts that define its stance: (1) It depends on the Colorado River and adjacent groundwater for growth and sustainability and on the river for hydropower. (2) It holds first-priority, senior water rights (among the oldest along the CA stretch bordering Mohave County) and treats that seniority as its core protected asset. (3) Its allocation (~2,528 AF/yr) is small versus Havasu/Bullhead/Laughlin neighbors, so it is a minor consumer but a legally advantaged one. (4) Under a 1986 federal act (P.L. 99-655) and subsequent contract it administers the LCWSP and executes subcontracts letting river-adjacent pumpers use Colorado River water; it purchased 800 AF of Stage I capacity, and 2005 amendments authorized Stage 2 (+5,000 AF). (5) It has been in acute infrastructure distress: as of 2019-2021 three of four wells failed CA water-quality standards, leaving the city running on a single compliant well in 115F heat (a July 2021 well-part failure nearly ran storage tanks dry); asbestos-cement mains from the early 1960s and copper/'orange-burg' laterals from the 1950s generate 200+ leaks/year. (6) It successfully lobbied the state and won ~$3M in emergency drinking-water funding in 2021 ($1.9M new well, $1.1M booster station), positioning itself publicly as an under-resourced small system that needs outside capital. Implied posture: reliability-first, capital-hungry, protective of seniority, largely absent from Law-of-the-River negotiation tables.

On conservation. Cautiously interested, likely a small net seller if seniority is protected. As a senior, low-volume, cash-poor rights holder, Needles is well positioned to be paid for verified consumptive-use reductions, and its administration of the LCWSP gives it familiarity with subcontracting water access for value. It would treat a compensated conservation market as a potential funding stream for its infrastructure crisis. Hard conditions: participation must be voluntary and must not erode its present-perfected/first-priority seniority or set a precedent that senior rights can be diminished; payments must be real and durable; and it will worry about depleting a small allocation it also needs for growth and its LCWSP obligations. Wariness spikes if the market is framed as senior holders 'owing' cuts rather than being paid for optional savings.

On solar+water. Interested-to-favorable if the water-funding and local benefits are concrete, indifferent-to-skeptical otherwise. A hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water reads to Needles primarily as potential outside capital for its failing system plus possible tax base and jobs in a distressed desert town, on land the Mojave has in abundance. It is not a basin-scale water hawk, so 'new datacenter demand' is less of a red flag to Needles than to upstream negotiators, provided the project does not draw on or threaten Needles' own senior water and actually delivers the promised infrastructure dollars. Skepticism if the 'also funds water' piece is vague, if the project competes for local groundwater/river water without benefit to the city, or if it stresses its hydropower-linked electric utility. Move it to favorable by earmarking funding specifically for Needles' mains/wells/treatment and structuring the load as air-cooled/low-water with a firm local benefit agreement.

On reuse/desal. Broadly neutral-to-mildly-favorable but low-priority for its own situation. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a Lower-Basin/coastal-metro-scale play (MWD, coastal California) that mostly reduces pressure on the river system Needles depends on, which indirectly protects its seniority and hydropower, so it has no reason to oppose it. But desal/large reuse does little to solve Needles' actual problem, which is clean local delivery through failing pipes, so it is not a project Needles champions or funds. Small-scale local reuse (e.g., recycled water to stretch its own supply and defer well/treatment costs) could interest it if grant-funded. It will resist any cost-share or rate impact that a distant mega-project might push onto small systems, and it has no capital to contribute.

A win for them. A funded, reliable, affordable water system: replaced 1950s-60s mains/laterals, compliant wells and treatment, and a booster/storage buildout, paid for largely with outside capital so a poor ratepayer base is not soaked. Alongside that, ironclad protection (or monetization on its own terms) of its senior first-priority Colorado River rights and its LCWSP administrator role, plus stable, affordable hydropower. If it can turn its senior water and river-adjacent access into a revenue stream that funds its own infrastructure without surrendering seniority, that is a clear win it can sell to its council and residents.

Public record. Needles' reliance on its own water and wastewater utilities, without a broader basin position, suggests its interests are localized and focused on reliability, making it open to infrastructure programs that serve its direct needs.

Position. North Las Vegas is a fast-growing Southern Nevada municipality that runs its own Utilities Department (water distribution plus wastewater treatment) but sits INSIDE the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) wholesale system, so its Colorado River positions are largely set for it by SNWA and the Colorado River Commission of Nevada, not stated independently. More than 90% of the water it delivers is Colorado River water drawn from Lake Mead by SNWA; the balance is deep-aquifer groundwater. Its longstanding, revealed public posture is pro-growth-through-recycling: it operates a wastewater plant near Nellis AFB whose treated flows travel via Sloan Channel to the Las Vegas Wash and back to Lake Mead, feeding Nevada's return-flow-credit system (Nevada consumes ~198,000 AF but returns ~245,000 AF, letting it use far more than its nominal 300,000 AF/yr apportionment). Since 1987 the city has been an SNWA member banking treated Colorado River water in the aquifer in surplus years. Its signature current position is the Garnet Valley/Apex Water and Wastewater System, a partnership with SNWA (SNWA board approved $37M; transmission line est. '$280M-plus,' broke ground 2024, online ~2028) explicitly designed so ALL indoor water use at the 18,000-acre Apex Industrial Park is reclaimed and recycled back to Lake Mead. City officials (Mayor John Lee, Mayor Pro Tem Scott Black, gov-affairs/econ-dev director Jared Luke) frame water as an economic-development enabler for Apex data centers and industry, projecting 73,000 jobs and $7B of investment over 20 years. The city has courted water-conscious data centers (e.g., Novva's water-free-cooling site) and land-banking hyperscalers (Switch, Novva). Net: it does not lead on basin-wide crisis policy; it champions reuse-enabled growth and defers to SNWA on cuts, credits, and interstate negotiations.

On conservation. Mildly favorable but low-salience, and it will follow SNWA's lead rather than transact directly. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not threaten North Las Vegas: Nevada's whole model already turns on minimizing CONSUMPTIVE use (indoor water is recycled; only outdoor use is consumed), so the city is philosophically aligned with paying for/measuring consumptive-use reductions and has effectively been doing it via mandatory turf removal and reuse for years. It would welcome a credible market IF it protects Nevada's return-flow-credit accounting and does not recharacterize its recycled water as 'available' to others. Cautions: the city has little unused water to sell (it is a growth buyer, not a seller), so it is more likely a beneficiary of system stabilization than an active market participant; it will want any market to count Nevada's existing conservation/reuse as additional and not penalize a low-per-capita-use state. Expect the city to defer to SNWA and CRC on whether to engage and to care mainly that a market keeps Lake Mead elevations high enough to protect intake reliability for its supply.

On solar+water. STRONGEST hook of the three and the most likely to move North Las Vegas toward ally. The city has explicitly built its economic strategy around Apex as a data-center/industrial hub and has already partnered with hyperscaler-adjacent capital (developer/private and grant funding covers 56-79% of its utility CIP; it markets water-free-cooling and renewable-powered data centers like Novva; Switch and Novva are land-banking). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water maps almost perfectly onto what the city is already trying to assemble at Apex: outside capital to pay for the $280M-plus water/sewer backbone, firm clean power for data-center load on NV Energy's grid, and a funding stream that reinforces the reuse-back-to-Lake-Mead model that makes the growth legally possible. The city would engage eagerly IF: the water funding is real and dedicated to its reclamation/conveyance infrastructure (not just PR or offsets that free water elsewhere), the deal brings jobs and tax base to North Las Vegas specifically, and it does not aggravate the state-level backlash over data-center water/energy strain that is now a live political risk. Reliability and cost of power for Apex tenants, and keeping the 'every indoor gallon recycled' promise intact, are the make-or-break details.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive on reuse (it is a defining champion); cautiously supportive on desalination via the SNWA proxy. Large-scale REUSE is North Las Vegas's core competency and brand: its wastewater-to-Wash-to-Lake-Mead return-flow system and the Apex 'all indoor water reclaimed' design are exactly this, so it would be an enthusiastic partner for anything that expands reuse capacity, funds reclamation infrastructure, or hardens the return-flow-credit accounting its growth depends on. On DESALINATION, the city has no coastal nexus and would react through SNWA, which has long pursued ocean-desal-for-exchange concepts (paying for desal in California/Mexico in return for a larger Colorado River share). The city would welcome desal that augments Nevada's usable supply and thus underwrites more Apex growth, but it will not lead, fund, or shoulder desal cost/energy directly; it cares only that the resulting supply is firm, affordable at the wholesale rate SNWA charges it, and protects Lake Mead intake reliability. Reuse = high-enthusiasm, low-friction, on-brand; desal = supportive-but-passive, delegated to SNWA.

A win for them. A win is outside capital and clean firm power that lets North Las Vegas build out Apex faster and cheaper without loading the cost onto its own ratepayers or general fund. Concretely: (a) private/grant/hyperscaler money that funds the Garnet Valley/Apex water-and-sewer backbone and expands its wastewater-reclamation capacity, preserving the 'every indoor gallon recycled back to Lake Mead' model that underwrites its growth; (b) firm, affordable, low-carbon power for Apex data-center and industrial tenants so recruitment keeps winning; (c) durable protection of Nevada's return-flow-credit accounting and Lake Mead intake reliability so its >90% Colorado-River supply stays secure; and (d) jobs, investment, and tax base landing specifically in North Las Vegas (its stated 73,000-jobs / $7B target) - all achieved while defusing, not inflaming, the state-level backlash over data-center water and energy use.

Public record. As a municipal water distributor within the Southern Nevada Water Authority's (SNWA) service area, its conservation and reuse policies are largely shaped by the regional authority, making its independent public stance on these specific large-scale issues difficult to verify.

Position. PWP's longstanding public posture is diversification away from imported-water dependence, not river-politics advocacy. It does not take public positions in Law-of-the-River negotiations; that role belongs to MWD, its wholesaler. Recent public statements (2024-2026 town halls, council committee) center on: (1) reducing reliance on imported Colorado River/SWP water by expanding local Raymond Basin groundwater and stormwater recharge; (2) conservation as core policy (153 GPCD in 2020, ~27% below baseline; 'Ripple Effect' campaign; compliance with July 2025 'Making Conservation a California Way of Life' regs); (3) supply adequacy claims (utility told council Pasadena has enough supply through 2050 even in drought). Council members (Justin Jones, Tyrone Hampton) are actively pushing PWP to 'plan for a more constrained imported water future' and pursue more recharge projects. Chief Assistant GM Stacie Takeguchi framed the goal as supporting growth 'without further straining our water supplies.' PWP has NOT publicly commented on Upper/Lower Basin cut proposals, consumptive-use markets, or desalination.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but with limited direct standing. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates at the entitlement-holder level (MWD, ag districts, tribes), where PWP is not a party. PWP benefits indirectly: anything that stabilizes MWD's Colorado River supply and moderates wholesale rate escalation is favorable to PWP's ratepayers and its own budget gap. PWP's entire local strategy (conservation, recharge, reuse) is philosophically aligned with paying for consumptive-use reductions. Engagement channel runs through MWD, so PWP would be an ally-of-convenience rather than a direct market participant. Persuadable-to-supportive.

On solar+water. Plausibly INTERESTED, and the strongest natural fit of the three. PWP is a combined water AND electric utility with 'one of the most ambitious clean energy targets in the state' (100% carbon-free electricity by 2030, per Acting GM David Reyes). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure aligns with both halves of PWP's mission and could directly finance the capital projects (groundwater wells, recharge, non-potable system) it is already funding through painful rate hikes. Caveat: Pasadena is a dense built-out municipality with limited land for large solar+storage, and no obvious large data-center load; PWP would more likely value the water-funding mechanism than host the generation. Persuadable if the water-funding is concrete and de-risks its rate trajectory.

On reuse/desal. SPLIT: strongly favorable to reuse, cool-to-neutral on desalination. PWP already runs a Non-Potable Water Project (recycled water from LA/Glendale Water Reclamation Plant + Arroyo Seco + tunnel inflows) targeting up to ~10% of demand, with Phase 1 customers Rose Bowl, Brookside Golf Course, Brookside Park, and Art Center. It stands to benefit from MWD's regional Pure Water Southern California (150 MGD; Final EIR certified Feb 10, 2026). Large-scale reuse is directly on-strategy. Desalination has never appeared in PWP's public strategy (inland utility, no coastal access, would only touch it via MWD regional supply). So: reuse = ally; desal = indifferent unless it lowers MWD wholesale rates.

A win for them. A win for PWP is a more predictable, lower imported-water bill and outside capital that funds its local-supply and recharge program so it can stop closing budget gaps on ratepayers' backs. Concretely: reduced or slower MWD wholesale rate escalation; grant/hyperscaler financing for groundwater wells, stormwater capture (Arroyo Seco, Devil's Gate), and the Non-Potable Water Project; measurable progress toward supply independence through 2050; and dual-benefit projects that also move its 100%-carbon-free-electricity-by-2030 target. Politically, being able to tell council and ratepayers that Pasadena is buffered from Colorado River shocks without another rate shock is the win.

Public record. PWP has a City Council-mandated goal of 100% carbon-free electricity by 2030 and is actively developing numerous local solar-plus-storage and water reuse projects to reduce imported resource dependence.

Position. Peoria is a fast-growing NW Phoenix-metro municipal water provider (~34,121 AF/yr of CAP entitlement: 27,121 AF M&I subcontract plus a 7,000 AF Indian-priority lease from the Gila River Indian Community). Longstanding posture: 'shortage on the river isn't a shortage at the tap.' It has spent ~$450M since FY2000 to diversify its portfolio (CAP, SRP, reclaimed, groundwater) so groundwater is now only ~5% of supply, and it holds ~242,000 AF (~79 billion gal) of underground storage credits as of end-2024. It uses ~60-65% of its CAP water directly and banks the rest. Its 2025 Integrated Water Utility Master Plan (IWUMP) centers on a ~$1B Advanced Water Purification (potable reuse) facility built over ~14 years, plus new redundant well fields (Lake Pleasant Pkwy/SR-303), plant interconnects, and conservation. Explicit goal: reduce dependence on the Colorado River, with managers openly planning for worst-case zero-CAP years. Water is a named Mayor/Council priority ('Water Security').

On conservation. Moderately favorable but cautious. Peoria's high priority means it isn't forced to sell/curtail, and it already banks a large share of its CAP water, so it may view a consumptive-use market more as a supply-augmentation or hedging tool than a compliance need. Likely to engage if the market is verified/additive and doesn't jeopardize its priority or stored credits. Would resist anything that reallocates municipal high-priority water to lower-priority users or complicates its recharge/recovery accounting.

On solar+water. Potentially strong interest, with guardrails. Peoria is actively courting economic development and faces a ~$1B augmentation bill; outside capital that funds water while supplying solar+storage directly addresses its cost and energy-for-treatment (AWP/pumping is energy-intensive) pain points. But metro-Phoenix cities are increasingly wary of data-center water/power draw amid basin depletion, so Peoria would want assurances that a hyperscaler deal is net-water-positive (funds reuse it would build anyway) and doesn't add groundwater demand. A well-structured 'they fund the AWP/well field, we host load' deal is a plausible win.

On reuse/desal. Very favorable on reuse; this is squarely where Peoria is already going. Its A+ reclaimed water is ~100% reused, and the flagship IWUMP move is a ~$1B advanced-purification (potable reuse) plant explicitly to gain independence from the Colorado River. Large-scale reuse partnerships/financing would be highly welcome. Desalination interest is real but secondary (inland; would engage via regional/state augmentation efforts like a Sea of Cortez or in-state brackish project rather than lead one).

A win for them. A win is cheaper, faster, river-independent firm supply that protects ratepayers and their high-priority CAP position: outside capital or partnership that de-risks and accelerates the ~$1B advanced-purification/potable-reuse program and redundant well fields, ideally with clean energy to power water treatment, without adding new consumptive demand or eroding their stored credits or CAP priority.

Public record. The city offers residents and businesses rebates for converting grass to xeriscape and has a goal to reuse 100% of its reclaimed water.

Position. Phoenix is the largest municipal Colorado River user in the Lower Basin and, by NPR's framing, 'the city with the most to lose' in the crisis. The Colorado River (delivered via the Central Arizona Project) supplies roughly 40% of the city's water; the Salt and Verde rivers plus groundwater and reuse make up the rest. Longstanding public position: Phoenix insists it is 'not running out of water' and has 'planned for drought for decades' through an intentionally diversified portfolio. It supported the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan and operates a phased Drought Management Plan (currently Stage 1, focused on awareness and conservation). In 2026, with Reclamation holding the basin in a Tier 1 (deepening toward larger) shortage and CAP deliveries to Arizona cut ~30%, Phoenix moved from reassurance toward active adaptation: Mayor Kate Gallego and Water Services rolled out a long-term water-security roadmap (April-May 2026), warned of tougher future cuts, and on July 3, 2026 the Council unanimously approved the Secure Water Arizona Program (SWAP), a Phoenix-Tucson-led voluntary water-sharing framework with an emergency reserve, an offset-reduction program (e.g., deals with ag districts), and city-to-city market transactions, targeted to launch Jan 1, 2027. Phoenix explicitly favors expanding water-sharing and water-transaction agreements across Arizona. It backs the seven-state / Lower Basin conservation effort (AZ-CA-NV Water Stabilization Plan to cut up to ~3.2 MAF) and supports large augmentation (basin plans include a possible ~$6B Mexico-coast desalination facility). Notably, water advisor Max Wilson framed SWAP around avoiding 'moral hazard' - too generous a safety net would discourage cities from securing their own supplies - signaling Phoenix wants markets/aid structured to reward self-reliance, not subsidize free-riding.

On conservation. Favorable / early adopter. Phoenix already built essentially this mechanism itself: SWAP's three pillars (emergency reserve, offset-reduction, and willing-buyer/willing-seller market transactions) approved July 2026 are a verified consumptive-use conservation market at the municipal and ag-district level. A credible, verified, volumetrically-accounted market fits Phoenix's stated preference to 'expand water-sharing and water-transaction agreements across Arizona.' The key conditions Phoenix will impose come straight from its own words: rigorous measurement/verification of real wet-water savings (no paper water) and structuring that avoids 'moral hazard' - it wants a market that rewards cities/users who invest in their own supply, not one that lets free-riders lean on the reserve. Expect Phoenix to want a seat shaping governance, priced conservation (the going basin rate has clustered around ~$400/AF), and assurance that savings are additional and don't erode Arizona's Law-of-the-River standing.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, with caveats - the strongest wedge if framed right. Phoenix is courting data centers and fabs as economic engines while under intense public scrutiny over their resource footprint, so an offer that pairs hyperscaler-funded solar+storage (cutting the fossil/nuclear generation whose groundwater draw is the real regional risk) with a dedicated water-funding stream directly answers its two exposures at once. Phoenix would likely engage but demand: (a) that on-site cooling stay low-water (closed-loop/air), (b) that the water funding buy real, verified wet-water or reuse capacity rather than offsets on paper, and (c) transparency, given active public/legislative pressure for data-center water disclosure and the political sensitivity of appearing to trade the public's water for tech load. The self-reliance / anti-moral-hazard instinct means Phoenix will prefer a deal where the hyperscaler funds net-new supply it can point to, not a subsidy that masks demand growth. Well-structured, this moves Phoenix toward ally on this specific vector.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable - already Phoenix's flagship strategy. Reuse is core to the roadmap: the ~$350M Cave Creek 'Pure Water Phoenix' Advanced Water Purification build (RO + UV advanced oxidation, ~7 MGD initial, ~2029) and the Reclamation-cofunded North Gateway facility (~$179M) show Phoenix is already spending big and taking the political risk of 'toilet-to-tap' messaging. It also endorses large-scale augmentation at the basin level, including the proposed ~$6B Mexico-coast desalination concept. Constraints Phoenix will flag: cost/affordability and rate impact, energy intensity of RO/desal (which loops back to the clean-energy argument), regulatory/permitting timelines, and for ocean desal the interstate/international financing and delivery-exchange complexity. Any partner who helps de-risk the capital cost or the energy load of reuse/desal is pushing on an open door.

A win for them. A win is more firm, verifiable, non-Colorado-River wet water at a defensible cost and rate impact, secured in a way that (1) protects Assured Water Supply and continued growth, especially the fab/data-center economy, (2) reduces the ~40% CAP dependence and its cut exposure, (3) preserves Arizona's Law-of-the-River standing and doesn't create free-rider/moral-hazard dynamics, and (4) lets Gallego and the Council show ratepayers and the public that they got ahead of the crisis. Concretely: funded/accelerated reuse and augmentation capacity, a working verified conservation market they help govern (SWAP realized and scaled), and outside capital (e.g., hyperscaler-funded) that pairs clean energy with net-new water Phoenix can point to as its own achievement.

Public record. The city established a fund to secure shortage-year water leases from higher-priority rights holders and is a leader in a new water-sharing program (SWAP) to encourage conservation and transfers.

Position. Pueblo sits on the Arkansas River, not the Colorado River mainstem, so it is not a direct Colorado River Compact party. Its exposure is indirect but real: the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project transbasin-diverts an average ~69,200 AF/yr from Colorado River headwaters (Fryingpan River / Upper Colorado tributaries) over the Continental Divide into the Arkansas Basin, storing it in Pueblo Reservoir, and this Fry-Ark supply serves ~720,000 people across Pueblo, Colorado Springs, La Junta, Lamar and other SE Colorado users. Longstanding public positions: (1) Self-styled steward of Arkansas Valley flows. Pueblo negotiated flow-management provisions (2004 IGAs, reaffirmed ~2009 with Colorado Springs' Southern Delivery System) that supplement flows below 50 cfs from a Lake Pueblo pool, restrict exchanges below 100 cfs, and support the downtown whitewater park. (2) Keep-water-in-basin doctrine: Pueblo Water has historically bought Arkansas ditch shares and leased them back to farmers to preserve rights and resist out-of-basin export. (3) Dual character on 'buy-and-dry': in 2009 Pueblo Water bought 5,540 Bessemer Ditch shares (~$10,150/share, ~8,000 AF) permanently converting ~1/3 of Bessemer irrigated land to municipal use, but softened it with up-to-20-year lease-backs (through ~2029) and pioneered a lease-fallowing pilot, positioning itself as the 'responsible' buyer relative to Aurora and Colorado Springs. (4) Contamination/equity driver: Pueblo Reservoir is the source for the ~$1.39B, 130-mile Arkansas Valley Conduit (AVC) to bring clean Colorado River-origin water to 39 downstream communities plagued by radionuclides (radon, uranium) and high TDS/salinity; a Dec 30 2025 Trump veto of a bipartisan AVC funding bill made federal support a live political fight (SECWCD says ~3 more years of construction funded).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with Pueblo's stated preference for lease-fallowing and rotational fallowing over permanent buy-and-dry - it already runs a Bessemer lease-fallowing pilot and leases converted shares back to farmers. Pueblo would likely support a market that (a) rewards verified, temporary consumptive-use reductions, (b) keeps water and economic value in the Arkansas Basin, and (c) lets it firm supply without permanently drying farmland or inflaming LAVWCD. Concerns: it will insist on rigorous quantification (consumptive use vs. diversion), protection of return flows and downstream/river-corridor flows, no erosion of its senior Arkansas rights, and that the market not become a vehicle for out-of-basin export past Pueblo.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical, persuadable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure is attractive because Pueblo is a post-industrial, cost-sensitive city (former steel town) that needs capital for aging infrastructure and the AVC after federal funding wobbled. Non-ratepayer capital that funds supply/treatment/conservation would be welcomed by the elected board and city. Skepticism: Pueblo will scrutinize whether a new large data-center/industrial load creates NEW consumptive water demand in an already water-short basin (net water balance must be favorable), demand local jobs/tax base benefit (Pueblo prizes economic development), and want assurances the deal does not accelerate transfers off Lower Arkansas farms. Framing as 'funds the AVC / offsets ratepayer burden / net-water-positive' is the unlock.

On reuse/desal. Supportive of reuse; desal largely N/A. Reuse/recycling fits Pueblo's cost-and-supply logic and reduces reliance on volatile Fry-Ark imports and contentious ag purchases; expect support if capital and O&M costs pencil for ratepayers. Large-scale seawater desalination is geographically irrelevant (landlocked, ~1,000+ miles inland). Brackish-groundwater desalination is highly relevant to the LOWER valley's salinity/TDS/radionuclide problem (the very problem AVC addresses); Pueblo would view basin brackish treatment favorably as complementary to AVC, provided brine disposal and energy costs are solved and it does not undercut the AVC's federal funding case.

A win for them. A win for Pueblo is: firmer, more drought-resilient supply that reduces dependence on volatile Fry-Ark Colorado River imports and on politically toxic permanent ag buy-outs; outside (non-ratepayer / non-federal) capital that completes the Arkansas Valley Conduit and modernizes aging infrastructure at low cost to ratepayers; protected in-river flows through the city (whitewater park, 50/100 cfs regimes); economic development and tax base for a cost-sensitive post-industrial city; and reputational credit as the Arkansas Valley's responsible steward - solving the lower valley's contamination/salinity problem while keeping water and farm economies in-basin, rather than being lumped in with Aurora/Colorado Springs as a drier of farms.

Public record. As an entity reliant on trans-basin diversions that are increasingly uncertain, Pueblo Water has a strong incentive to support basin-wide conservation and infrastructure but has not taken a leading public role on these specific Colorado River-focused initiatives.

Position. Longstanding: Santa Fe is a national model for demand-side water conservation, not a supply-augmentation advocate. Tiered pricing since 1997; aggressive, steeply escalating rate tiers that recover peak-capacity cost in upper tiers; mandatory watering restrictions and turf ordinances; drought index tool (STEWaRDS, unveiled ~2024-25) tying restrictions to a 0-10 scale. Result: GPCD cut ~30%+ since buying the water company in 1995 despite ~25-31% population growth; among the lowest per-capita municipal use in the West (roughly 87-97 GPCD depending on year, vs ~150 national). The City frames its conservation record as proof that demand management works and treats new supply as a supplement, not a substitute for efficiency. Recent (Colorado River crisis era): The City publicly acknowledges its SJCP allocation is no longer reliable. Since 2014 the SJCP has delivered a full allocation in only 3 of 10 years; shortages have cut Santa Fe's imported supply to as low as ~66% of contract (~3,700 AF city+county in 2021), and Reclamation and the City both expect shortages to continue as the Colorado River declines. The City's flagship response is the San Juan-Chama Return Flow Pipeline (~$50M, ~17-18 miles from the Paseo Real Water Reclamation Facility to the Rio Grande below the BDD intake): treated reclaimed SJCP water is returned to the river to earn return-flow credits, letting the BDD divert more and stretching each unit of Colorado River water 2-3x. This is reuse-as-supply-multiplier, entirely inside the existing SJCP allocation. On data centers/hyperscalers: Santa Fe COUNTY (adjacent jurisdiction) adopted a unanimous 18-month data-center moratorium on July 2, 2026, at a low 1 MW threshold, citing groundwater depletion, acequia/irrigation impacts, grid reliability, and environmental justice. Regional political posture toward large water-and-power-intensive industrial buildout is skeptical and protective. State context: NM Gov. Lujan Grisham's Strategic Water Supply (brackish/produced-water treatment with state advance-market commitments, end uses including data-center cooling, hydrogen, renewable storage) shapes the state-level debate; Santa Fe has not championed it.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE, with a strong self-interest caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Santa Fe's identity and record perfectly and lets it monetize/credit conservation it already achieves. Two realistic reactions: (1) As a potential SELLER/creditor of verified savings, Santa Fe is attractive because it can document deep, audited, long-run reductions - but it has little marginal savings left to sell, so upside is capped and it will resist any framing that treats its already-lean baseline as the reference against which it must cut further. (2) As a buyer/participant, it would value a market that lets it acquire firmed Colorado River water or offsets to stabilize the unreliable SJCP delivery. Key concern: rigorous, defensible measurement (Santa Fe prizes verified numbers) and ensuring credits are additional, not paper. It will insist that a low-GPCD provider is rewarded, not penalized, by the baseline methodology. Overall a natural ally to a credible consumptive-use market IF the accounting treats early conservers fairly.

On solar+water. SKEPTICAL to OPPOSED as framed, but PERSUADABLE if the water benefit is direct, local, and clearly additional. The surrounding political environment is actively hostile to hyperscaler water/power demand: Santa Fe County's July 2026 unanimous 1 MW data-center moratorium cites the exact concerns (groundwater, acequias, grid, environmental justice) a hyperscaler pitch triggers. A proposal that reads as 'let a data center into our watershed and we'll also fund water' would collide head-on with that posture and with Santa Fe's environmental-justice, land-and-water-are-sacred political identity. To move Santa Fe, the offer must decouple the water benefit from local hyperscaler load: fund the return-flow pipeline or SJCP firming with NO new local consumptive draw, site any data-center/solar load well outside the Santa Fe watershed and acequia systems, and make the solar+storage a grid-reliability asset rather than a new stress. Even then expect intense public scrutiny. Persuadable only with a clean, water-positive, load-elsewhere structure and transparent governance.

On reuse/desal. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE on reuse; NEUTRAL-to-cautious on desalination. Reuse is already Santa Fe's core strategy: it treats reclaimed wastewater as one of its supply sources and is building the ~$50M San Juan-Chama Return Flow Pipeline to multiply Colorado River water 2-3x via return-flow credits. Funding, permitting help, or cost-sharing for reuse/return-flow infrastructure is the single most welcome offer you can bring. Desalination is less relevant to Santa Fe specifically - it has no brackish-desal project of its own and sits far from the state's brackish-aquifer end-use debate (which centers on southern NM, Project Jupiter, and data-center cooling under the Strategic Water Supply). Santa Fe would not oppose desal in principle but would want assurance it doesn't divert state funding away from reuse/conservation or become a subsidy vehicle for industrial (data-center) demand it distrusts. Large-scale reuse aligned with its return-flow program is the winning lane.

A win for them. A win for Santa Fe is durable, reliable Colorado River (SJCP) water it can count on, achieved without abandoning its conservation identity or exposing its watershed, acequias, and EJ communities to new industrial demand. Concretely: (a) the ~$50M San Juan-Chama Return Flow Pipeline funded/de-risked and permitted, multiplying each acre-foot of imported water 2-3x; (b) firmed or supplemented SJCP delivery that ends the 66-96% allocation roulette since 2014; (c) fair monetization/credit for its already-deep verified conservation in any consumptive-use market, with a baseline that does not punish low-GPCD providers; (d) relief from the conservation-revenue paradox so financial health does not depend on selling more water. The clean win is water-supply reliability plus infrastructure funding, with conservation leadership intact and no new local hyperscaler water/power footprint.

Public record. A national leader in demand management, the city has reduced per capita water use by over 50% since 1995 and is actively planning a large-scale potable reuse project to augment its supplies.

Position. Scottsdale is a large, affluent Phoenix-metro municipal water provider that draws roughly 70% of its supply from the Colorado River via the Central Arizona Project (CAP). It is a CAP subcontractor with a municipal-and-industrial (M&I) priority allocation (~72,000-81,000 AF), which is high-priority and shielded from cuts at Tier 1 but exposed to deeper cuts at Tier 2 and beyond. Public posture is 'proactive planning + confident but not complacent': the city frames itself as well-prepared while explicitly warning of long-term Colorado River uncertainty and structural aridification. Longstanding positions: (1) Aggressive water-supply diversification via a publicly stated multi-spoke strategy - demand management/conservation, advanced water purification/reuse, groundwater (Harquahala Irrigation Non-Expansion Area credits), proposed Bartlett Dam expansion on the Verde, and 'emerging solutions.' (2) National leadership in water reuse - the Scottsdale Water Campus has done indirect potable reuse (aquifer recharge of purified recycled water) for 30+ years, recharges ~2 billion gallons/yr, and in 2019 became the first AZ facility permitted for Direct Potable Reuse (demonstration). (3) A hard-line, jurisdiction-first stance on serving only its own customers: on Jan 1, 2023 it cut off hauled-water service to the unincorporated Rio Verde Foothills (~500-750 homes), citing its Drought Management Plan and Colorado River obligations, and litigated before a state-brokered fix. (4) Willingness to participate in compensated conservation - Scottsdale agreed to leave ~6,000 AF in Lake Mead in exchange for financial compensation, and has spent $8.25M+ on Colorado River preparedness plus $8.5M to buy Harquahala water-storage credits. Rates are rising (~4.5% increase effective Nov 1, 2025-2026; CAP water cost up ~14%) explicitly to fund new supply.

On conservation. Favorable to strongly favorable, with conditions. Scottsdale has already voluntarily left ~6,000 AF in Lake Mead for compensation and buys storage credits, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely within its revealed behavior. As a senior M&I holder it is better positioned to be a paid conserver or a buyer of dependable, verified reductions than a distressed seller. Likely conditions: rigorous, independently verified accounting (no paper water), protection of its CAP priority and long-term storage credit position, assurance that conservation is additional and not simply reshuffled, and that a market not undercut its own reuse/recharge investments. Skepticism if a market looks like it rewards prior over-users or erodes the priority system it benefits from.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested / persuadable. Scottsdale is a wealthy, growth-oriented city that welcomes high-value economic development, and its rising rates and multi-spoke funding gaps ($50M cited for expanded potable-reuse plans) make outside capital attractive. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure (AWT expansion, recharge, groundwater conveyance) could align well if the water benefit is real and local. Key frictions: metro Phoenix scrutiny of data-center water/energy demand, Scottsdale's brand as an upscale low-industrial community (siting large data centers inside Scottsdale is unlikely; nearby siting with water benefits flowing to Scottsdale is more plausible), and insistence that any deal not increase net regional consumptive demand on the Colorado River. Persuadable if structured as net-water-positive and capital-in, not load-in.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable on reuse; supportive-but-secondary on desalination. Reuse is core Scottsdale identity - it is a 30+ year national leader in indirect and demonstration direct potable reuse and is actively expanding advanced purification. It would enthusiastically back and likely help lead large-scale reuse initiatives and 'toilets-to-taps' scaling, subject to funding (it has flagged a ~$50M gap) and regulatory clarity from ADEQ. On large-scale desalination (e.g., Sea of Cortez / binational or in-state brackish), Scottsdale is generally supportive as a state/regional supply augmentation that could relieve Colorado River pressure, but it is inland and would not be a direct off-taker; expect endorsement of state/CAP/AZ Water Infrastructure Finance Authority efforts rather than city-led investment. Cost, energy intensity, and brine disposal are its likely reservations.

A win for them. A win is durable, drought-proof supply reliability that protects Scottsdale's high-value economy (resorts, golf, luxury residential) without steep, politically costly rate shocks or a repeat of the Rio Verde reputational hit. Concretely: outside capital that closes their reuse/purification funding gaps, verified conservation or storage credits that shore up their Lake Mead/CAP position while paying them for conservation they can deliver, protection of their senior M&I priority through the post-2026 guidelines, and public positioning as a national model for reuse and responsible Sun Belt water management. Net-water-positive economic development that funds water infrastructure is the ideal package.

Public record. The city operates one of the world's most sophisticated recycled water facilities and was the first in Arizona to receive a permit for direct potable reuse.

Position. Surprise is a fast-growing Phoenix exurb (~167,600 residents in 2025, up ~22% since 2020; added more people year-over-year than any Arizona city except Phoenix). Its longstanding public position is reassurance: it repeatedly messages that Colorado River shortage does NOT mean shortage at the tap, and that a Tier 1 declaration has 'no effect' on its allocation or customer deliveries. Operationally the city currently delivers groundwater from the West Salt River Valley sub-basin for nearly all drinking water, and uses its Central Arizona Project (CAP) Colorado River allocation primarily for recharge/replenishment rather than direct delivery. It touts a large banked-water cushion (reported ~16 years of groundwater stored as long-term storage credits) and an Integrated Water Master Plan that projects demand 100 years out, leaning on CAP plus reclaimed water to serve growth (e.g., ~24,450 AF needed by 2032, ~10,249 AF of that from CAP, remainder reclaimed). It runs a Class A+ recycled-water program (~7.3 MGD reused/recharged for agriculture, landscape, recharge, dust control). It participates in regional groundwater-for-CAP exchange deals with Phoenix, Peoria, and Cave Creek (leaving CAP water in the canal for partner cities in exchange for pumping banked groundwater). Public stance on the Post-2026 federal operating-guideline fight is low-profile; Surprise has not been a loud voice like the big cities or ag districts, but its interests align with protecting municipal/CAP priority. NPR (Apr 2026) profiled it in the frame of a city with heavy long-run exposure trying to adapt.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-neutral, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market lets Surprise potentially acquire/lease firmed supply or generate credits from efficiency and reuse without owning senior rights it lacks. As a lower-priority CAP holder, a functioning market to buy conserved consumptive use is one of the few ways it can shore up long-term firm supply, so it is a plausible buyer. Concerns: cost to ratepayers, whether purchased conserved water is legally deliverable through CAP infrastructure and counts toward Assured Water Supply, and reliability/verification of the credits. It would engage if the market is credible, additional, and delivers wet water it can actually use for growth.

On solar+water. Likely interested and receptive. Surprise is pro-growth and courts jobs/data-center-style development; a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure fits both its economic-development appetite and its need for capital to build reuse/AWP and replacement supply without loading it entirely on residential ratepayers. Data centers do raise a water-consumption optics risk the city would want managed (cooling water demand), so it would push for net-water-positive framing, community benefit, and that the water funding materially offsets any new demand. Overall a persuadable-to-ally posture if the deal brings capital plus firm supply and does not worsen its consumptive footprint.

On reuse/desal. Strongly aligned, already moving this direction. Surprise already operates Class A+ reclaimed water and its master plan leans on reclaimed water for future supply; Arizona is standardizing advanced water purification / potable reuse and studying desalination and imports. Large-scale reuse is squarely in its plan and it would welcome regional reuse/AWP and cost-shared desalination/import projects. Main hesitation is capital cost and rate impact and its lower-priority claim on any imported/desal supply allocated statewide. It would back reuse enthusiastically and support desal/import if the financing and its share of the delivered water are secured.

A win for them. A win is locking in firm, legally deliverable, AWS-qualifying long-term supply that lets Surprise keep approving growth and keep its 'your tap is secure' promise, while shifting the capital cost of new supply (AWP/potable reuse plants, imported/desal share, interconnects) off residential ratepayers onto outside capital (hyperscaler/DaaS financing, conservation-market monetization, grants). Concretely: replenished/expanded banked credits, a credible replacement-supply portfolio beyond CAP, protected municipal priority in any post-2026 framework, and economic-development wins (jobs, data centers, solar) that come bundled with net-positive water funding rather than net-new consumptive demand.

Public record. The city actively promotes water conservation through rebates for xeriscaping and efficient irrigation, and has a comprehensive recycled water program for uses like agricultural irrigation and groundwater recharge.

Position. Tempe frames itself as water-secure despite the Colorado River crisis. Its portfolio is ~87% renewable Salt River Project (SRP) surface water, ~7% renewable groundwater, and only ~6% Central Arizona Project (CAP) Colorado River water in a typical year, so it is one of the least CO-River-exposed large Valley cities. Public longstanding position: proactive conservation plus supply diversification. Since 2000 it cut water demand ~20% while population grew ~25%. It is currently in Stage 0 (Watch) of its Drought Resiliency and Preparedness Plan and participated in the 500+ Plan, voluntarily foregoing 178 acre-feet of CAP water in 2022 to help prop up Lake Mead. It signed onto the multi-city DCP agreement to mitigate reductions to CAP NIA priority water. Its flagship supply-side move is recommissioning the Kyrene Water Reclamation Facility (KWRF, closed 2010, reopening ~2026, ~4 MGD) for reuse: SRP Kyrene power-plant cooling water, aquifer recharge, and golf-course irrigation. No sharp partisan or litigation posture on the river surfaced; Tempe reads as a technocratic, resilience-focused municipal water manager rather than a combatant in interstate allocation fights.

On conservation. Likely supportive but not a heavy seller. Tempe already voluntarily forgoes CAP water (500+ Plan, 178 AF in 2022) and prides itself on conservation, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with its stated values and it could monetize the small CAP allocation it does not need. But with only ~5,000 AF of CAP and a self-image of being water-secure, it is a marginal, opportunistic participant rather than a large supplier. It would want rigorous, verified measurement (its conservation credibility is a brand asset) and assurance that selling saved water does not jeopardize its own future rights or Assured Water Supply designation. Persuadable-to-ally on a well-verified market.

On solar+water. Most interesting lever. Tempe is a growth magnet with data-center, semiconductor, and entertainment-district load, and it already couples water and power at the Kyrene site (reclaimed water cooling SRP's Kyrene Generating Station). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water reuse/offsets maps directly onto Tempe's existing model and could subsidize KWRF-style infrastructure and industrial cooling water. Risk it will weigh: neighboring Valley cities (Mesa, Avondale, Phoenix) have capped industrial water use and required developers to buy supplemental supply, so Tempe will want any hyperscaler deal to net-add water, not just consume it. If structured as the developer paying for reuse capacity and clean power, Tempe is a strong candidate. Persuadable leaning ally.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: already a believer and an active builder (KWRF reopening 2026, MBR upgrade, recharge + industrial reuse + irrigation). Large-scale reuse expansion is squarely on-strategy and Tempe would be a willing partner and reference case. Desalination: more distant. Tempe is inland with no coastal access and relies on SRP surface water, so seawater desal only helps indirectly via basin-wide augmentation (e.g., a shared Sea of Cortez or brackish-groundwater project that frees Colorado River water). It would likely support desal as a state/regional augmentation strategy that eases pressure on the shared system, but is unlikely to fund or champion it directly given low CAP dependence and high cost. Net: enthusiastic on reuse, passively supportive on desal.

A win for them. A win for Tempe is durable, low-cost water security that lets it keep growing its industrial, tech, and entertainment tax base without a supply crunch or a political fight over rates and rationing, while preserving its brand as a conservation and reuse leader. Concretely: outside capital (hyperscaler or market revenue) that funds reuse capacity like KWRF and industrial cooling water, verified conservation credit for water it already forgoes, clean energy that de-risks its load growth, and protection of its ~5,000 AF CAP position and Assured Water Supply designation. Bonus win: being a demonstrated model other Valley cities copy.

Public record. Tempe has a long-standing water reuse program, which it is currently upgrading and expanding, and has received national recognition for making residential solar and battery storage easier to permit and install.

Position. Thornton is a fast-growing Denver-metro suburb (Adams County, ~2026 pop. ~145k+) whose defining public position is that water is the binding constraint on its growth, and that securing and physically delivering firm supply is an existential municipal priority. Its supply is East Slope, not a direct Colorado River diversion: Upper South Platte and Clear Creek snowmelt stored in reservoirs including Standley Lake, plus Cache la Poudre River rights it bought in the 1980s via shares in the Water Supply and Storage Company (WSSC). Longstanding position: an aggressive 'acquire and transfer' (buy-and-dry) strategy: it paid ~$55M for ~21,000 acres of Larimer/Weld farmland and their irrigation rights and has pushed the Thornton Water Project (TWP), a ~70-mile pipeline to move that water to the city, targeted for completion 2028 at the earliest. It has been notably more aggressive than peer cities in acquiring supply outside original Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) boundaries. That pipeline has been mired in litigation and permitting fights with Larimer County and Poudre River advocates (1041 permit denials, appeals), and Thornton has consistently held the position that it will use water it already owns and legally divert it, rejecting demands to run a share back down the Poudre as an in-stream flow. On demand, Thornton publicly embraces conservation as a supply-stretching tool: residential GPCD fell from 103 (2002) to 73 (2025), and it declared a Stage 1 Drought response effective March 15, 2026 amid the worst regional snowpack in ~20 years, imposing 2-day/week outdoor watering limits and 10% cuts on parks/HOAs/large users. Its posture is pragmatic scarcity management, not river-restoration advocacy: it treats water as an asset to be secured and delivered, and it is exposed to Colorado River basin dynamics indirectly, through the shared Front Range supply pool (transmountain C-BT water underpins regional South Platte supply), through competition for finite Colorado water, and through the same drought that is emptying its reservoirs.

On conservation. Cautiously interested, leaning positive, but as a buyer/beneficiary rather than a seller. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive to Thornton mainly if it lets the city acquire quantified, additive, legally firm water without the decade-long litigation and reputational cost of its buy-and-dry model. Thornton already lives on transferred consumptive-use ag water and understands the accounting, so a rigorous verified-CU market is squarely in its wheelhouse and could be a faster, cleaner supply channel. It would scrutinize additionality, permanence, and whether the market competes with (and bids up the price of) the rights it still wants to buy outright. It is unlikely to be a large seller (it needs every acre-foot for growth). Reaction: engage as a demand-side participant; supportive if the market is credible and expands its acquisition toolkit, wary if it is framed as forcing municipal givebacks.

On solar+water. Interested and pragmatic. Thornton is a growth-and-development-oriented city that would welcome a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also underwrites water, on two fronts: (a) a data-center/large load in or near its jurisdiction brings tax base, jobs, and infrastructure investment it actively courts, and (b) any mechanism where that capital funds new water supply, reuse, or conservation infrastructure directly offsets the city's own capital burden (a stalled $500M+ pipeline makes third-party water capital very appealing). Concerns: data centers are themselves large water/power consumers, so Thornton would demand the deal be net-water-positive for the city and not a competing straw on the same stressed South Platte/Front Range pool. It would also weigh Colorado's tightening large-load/data-center scrutiny. Net: a persuadable-to-favorable audience if the water math clearly nets out in the city's favor.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly favorable and the most natural fit. Reuse/recycling is exactly the kind of firm, drought-proof, locally-controlled supply Thornton needs, and Colorado law permits indirect and direct potable reuse. Thornton reuses/return-flows are already part of Front Range water accounting, and a large-scale reuse buildout would let the city stretch owned supply and reduce dependence on the contested pipeline; expect active interest, especially if capital is subsidized. Desalination: largely irrelevant to a landlocked Front Range city except as brackish-groundwater or basin-scale Lower-Basin desal that frees Colorado River water upstream. Thornton would view ocean/large-scale desal as a beneficial system-level move if it eases pressure on the shared basin, but it is not a direct participant and would not lead on it. Overall reaction: reuse = eager adopter; desal = supportive bystander.

A win for them. A win for Thornton is more firm, drought-proof water delivered sooner and cheaper, enabling continued growth and build-out without the cost, delay, and reputational damage of buy-and-dry litigation. Concretely: (a) new quantified acre-feet from a verified-CU market or reuse project that supplement or de-risk the Thornton Water Project; (b) third-party capital (hyperscaler/utility) funding water infrastructure so ratepayers/the city don't shoulder it alone; (c) a defensible public narrative that Thornton is securing its future responsibly and sustainably (conservation wins, reuse, GPCD reductions) rather than draining farms and rivers; (d) reduced exposure to the shared Front Range/Colorado River shortage that is already forcing drought stages. Any proposal that visibly delivers reliable water + capital relief + reputational cover will win Thornton's support.

Public record. While its main focus is completing the Thornton Water Project pipeline to deliver water rights it owns, the city also offers residents a variety of rebates for water-efficient appliances and lawn removal to encourage conservation.

Position. Tucson is one of the most conservation-forward large municipal water users on the Colorado River, and its positions are unusually well-documented. Its supply is ~96% Central Arizona Project (CAP) Colorado River water, roughly 144,000 acre-feet/year, delivered via Tucson Water. Rather than consume its full allocation, Tucson has for years banked (recharged) Colorado River water underground in Avra Valley basins, giving it multiple years of stored supply and a rare 'supply exceeds demand' posture. In May 2023 it signed a System Conservation Implementation Agreement to voluntarily leave up to 110,000 AF in Lake Mead through 2025 at ~$400/AF. Its 2023 One Water 2100 Plan is the strategic backbone: 16 high-priority strategies built around supply diversification and demand management, explicitly modeling CAP cut scenarios (Tier 3 down to ~124,000 AF; up to a 50% cut to ~72,000 AF by 2100) and planning to survive them. In Jan 2025 the Council voted 7-0 to accept up to ~$86.7M from Reclamation to build an Advanced Water Purification (direct potable reuse) demonstration plant (~2.5 MGD from the Pima County Tres Rios plant, ~2031), projected to conserve ~56,000 AF for Lake Mead over ten years. Most tellingly, in Aug 2025 the Council voted 7-0 to reject Project Blue, a ~$3.6B Amazon-linked, ~290-acre data center, over water and energy concerns, then within weeks adopted a Large Quantity Water User Ordinance requiring any user over ~7.48M gal/month to submit a conservation plan, offset at least 30% of use with recycled water, bar potable water for cooling, and disclose energy mix and renewable share. Tucson is also a climate leader: its Resilient Together plan targets carbon neutrality (city operations by 2030, citywide by 2045), pushes grid decarbonization led by solar, runs 70+ municipal solar installs (~30 MW goal), and has explored a municipal power utility. Net: Tucson favors conservation, reuse, and renewables, and is deeply skeptical of large industrial water/energy users unless they demonstrably pay their own way and do not draw down community water.

On conservation. Strongly supportive, and arguably a model actor. Tucson already participates in exactly this kind of arrangement: it voluntarily forgoes up to 110,000 AF for ~$400/AF under the 2023 SCIA and treats banked/conserved water as a strategic asset. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with its revealed strategy of getting paid to leave water in Lake Mead while its stored supply carries demand. It would want rigorous verification (it prides itself on real, measured savings), guarantees the payments fund local resilience rather than simply subsidizing others' overuse, and assurance the market does not become a vehicle for junior/growth users to buy their way past cuts. Likely an early, credible participant and reference case.

On solar+water. Most skeptical of the three, and this is the sharpest, most concrete signal in the record. In Aug 2025 Tucson's Council unanimously (7-0) killed the Amazon-linked Project Blue data center over water and energy concerns and immediately passed a Large Quantity Water User Ordinance. So a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is NOT an automatic win here, it runs straight into Tucson's live grievance that big tech seeks 'unrestricted consumption while others sacrifice.' It could become persuadable IF the deal is structured to Tucson's stated ordinance terms: no potable water for cooling, at least 30% recycled-water offset, transparent disclosure of energy mix and renewable share, new solar+storage that is genuinely additive (not just claiming existing renewables), and water funding that flows to community resilience/reuse rather than merely offsetting the load's own draw. Tucson likes solar (carbon-neutral goals, 30 MW municipal solar, explored public power), so the energy half is attractive on its own. The failure mode to avoid is anything that looks like a corporate water grab dressed up with clean-energy PR, that is precisely what its residents mobilized against.

On reuse/desal. Enthusiastic on reuse; cautious-to-neutral on desalination. Reuse is core Tucson strategy: it operates one of the West's larger reclaimed-water systems, its One Water 2100 Plan leans on recharge and recycled water, and it just committed (7-0) to an ~$86.7M federally funded Advanced Water Purification / direct-potable-reuse demo plant projected to conserve ~56,000 AF for Lake Mead. It would welcome large-scale reuse investment and see itself as a national demonstration site. Large-scale desalination (e.g., Sea of Cortez / imported desal for CAP augmentation) is different: Tucson would evaluate it as a basin supply-augmentation question, wary of the energy cost (conflicts with decarbonization), the price, who pays, and whether it becomes a justification to keep over-allocating the river. Expect support for local/regional reuse first, conditional interest in desal only as a well-priced, low-carbon, equitably-funded basin backstop.

A win for them. A win for Tucson is being paid, on verified terms, to keep doing what it already does well, banking and conserving Colorado River water, while outside capital funds the reuse and diversification build-out (advanced purification, recharge, distribution) that lets it survive deep CAP cuts without rate shocks or growth moratoria. Concretely: durable, high-integrity conservation revenue that stays local; federal/private co-funding of its direct-potable-reuse and recharge program; new additive solar+storage that advances its carbon-neutral goals; and any large industrial load structured so it strengthens rather than threatens community water security and is publicly defensible. The ideal outcome positions Tucson as the national model for a desert city that monetized conservation, went carbon-neutral, and closed its water loop, on its own transparent terms.

Public record. Tucson's 'One Water 2100 Plan' explicitly prioritizes expanding municipal water reuse to drinking water standards and has secured federal funds to build a new purification plant to reduce its Colorado River reliance.

Position. {'summary': "Vernon is an 'exclusively industrial' 5.2-square-mile city just south of downtown Los Angeles with almost no residents (roughly 100-300 people) and ~1,800 businesses. Its municipal utility, Vernon Public Utilities (VPU), sells electricity, water, gas, and fiber to industrial customers at deliberately low rates as an economic-development tool. On water, Vernon has taken no visible public position on Colorado River allocation, the Lower Basin shortage, or interstate negotiations. Its water identity is local and pragmatic: it pumps adjudicated groundwater from the Central Basin and buys imported water (a Colorado River + State Water Project blend) from Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) only as a supplemental and emergency backup. Its stated priority is cheap, reliable water for industry, not river policy.", 'longstanding': "Vernon's whole civic model is built on low-cost utilities to attract and retain energy- and water-intensive manufacturing, food processing, and logistics. It holds long-standing adjudicated groundwater rights in the Central Basin (allocation on the order of 9,000-9,500 acre-feet/year under the Central Basin judgment administered by the Water Replenishment District of Southern California) and is one of a small panel of Central Basin water-rights holders. On the power side, Vernon has a long history with Colorado River hydropower and Southwest generation: it holds a federal Boulder Canyon Project (Hoover Dam) hydroelectric allocation (~12 MW) and a share of Palo Verde Nuclear (~11 MW), and it owns in-city gas generation (the Malburg/MGS ~134 MW plant). So the river matters to Vernon at least as much as a POWER source (Hoover hydro) as a water source.", 'recent': "During California's drought emergencies, the State Water Resources Control Board directed Vernon to conserve (an ~8% target vs. 2013 use) and specifically required Vernon to build a targeted outreach plan for its top ~25 industrial water users - an acknowledgment that a handful of large industrial accounts drive its demand. Recent water-quality filings flag PFOS/PFAS in some of its groundwater wells (below state notification/response levels so far), which is its more pressing near-term water issue than river allocation. No recent public statements tie Vernon to Colorado River shortage politics."}

A win for them. A win = Vernon keeps water and power cheap and reliable for industry while de-risking its two real vulnerabilities (groundwater quality/quantity and falling Hoover hydro). Concretely: (1) a verified conservation mechanism its large industrial users can use to cut process-water cost and sell savings, reinforcing Vernon's low-rate value proposition; (2) cheaper, cleaner power (solar+storage) that offsets shrinking Hoover Dam output and protects its economic-development model; (3) access to low-cost regional recycled water that stretches its adjudicated groundwater, dilutes PFAS exposure, and reduces reliance on pricier MWD imported river water. It gets to stay a quiet, low-cost, reliable industrial utility - resilience and rate stability, not a policy fight.

Public record. As a customer of the Metropolitan Water District (MWD), Vernon benefits from regional conservation and new supply initiatives, but its primary public focus is on providing reliable, low-cost water and power to its industrial base rather than leading on policy.

Position. Longstanding, documented posture: Westminster is a national poster child for aggressive municipal water conservation and demand management rather than supply-side expansion. It has run conservation and efficiency programs since the 1980s; a peer-reviewed study (Alliance for Water Efficiency; covered by High Country News) credits conservation with keeping water rates roughly half of what they would otherwise be, saving the average customer about $600/year. It maintains a formal 2020-2027 Water Conservation and Efficiency Plan, a 2019 Drought Management Plan, tiered/inclining-block water rates, watering restrictions, and a large non-potable reuse program (121 reclaimed-water sites irrigating over 1,300 acres). Supply portfolio: South Platte diversions, Standley Lake storage (shared with Northglenn and Thornton via FRICO; ~42,000 AF max, Westminster holds roughly half of a 24,000 AF dam-raise increment), Big Dry Creek storage, and CBT transmountain water from the Colorado River headwaters delivered through the Adams Tunnel. Public framing centers on affordability, growth-without-new-supply, and demand management; the city has not been a loud voice in interstate Colorado River law-of-the-river politics. On the crisis specifically, its public record is stewardship-and-efficiency, not entitlement-defense. Recent actions: 4% water rate increases adopted for 2025 and 2026 (a two-year schedule approved 2024) tied to main replacement and treatment costs; ~$40M value-engineering savings on a new drinking-water treatment facility; drought watch declared in the dry 2026 season.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE-to-favorable, with caveats. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with Westminster's identity as a conservation leader and its demand-management-over-new-supply philosophy. As an importer holding CBT units, it could plausibly be a buyer of conserved consumptive use to firm supply, or could monetize verified savings it has already banked. Caveats: (1) it is a municipal M&I provider, so most tradable consumptive-use volume in the basin sits with agriculture, not with it, meaning it is more a market participant/beneficiary than a large seller; (2) it will insist on rigorous, independently verified accounting and no injury to CBT/Northern Water operations; (3) affordability politics mean it will resist any structure that raises ratepayer costs without clear supply benefit.

On solar+water. PERSUADABLE, cautious. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive if the water funding lowers ratepayer burden (reuse/treatment capex, conserved-supply purchases) and if the data-center load is sited and powered so it does not compete with the city for its own water. Concerns: Westminster has a strong affordability-and-stewardship brand and would scrutinize whether a large industrial water/energy user is a net drain on regional supply or the grid, and whether the deal externalizes long-term risk onto ratepayers. It would want the water benefit to be firm, verified, and contractually durable, not a one-time PR gesture. Net: open to a well-structured deal, hostile to anything that looks like buying water access with an energy sweetener.

On reuse/desal. MIXED, leaning positive on reuse and skeptical on desal. Westminster already runs one of the region's more developed non-potable reuse systems (121 sites, 1,300+ acres) and is building new treatment capacity, so large-scale reuse expansion fits its trajectory and it would likely welcome outside capital or a regional reuse partnership, subject to South Platte return-flow / water-rights accounting (reusable vs single-use return flows is legally load-bearing in Colorado). Desalination is a poor fit: Westminster is an inland Front Range city with no brackish/ocean source at scale, so large desal is geographically irrelevant to it except as a basin-wide augmentation that might relieve pressure on shared Colorado River supply. It would view desal as someone else's solution and judge it purely on whether it protects CBT deliveries and does not raise its costs.

A win for them. A win is firmer, cheaper water for their ratepayers: additional verified/firmed supply (or reduced reliance on shrinking CBT deliveries) that holds or lowers water rates, funds their reuse and treatment capital, keeps them a recognized conservation and stewardship leader, and avoids the kind of rate-increase political fight they had in 2021. Concretely: outside capital or contracts that offset the new treatment plant and reuse expansion, a durable supply hedge against Colorado River / CBT curtailment, and a story they can tell residents about protecting affordability and the environment at the same time.

Public record. The city operates an extensive reclaimed water system for irrigation to reduce demand on drinking water and has a 2020 plan to reduce per capita water use by over 12% by 2030 through expanded efficiency programs.

Position. Yuma is a sole-source, direct-diversion Colorado River community that relies EXCLUSIVELY on the river for its municipal supply, holding Priority 1 and Priority 3 contracts. Groundwater inside city limits has a legal nexus to the river and is debited to Yuma's entitlement, so there is no alternative source. Its dominant, decades-long public position is protection of the Law of the River and priority-based allocation: senior rights must be honored, and shortages must fall on junior users first, not via pro rata cuts (which it accepts only under extreme life/safety emergencies). Longstanding secondary positions, all reiterated in its March 2, 2026 formal comments to Reclamation on the Post-2026 Draft EIS (Resolution R2026-020/R2026-010): (1) demands comprehensive, transparent, publicly accessible basin-wide consumptive-use accounting (verified diversions, consumptive use, return flows, system losses) as a prerequisite to any durable operations; (2) wants credit for its conservation - it routinely diverts less than half its full entitlement and leaves the rest in the river, and insists any shortage be computed off ENTITLEMENT, not off already-reduced actual use, so efficient users are not penalized; (3) wants return-flow credits preserved (it returns treated wastewater to the river, which also counts toward the U.S.-Mexico treaty delivery); (4) is hostile to the Intentionally Created Surplus (ICS) program, calling it a fragile house-of-cards that lets other entities claim credit for water Yuma actually conserved, and wants it reformed or eliminated; (5) strongly opposes on-river-to-off-river water transfers - the City Council passed a resolution opposing the Colorado River transfer to Queen Creek and asked Reclamation to restrict transfers from on-river Arizona entitlement holders to off-river metro areas, and to prohibit any such transfer during declared shortage/drought or while Lake Mead is below 1,090 ft. Yuma County agriculture (the surrounding ag economy Yuma's identity is tied to) uses ~8% of basin irrigation water but produces ~18% of basin crop sales and ~90% of U.S. winter vegetables, ~$4B/yr in sales, on some of the most senior mainstem rights in the Lower Basin.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to supportive IF structured correctly - this is the strongest wedge. Yuma is philosophically pro-conservation and is already an over-performer (diverts <50% of entitlement, high-tech irrigation, canal automation, wastewater recycling; regional ag cut water use ~20% while doubling output over three decades). Its explicit written ask is that conservation be REWARDED, not penalized, and that shortages be figured off entitlement. A verified consumptive-use market aligns directly with its top process demand: comprehensive, transparent, verified basin-wide accounting. The catch is design: Yuma is bitter that under ICS its real conservation gets claimed by others, so it will insist the market pay the entity that actually conserves within its own allocation, use verified (not modeled/swept) volumes, and not become a vehicle to move water permanently off-river to metro Phoenix. Get accounting integrity and anti-permanent-transfer guardrails right and Yuma is an ally; get them wrong and it reads the market as ICS 2.0 and opposes.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-guardedly-open, but not a natural fit and low salience. Yuma's fights are about water rights and accounting, not power supply, so a solar+storage buildout is orthogonal to its core interest unless the water-funding piece is concrete and non-consumptive. The appeal: outside capital that funds municipal system efficiency, well resilience, treatment upgrades (Agua Viva/Main Street WTFs), or reuse WITHOUT touching Yuma's entitlement. Two watch-outs: (1) if the deal really frees up on-river water to serve an off-river data-center load, Yuma will treat it as a disguised transfer and oppose it hard; (2) large new industrial load raises its accounting-fairness antennae. Framed as money that hardens Yuma's infrastructure and leaves its senior water in place, it is persuadable; framed as buying access to its water, it is an opponent.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, especially augmentation that adds new supply to the system without threatening priority. Yuma already recycles wastewater and returns treated flows to the river (and wants return-flow credit preserved), so reuse is congruent with its practice. It would welcome large-scale reuse/desal that increases total basin supply and relieves pressure on the mainstem - that reduces the political case for cutting senior users or forcing transfers. Nuance: Yuma will want assurance that (a) new supply is genuinely additive and not accounted in a way that erodes its return-flow credits or entitlement, and (b) reactivating the idle federal Yuma Desalting Plant does not create local environmental or cost burdens (Ciénega de Santa Clara / brine and O&M-cost concerns have long dogged YDP) without local benefit. Ocean desal that offsets Mexico's or CAP's demand elsewhere is a clear win for Yuma; anything that treats Yuma's own return flows as the 'new' water to be reallocated is a threat.

A win for them. A durable Post-2026 framework that (1) keeps priority-based allocation intact and treats pro rata cuts as an extreme-emergency-only last resort so Yuma's senior sole-source municipal supply and the regional ag economy stay reliable; (2) computes any shortage off ENTITLEMENT, not off already-reduced actual use, and formally credits Yuma for the water it leaves in the river; (3) preserves its return-flow credits; (4) stands up transparent, verified, basin-wide consumptive-use accounting Yuma has demanded for years - and, if a conservation market pays Yuma directly for real, verified savings within its own allocation, that converts its unpaid stewardship into revenue; (5) hard guardrails against permanent on-river-to-off-river transfers, especially during shortage. A win lets Yuma be paid and recognized for conservation it already does while keeping its senior water and farm economy secure.

Public record. The city is leasing 15 acres of its wastewater treatment facility property for a 25-year solar project and has an agreement to purchase power from the facility.

Position. Clifton Water District is a small municipal domestic water provider formed in 1951 serving ~13,700 connections across ~10,720 acres of the Grand Valley in Mesa County, CO (Clifton/east Grand Junction). Its entire raw supply is Colorado River water, drawn via the Colorado River Diversion and Grand Valley Canal Diversion just above/around the Palisade-Cameo reach. Public posture historically was low-key and operational, not policy-forward: it framed the river crisis mainly as a local conservation-and-treatment problem ('We all have an obligation to our community to practice water conservation daily'), leaning on a 2011 Regional Water Conservation Plan co-developed with the City of Grand Junction and Ute Water Conservancy District, plus an older Drought Response Plan rooted in the 2002-2003 drought. The district notably avoided explicit commentary on the Compact crisis, Lake Powell/Mead, or the Lower Basin. That changed sharply in 2026: during an exceptional-drought summer, the Colorado River near Palisade fell to ~2.92 ft / ~240 cfs (from a 2024 high of ~9.91 ft), and Manager Ty Jones went on record: 'We're seeing things never seen before, in all the records that we've kept in the last 100 plus years,' with flow 'less than a fourth of what it was in 2025.' The district implemented temporary drought conservation rates effective June 1, 2026 (monthly minimum on the first 3,000 gallons unchanged, higher rates above that), asked customers to cut outdoor watering to once or twice weekly, and warned it may impose irrigation/domestic-use restrictions. Its stated hierarchy is explicit: 'health and human safety, that's number one.' The district benefits from the Grand Valley's senior 'Cameo Call,' the largest and most senior mainstem call on the Colorado River, which structurally protects Grand Valley diversions even in drought.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but not a natural seller. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is aimed mostly at agricultural and large consumptive users; Clifton is a municipal domestic provider whose consumptive use is small and whose priority is reliable, safe drinking water, not fallowing. It would welcome a market that pays Grand Valley irrigators (with whom it shares the Cameo Call) to reduce demand and keep more water/flow in the reach, especially if that eases low-flow water-quality and treatment stress. It would be wary of anything that could be read as undermining the senior Grand Valley call or that lets the Lower Basin or Front Range buy up Western Slope water ('buy and dry' fears). Persuadable if the market is voluntary, compensated, verified, and structured to protect senior Western Slope rights and local supply first.

On solar+water. Mixed and pragmatically interested. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps well onto Clifton's real needs: capital for advanced treatment (sediment/TDS), plant capacity above 16 MGD, and drought resilience for a small ratepayer base that would otherwise absorb those costs. The energy piece is peripheral to a water district, so uptake hinges entirely on the water-funding mechanism, its strings, and local control. Concern would center on a large new water-consuming datacenter load in an over-appropriated basin; Clifton would want assurance the hyperscaler's own water footprint is minimal/reused and that funding is not a Trojan horse for a new senior consumptive demand. Genuinely persuadable if the deal is net-water-positive locally, funds specific plant upgrades, and respects the Cameo Call.

On reuse/desal. Interested in reuse-style solutions, cool on desalination. Ocean desalination is geographically irrelevant to an inland Grand Valley district. But advanced treatment, brackish/TDS reduction, and reuse concepts are directly relevant given the river's notorious salinity and sediment and the district's treatment-capacity constraints; the district already runs 'leading-edge technology' framing and did an $8.5M optimization. Large-scale basin reuse that augments or firms Colorado River supply would be viewed favorably if affordable to a small ratepayer base and if it improves source-water quality. The main hesitation is cost per connection and whether a district this size can finance capital-intensive treatment without outside funding, which is exactly why the hyperscaler-water and conservation-market options matter to them.

A win for them. A win is durable, affordable water security for a single-source domestic district: reliable Colorado River flow and better source-water quality at their Grand Valley diversions, treatment capacity and advanced-treatment capital funded from outside the ratepayer base, and the ability to retire the temporary drought rates without imposing hard restrictions. Critically, any solution must preserve or strengthen the senior Cameo Call and keep decisions locally controlled. Concretely: outside capital for plant upgrades beyond 16 MGD and TDS/sediment handling, a conservation or reuse mechanism that keeps more water in their reach during drought, and protection of ~13,700 customers' affordability and 'health and human safety first' priority.

Public record. The district's public posture is focused on local conservation through drought rates and customer education, and it has participated in regional conservation planning, but it has not taken a public stance on broader basin-wide compensated conservation or infrastructure programs.

Position. CVWD is a Priority-3 California Colorado River contractor with a ~450,000 AF/yr quantified right under the 2003 Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA), of which ~260,000 AF goes to Coachella Valley agriculture (dates, citrus, table grapes, specialty vegetables) via the 123-mile Coachella Canal, and the balance to groundwater replenishment, environmental mitigation and large-landscape irrigation. Colorado River water is 75%+ of the valley's imported supply. Longstanding positions: (1) Defend QSA priority and California's senior Law-of-the-River standing while presenting itself as a cooperative conservation leader; (2) It is a partner in California's Dec-2025 post-2026 framework (California offering 440,000 AF/yr toward the Lower Basin's up-to-1.5 MAF/yr), and touts having conserved 118,000+ AF since 2022; (3) It runs a voluntary, temporary, compensated (Reclamation-funded) conservation program for canal water users at $340/AF for reductions vs a 5-year historical baseline, capped ~10 TAF/yr / 30 TAF total (2024-2026, extended to 2025-2026 tranche); (4) Heavy capital-project bent to 'conserve without cutting acreage' -- $39M Reclamation grant to expand the Thermal Water Reclamation Plant (33,600 AF projected 2029-2058), the $7.5M Mid-Canal Storage Project (2024) co-funded with SDCWA and San Luis Rey River Indian Water Authority, and ~$60M of irrigation-lateral replacements. It exchanges its 194,100 AF SWP entitlement (jointly with Desert Water Agency, 3rd-largest in CA) with MWD for Colorado River water to recharge the overdrafted aquifer. On the Salton Sea, CVWD is a QSA party legally entangled in mitigation obligations, so it treats consumptive-use conservation as double-edged: less ag runoff accelerates Salton Sea shrinkage and dust/health liability. On energy, CVWD is pragmatic: it signed a 30-year solar+BESS PPA (Nobell Energy) for on-site generation at its Palm Desert facilities, and the region formed the Coachella Valley Power Agency (2025), signaling openness to energy-water deals but no stated position tying hyperscaler energy to river water.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive, conditional. CVWD already runs exactly this kind of program (compensated, voluntary, verified against a 5-year baseline at $340/AF) and co-authored the state's compensated-conservation framework, so a verified consumptive-use market aligns with revealed behavior. Two hard conditions: (1) transparent, verifiable accounting (a stated California-framework requirement) so it isn't accused of paper water; (2) Salton Sea mitigation must be funded and its liability capped, because permanently monetizing consumptive-use reductions dries the Sea and shifts dust/health cost onto QSA parties. It will resist any market that erodes QSA priority or lets its senior water be reallocated cheaply -- it wants to be a compensated seller/participant on its own terms, not a source of involuntary cuts.

On solar+water. Open but skeptical, persuadable with structure. CVWD is already doing energy-water deals (30-yr solar+BESS PPA, regional power agency), so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is directionally attractive -- it likes third-party capital that lets it conserve without cutting acreage or raising rates. Frictions to manage: (a) siting solar on active irrigated Coachella farmland is politically fraught (neighboring IID formally opposes utility-scale solar on ag land; prefers desert/industrial/long-fallowed ground), so the buildout must target non-productive/marginal land; (b) it will ask what 'funds water' concretely buys -- recharge, reuse capacity, canal efficiency, or farmer conservation payments -- and demand governance/ratepayer protection; (c) datacenter water demand in a shortage basin is a reputational landmine it will want to avoid. Frame as: developer capital funds CVWD recycled-water/recharge/efficiency and Salton Sea mitigation in exchange for conserved consumptive use, on non-prime land.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable -- this is CVWD's preferred lane. Its whole strategy is 'stretch supply with infrastructure, not acreage cuts': the $39M Thermal Water Reclamation Plant tertiary expansion (33,600 AF), recycled/non-potable systems, aquifer recharge, and SWP-for-Colorado-River exchanges. Large-scale reuse directly substitutes for river demand and reduces its exposure to cuts, and it has a track record of stacking Reclamation/state/DWR grants to pay for it. Desalination is more distant (inland, no coastal access; brackish groundwater or Salton Sea/Sea-of-Cortez concepts are capital- and energy-intensive and speculative) -- it would engage if someone else brings capital and it fits recharge, but it is not a near-term self-funded priority. Reuse: enthusiastic co-funder. Desal: interested if externally financed.

A win for them. A win is more reliable supply and lower cut-risk without fallowing productive permanent-crop acreage or raising ratepayer costs -- achieved by outside capital paying for reuse expansion, aquifer recharge, canal efficiency, and (critically) fully funded Salton Sea mitigation with their QSA liability capped. They want to keep their senior priority intact, be paid fairly for any voluntary conserved consumptive use with transparent accounting, keep farmers economically whole, and be seen as the region's conservation leader. The ideal package: developer/hyperscaler and federal/state dollars that let CVWD substitute recycled and recharged water for river demand, monetize verified savings, and protect the Salton Sea -- all without a mandated Priority-3 cut.

Public record. CVWD is actively participating in federally funded programs to pay agricultural users to conserve Colorado River water and is expanding its water recycling capacity to reduce its draw on the river.

Position. Lower Basin mainstream tribe (three noncontiguous reservations near Yuma: East, West, North) with senior water rights. Total diversion entitlement of 10,847 acre-feet/year decreed in Arizona v. California (574 U.S. 150, 2006), including 1,140 afa dated 1915 (first-priority within Arizona) and 7,681 afa dated 1917. Uses less than ~3,000 afa/year, mostly because it lacks infrastructure to convey water to its lands, so a large block of high-priority water is effectively undeveloped/unused. Longstanding public posture: (1) member of the Ten Tribes Partnership / Colorado River Basin Tribes Partnership, which supports tribal water sovereignty and the ability to lease/market unused water only under negotiated preconditions (states help quantify unused supply first; leases subject to approval by basin states, the tribal partnership, and the Secretary of the Interior). (2) Deeply invested in Colorado River Delta / Limitrophe habitat restoration as an 'act of cultural survival' -- has restored 200+ acres of riparian habitat removing salt cedar/phragmites and is transforming 400+ more acres, using its own decreed water to sustain restored habitat in the absence of natural flows. Secured ~$5.5M restoration funding (NFWF America the Beautiful Challenge $5M, USFWS Tribal Wildlife $200K, Bonneville Environmental Foundation $315K); work began 2024. Also in talks with Reclamation, the Sonoran Institute, and CRIT about additional ecological water. Frames river health in cultural/subsistence terms, not just economics.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but conditional. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly monetizes the tribe's structural position: senior, largely undeveloped rights it cannot yet fully use. The Ten Tribes Partnership already endorses compensated tribal water leasing/marketing under negotiated safeguards, and CRIT's 2022 off-reservation leasing authority is the template Cocopah watches. Payments could fund conveyance infrastructure and community programs without permanently alienating rights. Conditions/red lines: rigorous verification and additionality (it will not want its unused senior water treated as 'available' by default or quantified against it without consent); leases approved via tribal-sovereignty-respecting process; no coerced fallowing; protection of priority dates; and ideally a carve-out or complementary channel that lets conserved/undeveloped water serve delta ecological flows rather than only downstream M&I users. Cultural-survival framing means it will resist any market that treats water as pure commodity divorced from the river's ecological health.

On solar+water. Likely RECEPTIVE, among the warmest of the three options. The tribe has already executed a DOE-grant-plus-tax-credit solar model on the East Reservation to cut costs and fund community services, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water is squarely aligned with revealed behavior. Attractive because it brings outside capital, energy-cost savings/lease revenue on tribal land, and a funding stream for the water infrastructure and delta restoration it cannot self-finance. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis IF: the tribe retains sovereignty and land control (lease not alienation), gets real equity/revenue and jobs (not just a passive host), the 'funds water' portion is dedicated and enforceable (ecological/conveyance water, not just offsets that free up water for a hyperscaler elsewhere), and siting respects culturally sensitive land and the three noncontiguous parcels. Skeptical of arrangements that use tribal land/name for greenwashing without durable benefit.

On reuse/desal. Likely NEUTRAL-to-CAUTIOUSLY-SUPPORTIVE, with the most conditions of the three. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the system is generally welcomed by tribes because it eases pressure to draw down their entitlements and can support environmental flows. Positive if new water helps rehydrate the delta/Limitrophe and relieves basin scarcity. But Cocopah-specific concerns are acute given its geography at the bottom of the mainstream near the Mexican border: (1) brine/salinity disposal and water-quality impacts on the already salinity-stressed lower river and delta directly threaten its restoration lands and subsistence resources (the defunct Yuma Desalting Plant and past salinity battles are living memory in this reach); (2) it will insist on consultation, environmental review, and that new supply not simply enable more upstream depletion that leaves the delta dry. Support is contingent on protecting downstream water quality and dedicating a share of new supply to ecological/tribal benefit.

A win for them. A win: durable, sovereignty-respecting outside capital that (a) funds the conveyance/irrigation infrastructure so the tribe can beneficially use its senior rights instead of leaving them stranded, (b) secures dedicated water and funding to sustain and expand delta/Limitrophe habitat restoration as an act of cultural and subsistence survival, and (c) delivers revenue, jobs, and energy savings reinvested in community programs -- all without alienating water rights, compromising priority dates, or degrading downstream water quality. Concretely: an off-reservation leasing/marketing authority on CRIT's model plus a solar+storage-plus-water package that pays for both community services and the restored river reach they depend on.

Public record. The tribe is actively developing large-scale solar projects on its reservation and is using its water rights for a 400+ acre habitat restoration project that includes routing municipal wastewater through a new wetland.

Position. DWR is the Office of the State Engineer, Colorado's primary water-rights administrator and the state's commissioner on nine interstate compacts including the 1922 Colorado River Compact and the 1948 Upper Colorado River Basin Compact. Its core, longstanding function is administering water rights by strict prior-appropriation priority and assuring Colorado meets its compact obligations at Lee Ferry so the Upper Basin can avoid a Lower Basin 'call' and forced curtailment. State Engineer and Director Jason Ullmann was appointed in March 2024 (20+ years in water-resources engineering, 18 on the Western Slope, previously Deputy State Engineer and Div. 4 Assistant Division Engineer). Longstanding Upper Basin posture, which DWR shares operationally: the Upper Basin already lives within its ~7.5 MAF apportionment, has never violated the non-depletion obligation, and routinely delivers more than 8 MAF/yr past Lee Ferry, so future cuts are largely the Lower Basin's structural-deficit problem (this aligns with lead negotiator Becky Mitchell/CWCB, a sister DNR agency). In 2024 Ullmann said there were 'too many unknowns' and 'not any imminency for us needing to do any curtailment.' By August 20, 2025 he signaled a policy shift, telling lawmakers Colorado lacks clear regulations for handling forced (compact) curtailment and that it may be time to build them, doing so transparently and 'not in a vacuum,' via listening sessions with key water-user groups in winter/spring 2026 followed by broader public meetings. Recurring themes: 'You can't manage what you can't measure' (Ullmann pushing Western Slope diversion-measurement upgrades and Measurement Rules as the foundation for any curtailment), protecting Colorado's ability to fully develop its apportionment, defending senior water rights, and avoiding costly Lower Basin litigation if 10-year Lee Ferry deliveries fall toward the 8.25 MAF threshold. 2026 curtailments (intrastate, hydrologic) were expected to exceed any prior year due to historically low snowpack. DWR is a regulator/administrator, not a policy advocate or funder; CWCB (its sister DNR agency) holds the conservation-program purse and negotiating lead.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but strictly on its own regulatory terms; net persuadable-to-ally on a well-designed program. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits DWR's worldview because verification is exactly its wheelhouse. DWR was operationally central to the Upper Basin System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP), where consumptive-use savings from fallowing/crop-switching were quantified, field-verified (site visits, photo documentation), and compared to proposed savings. Ullmann's mantra 'you can't manage what you can't measure' signals it will insist on rigorous measurement, engineering-grade consumptive-use accounting, and protection of the priority system and other water users (no injury / no expanded use beyond historical consumptive use). Concerns it will raise: that voluntary compensated conservation not create a de facto new water right, not injure senior rights, route through the SWSP/administrative-approval process, and not be conflated with or used to substitute for its separate compact-curtailment authority. It will not fund or run the market itself (that is CWCB / UCRC / federal money), but it is the indispensable verifier and administrator whose sign-off makes a market credible in Colorado.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-mildly-favorable but largely outside its lane; treat as a permitting/administration gatekeeper rather than a decision-maker. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is an economic-development and financing story that DWR does not evaluate on the merits. What DWR cares about: any new or changed water use (cooling, augmentation, new wells, reservoir operations, or funded conservation) must have a valid water right or an approved plan for augmentation / substitute supply and must not injure existing rights. If the 'funds water' component means paying for verified conservation or augmentation, DWR becomes the verifier/permitter (favorable, familiar). If it implies new consumptive demand for data centers, DWR will scrutinize it hard and require it be fully covered under Colorado water law. It has no mandate over energy policy or who finances solar, so it will be procedurally cooperative but substantively agnostic. Expect 'show us the water right and the accounting' rather than endorsement or opposition.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle for reuse; largely not-applicable for ocean desalination (Colorado is landlocked). DWR generally favors reuse and water-efficiency because they stretch Colorado's fixed apportionment without triggering compact risk, and Colorado law increasingly enables potable/non-potable reuse of fully-consumable water. DWR's role is administrative: it must confirm the source water is legally reusable (typically transbasin/fully-consumable or reusable effluent), that reuse does not expand consumptive use or injure downstream seniors who historically relied on return flows, and that accounting is sound. So its 'reaction' to reuse is a technical gate, not advocacy. Large-scale desalination is only relevant to Colorado via brackish-groundwater or produced-water treatment, not seawater; for those, DWR again acts as permitter/administrator (well permits, quality/quantity accounting) rather than proponent. Net: a green light on reuse conditioned on legal-source and no-injury accounting; mostly N/A on desal.

A win for them. A win is administering Colorado River water lawfully and defensibly with the tools and data to do it, so that if forced curtailment ever comes it can be implemented equitably, transparently, and litigation-proof, while Colorado fully develops and protects its compact apportionment and never gets successfully sued by the Lower Basin. Concretely: finalized, publicly-vetted compact-administration and Measurement Rules; complete Western Slope diversion measurement so curtailment/conservation can be quantified; a verified consumptive-use conservation framework that reduces demand voluntarily (easing pressure toward mandatory curtailment) without injuring senior rights or creating new entitlements; and durable trust with water users that the State Engineer acts by rule and priority, not by fiat. Anything that supplies clean, measured, legally-sound water accounting and reduces the odds it must forcibly curtail Coloradans is a win.

Public record. The agency is actively investigating the feasibility of a statewide paid water conservation program (Demand Management) to help meet Colorado River Compact obligations.

Position. The Colorado Healthy Rivers Fund (CHRF, originally the Colorado Watershed Protection Fund) is a small state grant program created by the Colorado General Assembly in 2002 and administered by the Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) in association with the Water Quality Control Division and the nonprofit Colorado Watershed Assembly (CWA). It is financed almost entirely through a voluntary check-off line on the Colorado Individual Income Tax Refund form (donors can also give year-round after a 2016 legislative change). It makes small grants (roughly $20K-scale awards, ~10 organizations in a typical annual round) to locally-based watershed groups for on-the-ground work: water quality and quantity monitoring, riparian/streambank/channel and habitat restoration, flood protection, and watershed planning. Grants are leveraged at an average of about $6 matched for every $1 donated. Its longstanding public posture is apolitical and restoration-focused: cleaner water, healthier wildlife habitat, and improved recreation. It takes NO public position on Colorado River Compact allocations, Lower Basin cuts, the 2026-and-beyond operating guidelines, or interstate/agricultural-conservation policy fights. It is best understood as a funding pass-through and collaborative-restoration enabler, not a crisis advocacy actor.

On conservation. Likely mildly favorable but largely on the sidelines. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is an allocation/water-rights mechanism outside CHRF's restoration-grant mandate, so it would not lead or oppose it. If such a market produced funded stream-flow, riparian, or habitat co-benefits (e.g., restoration components eligible for CHRF project grants, or new matching money into watershed work), CHRF and CWA would welcome the incremental project pipeline and could serve as a small funding/administration partner. It would not weigh in on the market's pricing, verification, or interstate legitimacy. Reaction: passive ally to co-benefits, neutral on the market itself.

On solar+water. Likely cautiously receptive if it channels money to watershed restoration, neutral-to-skeptical otherwise. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is outside CHRF's core scope, but the fund's entire model is leveraging outside dollars into local restoration ($6:$1). New corporate water funding routed through the check-off model or as matching funds for watershed projects would be attractive. CHRF itself would not evaluate the energy buildout's siting, land, or grid merits and would defer to CWCB and local watershed groups. Reaction: opportunistic partner on the water-funding piece, no position on the energy piece.

On reuse/desal. Largely indifferent / out of scope. Large-scale reuse and desalination are supply-augmentation infrastructure decisions handled by CWCB, utilities, and basin roundtables, not by a small restoration check-off fund. CHRF would take no institutional position and has no operational role. It would engage only if such projects created eligible watershed-restoration or habitat-mitigation components it could co-fund, in which case it would be a minor, welcoming funding partner. Reaction: neutral, non-actor.

A win for them. A win is more dollars into the check-off pool and matching funds, plus visible, fundable restoration projects that improve water quality, habitat, and recreation with measurable local outcomes and strong grassroots partners. They want their small grants to leverage far larger co-investment ($6:$1) and to keep the watershed-group network healthy and collaborative. Any initiative that delivers documented on-the-ground stream/riparian/habitat benefits and can be told as a clean-water-and-recreation story, without dragging them into allocation politics, is a win for them.

Public record. The fund provides grants for watershed restoration and implementation of best management practices, but its direct focus is on local watershed health, not explicitly shepherding water to Lake Mead or large-scale energy infrastructure.

Position. The Colorado River Basin Fund is a small (~$5M target) Denver-based, place-based water-technology venture fund, led by GP/CEO Will Sarni (founder of consultancy Water Foundry; also associated with 'The Future of Water Fund') and GP Lon Johnson. Its longstanding public thesis: the American West is 'among the world's most water-stressed regions' and the crisis is best solved by scaling early-stage 'exponential technology' (digital and advanced materials) plus innovative finance (blended finance, water-as-a-service) and cross-sector/public-private partnerships. Investment focus: satellite and digital tools for agricultural and municipal water efficiency, leak detection in smart homes, real-time water-quality monitoring, next-gen water recycling/reuse, and atmospheric moisture capture. Portfolio signal: the affiliated Future of Water Fund invested in Hydraloop (residential/commercial water reuse) 'to help the parched American West.' A defining, repeated public position: 'We don't buy or sell water' and they distinguish themselves from 'exploitative' water-rights investment strategies. Sarni frames water as a 'wicked problem' solvable only through tech + partnerships + financing, and publicly favors transparency and data as the basis for 'rational public policy.' No public evidence of positions on the Law of the River, interstate allocation disputes, or specific compact/curtailment fights.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE-to-enthusiastic, with a technology angle. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly increases demand for exactly what the fund backs: satellite/remote-sensing measurement, digital monitoring, and MRV (measurement/reporting/verification) tools that make conservation credits credible. Sarni publicly favors data, transparency, and market/financing innovation as the route to 'rational public policy.' The fund would likely welcome the market as a demand driver for portfolio companies and a source of 'water-as-a-service' business models. Caveat: because it explicitly does not trade water, it would participate as a tech/verification enabler and financier, not as a market maker or credit buyer. Persuadable-to-ally on this specifically.

On solar+water. Likely POSITIVE and a natural fit. The fund already cites basin collaborations with large corporates (Microsoft, PepsiCo) and champions cross-sector and public-private partnerships plus blended finance. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with its model of corporate capital flowing into basin water solutions and its energy-water-nexus framing. It could see a role placing its portfolio companies (monitoring, reuse, efficiency) into such projects and attracting co-investment. Main friction: the fund is a niche water-tech VC, so it benefits most if the buildout channels demand/capital toward technology it can finance rather than toward pure allocation deals it cannot touch.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE, especially on reuse. Reuse/recycling is explicitly named in the fund's investment focus, and its affiliated fund invested in Hydraloop (decentralized water reuse); Sarni's writing highlights commercialization of desalination and reuse technologies as opportunities. Large-scale reuse/desal expands the addressable market for its portfolio (treatment, monitoring, decentralized systems) and fits the 'technology solves scarcity' thesis. Nuance: the fund tilts toward digital/decentralized and 'exponential' tech, so mega-scale centralized desalination (energy-intensive, capital-heavy, long timelines) is less directly investable for a ~$5M fund than distributed reuse; it would more likely applaud and seek adjacent tech plays than lead the build.

A win for them. A win is deal flow and validated exits: identifying and scaling basin water-tech startups that both improve water outcomes and generate venture returns, while burnishing the fund's 'first place-based water fund' brand and Sarni's thought-leadership position. Any initiative that (a) creates demand for measurement/verification/reuse/efficiency technology, (b) brings corporate or philanthropic co-capital (they cite Microsoft/PepsiCo-style basin collaborations), and (c) lets them stay a technology financier rather than a water-rights trader is a clear win.

Public record. The fund's stated mission is to invest in and scale new water technologies that address scarcity and quality issues in the basin, explicitly backing software and materials that help users consume less water.

Position. The coalition (originally launched as the Tribal Leaders Forum) is a consensus-building body open to all 30 federally recognized tribes with land and water claims in the Colorado River Basin, spanning both Upper and Lower Basins. It overlaps with, but is broader than, the older Ten Tribes Partnership. Longstanding, consistent position: tribes were entirely excluded from the 1922 Compact and most subsequent operating agreements, yet collectively hold senior, mostly-unquantified Winters-doctrine rights estimated at roughly 20-25% of the river's flow (~2.9 million acre-feet quantified, with more in unsettled claims). Core demands: (1) a permanent, meaningful seat in the post-2026 operating-guideline negotiations, not just consultation; (2) recognition and quantification of tribal rights plus federal funding to actually build the infrastructure to 'wet' those paper rights; (3) authority to lease, bank, forbear, and market their water with the tribe (not the federal government) receiving the compensation. Recent flashpoint (2026): the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe, San Juan Southern Paiute) -- the largest tribal water settlement in U.S. history, ~$5B in federal infrastructure funding -- was near enactment when Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming moved to block Congressional codification, hardening tribal distrust of the four Upper Basin states. The coalition frames tribal rights as part of the solution to basin scarcity, not a problem to be solved.

On conservation. Broadly favorable but conditional. Tribes already participate in compensated conservation (CRIT land-fallowing storing water in Lake Mead; Navajo/Hopi offered to leave water in reservoirs), and forbearance/compensated-conservation revenue is one of their few paths to fund infrastructure. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive IF (a) it pays the tribe directly, (b) it does not require them to first prove 'beneficial use' in ways that jeopardize unexercised senior rights (the 'use it or lose it' trap that some settlements and federal rules impose), and (c) it is voluntary and reversible, not a mechanism to permanently strand tribal rights they have not yet been funded to develop. Expect strong interest, paired with insistence on sovereignty over the transaction and legal protection of un-quantified claims.

On solar+water. The most receptive of the three, if structured on tribal terms. There is a live, proven appetite for clean-energy buildout on tribal land as an economic-sovereignty and electrification play (Kayenta I/II and Red Mesa Tapaha solar farms, ~$100M USDA/PACE award to Navajo Tribal Utility Authority for 30MW solar + storage, Navajo Power). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses their two largest gaps at once: electrification and unfunded water infrastructure. Persuadable-to-ally on this axis. Hard conditions: tribal ownership or equity (not just land lease), jobs and revenue staying with the tribe, water for the data centers must not come out of tribal allocations or stress local aquifers, and prior, informed consent -- given deep, historically grounded distrust of outside 'solutions' imposed on them. A deal that reads as an extractive land/water grab dressed as philanthropy will be rejected hard.

On reuse/desal. Most skeptical / lowest priority. Large-scale reuse and desalination are Lower-Basin municipal supply-augmentation strategies that do little for on-reservation delivery and are seen as ways for states/cities to grow new (junior) supply while avoiding the harder political work of honoring senior tribal rights and funding tribal infrastructure. Tribes are generally wary of energy-intensive, high-cost, brine-producing desal, and of augmentation narratives that let the basin 'make more water' rather than share existing water equitably. Not actively opposed in principle, but they will insist these projects not be used as an excuse to deprioritize settlements, and that any federal augmentation dollars not crowd out tribal infrastructure funding. Likely neutral-to-skeptical unless a project explicitly co-funds tribal water systems or offtakes tribal renewable power.

A win for them. A win is physical, funded water reaching homes on the reservation plus durable legal recognition of their rights: (1) their water-rights settlements codified by Congress with the infrastructure money intact (the ~$5B Northeastern Arizona settlement enacted, four-state opposition overcome); (2) a permanent, decision-level seat in post-2026 and future basin governance; (3) the legally protected right to lease, bank, and conserve water on their own terms with revenue flowing to the tribe; and (4) energy sovereignty -- tribally owned solar+storage that electrifies homes and generates revenue. In one line: paper rights turned into wet water and revenue, without surrendering sovereignty or senior priority.

Public record. The Coalition advocates for tribal sovereignty in water management, including the right to be paid for system conservation and to develop their own renewable energy resources on tribal lands.

Position. The Colorado River Board of California (CRB) is a state agency in the California Natural Resources Agency whose statutory mission is to protect the rights and interests of California, its agencies, and citizens in the water and power resources of the Colorado River System. It is the coordinating and negotiating body for California's Colorado River water: an 8-member board appointed by the Governor, seating the six senior-rights water agencies (Palo Verde Irrigation District, Imperial Irrigation District, Coachella Valley Water District, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, San Diego County Water Authority, and LADWP) plus two public members and the directors of DWR and Fish & Wildlife. It speaks for California in seven-state, federal, and U.S.-Mexico (1944 Treaty) negotiations. California holds a 4.4 MAF Lower Basin apportionment (the largest single-state entitlement) and is unique in that Interior contracts directly with the water agencies rather than the state. Longstanding posture: defend California's senior priority under the Law of the River and the 4.4 MAF entitlement, while positioning California as a conservation leader. In the post-2026 negotiations the CRB (via its December 2025 framework and February 2026 statements) publicly committed to reducing California's use by 440,000 acre-feet/year as part of the Lower Basin's proposed 1.5 MAF/yr contribution to the structural deficit, called that Lower Basin offer 'the first enforceable offer on the table,' and endorsed hydrology-based flexible releases protecting both Lake Powell and Lake Mead with risk-sharing across basins. It insists any framework include 'transparent and verifiable accounting for conserved water' and participation by all seven states plus Mexico. California use was projected at 3.76 MAF in 2025, the lowest since 1949. Leadership stated willingness to 'set aside many of their legal positions' (Compact Powell releases, Lower Basin shortage distribution, other Law of the River provisions) if every basin contributes equitably and sufficiently.

On conservation. Supportive and largely aligned, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps directly onto the CRB's stated demand for 'transparent and verifiable accounting for conserved water' and onto its members' existing paid-conservation programs (IID DIP, Met fallowing). They would welcome a market that pays California agencies for real, measured savings and that credits California's already-historic reductions. Two frictions: (1) they will fight to protect senior-priority/entitlement so that conserved water is credited to the conserver, not redistributed, and (2) they will demand the measurement/accounting be rigorous and legally defensible (they have used verifiability as a lever against other basins). Net: ally-leaning on the mechanism, guarded on who controls the credited water.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, but not their native lever. The CRB's remit is water and power resources of the river; it is not a datacenter or energy-buildout body, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage package would be evaluated by whether the water dollars are real, additional, and don't erode California's priority or accounting rigor. LADWP's seat gives an energy-literate voice, and California already links interstate water exchanges to funding new-supply projects. They would engage if the water funding attaches to verifiable conservation or new supply (recycling/desal) rather than being a vague offset. Skepticism risk: they will not trade entitlement or accept soft 'water positive' claims for energy investment. Persuadable if structured as pay-for-verified-water.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive in principle; California is already leading here. Member agencies (San Diego County Water Authority via Carlsbad desal and Pure Water, Metropolitan's regional recycling) are core to the June 2026 Reclamation MOU letting Arizona/Nevada fund California coastal desal/recycling and take less Colorado River water 'on paper.' The CRB frames interstate exchanges enabling new-supply projects as part of its post-2026 framework. Large-scale reuse/desalination that reduces Colorado River draw is directly in their interest and monetizes San Diego's surplus. Caveats: cost, energy intensity, permitting, and ensuring the freed-up river water is credited to California agencies. Clear ally on this vector.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 deal in which every basin and Mexico contributes equitable, verifiable water; California's 4.4 MAF senior entitlement and priority are protected; conserved water is credited to the conserving California agency; and stable, non-cliff funding backstops the voluntary cuts. Concretely: reliable Southern California supply, Lake Mead/Powell protected via hydrology-based flexible releases, expanded reuse/desal and interstate exchanges that let California draw less river water while monetizing surplus (e.g., San Diego), and rigorous transparent accounting they can enforce against other states.

Public record. The Board has publicly committed to significant water conservation in exchange for federal funding and is actively promoting a collaborative, basin-wide framework that includes large-scale conservation, water reuse, and operational flexibility.

Position. The Colorado River Commission of Nevada (CRC) is a state executive agency (est. 1935) with two core mandates: (1) protecting Nevada's Colorado River water allocation and (2) acquiring/marketing federal hydropower from Hoover (Boulder Canyon Project), Parker-Davis, and Salt Lake City Area Integrated Projects, reselling to ~23 municipal, industrial and retail customers. Longstanding public position: the river has suffered 'the worst drought in history' over ~25 years, and Lake Mead levels are critical BOTH for drinking-water supply AND for Hoover Dam hydropower generation. The CRC credits conservation as Nevada's central strategy, touting that southern Nevada used the least Colorado River water in 31 years in 2023 despite population growth. Institutionally the CRC is tightly fused with the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA): SNWA appoints 3 of the 7 commissioners (Governor appoints the other 4), and the CRC's high-voltage Power Delivery Project transmission system (Lake Mead substation to SNWA treatment facilities) is funded by SNWA under contracts SNWA must approve line-by-line. Nevada's water-negotiation voice is effectively SNWA/John Entsminger, who has: agreed reopening talks every two years is 'not a good plan,' backed a Lower Basin short-term operations framework, accepted the largest modern cut to Nevada's small 300,000 AF allocation (mandatory ~13,000-50,000 AF reductions plus conservation), and called for disaster-level federal investment ('of that order of magnitude' as hurricane relief). On augmentation, SNWA has signed a non-binding MOU with San Diego County Water Authority tied to Carlsbad ocean desalination (California leaves water in Lake Mead for Nevada in exchange for compensation) and openly forecasts a Nevada equity stake in a California- or Pacific-Mexico-coast desal facility in 30-40 years, plus Mexico water-efficiency-for-treaty-water swaps. SNWA projects growth to outpace supply by ~2037.

On conservation. Supportive-to-favorable. Conservation is the CRC/SNWA flagship narrative and Nevada is the basin's proof case (least use in 31 years amid growth). A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays for measured, permanent reductions aligns with Nevada's identity and lets it monetize its efficiency lead. Likely conditions: rigorous measurement/verification of consumptive (not just diverted) use so paper-water and double-counting are excluded, credit for Nevada's already-banked prior conservation, and assurance that a market does not let larger junior/senior users buy their way out of proportional cuts. Because Nevada's absolute volumes are small, the CRC would engage less as a big seller and more as a validator and beneficiary of basin-wide demand reduction that protects Lake Mead elevation (and thus Hoover generation).

On solar+water. This is the CRC's highest-interest lever and where it is most distinctly persuadable versus a pure water agency. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water speaks directly to the CRC's power mandate. The CRC already frames hydropower as working 'well in conjunction with' solar, wind and battery storage and counts hydropower toward Nevada's Renewable Portfolio Standard. Declining Hoover output creates a structural gap in the CRC's low-cost power portfolio that new solar+storage could backfill for its 23 customers (including SNWA's energy-intensive pumping/treatment load). If the deal also funds water augmentation or conservation, it hits both CRC mandates at once. Risks/conditions the CRC would raise: who controls the generation and transmission (the CRC operates its own high-voltage system and guards that role), how it interacts with WAPA marketing and federal hydropower contracts, ratepayer/customer cost allocation, and Nevada siting/interconnection. Nevada also hosts significant data-center growth, making hyperscaler load-plus-supply framing locally credible. Most likely: cautiously enthusiastic, wants a seat at the table on power delivery.

On reuse/desal. Favorable in principle, with the CRC following SNWA's lead. SNWA already treats large-scale reuse as core (Las Vegas returns highly treated wastewater to Lake Mead for return-flow credits, the mechanism that lets southern Nevada stretch its small allocation) and has actively pursued ocean desalination via the San Diego/Carlsbad MOU and long-horizon equity in California- or Mexico-coast desal. So Nevada is one of the more desal- and reuse-forward basin actors. Caveats: SNWA sees desal as a 30-40-year, partnership-and-swap play (paying others to desalinate so Nevada draws more from Lake Mead) rather than a pipeline to Las Vegas, so it will scrutinize cost per acre-foot, the energy intensity (which loops back to the CRC's power role), and whether a project delivers wet water to Nevada via exchange rather than stranded capacity. The CRC specifically would flag the power supply and cost implications of energy-intensive desal.

A win for them. A win is protecting Lake Mead elevation while stabilizing BOTH pillars of the CRC's mandate: secure, affordable power for its 23 customers and a defensible Colorado River allocation for Nevada. Concretely: new firm, RPS-qualifying solar+storage capacity that replaces at-risk Hoover hydropower without raising customer rates and that integrates with (not around) the CRC's transmission and WAPA contracts; conservation and augmentation financed by outside capital (hyperscalers, exchange partners, federal disaster-scale funds Entsminger has called for) so Nevada ratepayers and its small allocation aren't the ones squeezed; and credit for Nevada's demonstrated conservation leadership so it is treated as a partner and validator, not a payer, in any basin-wide deal.

Public record. Represents Nevada's interest in securing its water and power allocations, participating in collaborative multi-species and system conservation programs to protect river resources.

Position. The CRRG is an independent group of ~14 academic Colorado River scholars (formed 2014, housed at CU Boulder's Getches-Wilkinson Center, self-governed by unanimous consent, individuals not institutions), modeled on Australia's Wentworth Group. It exists to give a non-partisan, basin-wide scientific voice insulated from sectoral/political pressure. Longstanding positions: (1) the crisis is structural aridification driven by climate change, not a temporary drought - flows have averaged ~12.2 MAF vs the 16.5 MAF the Compact assumed, precipitation down ~7% since 1999, and flows 'are not going to rebound' with further ~20% declines possible; (2) the fundamental fix is permanent reduction of consumptive use to match a shrinking supply, plus reallocation - not new supply; (3) deep skepticism of large supply-side augmentation - a member states 'system-wide supply augmentation, such as desalination, isn't cost-effective or realistic,' and the group warns against 'shifting unsustainable surface water uses to unsustainable groundwater uses'; (4) demand management and voluntary/compensated conservation are core tools, but conserved water must be legally protected to count; (5) governance reform is central - their 2025 report 'Dancing with Deadpool' calls for durable, equitable, climate-realistic post-2026 rules and floats a basin-wide management entity. They publish short 'Insights' bulletins/white papers and act as an expert commons cited by media and negotiators.

On conservation. Favorable and likely the most aligned of the three. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps directly onto their stated priorities: permanent/temporary reductions in consumptive use, reallocation, and voluntary compensated demand management. Two conditions determine their support: (1) savings must be measured as real reductions in consumptive use (not paper/hydrologic-neutral shifts, not just diversion cuts), and (2) conserved water must be legally protected - they cite evidence that markets without legal protection of conserved water are ~29% less cost-effective. If the market meets those tests they are potential validators and citation sources. If verification is weak or it enables use-it-or-lose-it gaming, they will critique it publicly.

On solar+water. Skeptical, conditional, and the highest-risk pitch for this group. They will scrutinize a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-plus-water buildout for: whether the 'water' benefit is a real net reduction in basin consumptive use or just new demand (datacenter cooling and its own water footprint) dressed up as a solution; full lifecycle water/energy accounting; and whether it substitutes private supply-side spending for the hard structural demand cuts they insist are unavoidable. They are wary of framing that lets big new industrial load claim to 'fund water' while adding consumption. To win even neutrality, the proposal must show net-negative consumptive use with transparent accounting and not position new supply/industry as a substitute for demand reduction. Expect probing questions and possible public caution, not endorsement, absent airtight data.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: cautiously supportive where it demonstrably cuts fresh diversions from the river (they treat efficiency/reuse as legitimate demand-side tools). Desalination / large-scale augmentation: openly skeptical - members have said system-wide desalination 'isn't cost-effective or realistic' and warn against trading one unsustainable source for another. They see basin-scale desal as a costly distraction that risks diverting political will and funding from permanent demand reduction. They would likely oppose or heavily qualify a desal-led strategy, while acknowledging niche/local reuse and brackish treatment can help at the margins. Expect them to demand honest cost-per-acre-foot and energy/carbon comparisons against demand management before conceding any role.

A win for them. A win is influence: seeing their science shape post-2026 operating rules toward permanent demand reduction and durable, equitable, climate-realistic governance - and being cited as the credible independent voice that got the basin to face the supply-demand gap honestly. They 'win' when a proposed intervention is shown, with defensible data, to cut structural consumptive use rather than paper over it with speculative new supply. Reputational integrity (being right, non-partisan, and non-captured) is their currency; any engagement that lets them stay independent while advancing rigorous demand-side reform is a win.

Public record. As an independent academic body, CRRG's purpose is to provide objective analysis rather than take advocacy positions, though its scholarship generally supports conservation and innovative management.

Position. The Colorado River District is the water-policy authority for Colorado's Western Slope, covering all or part of 15 counties (~500,000 residents) in the Colorado River drainage. Its statutory mission is to protect, conserve, use and develop Western Slope water and to keep Colorado River water on the West Slope. Longstanding and current positions under GM Andy Mueller (2025-2026): (1) The basin has a 'basic math problem' - Lower Basin consumptive use must be cut by roughly 1.5 million acre-feet at all times, treated as structural 'system losses' (evaporation/transit loss) rather than 'shortage,' BEFORE any shortage-sharing is discussed. Mueller: 'The Colorado River system is on the brink of collapse, drained by decades of overuse in the lower basin states.' (2) Strongly opposes inter-basin transfers/transactions as a 'Law of the River concern' and resists trans-mountain diversions moving West Slope water to the Front Range. (3) Supports temporary, voluntary, compensated demand management / system conservation for the Upper Basin (participated in demand-management feasibility studies; part of the 2019 DCP framework) but insists Upper Basin conservation assumptions and scale be re-evaluated - the Upper Basin should not shoulder cuts to cover Lower Basin overuse. (4) Fiercely opposes permanent agricultural 'buy and dry' and land retirement - calls it a 'misguided approach' that endangers food security; wants programs that are temporary, locally custom-built, efficiency- and crop-switch-based, and that respect rural communities. (5) Publicly hostile to Wall Street / out-of-state water speculators - Mueller labels Water Asset Management and East Coast investment firms buying Grand Valley ag land 'drought profiteers' 'trying to suck the very lifeblood out of these communities.' (6) On new demand: Western Slope leaders (allied with the District's constituency) are openly wary of data-center water/energy demand and the risk it drives more eastward water transfers and higher power bills.

On conservation. Conditionally supportive - this is the mechanism they already back (temporary, voluntary, compensated demand management / system conservation), so a VERIFIED consumptive-use market aligns with their stated preference over crude buy-and-dry. But their support hinges almost entirely on the guardrails. They will scrutinize: is it temporary and reversible or a Trojan horse for permanent dry-up? Does verification prevent double-counting AND prevent the conserved water from being 'picked up by the next user' or exported inter-basin? Does it exclude/neutralize speculators like Water Asset Management, or does a market give 'drought profiteers' a liquid asset to trade? Does compensation actually reach West Slope ag families and stay in the community? If those are satisfied, they become an ally and even a program partner; if the market looks like a speculation or buy-and-dry vehicle, or shifts cuts onto the Upper Basin before the Lower Basin fixes its math, they oppose loudly.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, leaning skeptical initially. Two competing instincts: (a) They are openly alarmed about data-center/AI water and energy demand and its second-order pressure to move West Slope water eastward and raise power bills - so any hyperscaler-linked proposal starts under suspicion. (b) But solar+storage that avoids water-cooled/thermal generation directly answers their 'renewables don't consume water, gas and coal do' concern, and outside capital that FUNDS West Slope water security (rather than competing for the water) is attractive because it brings new money without drying ag. To win them, the deal must: add zero net Colorado River consumptive demand (ideally offset or reduce it), avoid enabling any inter-basin transfer, keep benefits and any new load on terms the West Slope controls, and channel funding into local water/ag resilience. Framed that way it is a persuadable-to-ally play; framed as 'new demand we'll make up for with water later' it is an opponent trigger.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, with a sharp basin caveat. The District's core demand is that the Lower Basin reduce its own overuse; large-scale reuse and coastal desalination (e.g., the June 2026 Reclamation MOU letting AZ/NV fund CA desal/recycling so California pulls less from the river) are exactly the kind of Lower-Basin-side supply augmentation and demand reduction they want to see BEFORE the Upper Basin is asked to cut more. So they favor reuse/desal that offsets Lower Basin consumption. Their objection surfaces only if reuse/desal is used to justify continued or new diversions, or if 'augmentation' becomes a rationale for inter-basin transfers or for exporting West Slope water. They will also insist augmented supply not be double-counted or used to paper over the structural 1.5 MAF overuse. Net: ally on Lower-Basin reuse/desal that genuinely reduces river draw; wary of any version that props up the status quo or enables transfers.

A win for them. A win: the Lower Basin is forced to permanently reduce its structural overuse (~1.5 MAF) first, so the burden of balancing the river does not fall on Western Slope agriculture; Colorado's Upper Basin Compact entitlement is protected; any conservation participation is temporary, voluntary, transparently governed, and pays local farmers/ranchers real money that keeps working lands and communities intact (not Wall Street speculators); no new inter-basin/trans-mountain diversion or data-center demand is enabled at the West Slope's expense; and new outside capital flows INTO West Slope water security and CFP-style projects. If a conservation market or hyperscaler-funded deal can demonstrably deliver those outcomes with airtight anti-speculation and verification, the District moves from skeptic to advocate.

Position. Colorado Springs Utilities (CSU) is the largest community-owned, four-service utility in the U.S. (electric, gas, water, wastewater), ~$2.2B annual revenue (2026), governed by the Colorado Springs City Council sitting as its Utilities Board. It is deeply dependent on the Colorado River: roughly 50% of its raw water supply (~50,000 acre-feet/yr) originates as transbasin diversions from Colorado River headwaters tributaries, and through aggressive reuse of those legally reusable transmountain supplies it serves ~60-70% of total demand from Colorado River-origin water. Its four transbasin systems include the Continental-Hoosier/Blue River system (oldest, ~8,000 AF/yr avg) and Twin Lakes/Roaring Fork (~4,700 AF/yr). Longstanding public identity is efficiency leadership: water use down ~40% since 2001 while population grew ~92%; pioneered non-potable reclaimed reuse in the 1960s; running a PureWater Colorado direct-potable-reuse (DPR) demonstration on effluent from its J.D. Phillips facility. Committed to nearly double conservation spending by 2030 (goal >2,191 AF/yr saved). On the river-policy fight, CSU is a member of the Front Range Water Council (with Denver Water, Aurora, Northern, Pueblo, Southeastern, Twin Lakes), which co-signed a hard-line 2026 letter with the Colorado River District and Southwestern District arguing 'policy must follow hydrology,' that Colorado already absorbs shortage 'without compensation, without delay and without debate,' and that the fix is to 'reduce use to match supply, not to mask imbalance by shifting risk upstream' (i.e., Upper Basin resists mandatory curtailment and pushes demand reduction where the shortage physically shows up). In spring 2026 CSU entered a voluntary 'Water Shortage Preparation' stage after a warm/dry winter (~54% of normal runoff expected), while emphasizing its system was ~77% full (~3 years of supply) and stopping short of mandatory restrictions. On energy, CSU is mid-transition: board-approved Sustainable Energy Plan retiring coal (Ray Nixon coal unit slated ~2030, with legislation creating a pathway to 2032), a target near 80% GHG reduction by 2033, an RFP for ~300 MW of new wind/solar/storage by 2030, and public interest in nuclear. It reuses ~all of its transmountain water, so its consumptive footprint is already tight.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but self-interested. CSU already brands itself as a conservation and reuse leader and is comfortable with the Upper Basin frame that consumptive-use reduction (not paper curtailment) is the right lever, so a verified, voluntary, compensated consumptive-use market aligns with its public messaging and the Front Range Water Council 'reduce use to match supply' line. It would engage most readily as a potential BUYER of verified savings or as a facilitator that lets Arkansas Basin/ag partners fallow and free up consumptive use it could rely on, rather than as a seller (its own transmountain water is already ~fully reused, leaving little consumptive slack to monetize). Key conditions: rigorous, defensible measurement/verification (they will not want to pay for phantom savings), no impairment of their senior/conditional water rights or reuse rights, no precedent that erodes Upper Basin's 'we already live within a smaller river' legal posture, and affordability for ratepayers already facing multi-year rate hikes.

On solar+water. Interested and plausibly the strongest fit of the three, but with governance friction. CSU is simultaneously running a coal-to-clean transition (300 MW wind/solar/storage RFP, ~80% GHG cut by 2033, nuclear curiosity) AND fielding data-center load growth near Garden of the Gods. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water (new supply, DPR/reuse, or conservation) directly addresses both its clean-energy capital gap and its water-supply exposure, and lets the data-center demand it is being asked to serve pay for the resources it consumes. As a four-service municipal utility it can uniquely internalize an energy-and-water bundle. Frictions: it is a not-for-profit public utility governed by an elected board, so any large private-capital deal faces procurement, rate-fairness, and public-scrutiny hurdles (the same board is under pressure on affordability and on whether to allow water-thirsty data centers at all). It will insist the water contribution be real and additional, that large loads pay their full cost of service, and that deals not lock it into stranded assets or undercut its own SEP.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: strongly supportive and already a leader. CSU is one of the more advanced potable-reuse utilities in the region (1960s non-potable reclaimed reuse, active PureWater Colorado DPR demonstration on J.D. Phillips effluent, near-total reuse of its legally reusable transmountain supply). Large-scale reuse expansion is squarely on-strategy and its most likely 'new water' path, subject to cost, ratepayer affordability, and Colorado regulatory approval for DPR. Note tension: it currently bans residential graywater systems (a resident is suing) because it captures/reuses that water centrally, so it favors utility-scale, controlled reuse over distributed reuse. Desalination: low direct relevance. Colorado Springs is landlocked and inland; ocean desal is not a native option, and while brackish-groundwater desal exists elsewhere in the basin, it is not central to CSU's portfolio. CSU would view basin-scale desal mainly as a way for Lower Basin users to reduce their draw on the shared system (indirectly protecting Upper Basin/CSU supply), so it would likely support others' desal that relieves system pressure without touching its own operations.

A win for them. A win for CSU is firming up its Colorado River-origin supply and its growth headroom without a politically painful rate shock or a loss of water-rights standing, ideally with someone else's capital. Concretely: (1) new large loads (data centers) that fully fund the clean energy AND water they consume, advancing the Sustainable Energy Plan and its 300 MW renewables/storage RFP at once; (2) expanded utility-scale potable reuse (building on PureWater Colorado) that adds durable 'new' supply from water it already owns and can reuse; (3) access to verified consumptive-use savings (e.g., Arkansas Basin ag partnerships) it can rely on as a buyer/facilitator, on defensible measurement; all while (4) preserving its senior and 1952 conditional rights, its reuse rights, and the Upper Basin's 'we already live within a smaller river' negotiating position, and keeping bills defensible to an elected board.

Public record. CSU is executing a Sustainable Energy Plan to exit coal and add significant solar and storage, while also operating an award-winning direct potable reuse project to maximize its water supplies.

Position. The Colorado Water Center is one of 54 federally chartered Water Resources Research Institutes (established 1965; 60th anniversary in 2025), housed in CSU's Office of Engagement and Extension and co-supported by USGS, CSU Provost, the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station, and CSU Extension. Its self-defined role is a neutral, science-providing convener, not an advocate. Director John Tracy: 'our role is understanding the science and making sure everybody's educated on the science.' It runs a competitive seed-grant program and three programmatic priorities: (1) agricultural water management, explicitly to 'research and advance agricultural practices that decrease water consumption or increase water efficiency' via alternative crops and irrigation; (2) water education/workforce; (3) water quality and access. On the Colorado River crisis it speaks through named scholars rather than institutional advocacy. Senior water policy scholar Jennifer Gimbel (former director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board 2008-2013, former DOI principal deputy assistant secretary for water and science, former Reclamation deputy commissioner) focuses on the Upper Basin and the seven-state framework, and publicly diagnosed the 2026 post-2026 negotiations as suffering a 'lack of trust' among state negotiators who denigrate rivals' proposals. Director Tracy has said the basin is 'almost to the breaking point where someone will have to suggest that the compact needs to be looked at,' framing the choice as 'either do something really big, dealing with multiple states and the politics and interest groups involved, or you do year-to-year adjustments.' The Center emphasizes measuring real consumptive use and consumptive-vs-return flows (Research Scientist Perry Cabot quantifies crop consumption and return flows to rivers) and notes Reclamation's limited legal authority ('they can't tell a state or irrigation district what to do'). New director Karen Schlatter (appointed 2025) came from the Sonoran Institute's Colorado River Delta Program, bringing a restoration, binational, and cross-sector partnership orientation. Net: quantification-focused, agriculture-efficiency-oriented, institutionally neutral on allocation politics.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable and highly useful as a partner. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in their wheelhouse: their agricultural-water-management priority is literally about reducing consumption/increasing efficiency, and scientist Perry Cabot already quantifies consumptive use versus return flows. They would likely welcome the chance to help design and independently validate the MRV methodology and would flag the classic technical risks they study (paper-water vs wet-water savings, return-flow accounting, verification integrity, buy-and-dry harm to ag communities). They will not politically endorse a market, but they can be the credible scientific validator that makes one trustworthy, and Gimbel's law/policy depth de-risks the Upper Basin legal framing. Expect rigor and skepticism, not cheerleading.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-curious, contingent on data access and independence. As a neutral academic body, the Center will not endorse a private hyperscaler-funded solar+storage+water buildout, but it would be interested in studying the water-energy nexus, the actual water savings/costs, and whether such funding genuinely keeps water in the system. They would want transparent data and would scrutinize claims (e.g., net water accounting, whether 'funds water' translates to verified consumptive-use reductions). Best framed as a research and education dataset opportunity, not a partnership announcement. Low risk of opposition unless the buildout is perceived as greenwashing or as extracting water/energy from ag communities without rigorous accounting.

On reuse/desal. Interested but rigor-first, with regional caveats. Reuse aligns with their water-quality/access and sustainable-management priorities and they would likely support and study it. Large-scale desalination is more peripheral for an Upper Basin, inland, agriculture-oriented Colorado institution (desal is a Lower Basin/coastal lever), so expect analytical engagement on energy intensity, cost, brine, and whether it materially relieves basin pressure rather than institutional advocacy. They would treat both as options to be measured and taught, not endorsed.

A win for them. A win is scientific credibility and mission advancement, not political victory: robust, peer-reviewable data on real consumptive use and water savings; funded research, fellowships, and student pipeline (their explicit workforce-development priority); a defensible MRV methodology that regulators and the seven states can trust; and their convening role reinforced as the neutral 'honest broker' of the basin's numbers. Restoration and Upper Basin agricultural-community outcomes (Schlatter's and Gimbel's interests) count as wins if the intervention demonstrably keeps water in the river or in productive local use without hollowing out ag communities. Publishable, open results that raise CSU's profile in the post-2026 debate are the deliverable they most value.

Public record. As a research institute, it does not take official policy positions but produces objective analyses on topics like floating solar and supports workforce development, making it a key source of information for persuadable stakeholders.

Position. CESPM is Baja California's state-run municipal water and sanitation utility for the Mexicali municipality and the port of San Felipe, created by decree in 1967 (some sources cite the 1967 founding decree; the utility itself dates its authorizing decree to Dec 10, 1967). It serves the urban core of Mexicali, a border city of roughly one million people, with reported service coverage above 97%. Its supply is overwhelmingly Colorado River water: an annual CONAGUA allocation of about 147.1 million cubic meters (Mm3) drawn from the river via Morelos Dam and a canal network to treatment plants, supplemented by surface and groundwater. Of its usable physical volume (~138.9 Mm3 after ~10% conveyance loss), roughly 126.9 Mm3 is surface (Colorado River) water and ~11.9 Mm3 groundwater; it delivers ~106.5 Mm3 to Mexicali and ~4 Mm3 to San Felipe. CESPM's consistent, longstanding public position is reassurance and supply-security messaging, not river-crisis advocacy: its recurring public line (e.g., late 2025 statements under director Armando Carrazco Lopez) is that it 'guarantees' potable supply through its assigned CONAGUA volumes for both Mexicali and San Felipe, and that it is investing in modernization (pump-plant efficiency, harmonic filters at Potabilizadora No. 3 to cut energy losses) and new sources for San Felipe. CESPM does not itself sit at the binational negotiating table. Mexico's Colorado River allocation is governed by the 1944 Water Treaty and IBWC/CILA Minutes 323 (2017, expiring end of 2026) and 330 (2024), negotiated by CILA and CONAGUA. Under the Binational Water Scarcity Contingency Plan, Mexico absorbs shared shortages: Mexico's 2025 allocation was cut ~62 Mm3 (50,000 AF) and its 2026 initial allocation set at ~1,668.4 Mm3 (~1.35 MAF). Crucially, within Mexico these cuts fall FIRST and hardest on agriculture (the ~1,600 Mm3/yr Irrigation District 014 in the Mexicali/San Luis Rio Colorado valleys, using ~86% of regional water), with urban municipal supply legally and politically prioritized. That structural protection is why CESPM can credibly promise continuity even as the river shrinks, and why its public tone is calm rather than alarmed.

On conservation. Lukewarm and indirect. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is designed around large agricultural and system users who can fallow or reduce consumptive use for payment. CESPM is a small urban municipal utility whose consumptive use is essential-service delivery it will not cut, so it is a beneficiary rather than a seller. It would likely welcome such a market IF it operates on the Mexican side of the border under CILA/CONAGUA rules and channels the freed-up or compensated water toward securing municipal supply and generating conservation-program funds (the Minute 330 model already pays for Mexican conservation projects that benefit users on both sides). CESPM's practical interest is that ag-side conservation in District 014 could ease pressure on the shared Mexican allocation and reduce the risk that urban supply is ever squeezed. It would resist any framing where a market monetizes and exports Mexican water north while Mexicali still bears salinity and reliability risk. Net: quietly supportive if it strengthens Mexican urban security and brings money in, indifferent-to-wary otherwise. It is not a natural counterparty to sign conservation contracts itself.

On solar+water. Potentially the most directly appealing of the three, but with real caveats. CESPM is an energy-intensive pumper and treater actively investing to cut power losses, so cheaper, firmer electricity for its pump stations and potabilization plants hits a genuine operating pain point, and a structure that also funds water (new source or modernization capital) doubles the appeal. Mexicali sits in a high-solar-resource, industrializing border region already attracting cross-border data-center and manufacturing interest, so a solar+storage buildout is plausible locally. Caveats CESPM and Baja California will weigh: Mexico's power market is dominated by state utility CFE, which complicates private PPAs and self-supply, so the energy-delivery mechanism is non-trivial; new hyperscaler load could compete for the same scarce water and grid the region needs, a politically charged point in a water-stressed border city; and CESPM would want the water funding to be real wet water or hard infrastructure, not PR. If the deal lowers its pumping-power bill and delivers new municipal supply without new ratepayer burden, CESPM is a willing partner; reliability of pumping power is non-negotiable, so storage/firming is the deciding detail.

On reuse/desal. Most strategically aligned with CESPM's actual needs. Large-scale reuse and desalination directly answer CESPM's core vulnerability: near-total dependence on a shrinking, saline Colorado River allocation. Baja California is already a Mexican desalination pioneer and is advancing major seawater desal on the Pacific side (Rosarito/Ensenada; a new ~8.9 billion peso plant cited for 2025-26) plus urban reuse programs (treated wastewater recovered rather than discharged). For CESPM specifically, San Felipe sits on the Sea of Cortez and its director has toured it seeking new potable sources, making a San Felipe desalination tie-in a natural fit, and treated-wastewater reuse within Mexicali is lower-friction than any mega-project. CESPM will strongly favor reuse/desal that produces firm local supply, reduces river dependence, and is financed externally (federal National Hydric Plan 2024-2030, binational, or private capital) so it avoids a tariff shock. Its hard constraints are cost, energy intensity (desal adds to its already-heavy power load), and who pays: CESPM lacks the balance sheet for a mega-desal alone and will insist the capital come from elsewhere. Reuse first, targeted desal for San Felipe second, mega-desal only if fully funded.

A win for them. A win is anything that lets CESPM keep its promise of uninterrupted urban potable supply to Mexicali and San Felipe while lowering its cost and capital burden. Concretely: (a) a firm, diversified new water source (local reuse or a Sea-of-Cortez/San Felipe desalination tie-in) that reduces its near-total dependence on a shrinking, salinity-prone Colorado River allocation; (b) cheaper, firmer pumping energy, since pumping and treatment power is a major operating cost it is actively trying to trim; (c) outside capital (federal, binational NADBank-style, or private) for modernization and new sources so it avoids raising tariffs on a low-income border ratepayer base; and (d) political cover that keeps municipal supply protected ahead of agriculture as Mexico's overall river allocation contracts. The single strongest win is new, non-river wet water for San Felipe and Mexicali funded by someone else's balance sheet, delivered without a tariff shock.

Public record. CESPM is an active participant in binational agreements with the U.S. to improve water infrastructure and management, including projects funded under various IBWC Minutes to conserve water and address pollution.

Position. CESPT is the Baja California state water/wastewater utility serving Tijuana and Playas de Rosarito (roughly 2 million people), and it is one of the most Colorado-dependent large utilities in the entire basin: ~90-99% of the region's potable supply arrives via the 125-km Colorado River-Tijuana Aqueduct (CRTA), which lifts water ~1,060 m over La Rumorosa through six pumping plants. Its longstanding public position is existential dependence framed as vulnerability: it repeatedly issues public conservation appeals ('cuidar el agua'), warns demand will exceed CRTA conveyance capacity (~5,333 L/s) within a few years, and has for a decade named supply diversification (desalination + treated-wastewater reuse) as the only structural fix. It does not present as a Colorado water-rights combatant (it holds no U.S. allocation and buys its water through Mexico's Irrigation District 014 / federal allocation), but rather as a downstream, last-in-line buyer exposed to any upstream disruption. It has publicly embraced reuse ('agua morada'/purple water) and a Plan Integral de Saneamiento y Reúso, and has actively pursued the Rosarito desalination plant as its flagship supply-security bet. Recent (2024-2025) messaging has pivoted from 'crisis/debt' toward 'financial stability and infrastructure buildout,' after HR Ratings reaffirmed an HR AA / Stable rating and revenues rose ~18.2% (2022-2024).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but with a critical caveat about scope. A verified consumptive-use conservation market on the U.S./upper-basin side that keeps more water in Lake Mead helps CESPT indirectly by reducing the odds of deeper Mexican shortage cuts under Minute 323 shortage-sharing, so it would welcome anything that stabilizes Mexico's treaty allocation. But CESPT's own operational pain is not upper-basin farming; it's the Mexicali District 014 reallocation and its own high physical losses (~15% non-revenue). It would engage most enthusiastically if a conservation market were structured to let it (or the Mexican federal government on its behalf) monetize saved/leased agricultural water in Mexicali, or fund its own loss-reduction and reuse as the 'conserved' supply. Skepticism: it will treat any market that doesn't put wet water or cash into its own diversification program as macro-helpful but operationally irrelevant. Persuadable, not an automatic champion.

On solar+water. This is the strongest hook and where CESPT is most winnable. Its two defining costs are energy (six-plant aqueduct lift + an 80 MW desalination plant) and capital for diversification. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly attacks both: cheap/firmed renewable power would cut the operating cost that makes desal 'the most expensive, most energy-intensive' option (its own framing), and co-funding water infrastructure de-risks the Rosarito program that keeps stalling on financing and bids. CESPT would react positively to a structure where a data-center/hyperscaler load anchors a Baja solar+storage project whose power (or PPA savings) offsets desalination/pumping energy, and whose water contribution funds reuse or desal capacity. Watch-outs: Baja's constrained grid and CFE's role mean any power deal must clear Mexican federal energy rules; and CESPT will resist a data center that competes for its scarce water unless the project is net-water-positive (i.e., the hyperscaler funds more new supply than it consumes). Frame it as energy + capital relief for their existing plan, not a new water demand.

On reuse/desal. Strongly aligned; this is already their declared strategy. CESPT has publicly committed to treated-wastewater reuse (agua morada/purple pipe, a Plan Integral de Saneamiento y Reúso, and studies to route treated effluent upstream of Abelardo L. Rodríguez Dam for indirect potable reuse) and to the Rosarito seawater desalination plant as its principal 40-year supply guarantee for the coastal zone (Phase 1 ~2.2 m3/s, full ~4.4 m3/s, ~994,000 people). It also sits inside the binational Tijuana River sanitation framework (IBWC Minutes 328/330-333, ~$474M program) and the U.S. has tentatively offered ~50% funding of a Tijuana wastewater-recycling project. So large-scale reuse/desal is not something to sell CESPT on in principle; it is their plan. The real value-add an external partner brings is closing the persistent gaps: financing certainty, energy supply for desal, and execution capacity after repeated bid failures. They would react to a credible, funded reuse/desal proposal as a partner, not a skeptic.

A win for them. A win for CESPT is durable water security for Tijuana-Rosarito that reduces its ~90-99% single-source dependence without breaking ratepayers or its balance sheet: the Rosarito desalination plant financed and actually built, treated-wastewater reuse scaled (purple-pipe + indirect potable), and the energy cost of pumping/desal driven down by cheap firmed renewables so new supply is affordable. Concretely, they win if an external partner (a) brings low-cost, reliable power that makes the 80 MW desal load economic, (b) closes the financing/execution gap that keeps voiding the desal bids, and (c) protects the Mexican treaty allocation from upstream shortage and internal Mexicali reallocation. Bonus win: binational co-funding (U.S./EPA/IBWC + IDB/NADBank) that lets them modernize aging network (cut the ~15% physical losses) while keeping tariffs politically survivable.

Public record. CESPT is actively pursuing new water sources, including desalination and reuse, and is a key partner in binational agreements like Minute 328 to invest hundreds of millions in new water infrastructure to address regional shortages and pollution.

Position. CEA is the Baja California state water utility responsible for building and operating the major intermunicipal hydraulic infrastructure that carries and distributes bulk water to the coastal population centers of Tijuana, Playas de Rosarito, Tecate and Ensenada. It is a paraestatal agency created by state decree in 1999 and now operates under the state Secretaría del Agua / SEPROA (Secretaría para el Manejo, Saneamiento y Protección del Agua). LONGSTANDING POSITION: the coastal zone is almost entirely dependent on Colorado River water delivered under the 1944 Treaty and conveyed via the Río Colorado-Tijuana aqueduct (operating since 1982); state materials state roughly 9 of 10 families in the coastal zone depend on the Colorado River. CEA's institutional worldview is supply-security and diversification away from single-source Colorado River dependence. RECENT POSITIONS (2025-2026): after the U.S./Lake Mead-driven cut lowered Mexico's 2026 Colorado allocation to ~1,668.4 Mm3, the state (SEPROA Secretary Víctor Daniel Amador Barragán) announced a three-part mitigation strategy executed largely through CEA: (1) modernize the Río Colorado-Tijuana aqueduct, (2) modernize and drill new wells in the Mesa Arenosa aquifer, and (3) a 'water bank' concertation agreement with Irrigation District 014 to shift agricultural water to urban use. CEA is simultaneously advancing seawater desalination (flagship Rosarito plant, ~2,200 L/s targeted, serving up to ~2.4M people, licitation reached final phase in 2026 with seven consortia bidding) and treated-water reuse (59 projects funded via the state 'Bono Verde'/sustainable bond: 36 potable-water works, 19 sewer, 4 sanitation/reuse). CEA's coordinator Mario Zepeda Jacobo has publicly flagged operational reliability limits of desalination, citing Ensenada's 2018 plant that never reached its committed 250 L/s and requires routine membrane maintenance. Reuse is currently minimal (CESPT recovers ~half of wastewater and reuses only ~3%), which CEA frames as headroom to expand.

On conservation. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE but constrained by Mexican federal law. CEA already relies on conservation and District 014 water-bank concertation to close its supply gap, and a verified consumptive-use conservation market maps onto tools it is actively using (buying/leasing ag water, ~60 Mm3/yr, plus 82.6 Mm3 of conservation credited toward 2026). It would welcome verified, additional, well-measured savings as new firm supply. BUT the 2026 water-law reform explicitly bans private transferable water rights and speculative sales, favoring state-administered compensation. So CEA would engage with a conservation-market concept only if it is structured as a public/binational conservation-and-compensation program (District 014 water bank, Minute-style U.S.-funded conservation such as Minutes 323/330) rather than a private tradable market. Framed that way it is a strong fit; framed as a private market it collides with current federal policy.

On solar+water. PERSUADABLE / mixed. CEA's binding constraint is water supply and the capital cost of desalination and reuse, plus ~2.69B pesos of new debt. Any mechanism that funds water infrastructure (desal capex/opex, aqueduct modernization, reuse plants) would be attractive because energy is a large operating cost of desalination and CEA is debt-constrained. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could de-risk the Rosarito plant's power costs and cross-subsidize reuse. CAUTION FLAGS: (1) hyperscaler datacenters are themselves large water consumers, which is politically toxic in a water-scarce, agriculture-vs-cities conflict zone (Mexicali); CEA would need ironclad assurance the datacenter load does not compete for the same stressed supply. (2) The Sheinbaum reform and 'water as a right of the people and good of the nation' framing is hostile to private commercial appropriation of water, so a foreign-corporate-branded water deal carries political risk for a state agency. Structured as clean-power + water-infrastructure financing that reduces CEA's debt and energy bill WITHOUT adding net water demand, it is genuinely persuadable.

On reuse/desal. STRONGLY FAVORABLE - this is already CEA's stated core strategy. CEA is mid-execution on the Rosarito desalination plant (~2,200 L/s), the existing Ensenada plant, treated-water reuse via the Bono Verde (4 sanitation/reuse works, with reuse currently only ~3% of recovered wastewater = large upside), and aqueduct/well modernization. Large-scale reuse and desalination are the explicit pillars of its diversification-away-from-Colorado agenda. The main friction CEA itself names is reliability and cost: Ensenada never hit its 250 L/s commitment, membranes foul and need routine downtime, and the distribution buildout required ~2.69B pesos of debt. So CEA's reaction to a serious reuse/desal proposal is 'yes, but prove the reliability and bring the financing.' A partner that closes the cost/reliability gap is pushing on an open door.

A win for them. A win for CEA is guaranteed, diversified, affordable water supply to Tijuana/Rosarito/Tecate/Ensenada that reduces dependence on a shrinking Colorado River allocation WITHOUT raising costs to households or adding to state debt. Concretely: firm new supply from desalination and reuse that actually hits committed flow rates (avoiding the Ensenada shortfall), lower and predictable energy costs for desalination, outside capital that offsets the ~2.69B-peso debt, additional verified conservation/water-bank volume from District 014 that survives the federal reform, and political cover under the Sheinbaum 'water as a public good' framing so the solution reads as state-secured public benefit rather than privatization. Bonus win: a package that eases the Mexicali agriculture-vs-cities conflict instead of inflaming it.

Public record. The agency launched a major water regeneration project to treat and reuse wastewater to reduce reliance on the Colorado River, as part of a binational agreement with the United States.

Position. CILA is the Mexican Section of the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC/CILA), headed by an Engineer-Commissioner (currently Adriana Reséndez Maldonado, the first woman in the role, a 23-year CILA veteran and former subdirector for the Colorado River). It sits under Mexico's Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores (SRE). Its mandate is to interpret and implement the 1944 Water Treaty and all binational 'Minutes' with the U.S. Section (USIBWC). Longstanding public position: binational cooperation and shared-risk management of the Colorado River. CILA co-authored and administers Minute 323 (2017, 9-yr Binational Water Scarcity Contingency Plan, expiring 2026) and Minute 330 (2024, 'Expansion of Colorado River Temporary Measures'), under which Mexico takes proportional shortage cuts tied to Lake Mead elevations, stores a Mexican Water Reserve in Lake Mead, and runs conservation projects. It publicly frames Mexico's shortage reductions as treaty compliance, not concessions: 2025 delivery cut by 50,000 AF plus 30,000 AF savings (net ~1,220,000 AF); 2026 initial allocation 1,352,595 AF. CILA also administers the Minute 323 environmental-flow commitment to the Colorado River Delta (governments providing ~2/3 of committed flows, Raise the River NGO coalition ~1/3, expanding restored habitat from 1,700 to 4,300 acres). It co-leads the Minute 323 Monitoring Group with USIBWC and has publicly flagged desalination (Sea of Cortez, Rosarito) and wastewater reuse as study topics for augmentation. It is the designated Mexican channel for the separate binational post-2026 track that runs parallel to Reclamation's domestic EIS.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. CILA already runs verified consumptive-use-style conservation under Minutes 323 and 330 (recoverable savings credited to Mexico's Lake Mead reserve, U.S.-funded projects), so a rigorously verified conservation market is conceptually familiar and consistent with its practice. Conditions: it will only participate through the Minute framework with airtight measurement, monitoring, and provenance; savings must credit to Mexico's account, not be siphoned to U.S. users; and it must protect Mexicali Valley irrigators and the Delta environmental-flow commitments. It will resist any market design that looks like selling or permanently alienating Mexico's treaty entitlement, or that bypasses CILA/CONAGUA. Well-structured, it is a likely partner.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-open but institutionally cautious; likely unknown until specifics are on the table. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps onto a model CILA already accepts: third-party (here, U.S. federal) money funding water infrastructure on the Mexican side, as under Minute 330. It would welcome external capital that finances conservation or new supply and reduces Mexico's shortage exposure. But CILA's mandate is water and boundaries, not energy, so an energy-led deal would need co-sponsors (CFE, CONAGUA, Baja California/Sonora state governments, SENER) and CILA would engage only on the water-funding and cross-border components. It will scrutinize sovereignty, land/permitting on the Mexican side, and whether the water benefit is verifiable and credited to Mexico. No public record of CILA taking a position on hyperscaler or energy-financed water, so treat specifics as unknown.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle and already engaged. CILA explicitly flagged desalination (Sea of Cortez, Playas de Rosarito on the Pacific) and wastewater reuse as augmentation study topics inside Minute 323, and binational desal/reuse studies (Yuma Desalting Plant, Tijuana-San Diego, Mexicali) are part of the IBWC agenda. These options directly reduce Baja California's over-dependence on the Colorado River, which is a core CILA/Mexican interest. Caveats: large desal is very high cost, the Rosarito project has stalled over private-concession licensing disputes, and CILA would insist any binational supply-swap (e.g., desalinated water offsetting Colorado deliveries) be structured through a Minute with clear accounting and no loss to Mexico's entitlement. This is the augmentation lever CILA is most publicly comfortable with.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 binational arrangement that keeps Mexico's 1944 Treaty allocation secure, distributes shortage risk equitably and predictably, brings U.S. funding to conservation and augmentation infrastructure on the Mexican side (the Minute 330 model channeled $65M in U.S. money through CILA), protects/expands the Delta environmental flows CILA administers, and reduces Baja California's dangerous single-source dependence on the Colorado River. Concretely: additional verified water credited to Mexico's Lake Mead reserve, new supply (reuse/desal) that offsets Colorado dependence, and being seen as the effective, technically credible steward of the treaty relationship.

Public record. Under Minute 323, CILA is a key partner with the U.S. in implementing water conservation projects and environmental restoration in the Colorado River Delta.

Position. CONAGUA is Mexico's centralized federal water authority and the domestic counterpart to CILA (the Mexican section of the IBWC) on all Colorado River matters governed by the 1944 Water Treaty. Its longstanding public position is treaty-compliance-first: it manages Mexico's Colorado River allocation (initial 2026 allocation of 1,352,595 acre-feet, reflecting a 50,000 af reduction and 30,000 af of recoverable savings under Minute 323) and has, since 2017, publicly committed Mexico to shared shortage-sharing and conservation. Under Minutes 323 and 330, CONAGUA is the operational executor of binational conservation: Minute 330 (signed March 2024, El Paso) commits Mexico to at least 400,000 af of savings for 2023-2026 (67,000 af specifically for 2026), backed by $65M in U.S. funding channeled through IBWC/CILA to CONAGUA, which then disburses to Mexicali Valley farmers for fallowing and efficiency projects. CONAGUA also stores Mexico's water reserve in Lake Mead under Minute 323 flexibility. Governance-wise, CONAGUA is described by outside analysts (Wilson Center, Brookings) as heavily centralized, top-down, and insufficiently consultative of local stakeholders. Its most consequential recent position is anti-market: under President Sheinbaum, CONAGUA co-authored and now enforces the December 2025 General Water Law and National Water Law reforms, which repeal Articles 23 BIS and 33 to prohibit transfer of water concessions between private parties, criminalize illegal extraction/commercialization, create a National Water Reserve Fund (volumes return to the state before reassignment), and explicitly aim to end 'water black markets' such as the informal Mexicali-District-014-to-Tijuana sales. Sheinbaum and CONAGUA frame water constitutionally as an inalienable national resource that cannot be privatized.

On conservation. Skeptical-to-hostile if framed as a market; cautiously receptive if framed as state-administered. A 'verified consumptive-use conservation market' collides head-on with the December 2025 reforms that prohibit transfer of concessions between private parties and criminalize water commercialization. CONAGUA will not endorse a tradable-rights market on Mexican soil. However, it already operates the functional equivalent under Minutes 323/330 (verified, U.S.-funded fallowing where volumes are conserved and paid for through the state). So a conservation program that routes all verification and payment through CONAGUA/CILA and the new National Water Reserve Fund, with the state as the sole counterparty and reassignment authority, is compatible and even welcome, especially if it fixes the payment-timeliness problem that triggered the February 2026 office occupation. Framing determines everything: 'market' = opponent, 'state-administered verified conservation with U.S. funding' = ally.

On solar+water. Persuadable and potentially enthusiastic, with sovereignty guardrails. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure aligns with CONAGUA's need for capital it does not have to extract from a strained federal budget, and Baja California's grid and desal ambitions. The energy piece is largely outside CONAGUA's remit (CFE/SENER), but the water-funding piece must flow through CONAGUA as state-controlled infrastructure, not as a private entitlement to water in exchange for power. CONAGUA will scrutinize any arrangement that could be read as a foreign corporation acquiring or trading water rights, given Sheinbaum's constitutional stance. Structured as private capital financing public/state water assets (reuse, desal, conveyance) with CONAGUA retaining allocation control, this is one of the more attractive options, because it eases the Tijuana-Mexicali conflict without a market.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned option; likely ally. Large-scale reuse and desalination create new supply outside the Colorado River allocation, directly easing CONAGUA's hardest binational and domestic pressures: the shrinking treaty delivery, the Tijuana over-consumption gap, and the Mexicali-Tijuana zero-sum fight that the market ban may sharpen. Desal on the Baja/Pacific coast and municipal reuse fit Mexico's stated strategy and require no private water-rights transfer, so they sidestep the December 2025 legal constraints entirely. The constraints are financial (CONAGUA lacks capital and the reform centralizes fiscal control) and energy-related (desal is power-intensive, which is why a paired clean-energy funding model is attractive). CONAGUA would welcome externally financed, state-owned reuse/desal capacity as a durable answer to shortage, provided it retains ownership and allocation authority.

A win for them. A win is meeting Mexico's binational conservation obligations on schedule while relieving the Tijuana-Mexicali supply squeeze and the farmer-payment backlash, all without ceding state control of water. Concretely: new firm supply (reuse/desal) or reliable clean energy that lets CONAGUA reduce Colorado River draw or fund fallowing without informal market sales, faster and fuller payment delivery to fallowing farmers, and a defensible post-2026 treaty position that limits further cuts to Mexico's allocation. Politically, CONAGUA wins by demonstrating the December 2025 reform delivers order and fairness rather than shortage.

Public record. Through binational agreements like Minutes 323 and 330, CONAGUA has committed to implementing and receiving funding for water conservation projects to leave more water in the system and has agreed to explore binational desalination projects.

Position. The Cucapá ('people of the river' / xawitt kwnchawaay) are one of the oldest peoples of the lower Colorado, living in the Mexican delta around El Mayor Cucapá and the Rio Hardy in Baja California, with an ethnically continuous but jurisdictionally separate sibling nation, the U.S. Cocopah Indian Tribe of Arizona. Longstanding public positions: (1) The river crisis is existential and cultural, not just economic. Upstream diversion in the U.S. and Mexicali Valley left the delta a hypersaline, largely dry inverse estuary, collapsing the fishery and riparian habitat that define Cucapá identity. (2) They have fought since 1993 for recognition of Indigenous territorial and preferential natural-resource (fishing) rights after the government decreed the Upper Gulf of California & Colorado River Delta Biosphere Reserve WITHOUT prior consultation, criminalizing subsistence gulf-corvina fishing in their own ancestral waters. This produced sustained conflict with SEMARNAT, CONAPESCA, PROFEPA and the navy, including arrests/prosecutions (documented ~2010) and a CNDH recommendation (8/2002). (3) They consistently frame the fight as free, prior and informed consent (consulta previa) and survival ('the Cucapá refuse extinction'), with Cucapá women prominent in the resistance. On the U.S. side, the Cocopah Tribe holds quantified, senior ('present perfected') Colorado River rights from Arizona v. California and is a member of the Ten Tribes Partnership; in 2024 it secured ~$5.5M to restore 400+ acres of delta habitat on its reservation using its own water rights. Both nations are strongly aligned with binational delta restoration (Minute 319 pulse flow 2014, Minute 323 through 2026) and environmental-flow / habitat outcomes.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive IF designed with them, hostile if imposed. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that frees water and can direct 'saved' water to environmental/delta flows aligns with their core interest in reviving the river and fishery. The U.S. Cocopah Tribe, holding senior quantified rights, could be a direct beneficiary/participant (paid conservation or leasing) and would likely engage constructively. The Mexican Cucapá reaction is conditioned by a deep, evidence-backed grievance: conservation regimes (the biosphere reserve) were used AGAINST them without consent and criminalized their fishing. They will read any new 'market' or 'conservation' scheme through that lens and oppose it if it becomes another top-down restriction that monetizes water while excluding them, or if delta/Indigenous allocations are treated as a residual. Persuadable to supportive only with guaranteed consultation, a defined share of conserved water for delta flows, and protection (not further restriction) of subsistence fishing rights.

On solar+water. Mixed / skeptical-persuadable, and the two nations may differ. Attractive elements: new, non-agricultural funding that pays for water and delta restoration is welcome given chronic underfunding, and solar+storage on or near tribal land could bring revenue, jobs and energy sovereignty (the U.S. Cocopah Tribe has land and legal standing to host and negotiate). Concerns: (1) A hyperscaler / data-center-anchored buildout raises the specter of a large new water and land consumer in an already over-allocated basin, the exact dynamic that dried their river. They will scrutinize net water balance and demand the 'also funds water' portion be real, enforceable, and delta-directed, not greenwashing. (2) Consent, land tenure and benefit-sharing are threshold issues, especially for the Mexican community with weak formal land/water title. Likely supportive only if structured as genuine partnership with equity/benefit flows and a binding, additional water contribution to the delta and to Cucapá use, not merely offsets.

On reuse/desal. Generally favorable in principle, with important caveats. Reuse and desalination (e.g., new supply for Mexicali/Tijuana or agriculture that reduces pressure on the river and returns flow to the delta and Sea of Cortez) directly serve the Cucapá interest in rehydrating the delta and restoring the corvina fishery, and could reduce the zero-sum fight over dwindling river water. Caveats they will raise: (1) brine/discharge into the Upper Gulf could harm the very fishery and endangered species habitat they depend on, so siting and brine management are decisive. (2) 'New water' must actually reach the delta and their communities rather than simply enabling more upstream/coastal growth. (3) Consultation and a share of benefits. Net: persuadable-to-supportive if desal brine is managed to protect the Upper Gulf ecosystem and a defined volume is committed to environmental delta flows and Cucapá domestic/fishing use.

A win for them. A durable win is the river reaching the delta and the sea again with enough reliable, good-quality water to sustain the riparian corridor and the gulf-corvina fishery, paired with legal recognition and protection of Cucapá territorial and preferential fishing/water rights secured through their own prior and informed consent. Concretely: a committed, additional environmental-flow volume to the delta (beyond Minutes 319/323); an end to the criminalization of Cucapá subsistence fishing and formal recognition of their preferential resource rights inside the reserve; secure clean domestic water for their communities; and, where projects are built, genuine partnership with benefit- and revenue-sharing and hosting/energy-sovereignty upside for the Tribe. In short: cultural and physical survival as 'people of the river' with the river restored, on terms they consented to.

Public record. As the 'people of the river' at the end of the system, they are strong advocates for environmental flows and habitat restoration in the delta, participating in binational agreements like Minute 323, but remain dependent on upstream actions for their water.

Position. T. Daryl Vigil (Jicarilla Apache, Jemez Pueblo, Zia Pueblo) is the Water Administrator for the Jicarilla Apache Nation, co-facilitator/co-director of the Water & Tribes Initiative (WTI) in the Colorado River Basin, and former chairman/temporary executive director of the Ten Tribes Partnership. He has been a leading Indigenous water-rights advocate for ~25 years. Core longstanding positions: (1) The current 'Law of the River' is unsustainable and headed for collapse without change ('this system cannot be sustained... at some point there's collapse'). (2) Tribes must have a formal, sovereign-to-sovereign seat at the negotiating table on par with the states; there is currently 'no formally recognized institutional place' for tribes in Colorado River policymaking, and 'left to the states and the federal government, they've already proven they will leave us out every time.' (3) Tribal water is a self-determination asset: tribes have the right to use, develop, OR lease/market their water and receive compensation, a principle he ties to federal self-determination policy since the 1970s. (4) Basin tribes hold ~2.9M acre-feet quantified (~20% of the system, many claims still unresolved) with some of the most senior rights, giving them leverage to balance supply/demand and restore environmental health. (5) He favors collaborative, non-adversarial models ('collaboration and need' over 'protect, defend, win/lose') and frames the river as a living entity. He engineered the landmark 2022 Jicarilla-New Mexico ISC-Nature Conservancy agreement leasing up to 20,000 af/yr from Navajo Reservoir into the San Juan River for endangered fish (Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker) and state water security -- a 'win-win-win' he wants replicated basin-wide.

On conservation. LIKELY STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE, with sovereignty conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the model Vigil already built with the 2022 San Juan lease -- getting paid to leave water instream for measurable benefit. He explicitly champions tribes' right to contribute water and receive compensation. He will back it IF: tribes are co-designers not just suppliers; rights are protected against forfeiture/'use-it-or-lose-it' erosion; verification is credible; and it does not become a mechanism for states/feds to lock in tribal water on the cheap without addressing unquantified claims. He is a natural spokesperson/first-mover if approached as a sovereign partner.

On solar+water. LIKELY CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / PERSUADABLE. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with his economic self-determination and diversified-revenue framing (the Jicarilla have pursued economic development on tribal land). Attractive if it brings capital, jobs, and water-security funding onto or in partnership with the Nation on sovereign terms. Concerns he would raise: who controls the asset and the water benefit, cultural/land impacts, whether 'funds water' means real wet-water security for tribal communities (many basin tribes still lack clean water access -- a WTI priority) versus a PR offset. Frame it as tribe-owned or tribe-partnered infrastructure, not extraction, and he engages.

On reuse/desal. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE but not his lane; watchful. Large-scale reuse/desal that adds new supply and relieves pressure on the overallocated system fits his 'system is unsustainable, need new solutions' view and could reduce demand to raid senior tribal rights. He would insist it not become an excuse to defer honoring/quantifying tribal rights or to justify further tribal cutbacks, and that tribes share in any new-supply benefits and decision-making. Neutral-to-positive; lower salience than market/inclusion issues.

A win for them. A durable win: (1) formal, recognized tribal seat in Colorado River governance/renegotiation as co-equal sovereigns; (2) monetizable, non-forfeitable pathways for tribes to lease/conserve water for real compensation -- the Jicarilla model scaled and institutionalized; (3) capital and infrastructure (energy + water) that fund tribal economic self-sufficiency and close the clean-water access gap for basin tribes; (4) protection and eventual quantification of still-unresolved senior tribal claims; and (5) a collaborative governance culture ('collaboration and need') that replaces the exclusionary 'Law of the River.' Concretely, any deal that pays the Nation for water stewardship while strengthening its rights and giving tribes decision authority is a win he can sell.

Public record. As a leader of the Water & Tribes Initiative, he champions tribal sovereignty in water management and has directly facilitated compensated water conservation agreements, such as the Jicarilla Apache Nation's lease to New Mexico for environmental flows.

Position. No public, on-the-record positions on Colorado River policy could be found. Date Kings de México is a small, family-owned and family-operated date (primarily Medjool) grower and artisanal-food distributor operating ranches in both the Coachella Valley (California) and the Mexicali Valley (Baja California). Its public messaging is commercial and brand-focused: 'sustainable technology,' 'organic growing practices,' working 'symbiotically with natural resources in a renewable manner,' plus youth/agriculture education and hosting international date-cultivation visitors. It has taken no visible public stance on Minute 323/330, the 2027 quota cuts, fallowing/conservation payments, desalination, or reuse. Structurally, however, its interests are legible: every drop of water reaching the Mexicali Valley is Colorado River water diverted at Morelos Dam and delivered through Irrigation District 014 Río Colorado, so the company's entire Mexican operation depends on continued ID-014 deliveries. Unlike the annual-crop and fallowing-dependent farmers who dominate ID-014 conservation programs, a date grower runs a PERENNIAL, drought- and salinity-tolerant, high-value-per-acre-foot orchard. Date palm is precisely the crop the Baja California state government is urging Mexicali farmers to switch TO ahead of the ~350 Mm3/yr cut projected for 2027. That makes Date Kings a structural relative winner from the crop-switch transition and a poor fit for pure fallowing programs (you cannot idle a 20-year orchard for a season and replant it). Longstanding implied position: protect reliable ID-014 delivery volume and water quality (salinity) to their trees; support efficiency/modernization that frees water without idling perennials; neutral-to-negative on fallowing-first schemes that pay row-crop neighbors to stop farming while doing nothing for tree crops. NOTE: much of this is inferred from sector economics and agronomy, not from company statements. Confidence on specifics is LOW; the direction of interest is well-grounded.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE, with a specific design caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market (pay for measured water actually not consumed, verified via remote sensing / metering rather than crude fallowing) fits a date grower well IF it credits efficiency and deficit-irrigation savings on a standing orchard, not just idled land. Date Kings can plausibly reduce consumptive use through microirrigation and deficit-irrigation scheduling while keeping trees alive, and a market that pays for those verified savings turns their agronomic advantage into cash. They would resist any market structured as fallowing-only, because you cannot fallow a perennial orchard without killing it and forgoing decades of future yield, so a fallowing-priced program pays their row-crop neighbors and strands them. Also relevant: Mexicali farmers already distrust the existing conservation-payment channel (US pays Mexico's CILA/CONAGUA, which pays farmers; District 14 farmers occupied CONAGUA offices in Feb 2026 alleging roughly half of promised money never reached them). So Date Kings' support is conditional on TRANSPARENT, DIRECT, TIMELY payment that does not route opaquely through federal agencies. Net: persuadable-to-ally on a well-designed verified-consumptive-use market; skeptical of any repeat of the current slow, opaque fallowing regime.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED, low-salience. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive to Date Kings mainly on the WATER leg: if datacenter capital pays for ID-014 canal modernization, on-farm drip conversion, or replacement supply (reuse/desal offset), that directly de-risks their orchard without asking them to idle it. The energy leg is secondary but not irrelevant: pumping and cold-chain/processing costs are real for a grower-distributor, and cheap solar+storage could lower operating costs; solar over or adjacent to marginal parcels is compatible with a perennial operation. Concerns they would raise: (1) land competition, they will not give up productive orchard land for panels; (2) they want the water benefit to reach ID-014 agriculture, not be captured entirely by coastal cities (Tijuana/Rosarito) the way Rosarito desal capacity is; (3) cross-border complexity, a US-hyperscaler-funded scheme touching Mexican water rights runs through CILA/CONAGUA and treaty channels, which they have reason to distrust. Overall a real-asset, tangible-benefit pitch lands better here than an abstract market; persuadable and potentially an early adopter if the water benefit is concrete and local.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, WARY OF WHO BENEFITS. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply and relieves pressure on the Colorado is directionally good for anyone depending on ID-014, because every acre-foot of coastal-city demand met by desal/reuse (e.g., the ~2,200 L/s Rosarito plant serving Tijuana/Rosarito, or optimized Tijuana-Rosarito wastewater reuse) is demand NOT pulled off Mexicali's Colorado allocation or bought away from Mexicali farmers. Date Kings would welcome that substitution. The wariness: in practice Baja's new desal and reuse capacity is being built to supply COASTAL URBAN demand, and 'Baja weighs buying water from Mexicali's farmers' framing means the same infrastructure can be paired with schemes that transfer agricultural water to cities rather than protect it for farming. Desalinated/reused water is also generally too expensive and too far from the Mexicali Valley to irrigate dates directly. So Date Kings supports reuse/desal as a demand-offset that protects their river deliveries, but opposes any version that is really a mechanism to reallocate ID-014 agricultural water to Tijuana/urban users. Persuadable, with the ask being an explicit guarantee that new supply reduces, rather than backfills, pressure to move farm water out of the valley.

A win for them. A durable, protected water future for their Mexicali date orchard: reliable, good-quality ID-014 deliveries sufficient to keep perennial trees alive and productive through the 2027 cuts, WITHOUT being forced into fallowing that strands decades of orchard investment. Concretely, a win is (1) cofunded on-farm efficiency (microirrigation, deficit-irrigation scheduling) that lets them cut consumptive use while keeping every tree, (2) getting PAID for those verified savings through a transparent, direct, timely channel they can trust, (3) new coastal/urban supply from reuse and desalination that measurably reduces the pressure to reallocate Mexicali farm water to cities, and (4) recognition of date palm as the region's model drought-resilient, high-value crop so they end the transition as a relative winner and a demonstration site rather than a casualty. Bonus win: cheaper energy for pumping and post-harvest processing if a solar+storage buildout materializes on terms that do not cost them orchard land.

Public record. No public, on-the-record positions on Colorado River policy could be found, which is typical for a small agricultural producer.

Position. {'river_crisis_recent_and_longstanding': "No public record of Delta Brick taking positions on Colorado River allocation, Lower/Upper Basin negotiations, cuts, or post-2026 guidelines. Its consistent, evidence-backed frame is local and operational: Paonia Reservoir has lost significant storage capacity to decades of clay sediment deposition from Muddy Creek since the 1960s, threatening water supply for North Fork Valley agriculture, and dredging that sediment both restores capacity and supplies a raw material. The company won the 2022 NextCycle Colorado Pitch Competition on this waste-to-product / reservoir-desilting story. It has received Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) support, indicating the state water establishment views reservoir desiltation favorably. Company self-describes as a climate company (methane's warming potential ~84x CO2). It does NOT frame itself around drought policy, consumptive-use markets, or basin-wide water rights.", 'confidence': 'medium-high on operational facts (multiple independent sources: deltabrick.com, CDPHE press release, Colorado School of Mines newsroom, trade press); low/unknown on any explicit river-crisis policy stance because none is public.'}

Public record. The company's entire business model is based on climate-positive actions, turning sediment that reduces reservoir capacity into building materials and planning to power its kilns with captured methane from old coal mines.

Position. Longstanding: Denver Water has been one of the most sophisticated and pragmatic municipal voices in the basin. Former CEO Jim Lochhead was a co-originator of the System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP) in a 2013 session with Metropolitan Water District (Kightlinger) and Central Arizona Project (Cullom), designed to compensate farmers for temporary, voluntary conservation rather than force permanent water-rights sales. The utility frames itself as an efficiency leader: Denver-area per-capita use fell ~20-40% from 2000-2020 (~30 gallons/person/day drop 2010-2018). It operates the largest recycled/reuse system in Colorado (purple-pipe network serving 80+ sites in Denver and Adams County) and leans on the fact that Colorado River water imported into the South Platte is legally reusable to extinction, letting it stretch supply through storage and reuse. Recent (2024-2026): CEO Alan Salazar (permanent since Jan 2024) publicly favors a negotiated seven-state agreement and says Denver Water can tolerate a longer timeline to get one, aligning with the Upper Basin block (CO, NM, UT, WY) that argues Lower Basin overuse and the current Lake Powell/Lake Mead operating regime insulated the Lower Basin from hydrologic reality. Colorado's lead negotiator Becky Mitchell voices the Upper Basin ethos of living within what the river can actually supply. On March 25, 2026 the Denver Board of Water Commissioners declared a Stage 1 drought (20% reduction request) after the 2025-26 Colorado River Basin snowpack peaked March 18 at 58% of normal, the lowest in 40 years. Supply-side, it is finishing the ~$565-600M Gross Reservoir expansion (largest US dam raise, completion ~2027) but is under a federal court order (Judge Arguello, 2024) not to fill the added capacity pending NEPA remediation.

On conservation. Broadly supportive and credible on this. Denver Water helped invent the compensated-conservation model (SCPP) and prefers voluntary, paid, temporary conservation over permanent buy-and-dry. It would likely welcome a verified consumptive-use conservation market as a tool that keeps water in the system and defers curtailment of its own junior transmountain rights. Caveats it will raise, from experience: SCPP-style programs have been expensive per acre-foot (Colorado paid ~$1M for ~2,000 AF in 2023) and drew thin, skeptical Western Slope participation; verification/additionality and the 'where does saved water go and who gets credit' problem are unresolved; and a market must not become a back-door for permanent agricultural buy-and-dry or for Lower Basin users to purchase Upper Basin water. Denver Water will want rigorous measurement, protection of Colorado's compact position, and assurance that conserved water counts toward Upper Basin obligations rather than simply flowing to Lower Basin overuse. Persuadable-to-ally on a well-designed market.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not the natural lead adopter. Denver Water is a municipal supplier, not a power buyer, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure is attractive mainly as a source of non-rate capital for reuse, storage, or advanced treatment, easing pressure on its ~$1.8B capital program and ratepayers. It would scrutinize: whether datacenter load in its service territory adds consumptive water demand (cooling) that competes with municipal supply; governance and control (it guards its independence and its board's rate authority); and reputational/equity optics of subsidizing a private hyperscaler. If structured as third-party capital funding reuse/efficiency with no new consumptive draw and no strings on water allocation, it could be a willing partner. If it implies large new industrial water demand, expect resistance. Net: persuadable, deal-structure-dependent.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned of the three. Denver Water already runs the state's largest recycled-water system and treats reuse as core strategy (Colorado River imports are reusable to extinction in the South Platte). It would strongly favor large-scale reuse expansion and advanced treatment (potable reuse trajectory) as a way to stretch existing supply without new diversions or curtailment exposure. Colorado only recently opened the regulatory door to direct potable reuse, and Denver Water is positioned to lead. Ocean/brackish desalination is largely irrelevant to a landlocked Front Range utility except as a Lower Basin 'augmentation' that could relieve pressure on the whole system; it would support Lower Basin desal/augmentation in principle because anything that reduces Lower Basin draw on Lakes Powell/Mead protects Upper Basin (and Denver's) position, but it will insist Upper Basin states not be asked to pay for Lower Basin augmentation. Strong ally on reuse; supportive-bystander on desal-as-augmentation.

A win for them. A win is durable, adequate, legally protected Front Range supply that does not depend on new large transmountain diversions or expose their junior Colorado River rights to curtailment. Concretely: a seven-state deal that holds the Upper Basin's compact position and forces Lower Basin demand reductions; verified, well-funded conservation and reuse tools that let them stretch existing supply and defer/avoid curtailment; third-party or federal capital that offloads part of their multi-billion-dollar capital and reuse program from ratepayers; resolution allowing them to actually use the expanded Gross Reservoir yield; and revenue stability through drought. They 'win' by looking like the responsible, efficiency-leading utility that secured its customers' water without buying-and-drying agriculture and without triggering a compact crisis.

Public record. Denver Water actively promotes and implements a 'One Water' plan, which holistically integrates water reuse, conservation programs, and efficiency as core strategies for managing its water resources.

Position. Desert Forge Ventures is a Las Vegas venture capital firm founded in 2025 by former UNLV President Len Jessup (Managing/General Partner), seeded with Economic Development Administration funding in collaboration with UNLV. Fund I writes $100K-$1M checks (Pre-Seed to Series A) across deep tech (AI, quantum, advanced materials, robotics), with an explicit named focus area of 'solar and water harvesting technologies' and sustainable tech for arid climates. Its longstanding, on-record framing of the Colorado River crisis is supply-scarcity-as-investable-opportunity, not conservation or allocation politics. Jessup stated publicly (KTNV, Aug 2025): 'There's not enough coming out of the river. There's not enough in the aquifers underneath Las Vegas to sustain the growth that's happening here.' That is a growth-preservation thesis: the firm treats the river's decline as a market signal to fund new-water-supply technology so Las Vegas can keep growing, rather than as a call to cut consumptive use. Flagship water bet is WAVR Technologies, a UNLV-spinout atmospheric water harvesting (AWH) company; Desert Forge co-invested (with Nevada's Battle Born Venture program) in WAVR's $4M seed round as a 'strategic early supporter.' Jessup on WAVR: 'WAVR is solving one of the most urgent challenges facing the American West: reliable access to water.' No public record of the firm taking any position on Lower Basin cuts, the post-2026 operating guidelines, interstate allocation, Lake Mead levels as a policy matter, tribal water rights, or any conservation/market-based demand-reduction proposal. Their lens is technological supply augmentation and Nevada economic diversification, not water policy or basin governance.

On conservation. Mildly positive to neutral, and persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not threaten Desert Forge directly and could even help: it monetizes saved water and creates demand signals and potential customers/partners for efficiency and alt-supply startups they might back. But it is not their instinct. Their revealed preference is 'make more water' (harvesting, supply tech) so Las Vegas can keep growing, not 'use less.' They would likely view a conservation market as adjacent and complementary rather than core, and could be moved to support it if it is framed as unlocking growth headroom and creating a market their portfolio companies can sell into, rather than as a cap on regional expansion.

On solar+water. Most likely to be genuinely enthusiastic. This maps almost perfectly onto their thesis: deep tech + AI infrastructure + solar/storage + water, all in the desert Southwest, all growth-additive. Desert Forge explicitly lists AI infrastructure, solar, and water among its focus areas, and its whole reason for being is diversifying and growing the Nevada tech economy. A hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water would be read as exactly the kind of large-capital, growth-preserving, tech-forward solution they want to see, and as a potential source of pilot customers, co-investment, and deal flow for their portfolio. Highest-probability point of alignment; lead with this.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable in principle. Large-scale reuse and desalination are supply-augmentation plays, which is precisely their frame ('not enough coming out of the river' -> build new supply). They already fund atmospheric water harvesting, a cousin technology. They would likely welcome reuse/desal as validation of the water-scarcity-as-opportunity thesis and as a potential magnet for water-tech company formation in Nevada. Caveat: desal specifically is coastal/interstate and capital-intensive in ways a small Nevada seed fund can't directly play, so enthusiasm is more directional/rhetorical than a place they'd write checks; reuse (closer to home, modular, startup-scale) is the better fit for their actual capital.

A win for them. A win is Las Vegas / Southern Nevada continuing to grow despite the river's decline, achieved through technology and private capital rather than austerity, with that new-water and clean-energy economy incubating venture-scale Nevada companies they can fund and profit from. Concretely: their water/energy-tech portfolio (WAVR and future bets) gets real customers, pilots, and follow-on capital; Nevada becomes a recognized hub for arid-climate water and AI-infrastructure innovation; and the Colorado River crisis is 'solved' on the supply side in a way that preserves regional growth, validating the fund's founding thesis and generating returns for its LPs.

Public record. As a venture capital firm focused on regional economic development, its business model would be aligned with investing in the technologies and large-scale projects central to a conservation and clean infrastructure agenda.

Position. DWCD is a small Upper Basin (Colorado) irrigation/M&I/tribal supplier that operates the federal Dolores Project and McPhee Reservoir in Montezuma and Dolores counties, serving Dove Creek, the Montezuma Valley, and the Towaoc area on the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation. Its posture on the river crisis is driven by acute local shortage, not basin-scale advocacy. GM Ken Curtis has repeatedly called recent years among the worst on record: full-service (agricultural) supplies out of McPhee have run at extreme shortages (roughly 13-30% of normal in the worst years: 2002, 2013, 2021, 2025-26), and the district received only ~56% of normal in 2024. It has enacted overuse penalties and exhausted most reserves to keep costs bearable for strapped farmers. Municipal/domestic supplies are protected; the pain falls on a small subset of full-service irrigators. In Dec 2022 SEIS scoping comments the district stated that the 2007 Interim Guidelines and 2019 Drought Contingency Plan 'have proven insufficient' given continued dry hydrology, aligning it with the broader Upper Basin call (via the Upper Colorado River Commission and Colorado's negotiators) for post-2026 guidelines rooted in the river's actual, reduced supply rather than paper entitlements. Curtis frames the core problem as unreliability: 'Water is no longer reliably available' and farmers face 'year-by-year gambles with last-second planning.' Crucially, DWCD is an early, willing participant in paid conservation: its farmers and ranchers have volunteered to be paid to conserve under the System Conservation Program and store the saved water in McPhee to build carryover for the next dry year. Curtis actively advocates the model of conserving in good years and banking it locally in a nearby reservoir rather than letting it run downstream.

On conservation. Strongly positive; likely the single most attractive of the three options. DWCD is already a real-world demonstration of exactly this model: its irrigators volunteered to be paid to conserve under the System Conservation Program and banked the saved water in McPhee. A verified consumptive-use conservation market with durable measurement/verification and a credit that the district can store locally would be embraced, provided (1) the conserved water is credited/banked to Upper Basin or district benefit and does not simply flow downstream to Lower Basin users, (2) participation stays voluntary and compensated (not mandated curtailment), and (3) senior water rights and Colorado water law are respected. This is the clearest persuasion lever: engage them as a proof point and design partner, not a target.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not a natural fit, so uncertain-to-mildly-positive. DWCD is rural-agricultural and tribal-serving with modest existing hydropower; a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could appeal if it (a) hardens the Dolores Project (canal lining, storage, efficiency, carryover) or subsidizes conservation payments, and (b) does not create a new large consumptive demand competing with farms for scarce McPhee water. The district would be wary of any data-center load that itself needs water in an already over-shorted basin. Absent a specific local project, this is speculative for them (unknown how they would weigh it), but the 'funds water' hook is the way in.

On reuse/desal. Largely irrelevant to their situation, so neutral/low-priority rather than opposed. DWCD is an inland, headwaters-adjacent agricultural district with no coastal or large municipal wastewater stream to reuse or desalinate at scale. Large reuse/desal would be viewed as a Lower Basin / big-metro solution that could ease pressure on the overall system (a mild positive if it reduces calls on Upper Basin water) but would not directly help McPhee irrigators. They would support it in principle if it is framed as demand relief that protects Upper Basin agriculture, but would resist any framing that treats Upper Basin conservation as a substitute for Lower Basin structural fixes.

A win for them. A win is reliable, plannable water for their farmers plus a durable revenue path. Concretely: (1) voluntary conservation that pays their irrigators fairly AND lets them bank the saved water in McPhee as protected carryover for the next dry year, with a verified credit that survives to Upper Basin/district benefit; (2) post-2026 operating rules grounded in actual river supply that reduce curtailment risk on senior Upper Basin rights; (3) capital to harden the Dolores Project (efficiency, storage, canal improvements) so a given snowpack stretches further; and (4) protection of municipal and Ute Mountain Ute tribal supplies. If a proposal delivers plannable allocations and compensated flexibility instead of uncompensated cuts, DWCD becomes an ally and a showcase.

Public record. The district's board was split on a 2026 internal lease of scarce water to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, showing a willingness by some directors to engage in flexible water sharing arrangements, though it also highlights internal tensions.

Position. EPCOR Water Arizona is the largest private, regulated water/wastewater utility in Arizona (part of EPCOR USA serving ~360,000 connections across AZ/NM/TX; ultimate parent EPCOR Utilities is owned by the City of Edmonton, Alberta). On the river crisis its longstanding public posture is 'supply diversification + planning, not panic': it stresses that the Colorado River is only ~13% of its Arizona connections and that ag and aquifer recharge take cuts before municipal deliveries. It was an active drafter of Arizona's 2019 Drought Contingency Plan and is the ONLY private water company in the DCP Mitigation Agreement. Operationally it leans on groundwater, Lake Pleasant/CAP water, and high-priority Colorado River water leased from the Ak-Chin Indian Community (for its Anthem system), and recharges ~96% of treated wastewater into aquifers via a Maricopa Water District partnership. Most consequentially, EPCOR is a leading proponent of large-scale new supply: in Nov 2025 the Arizona Water Infrastructure Finance Authority (WIFA) selected 'EPCOR Water Innovation Partners' to advance a Gulf of California / Baja California desalination + binational conveyance concept (167,000-500,000 AF/yr by ~2034, swapping desal water for part of Mexico's Colorado allocation) plus a South Bay potable-reuse importation concept. It also builds reclaimed-water pipelines (2021 grant) and runs advanced potable-reuse messaging. As an ACC-regulated monopoly it frames conservation through rate design (inclining block tiers) and is investing >$500M over 10 years in its systems.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits EPCOR's stated 'plan ahead, diversify, price to conserve' philosophy and its DCP-mitigation track record, and it could be a seller/aggregator of verified savings (it already recharges ~96% of treated water and runs reclaimed pipelines). But as a regulated utility, EPCOR's core incentive is reliable supply and rate-base growth, not selling down its own firm supply, so it will only lean in if (a) participation is ACC-blessed and cost-recoverable, (b) it does not jeopardize its Assured Water Supply designations or ability to serve growth, and (c) verification is rigorous enough to protect it from prudence challenges. Expect it to prefer conservation as a complement to new supply, not a substitute for its desal/importation program.

On solar+water. Interested, likely favorable, but on its own terms. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with two EPCOR realities: it is an energy+water utility family (parent runs electricity/gas/water), and Arizona data-center load growth is a core driver of both power and water demand in its footprint. EPCOR would welcome third-party capital that de-risks or co-funds its expensive supply program (reuse, recharge, potentially desal) and could position itself as the water counterparty/operator for data-center campuses. Frictions: it will guard its regulated service territory and ACC rate treatment, will resist arrangements that route around its monopoly or shift prudent-investment risk onto ratepayers without return, and will want any water funding structured so the utility (not just the hyperscaler) controls the asset and cost recovery. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific lever if structured as co-investment in EPCOR-operated infrastructure.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive / effectively a champion. This is the lever EPCOR is already betting on. It is the WIFA-selected proponent of Gulf of California/Baja desalination + binational conveyance (167k-500k AF/yr) and a South Bay potable-reuse importation concept, builds reclaimed-water pipelines, and recharges ~96% of treated wastewater. Large-scale reuse/desal is its preferred solution because it creates new firm supply that grows rate base and reduces reliance on a shrinking river, all within its regulated-utility model. It will push hard for public co-funding (WIFA/LTWAF), favorable ACC cost recovery, and streamlined permitting/diplomacy (Mexico allocation swap, IBWC). Any coalition advancing reuse/desal has EPCOR as a natural anchor partner; the risk is that EPCOR's enthusiasm is tied to its own project winning, so it may be a rival to competing proponents (e.g., the Acciona-Fengate alliance also selected by WIFA).

A win for them. A win is new, firm, growth-enabling water supply that clears ACC prudence and earns a regulated return, while the Colorado River shrinks in relative importance to its portfolio. Concretely: (a) its WIFA desalination/importation and potable-reuse concepts get public co-funding, permitting support, and cost-recovery certainty and reach construction; (b) it locks in third-party (e.g., hyperscaler/data-center) capital for EPCOR-operated reuse/recharge/desal assets; (c) it preserves and expands Assured Water Supply designations so it can keep adding profitable connections in metro Phoenix; and (d) it participates in a verified conservation market on terms that add optionality without eroding firm supply or inviting rate backlash. Reputationally, EPCOR wants to be seen as the private utility that solved Arizona's supply problem, not the one that rationed customers.

Public record. EPCOR has publicly proposed multiple water reuse and desalination exchange projects to the Arizona Water Infrastructure Finance Authority to augment Colorado River supplies.

Position. Edith Zagona, PhD, PE, is a Research Professor of Water Resources Engineering at CU Boulder and founding Director of the Center for Advanced Decision Support for Water and Environmental Systems (CADSWES). She is the Principal Investigator and principal inventor of RiverWare, the modeling environment in which Reclamation's Colorado River Simulation System (CRSS) is built. CRSS is the primary long-term planning and policy-analysis model for the basin, used to shape the 2007 Interim Guidelines, the 2019 Drought Contingency Plans, and the ongoing Post-2026 operations EIS. She has ~45 years on the Colorado River. Her consistent, longstanding public posture is that of a neutral tool-builder and honest broker, NOT a policy advocate. Her core public position is that shared, transparent, inspectable modeling is what makes negotiation possible: before RiverWare there was 'this huge lack of trust' in Reclamation's numbers, and letting parties inspect the model's assumptions rebuilt that trust. On the current crisis she is cautiously optimistic precisely because the tools force parties to a common analytical table: 'The tools are bringing people to the table. They're at the table arguing. But at least they're at the table.' Methodologically she favors decision-making under deep uncertainty, stress-testing policies across thousands of hydrologic futures (8,000+ supply traces) rather than betting on a single forecast, and building interactive tools that let negotiators test competing proposals in real time to find compromises. Recent work: stochastic decadal streamflow/pool-elevation projections conditioned on temperature (2021), robustness-tradeoff analysis in the CRB (2024), and long-lead runoff forecasting via random forests (2024). She takes NO public position on allocation splits, the Upper/Lower Basin dispute, priority dates, or who should bear cuts, and studiously avoids advocacy. This neutrality is a deliberate professional stance tied to her role as the maintainer of infrastructure all seven states and the federal government rely on.

On conservation. Receptive but analytically demanding, and neutral on the policy merits. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is exactly the kind of intervention CRSS/RiverWare is built to evaluate: she would want it represented as an explicit accounting-and-operations rule in the model, stress-tested across thousands of hydrologic traces to show its reliability, additionality, and system-level effect on Powell/Mead pool elevations before endorsing that it 'works.' Her enthusiasm scales with the rigor and transparency of the verification and measurement. She will not advocate for the market politically, but she is the natural person to validate whether claimed savings are real (additionality, avoided double-counting, measurement uncertainty) and how they propagate through the system. Expect careful, caveated support for any market whose accounting is inspectable and whose savings can be modeled and audited; skepticism toward any scheme whose 'verified' savings cannot be reproduced in a transparent model.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, framed through the water-energy nexus, which is one of her stated research areas. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would appeal to her interest in operational water-energy coupling (reservoir operations, hydropower, load) and in new funding for basin resilience. She would treat it as a scenario to be modeled rather than a cause to champion, and would ask hard questions: how much firm water does it actually free or fund, at what reliability, and does the energy-side financing create dependencies that distort operations. Datacenter water consumption in the basin would draw her scrutiny as a new demand node to represent honestly in CRSS. Net: open, analytically curious, non-advocating, and insistent that the water benefit be quantified and modeled, not asserted.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-supportive in principle, evaluative in practice. Large-scale reuse and desalination are supply-augmentation levers she would want represented as new sources/nodes in the basin model and tested for how they change shortage risk across the trace ensemble, including cost, energy intensity (water-energy nexus again), and timing relative to when cuts bite. She has no ideological position for or against; her contribution would be to quantify how much these options actually shift the reliability curves versus their energy and capital costs. She is unlikely to oppose them and unlikely to champion them; she will insist the claimed supply benefit survive probabilistic stress-testing before it is treated as real in planning.

A win for them. A win for Zagona is any outcome that (1) keeps shared, transparent, inspectable modeling at the center of how the basin makes decisions, (2) demonstrably brings and keeps all parties at the analytical table, and (3) advances rigorous, uncertainty-aware evaluation of new mechanisms so that 'verified' means reproducible in a model everyone can inspect. If a conservation market, energy-water finance package, or supply-augmentation project is validated through (or benchmarked against) RiverWare/CRSS with defensible additionality and reliability, that both serves the basin and reinforces the centrality and credibility of the analytical infrastructure she built. She wins when good decisions are made on trustworthy numbers, not when any particular faction wins.

Public record. As the director of CADSWES, she leads the development of the RiverWare modeling software, a critical tool used by stakeholders to simulate and evaluate water conservation policies and the impacts of climate change on the Colorado River.

Position. COLEF is Mexico's leading northern-border research institution (founded 1982, Tijuana HQ with a Mexicali unit), and its Colorado River work is anchored by Dr. Alfonso Andres Cortez Lara, director of the COLEF Mexicali unit and a professor-researcher on transboundary water (Ph.D., Michigan State). COLEF's longstanding public positions: (1) The Mexicali Valley faces steep, near-term Colorado River cuts. Cortez Lara publicly projects Baja California's annual quota falling by ~350 million cubic meters by 2027, more than the city of Mexicali uses in a year, framing the crisis as urgent and structural, not cyclical. (2) Meeting that shortfall would require significantly cutting alfalfa and cotton acreage in the Mexicali Valley, but he stresses this carries 'an enormous cost' and that Mexico's federal government must fund and enforce water efficiency rather than push the burden onto growers. (3) He is a documented advisor to Irrigation District 014 (Rio Colorado) farmers in their negotiations with the Mexican federal government, and he frames those farmers sympathetically as vulnerable (poverty, disability, elderly). (4) COLEF has deep scholarly engagement with binational governance mechanisms (IBWC Minutes 317/318/319, Intentionally Created Mexican Allocation, the delta pulse flow and environmental-flow experiments) and with agricultural-to-urban water transfers, which historically let Mexicali farmers sell surplus water to coastal cities (Tijuana, Ensenada) before President Sheinbaum's 2025 law banned private inter-party 'black market' water sales. COLEF's stance across this body of work is analytical and pro-cooperation: it treats conservation, efficiency, wastewater reuse, and desalination as the prime tools to rebalance the water-scarce Mexican coastal zone, while insisting on procedural fairness, adequate compensation, and governance legitimacy for the affected users.

On conservation. Broadly favorable but conditional. A verified, measured consumptive-use conservation market aligns with COLEF's core research finding that the Mexicali Valley must reduce consumptive agricultural use (alfalfa/cotton) and that conservation should be funded, not imposed. Cortez Lara has explicitly argued growers should be compensated and that government must fund efficiency, so a market that pays for verified consumptive-use reductions answers his central objection to unfunded mandates. Two caveats will drive his reaction: (1) legitimacy under Mexican law, since Sheinbaum's 2025 reforms banned private water sales and reframed transfers as a 'black market,' so any market must be structured through sanctioned public/binational channels (IBWC minutes, government-administered conservation payments) rather than private trading, or COLEF will flag it as politically nonviable; and (2) equity/measurement, since COLEF will want rigorous MRV of true consumptive-use savings (not paper transfers) and protections so vulnerable District 014 smallholders are not coerced or left worse off.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, evidence-driven, likely the least-covered of the three in COLEF's existing work. There is no public COLEF position on hyperscaler-funded solar-plus-storage that also funds water, so this is partly unknown/inferred. Given COLEF's framing that the federal government has failed to fund efficiency and that outside capital is scarce, a credible new funding source for water efficiency, reuse, or desalination would be attractive in principle. Cortez Lara and COLEF colleagues would scrutinize: whether the water benefit is real and reaches the Mexican side (delta, Mexicali agriculture, coastal cities) rather than accruing only to U.S. or corporate interests; energy-sovereignty and land-use concerns common in Mexican policy debate; water demand of the data infrastructure itself; and whether governance is binational and transparent. Expect COLEF to want to study and validate it before endorsing, not reject or embrace it reflexively.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned with COLEF's stated research program. COLEF scholarship explicitly identifies wastewater reuse and desalination, alongside agricultural-to-urban transfers and efficiency, as the prime options to improve supply in the water-scarce coastal zone (Tijuana, Rosarito, Ensenada). Desalination is already part of the on-the-ground reality COLEF documents (Ensenada desal feeding water-truck 'pipas' during shortages). So large-scale reuse/desal would be received positively as a supply-diversification strategy that relieves pressure on the Colorado River allocation. COLEF's expert caveats: cost and who pays, energy intensity and its carbon/energy-sovereignty implications, brine/coastal ecological impacts, and equitable distribution so benefits reach underserved Tijuana neighborhoods that currently go without water. COLEF would position itself as an evaluator and design partner rather than a mere cheerleader.

A win for them. A win for COLEF is being the credible, independent scientific authority whose research shapes a fair, binational, well-funded solution to the Mexicali water crisis, one that funds efficiency and conservation instead of dumping the cost on vulnerable growers, diversifies supply through reuse/desalination, and restores some Colorado River delta flow. Concretely: commissioned or co-produced research and evaluation roles (elevating COLEF's funding stability and policy relevance during a tight Mexican science-budget period); a seat at binational governance/design tables (IBWC-adjacent, state and federal water planning); demonstrable protection and compensation for District 014 farmers Cortez Lara advises; and public validation that COLEF's long-standing prescription, funded conservation plus supply diversification plus cooperative binational governance, was adopted and worked.

Public record. As a research institution, COLEF provides analysis on binational water issues, including desalination, but does not take explicit advocacy positions, making it a source of information for decision-makers rather than a policy driver.

Position. Longstanding: left-of-center environmental foundation advancing 'the right to a healthy environment' and 'rights of nature' (nature holds legal rights co-equal with human rights). Core water positions: enforce the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act, protect and restore in-stream flows and water quality, treat water as a fundamental right for both people and ecosystems, defend the Bay-Delta, and prioritize aquatic-ecosystem health and native fish. Supports dam removal and opposes commercial logging on federal lands. ED Linda Sheehan (co-founder/first ED of Earth Law Center; ex-Ocean Conservancy, Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation; MIT/Berkeley Law/Goldman) is a leading rights-of-nature/'Earth Law' advocate who frames waterways as rights-bearing and pushes 'Clean Water Act 2.0.' On the Colorado specifically there is little direct public record; positions must be inferred from the rights-of-nature/in-stream-flow frame and from its grantees' Colorado-basin work (e.g., Center for Biological Diversity's ESA/species-flow litigation).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but conditional. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that measurably leaves more water in the river aligns with their in-stream-flow and ecosystem-restoration goals, and 'verified/measurable' matches their science-and-enforcement style. But they distrust market mechanisms that commodify water or entrench existing (especially agricultural) diversions, and their rights-of-nature frame resists treating water purely as a tradable commodity. They will ask: does saved water actually stay in the river for the ecosystem (a legally protected environmental flow), or is it re-sold to new consumptive users? Persuadable if the market is structured so a share of conserved water is dedicated to the river/species with real verification.

On solar+water. Skeptical-to-neutral, leaning skeptical. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water triggers their instinct to scrutinize industry-financed deals for greenwashing and for locking in new large water/energy demand. They would probe: what is the datacenter's own consumptive water and land/desert-habitat footprint, is the 'water funding' additive and permanent for ecosystems or an offset that enables more extraction, and who holds the resulting water rights. Clean energy is directionally aligned with their climate stance, but the rights-of-nature lens makes them wary of any scheme where a corporate consumer buys legitimacy. Persuadable only with hard additionality, ecosystem-dedicated flows, and habitat safeguards.

On reuse/desal. Split: strongly favor reuse/recycling; likely oppose or heavily condition seawater desalination. Water reuse/recycling and conservation are exactly their preferred 'reduce demand, protect the source' solutions and would be welcomed. Large-scale ocean desalination is a known sore point: their grantee California Coastkeeper Alliance led opposition to the Poseidon Huntington Beach plant over marine-life intake mortality (Water Code 13142.5(b)) and calls some coastal desal operations among the most destructive in the state. Expect Environment Now to oppose energy-intensive seawater desal on marine-ecosystem, cost, and 'supply-expansion-enables-more-growth' grounds, while being open to brackish/inland reuse with strong environmental controls. Note: desal is coastal and largely tangential to the Colorado consumptive-use problem, a point they would raise.

A win for them. A precedent where conserved or newly created Colorado River water is legally and permanently dedicated to the river ecosystem and its native species as a protected environmental flow, verified by independent science, advancing the principle that a river holds enforceable rights to its own water. Concretely: a conservation/market or reuse structure with a guaranteed ecosystem share and real accountability, held up as a model for Western rivers, that their grantees can point to as proof that rights-of-nature and measurable in-stream flows can be built into basin operations without simply commodifying water for the next consumptive user.

Public record. The organization has successfully opposed large-scale desalination projects like the Poseidon plant due to their environmental impact, indicating a cautious approach to large infrastructure.

Position. FERC is an independent federal energy regulator (an agency housed under DOE) with jurisdiction over hydroelectric licensing, interstate transmission planning and cost allocation, wholesale power markets, and generator/load interconnection. Its Colorado River footprint is narrower and more indirect than most basin stakeholders assume. The basin's marquee dams (Glen Canyon, Hoover, Flaming Gorge, the Aspinall Unit, Navajo) are federal Bureau of Reclamation projects, largely OUTSIDE FERC's licensing authority; FERC licenses hydro only where Congress has not vested authority in Reclamation, and the two agencies use MOUs and site-specific jurisdictional determinations to divide roles (usbr.gov/power FERC-licenses page). So FERC does not manage river flows, allocate water, or set dam operations for the big CRSP/Boulder Canyon facilities. Where FERC DOES touch the river directly is non-federal hydro and pumped-storage licensing on tributaries and adjacent lands. Its most consequential recent basin action: on Feb 15, 2024 FERC established a new policy that it will NOT issue preliminary permits for projects on Tribal lands if the Tribe opposes, and on April 25, 2024 it denied the Big Canyon Pumped Storage Project preliminary permit (a Little Colorado River tributary near Grand Canyon that would have pumped ~14.3 billion gallons of groundwater, threatening Blue Springs and humpback chub). That is a real signal that FERC is willing to reject water-intensive hydro in a scarce, Tribally sensitive part of the basin. FERC's much larger, longstanding institutional agenda is grid-side and basin-agnostic: Order No. 2023 (interconnection reform to clear the multi-thousand-GW solar/storage/hybrid queue backlog), Order No. 1920 / 1920-A (long-term regional transmission planning and cost allocation, explicitly accounting for data-center load growth), and a 2025-2026 push on large-load / data-center / co-located generation interconnection (ANOPR, show-cause orders to RTOs, PJM co-location order Dec 2025, SPP HILL approval Jan 2026), acting on a DOE Oct 2025 directive to accelerate large-load interconnection. FERC frames all of this around reliability, just-and-reasonable rates, and preventing cost shifts onto other ratepayers, not around water.

On conservation. Largely neutral-to-out-of-scope. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a water-allocation and Reclamation/state-compact matter, not a FERC wholesale-power or hydro-licensing matter, so FERC would have no direct regulatory hook and no standing to endorse or oppose it. The one indirect touchpoint: sustained conservation that keeps Powell/Mead reservoir elevations higher preserves federal hydropower output, which stabilizes the WAPA/CRSP power supply that FERC-regulated markets and customers rely on , a mild positive externality FERC would welcome but not champion. Expect FERC to treat this as another agency's lane. Mark this reaction as low-salience / mostly indifferent.

On solar+water. Most engaged and most favorable of the three, but strictly on the energy side. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout is squarely within FERC's core 2024-2026 agenda: clearing the interconnection queue (Order 2023), planning transmission for data-center load growth (Order 1920), and accelerating large-load / co-located generation interconnection (RM26-4, show-cause orders, PJM/SPP co-location approvals). FERC would view the energy-and-datacenter architecture as exactly the kind of load-plus-generation package it is trying to speed through. Caveats that shape its reaction: FERC's participant-funding norm means the hyperscaler pays its own grid-upgrade costs; FERC guards against cost shifts to other ratepayers and against reliability harm; and FERC has NO authority over the water-funding leg , that half lives with Reclamation, states, and Tribes. So FERC can be a powerful enabler of the power/interconnection side while being formally silent on whether the buildout funds water. In the Western Interconnection, most of this region is non-RTO (much of the desert Southwest outside CAISO), which limits how directly FERC's RTO-focused orders bite and pushes reliance on individual utilities and WestConnect-type planning.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-favorable, but again as a load/power regulator, not a water regulator. Large-scale reuse and especially desalination are extremely energy-intensive, so they show up on FERC's radar as new electricity demand and potential large-load interconnection requests, not as water infrastructure it permits. FERC would care about how a desal/reuse complex connects to and is powered by the grid, whether it can be treated as flexible/curtailable load (FERC is actively exploring faster study tracks for flexible loads), and whether its upgrades are participant-funded. FERC has no jurisdiction over desal plant siting, brine disposal, or water-quality permitting (EPA, states, Reclamation, Army Corps handle those). Net: FERC is an enabler of the energy needed for reuse/desal and indifferent to the water outcome itself.

A win for them. A win for FERC is delivering on its own institutional mandate: reliable, just-and-reasonable-priced power; a cleared interconnection queue that connects the solar+storage and large-load buildout the West needs without cost shifts or reliability degradation; durable transmission plans that absorb data-center growth; and decisions that survive judicial review and Congressional scrutiny. On the river specifically, a win is staying in its lane , enabling the energy side of solutions while avoiding permitting decisions (like water-guzzling tributary hydro on contested Tribal land) that would embroil it in the water crisis, draw litigation, or damage Tribal trust relationships. If a proposal lets FERC say yes to clean-energy interconnection AND cleanly defer the water questions to Reclamation, states, and Tribes, that is the outcome it most wants. FERC also increasingly wants to be seen as solving the data-center-load problem, so any structure that helps it demonstrate fast, fair large-load integration counts as a win.

Public record. FERC's Order No. 1920 mandates long-term, scenario-based regional transmission planning to accommodate new energy resources, which is critical for large-scale solar buildout, but the agency's primary role is grid reliability and economic regulation, not explicit conservation advocacy.

Position. Flexential is a mid-size colocation and hyperscale-adjacent data center operator (~42 data centers across ~19 markets, ~325 MW built or in development), co-controlled by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners and GI Partners (MSIP invested Oct 2024). It has NO public advocacy position on the Colorado River crisis, drought policy, or basin allocation. Its public stance on water is entirely operational/ESG framing, not political. Concrete, cited water positions: (1) New facilities are explicitly designed to a Water Usage Effectiveness (WUE) of zero and PUE of 1.4, with zero-water-usage sites already commissioned or targeted (Portland-Hillsboro 4/5, Atlanta-Douglasville 2) [2025 ESG Report]. (2) ~84% of total data center capacity is supported by closed-loop cooling systems that minimize consumptive water use [2025 ESG Report]. (3) In Southern Nevada its North Las Vegas facility used ~20 million gallons in 2024 (one of the smaller users among 30+ valley data centers; Google's Henderson site led at ~352M gal), and Flexential completed side-stream filtration + adiabatic pre-cooling projects projected to save ~2.6M gallons/year at Las Vegas-North [Las Vegas Review-Journal, Apr 2025; 2025 ESG Report]. (4) Executives frame Southern Nevada as a top-priority market operating under heavy regulatory and bond-covenant scrutiny: President/COO Ryan Mallory said 'There's nothing you can do on this scale that won't get you put under a microscope,' and the company cites bond requirements mandating environmental efficiency [Review-Journal]. (5) It has a Colorado Front Range presence (Denver-Parker), placing a second facility in the basin. Longstanding pattern: Flexential competes on efficiency/sustainability credentials (annual ESG reports since 2023, 402 GWh renewable energy consumed) but stays out of water-allocation politics. Colorado River / drought / basin allocation are NOT mentioned anywhere in its ESG reporting.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / low-friction. A verified consumptive-use conservation market lets Flexential monetize or credibly document what it already does. Because new sites are WUE-zero and 84% of capacity is closed-loop, its measured consumptive use is low, so participating (buying a modest number of verified credits to offset residual evaporative/consumptive use, or certifying its low draw) is cheap insurance that strengthens its ESG story and license to expand in Las Vegas. It would want the accounting to properly credit Southern Nevada return-flow water so it is not charged for water it returns to Lake Mead. Unlikely to lead or fund a market, but a willing early participant and a useful 'good actor' reference case versus thirstier evaporative-cooled peers.

On solar+water. MOST INTERESTED here. Flexential's real constraint is power, not water, and its owners are financing AI-driven expansion. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses its binding bottleneck (clean, firm power for growth markets) while the water-funding component neutralizes its biggest political/permitting risk in the basin. It already consumes 402 GWh renewable energy and markets sustainability hard, so a structured energy-plus-water package is squarely on-strategy. Caveats: as a colocation/wholesale operator it is a power BUYER and landlord, not a utility, so it would engage as an offtaker or site host rather than a project financier, and it would need the economics to pencil against grid power. This is the single most compelling of the three offers for Flexential.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-to-MILDLY-POSITIVE but low-priority. Large-scale reuse/desalination mainly benefits operators with heavy evaporative water draws; Flexential's WUE-zero, closed-loop posture means it needs little makeup water, so desal/reuse supply does not solve a problem it has. It would welcome anything that shores up the regional supply narrative (protecting its license to operate in Las Vegas and Denver) and would not oppose it, but it has little reason to co-fund capital-intensive desal/reuse infrastructure. Supportive as a regional-resilience backstop, not as a customer.

A win for them. A win = protected, expandable license to operate in water-scrutinized basin markets (Las Vegas, Denver) plus solved power for AI-driven growth, achieved without material new water cost or being cast as a drain on the Colorado River. Concretely: (1) firm clean-energy supply that removes the power bottleneck on expansion; (2) a credible, verified 'we are part of the solution' water story it can put in its ESG report and use with regulators, bondholders (its bonds carry environmental-efficiency covenants), and MSIP/GI Partners; (3) differentiation as a low-WUE, closed-loop good actor versus thirstier competitors. If the program hands Flexential cheaper/firmer power AND a defensible water narrative in one package, it converts from persuadable to ally.

Public record. The data center operator's 2025 ESG report details significant investments in water and energy efficiency, including designing new facilities with a water usage effectiveness (WUE) of zero and consuming 402 GWh of renewable energy.

Position. Small Colorado 501(c)(3) philanthropic foundation (EIN 81-3496752), based in Grand Junction/Colorado, founded ~2016. Mission: 'lead a unique business and consumer driven model to fund and support river health in the Southwest.' Runs a competitive grants program (Healthy Rivers, Vibrant Lives; Southwest Rivers; 4Rivers Stewardship Fund) funding riparian restoration, invasive-species removal (tamarisk/Russian olive), native-species planting, public access/boat launches, trail construction, and 'water transactions to enhance river flows.' Geographic focus is Colorado River tributaries (Gunnison, Roaring Fork, Dolores, Escalante, Gila, Verde) across CO, UT, AZ, and NM, NOT mainstem allocation/law-of-the-river policy. Publicly frames the crisis around climate: 'our changing climate is accelerating snowmelt, increasing evaporation rates, causing severe droughts.' Explicitly acknowledges the river's importance to Native tribes (a 'sacred site'), farmers, ranchers, and communities dependent on it for 'energy and clean drinking water.' Cumulative conservation impact cited at ~$2.37M and 5,000+ acres restored. Their theory of change is ecosystem/habitat and instream flow health at the watershed level, plus consumer/corporate cause-marketing, NOT interstate water allocation politics or large infrastructure. They already endorse 'water transactions to enhance river flows,' which is conceptually adjacent to a conservation market.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-enthusiastic, and the most natural fit of the three. They already fund 'water transactions to enhance river flows,' so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is a scaled, auditable version of their existing model. Their main tests: does freed-up water actually stay instream and reach ecological beneficiaries (net-flow, not paper water), is verification credible, and are affected communities (especially tribes, farmers, ranchers they explicitly name) included and not harmed. Meet those and they are a persuadable ally who can supply tributary-scale projects, verification-on-the-ground partners, and a consumer-facing legitimacy story. Persuadable rather than automatic ally because it sits outside their current tributary-habitat comfort zone and they'll scrutinize equity and additionality.

On solar+water. Cautious and conditional. As an environmental foundation they are wary of large industrial/datacenter-driven growth that could increase regional water and land pressure, and their brand depends on a pro-river, pro-community identity that industrial financing can complicate. However, they are pragmatic and business-driven by design (cause-marketing model), so hyperscaler money explicitly earmarked for watershed restoration and net-positive flows could win them over. Decisive factors: is the water commitment additive and net-positive for streams, is it durable (not a one-time PR grant), does it respect tribal and agricultural stakeholders, and does association with a hyperscaler risk their credibility with the conservation community. Persuadable, leaning skeptical until the water accounting is proven.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-skeptical and largely outside their lane. Reuse and desalination are supply-augmentation infrastructure that reduces mainstem demand rather than restoring tributary habitat, so it does not directly serve their grant program. They would likely welcome reuse if it demonstrably leaves more water instream on their priority rivers, but they would scrutinize desalination for energy intensity, brine/marine impacts, cost, and the risk that new 'firm' supply simply enables more consumptive growth without ecological benefit. Not opponents, but not a core constituency; their support is contingent on a clear, verifiable link to improved river flows and ecosystem health.

A win for them. A win is more restored river miles and more reliable instream flows on their priority tributaries, with credible community inclusion, plus durable, diversified funding for that work. Anything that (a) demonstrably adds water back to streams (net-positive flow), (b) creates a repeatable, verifiable funding mechanism they can plug their grantees into, and (c) gives their corporate partners a compelling healthy-rivers story lets them scale beyond their current single-digit-millions footprint. A conservation market that pays for verified consumptive-use reductions, or a buildout that earmarks money for watershed restoration, directly grows their grant pipeline and their brand.

Public record. The foundation's mission is to fund on-the-ground river restoration and conservation projects by partnering with businesses and local nonprofits, directly supporting a conservation agenda.

Position. The Fort Mojave Indian Tribe (Aha Makhav) is a Lower Basin tribal nation with reservation lands spanning Arizona, California, and Nevada near the tri-state Mohave Valley, and a member of the Ten Tribes Partnership. Under the 1964 Arizona v. California decree (and subsequent supplemental decrees) the Tribe holds among the most senior present-perfected rights on the Lower Colorado: roughly 103,535 AF/yr in Arizona, 16,720 AF/yr in California, and 12,534 AF/yr in Nevada (~132,000+ AF total). Priority date predates the Southern Nevada Water Authority and most municipal users. Longstanding positions: (1) The Tribe is a sophisticated, self-determined water manager and dealmaker, not a passive rights-holder. Under the decree it has a specific option to forbear/assign up to ~13,000 AF to the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) of Southern California for cash payment, and MWD agreements pay the Tribe when it limits development and lets water pass through the priority system. This proves the Tribe already monetizes conservation on its own terms. (2) But recent public rhetoric has hardened. Chairman Timothy Williams: 'There is going to be no excess water from the tribes because we are working harder than ever to ensure that we protect our own selves by utilizing every drop of water that we possibly can' and the water 'is going to be used for what it was originally intended for on the reservation.' (3) Sovereignty and representation grievance: Williams pointed out 'I don't see any tribe at that signing table, yet our water is being used' regarding basin drought-negotiation tables where tribes with senior rights were excluded. Former chairwoman Nora McDowell has said tribes have been forced to follow state/federal water decisions despite managing the river since time immemorial and deserve a greater voice. Net position: pro-conservation and pro-market IN PRINCIPLE and by track record, but fiercely protective of sovereignty, wary of any structure that treats tribal water as a bailout for downstream cities, and insistent on being a decision-maker, not a supplier.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable if structured right, hostile if structured wrong. The Tribe already runs the archetype of a verified consumptive-use conservation market: its decree-based forbearance/assignment deals with MWD pay cash for measured water passed through the priority system. So a rigorous, verified consumptive-use market is squarely within their comfort zone and history. Persuadable-to-ally IF: the Tribe controls whether/how much/when it participates, payments reflect its senior priority (premium pricing), participation is voluntary and reversible, and it does not erode the underlying right. Turns hostile IF the market is framed as extracting 'excess' tribal water for cities (chair Williams flatly rejects that there is any excess), or if it is imposed via state/federal process without tribes at the table. Verification and measurement they will likely welcome, because rigorous accounting protects senior rights from being quietly reallocated.

On solar+water. Most likely their favorite of the three, and the strongest persuadable-to-ally lever. The Tribe has a demonstrated appetite and capacity for on-reservation solar: FMTUA/AMPS operate a ~2.3 MW tribal solar array (~$4M EDA grant, ~50 jobs, lineman apprenticeships) and the Tribe advanced a ~332 MW utility-scale Fort Mojave Solar Project on ~2,800 acres of tribal land with 500 kV interconnection near Laughlin. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water hits multiple wins at once: economic development, energy sovereignty, jobs/training, tribally owned infrastructure, and a funding stream for water security without surrendering water rights. Keys to yes: tribal ownership or strong equity/revenue participation (not just a land lease), on-reservation jobs and training, and water benefits that accrue to the Tribe. Risks: cultural-resource and land-use concerns on ancestral lands, distrust of outside developers capturing the upside, and insistence on tribal control of siting and interconnection.

On reuse/desal. Broadly supportive but with lower direct stake and some wariness. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., ocean or brackish desal, municipal reuse) that creates new supply and reduces pressure on the river helps the Tribe indirectly by easing the political demand for it to give up water, and by strengthening its argument that cities should build new supply rather than lean on senior tribal rights. Likely reaction: 'good, build your own water, stop eyeing ours.' Concerns: they will not want desal/reuse used as a bargaining excuse to freeze or claw back tribal allocations, and will watch for environmental-justice and cost-shifting issues. This is the least Tribe-specific of the three, so support is genuine but engagement priority is lower unless a reuse/desal package explicitly channels benefits or offset credits to the Tribe.

A win for them. A win is: (1) Cash and durable economic value for water the Tribe VOLUNTARILY and temporarily forbears, on Tribe-set terms, structured so it is never framed as giving up their right and never permanent. (2) A seat as a decision-maker (not a consulted stakeholder) at basin negotiation tables, remedying the exclusion the chair called out. (3) Tribally owned/operated energy and water infrastructure on reservation land with real jobs and lineman/apprentice training for tribal members (the pattern of AMPS/FMTUA and the tribal solar work), building energy and water self-sufficiency. (4) Federal dollars flowing to the Tribe (e.g., Indian water-rights settlement funds, DOE/EDA-style grants) rather than to intermediaries. The ideal outcome lets the Tribe develop its full paper right on its own land AND monetize conservation of the portion it chooses not to use yet keeping optionality on every acre-foot.

Public record. The Tribe has both developed multi-megawatt solar projects on its reservation lands and entered into system conservation agreements to protect elevations in Lake Mead.

Position. Freeport is the largest U.S. copper producer (its Arizona/NM operations produce ~70% of U.S. refined copper) and one of Arizona's largest industrial water users. Its Arizona copper mines collectively consume on the order of ~70,000 acre-feet/yr (Morenci alone reported at ~14,000 af/yr on one basis and cited as one of the largest single users; Sierrita withdrew ~22,490 af of groundwater in 2023; Safford ~6,099 af/yr post-2020 expansion). Longstanding position: reliable, PREDICTABLE Colorado River (CAP) deliveries are essential to continuous-flow copper mining, concentrating, leaching and smelting, and to national-security-critical mineral supply. Freeport is deeply embedded in AZ water governance: it sits on the Governor's Water Policy Council / Water Augmentation & Innovation Council, participated in the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan, chairs the Arizona Mining Association Water Policy Committee, and is a party to the 50-year Gila River adjudication. It has invested heavily in efficiency (claims 83% global recycling, 89% at Morenci) and in renewable-water/aquifer-recharge projects, notably an $17.1M ($11.2M Freeport-funded) pipeline with Farmers Investment Co (FICO) delivering CAP water to Sahuarita/Green Valley pecan groves to cut groundwater pumping and generate future renewable-supply benefits. In its March 2, 2026 comment letter (VP Francis McAllister) on the Post-2026 / Near-Term Colorado River Operations Draft EIS, Freeport: (a) invoked EO 14220 (copper as a critical mineral) and warned that unplanned CAP cuts 'cannot be absorbed simply by incremental efficiency measures; they can force curtailments or shutdowns' and could erode the Miami smelter (~48% of U.S. primary smelting capacity); (b) demanded a quantified critical-mineral economic-impact analysis and alignment with federal critical-mineral/defense policy; (c) argued the Secretary has a non-discretionary duty to enforce the 1922 Compact and that the DEIS should be withdrawn/reissued; (d) pushed to cap Lower Basin + Mexico reductions at ~1.5 MAF static and to share cuts proportionally across BOTH basins (including Upper Basin and Mexico) rather than front-loading Lower Basin/AZ; (e) urged system-content-based (CRSP-inclusive) operating rules; and (f) explicitly asked Reclamation to 'provide for storage and augmentation that will encourage innovation and investment,' citing the 1968 Basin Project Act augmentation directive. Director of water strategy Sandy Fabritz has publicly favored equalizing Lower Basin priority so 'we can't have water users in one state continue to use water while another state is economically annihilated.'

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-participant, conditional on it being VOLUNTARY, compensated, and non-priority-eroding. Freeport already runs de-facto conservation-market plays (the FICO/Sahuarita CAP-for-groundwater pipeline, aquifer recharge, and use of stored credits) and its water-strategy team knows LTSCs, forbearance and fallowing well. A verified consumptive-use market lets it monetize/secure supply and demonstrate leadership while avoiding mandatory front-loaded cuts it fears. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific mechanism. Risk: it will resist any market framed as a substitute for Compact enforcement or as a way to shift the burden onto industrial critical-mineral users; it wants markets to ADD supply/flexibility, not to justify curtailing mining.

On solar+water. Likely interested and strategically aligned. Freeport is a direct beneficiary of the AI/data-center copper boom and is already piloting solar/wind and green hydrogen at its mines, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits two of its interests at once: lower-carbon/cheaper power for energy-intensive smelting and mining, and new augmentation/water funding that eases pressure on CAP. Its EIS letter explicitly asks Reclamation to 'provide for storage and augmentation that will encourage innovation and investment,' which maps directly onto a privately financed water+energy package. Persuadable/ally if it can co-locate or partner rather than compete with hyperscalers for the same grid and water. Caveat: it will watch that new data-center load does not itself compete for scarce CAP water or grid capacity near its operations.

On reuse/desal. Likely strong support in principle as augmentation, with a spending-responsibility caveat. Freeport's whole EIS ask (points 5-7) is to grow the pie via storage/augmentation and to treat Mexico-treaty imported water as a national obligation; large-scale reuse and desalination are exactly the 'new water' that would relieve pressure on its CAP deliveries. It has technical comfort with heavy water treatment (it runs AZPDES-permitted treatment plants, e.g., Miami/Pinal Creek). Persuadable/ally on advocacy. It will push for federal/basin-wide cost-sharing and against a model where industrial users are taxed to pay for desal while still absorbing early cuts; it wants augmentation to protect, not replace, its priority supply.

A win for them. A durable Post-2026 framework that (1) protects predictable, priority CAP deliveries to Morenci, the Miami smelter, and its other AZ mines so continuous operations and expansions are not curtailed; (2) formally recognizes copper/critical-mineral production as a national-security priority use; (3) spreads shortage reductions proportionally across BOTH basins and Mexico (its ~1.5 MAF static-reduction ask) rather than front-loading AZ; (4) unlocks new supply via augmentation, reuse/desal, recharge, and voluntary compensated markets that Freeport can co-invest in and earn credits from; and (5) lets it be seen as a solutions leader (efficiency + funded water) while its supply and license-to-operate stay secure amid rising AI/electrification copper demand.

Public record. The company actively shifts its water sourcing from local groundwater to Colorado River water through agreements with tribes and emphasizes water recycling, but its primary motive is securing long-term operational supplies, not system conservation.

Position. Steamboat Springs 501(c)(3), founded 1981 (incorporated 2010). Mission: protect and enhance the environmental and recreational integrity of the Yampa River and its tributaries via stewardship, advocacy, education, partnerships. The Yampa is framed as the last, largest, longest free-flowing tributary of the Colorado River with a near-natural hydrograph; the Yampa provides ~1/3 of Colorado's contribution to the Colorado River (7,660 sq mi watershed). Longstanding hard-line opposition to transbasin diversion/dewatering, specifically the Yampa Pumpback (Northern Water proposal to divert 2,000 cfs near Maybell to the Front Range) which they call an ecological disaster and a band-aid enabling unsustainable Front Range growth. On the broader crisis (op-ed backing the CO River Drought Task Force): call the Yampa 'one of the most threatened rivers in Colorado' facing climate change and increasing demand (earlier snowmelt, recreational closures). They explicitly SUPPORT two market/policy tools: (1) letting utilities (Tri-State, Xcel) lease water rights to environmental benefit over 25+ years as they decarbonize, and (2) more funding + legislative empowerment of the state instream flow program. Since Sept 2022 they manage the Yampa River Fund, a >20-partner community water fund that leases/buys water and funds reservoir releases (Stagecoach, Elkhead) to boost low late-summer flows, plus riparian restoration and the Yampa River Scorecard health-monitoring program. Partner in the Environmental Release Program with Colorado Water Trust and City of Steamboat Springs.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE if the market is genuinely additive, verified, and keeps conserved water in the river rather than exporting it. They already run a consumptive-use-reduction-style program (leasing water and funding releases to raise instream flows) and publicly endorsed letting utilities lease rights to environmental benefit. Their conditions: rigorous verification/measurement (they built a Scorecard for exactly this), no facilitation of a downstream 'water grab,' and benefits accruing to the river/ecosystem and local ag+recreation, not just a paper transaction that frees water for Front Range or out-of-basin export.

On solar+water. Cautiously PERSUADABLE and possibly a natural ally IF structured well. They have already publicly endorsed the exact mechanism of utilities leasing water rights to environmental benefit during energy transition, so a solar+storage buildout whose revenue funds instream flow leasing maps onto a position they hold on the record. Reservations: siting/land-use and wildlife-habitat impacts in-basin, any implied new consumptive water demand from a datacenter/hyperscaler load, and whether the 'funds water' commitment is durable and legally binding vs. marketing. Frame the water money as feeding the Yampa River Fund / instream flow program and this lands well.

On reuse/desal. Largely INDIFFERENT-to-mildly-positive but not a priority; desalination is coastal and far from a headwaters basin, and municipal reuse is a Front Range / lower-basin lever. They would welcome anything that reduces pressure to build transbasin diversions like the Pumpback (their #1 threat) since reuse/desal that offsets Front Range demand weakens the case for dewatering the Yampa. They will not champion it and will scrutinize energy/water/land footprints, but they would view demand-side alternatives to diversion favorably as long as it does not become a justification to move Yampa water.

A win for them. More cold water in the Yampa through the vulnerable late-summer/early-fall window, fewer recreational closures, and a durable, verified, well-funded stream of instream-flow leases and restoration that de-risks the Yampa River Fund's donor-dependent budget. A structural win is any mechanism (energy-transition water leasing, demand-side reuse) that reduces the political and hydrological case for the Yampa Pumpback / transbasin diversion, keeping the river free-flowing while sustaining local ag and the recreation economy.

Public record. Friends of the Yampa is a 501(c)(3) non-profit whose stated mission is to protect and enhance the environmental and recreational integrity of the Yampa River and its tributaries.

Position. No public statement by GN Productores Agrícolas itself on the Colorado River crisis could be found; on the company-specific question, treat its river-politics stance as UNKNOWN. What IS documented is the context that governs it. GN is a real, verifiable agribusiness: founded 2004 by the Navarro family in Ejido Nuevo León, Delegación Delta, Mexicali Valley, growing fruits and vegetables ('hortalizas') for national and international/export markets, ~300 employees (2023), with a second production site in Eréndira, Ensenada municipality (gnproductores.com; LinkedIn; Dun & Bradstreet; EMIS). Its only public sustainability messaging is agronomic, not hydrological: an in-house compost plant, worm-farm leachate, '100% organic' fertilizers, and 'cultivation and harvest standards that protect water and soil' (gnproductores.com/sustainability). No mention of the Colorado River, irrigation volumes, or conservation programs. Because GN farms in the Mexicali Valley, it sits inside Irrigation District 014 (Río Colorado), which is the front line of the crisis. Sector-wide, Mexicali farmers' documented public positions are: (1) deep frustration with mandated conservation cuts; (2) a live grievance that the Mexican federal government failed to pay promised fallowing/conservation compensation (District 14 farmers say they were promised roughly $4.5M in direct payments to leave land fallow and claim they were paid only about half, or not at all) (Voice of San Diego / Maven's Notebook, Feb 2026; Coyote Gulch, May 2026); (3) anger that a rewritten national water law stripped long-held water rights and centralized control in the federal government/Conagua; (4) a perception that cities (Tijuana, Ensenada) and U.S. treaty demands are being prioritized over agriculture, framed by some as a sovereignty surrender. Protests have included blockading border trade routes and seizing dam infrastructure. Baja California's Colorado River quota is projected to be cut ~350 million cubic meters by 2027, and the state (agriculture ministry head Mónica Vargas Núñez, with Conagua and SADER) is pushing crop-switching to drought-tolerant crops like safflower, canal repair, and precision land-leveling (up to ~14% efficiency gains) (Water Education Foundation / Aquafornia; IV Press, 2026). Whether GN specifically has taken fallowing money, switched crops, or joined protests is not public.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but wary. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly answers the sector's single loudest grievance: that promised conservation payments went unpaid or half-paid by the federal government. A market that pays growers reliably, transparently, and per verified acre-foot of consumptive use forgone is exactly the instrument Mexicali farmers have been demanding in practice. GN, as a sophisticated export operation, is well positioned to monetize efficiency gains (land-leveling, drip, deficit irrigation) and sell verified savings. The wariness: after being 'cheated' once by a government-run program, trust is low; GN would need the payer, verification method (real consumptive-use accounting, not just fallowing), and payment guarantee to be credibly non-governmental or escrow-backed. Cross-border enforceability and whether Mexican water law lets a private grower sell saved water (rights are now centralized in Conagua) are open risks. Net: a persuadable YES if the money is real and the mechanism respects their water rights rather than expropriating them.

On solar+water. Cautiously INTERESTED, with caveats. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be attractive: Baja California/Mexicali has excellent solar resource and abundant flat farmland, and a scheme that pays landowners for solar siting AND funds water infrastructure (efficiency retrofits, reuse, or replacement supply) offers a second revenue stream that hedges the water cut. GN owns/controls land and needs capital. Caveats: (a) putting panels on productive land competes with the food business GN is built around, so GN would favor siting on marginal/fallowed parcels, not prime irrigated ground; (b) skepticism that 'also funds water' promises materialize, given the unpaid-conservation-payment history; (c) Mexican energy policy and CFE grid-interconnection constraints for private/foreign-financed solar are a real friction; (d) any deal must survive the sovereignty narrative that already colors U.S.-driven arrangements. Persuadable if structured as land-lease + guaranteed water benefit, less so if it's framed as converting farmland to a datacenter power farm.

On reuse/desal. Broadly FAVORABLE toward it as a supply solution, but with a distributional concern. Reuse and desalination are explicitly identified in the regional literature (UC Davis / Hernandez-Cruz et al.; ASCE JWRM) as prime options for the Mexican coastal zone, and more supply is unambiguously good for a water-short grower. The catch is geographic and political: desal and wastewater reuse most naturally serve the COASTAL cities (Tijuana, Ensenada) and the Pacific-facing GN site in Eréndira, not the inland Mexicali Valley, which is far from the coast and uphill. Mexicali farmers already resent water being routed to cities. So GN would welcome desal/reuse if it backfills municipal demand and thereby frees Colorado River water to stay in agriculture, or if it directly supplies its Ensenada operation, but would oppose any framing where cities get new desal supply while agriculture absorbs all the Colorado River cuts. Cost, energy intensity, and who pays are the deciding factors. Persuadable, contingent on agriculture sharing in the benefit.

A win for them. A win for GN is staying in the high-value export produce business through the 2027 cuts without losing its market, its packing infrastructure, or its ~300 jobs. Concretely: (a) a dependable new cash stream (verified conservation payments and/or solar land-lease revenue) that offsets reduced water and the income lost to any fallowing; (b) capital to retrofit for efficiency so the same or better output comes from less Colorado River water; (c) preservation of its water rights rather than uncompensated erosion of them; (d) diversification and resilience across its Mexicali and Ensenada sites so a single-basin cut can't sink the company. The ideal outcome pays them to do what the crisis is forcing anyway, restores the trust the unpaid-conservation episode destroyed, and lets a family-built agribusiness modernize instead of shrink.

Public record. No public record of the company's specific stance on Colorado River policies could be found, requiring classification based on general agricultural interests in the region.

Position. Academic/research center at CU Boulder Law focused on sustainable management of Western natural resources, with water law and the Colorado River as a core program. It houses the Western Water Policy Program and is the institutional home of the influential Colorado River Research Group (CRRG), an ~14-member, self-governed body of independent scholars modeled on Australia's Wentworth Group, insulated from Basin State/Tribe/stakeholder affiliation. GWC-affiliated experts co-authored the April 2025 'Essential Pillars for the Post-2026 Colorado River Guidelines' (Anne Castle of GWC plus John Fleck, Eric Kuhn, Jack Schmidt, Kathryn Sorensen, Katherine Tara). Longstanding, consistent positions: (1) the river has 'an acknowledged math problem' - legal allocations and average use exceed available supply, so enforceable demand reductions in BOTH the Upper and Lower Basin are necessary and unavoidable; (2) reductions cannot be predicated on federal compensation, but state/water-user funding will and should continue, and Tribal forbearance must be compensated; (3) conservation pools in Lake Mead and Lake Powell are essential, and saved water must have a 'history of consumptive use' so 'saved water represents actual reductions in use' - a measurement/verification-first stance; (4) water-management opportunities and compensated forbearance must be fully open to all 30 Basin Tribes as a federal trust responsibility; (5) storage recovery must be built into mandatory cuts and cannot rely on sporadic big runoff years; (6) natural flows are not expected to rebound (aridification), so demand must fall. On new supply, CRRG is explicitly skeptical: member Jack Schmidt has stated system-wide supply augmentation such as desalination 'isn't cost-effective or realistic' and 'can't be implemented quickly enough,' and the group's founding principle is that the most cost-effective, reliable, equitable, and quickly implemented solutions are conservation, reallocation, and voluntary shortage sharing - not augmentation. They favor a litigation-avoiding 'grand bargain' with shared (not equal) pain and strong protection of domestic public-health-and-safety deliveries.

On conservation. Strongly positive, provided verification is real. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps directly onto their explicit demand: conservation pools must contain water with 'a history of consumptive use' so that 'saved water represents actual reductions in use and does not include water that would have otherwise flowed downstream.' Verification and additionality are their core technical concern, so a market built around measured, verified consumptive-use savings is close to their ideal instrument. Cautions they will raise: guard against paper water and double-counting; ensure Tribal participation and that Tribal forbearance is compensated but not double-charged against pools; keep it operationally neutral; and remember their warning that operations 'cannot be grounded on compensation from the federal government' - so a durable, non-federally-dependent funding source (state/water-user/private) is a plus, not a red flag. Likely ally on this if the M&V is credible.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but skeptical and conditions-heavy. They would not object to private capital (including a hyperscaler) funding conservation or Tribal forbearance - they explicitly expect non-federal funding to continue. But they will scrutinize hard: (1) additionality - does the funded solar+storage actually free consumptive use, or just relabel existing flows? (2) demand discipline - does it enable continued unsustainable growth (data centers add load and can add water demand), or does it net-reduce basin consumptive use? (3) equity - do Tribes and existing users share benefits, or does a deep-pocketed entity buy priority? (4) governance - is it operationally neutral and litigation-safe? Persuadable if framed as financing verified demand reduction and Tribal compensation with transparent accounting; a hard sell if it looks like buying a new water-and-power entitlement that entrenches demand.

On reuse/desal. Most skeptical here, consistent with their strongest on-record stance. CRRG member Jack Schmidt has publicly said system-wide augmentation like desalination 'isn't cost-effective or realistic' and 'can't be implemented quickly enough,' and the group's founding principle ranks conservation, reallocation, and voluntary shortage sharing above augmentation. They will not oppose reuse/desal outright - local reuse that reduces a community's Colorado River draw is consistent with demand reduction - but they will reject any framing that treats large-scale desal/reuse as a substitute for enforceable cuts or as a reason to avoid them. Expect them to warn about cost, timeline, energy/emissions, and the political-moral hazard of promising 'new water' that delays the painful demand reductions they see as unavoidable. Position reuse strictly as a demand-side supplement, never as the headline supply fix.

A win for them. A win is a post-2026 Colorado River regime that (a) locks in enforceable, verifiable, permanent reductions in consumptive use across both basins, (b) recovers reservoir storage to reliable levels, (c) fully includes the Basin Tribes with compensated forbearance honored as a federal trust duty, (d) rests on rigorous, transparent accounting that guarantees additionality (no paper water), and (e) is durable enough to avoid Compact litigation - a 'grand bargain' of shared pain. Any market or funding mechanism that demonstrably delivers real, measured, additional wet-water reductions and treats Tribes equitably advances their mission; anything that lets parties claim conservation without genuine consumptive-use cuts, or that props up unsustainable demand via costly new supply, is a loss they will publicly critique.

Public record. The center's mission is to influence law and policy for sustainable resource management, and it regularly publishes research and convenes experts on Colorado River reform, renewable energy, and tribal water rights.

Position. GRIC is one of the most consequential Lower Basin players and a sophisticated, self-interested actor. Its 2004 water-rights settlement (largest Native American settlement in US history) grants ~653,500 acre-feet/year, roughly half delivered via the Central Arizona Project (CAP), making GRIC the single largest CAP customer (~311,800 AF/yr). Governor Stephen Roe Lewis frames his mandate as 'implementing the settlement' his father Rodney Lewis won. Longstanding stance: deeply protective of trust-protected water rights and Arizona's junior CAP position. GRIC has repeatedly been a linchpin of basin-wide deals, voluntarily leaving water in Lake Mead: it committed up to 125,000 AF/yr of system conservation for three years at a fixed $400/AF (up to $150M total) and agreed to leave ~73,000 AF over a decade for ~$107M in infrastructure funding, part of up to $233M in federal conservation/infrastructure money (2023). BUT in March 2024 GRIC publicly rejected the Lower Basin states' post-2026 sharing proposal, saying it placed an 'unfair burden' on Arizona and failed to identify replacement water or compensation. Lewis: 'What is being contemplated is a major disruption to half of our water supply, and we will not be cut without our consent... We can and will simply say No if we believe that our trust-protected water rights are not being protected.' GRIC pushes a '38 sovereigns' (7 states + 30 tribes + federal) seat-at-the-table framing and is developing its own counter-proposal with Reclamation.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but on strict terms. GRIC has already been the flagship participant in paid, verified system conservation ($400/AF fixed-price deals leaving water in Lake Mead), so a verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with a proven revenue model and its self-image as a solutions leader. Key conditions: (1) participation must be voluntary and consent-based, never a mandated cut ('we will not be cut without our consent'); (2) price must be fair and durable, not a one-time bridge; (3) it must not prejudice or erode the underlying settlement entitlement or set a precedent that trust water can be taken. Design a market that pays GRIC to conserve without touching its paper rights and it is a strong ally; frame it as a cut and it becomes an opponent.

On solar+water. Likely INTERESTED / persuadable, with sovereignty and control as the gate. GRIC is already the national proof point for tribal solar-over-canal and is pursuing large-scale renewable buildout, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage project that also funds water conservation maps directly onto strategy it is already executing. Attractions: capital for its 18.5-mile canal-solar ambitions, evaporation savings, tribal energy sovereignty, and a water-funding stream. Concerns: must be tribally owned/controlled or a genuine partnership (not extractive), sited on tribal terms, must respect land and cultural resources, and the water benefit must accrue to the Community, not just offset a datacenter's footprint elsewhere. A hyperscaler that structures GRIC as owner/partner and routes real water and revenue to the tribe would find a willing, high-credibility counterparty.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE in principle, cautious on cost/equity. GRIC's own stated ask in the 2027 fight is 'plans to identify new sources of water away from the Colorado River that could replace water lost to cutbacks, or financial compensation.' Large-scale reuse/desal is exactly the kind of augmentation/new-source solution Lewis has demanded as the alternative to uncompensated cuts, so GRIC would welcome it as reducing pressure on its CAP water. Caveats: GRIC will insist tribes are not made to pay for or subsidize augmentation that primarily benefits cities and states; it will watch that new supply does not become a rationale to strip tribal entitlements; and timelines/costs of desal must be realistic, not a distant promise used to justify near-term cuts.

A win for them. A win is durable, well-paid conservation and augmentation that leaves the 2004 settlement entitlement fully intact and uncut-by-mandate, converts GRIC's water and land into long-term revenue and energy sovereignty (leasing, storage credits, tribally-owned solar+storage, water-funding streams), secures GRIC a genuine sovereign seat shaping the post-2026 rules rather than absorbing others' shortfalls, and positions the Community as the acknowledged national model for tribal-led water and clean-energy innovation. Concretely: paid voluntary conservation at fair fixed prices, capital for the 18.5-mile canal-solar and floating-solar ambitions, new non-Colorado water sources funded by others, and explicit protection that none of it erodes their paper rights.

Public record. GRIC receives federal compensation to conserve water for Lake Mead, is building innovative solar-over-canal projects, and is investing in reclaimed water pipelines.

Position. GRICUA is the electric utility enterprise of the Gila River Indian Community (GRIC), serving ~3,500 accounts on the reservation south of Phoenix. As a utility, its own public record is thin on Colorado River policy, but it is operationally fused to the Community's water strategy: GRICUA (with the tribe) built and energized the first U.S. solar-over-canal project (Casa Blanca Canal, ~1.3 MW, ~2,556 panels, activated Oct 2024, ~$5.6M IRA funding) that cuts canal evaporation ~50% while generating power, and the Community is advancing floating-solar-on-reservoir concepts. The parent Community, led by Governor Stephen Roe Lewis, holds one of the most consequential water positions in the basin: the 2004 Arizona Water Settlements Act granted GRIC 653,500 acre-feet/year, making it Arizona's single largest Colorado River entitlement holder. GRIC has been an aggressive, well-compensated participant in system conservation: in 2023 it signed agreements for up to $233M, including committing up to 125,000 AF/yr of its CAP entitlement to system conservation for three years at a fixed $400/AF (up to $150M), plus $83M for a 19.4-mile reclaimed-water pipeline connecting A+ reuse water to Pima-Maricopa Irrigation Project facilities (up to 20,000 AF/yr conservation), and committed to leave ~78,000 AF (later cited as 47,020 AF over 10 years starting 2025) in Lake Mead. Longstanding posture: leverage senior/settled water rights and tribal sovereignty, monetize conservation and leasing (existing CAP leases to Phoenix, Scottsdale, Peoria, Goodyear, Chandler, Mesa), and insist on being 'at the table' post-2026. Lewis has said conservation pools 'offer really the only path forward' and refuses deals he considers bad for Arizona or for tribal interests.

On conservation. Favorable and already proven. GRIC is the single largest contributor to the Lower Colorado System Conservation program and negotiated a fixed $400/AF price. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in their wheelhouse and could raise their per-AF price above the $400 federal floor via competition. Caveats: they will insist that measurement/verification not erode their settled entitlement or their separate, more lucrative city-lease market (~$1,200-1,500/AF), and will resist any market design that pressures them to sell more than they choose or that treats conserved water as permanently relinquished. Expect them to want to be a price-setter and rule-writer, not a passive supplier.

On solar+water. Most favorable of the three, and the best fit for GRICUA specifically. They have already executed the energy-water coupling logic (solar-over-canal cutting evaporation ~50% while generating power) and are exploring floating solar. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation/reuse maps directly onto their demonstrated strategy and their utility's growth ambitions. Keys to yes: tribal ownership or strong equity/revenue share, on-reservation siting with tribal jobs, load that respects their grid, and water benefits that accrue to the Community. Risk: they will not accept being a passive host site for a data center that extracts water or power without proportionate, tribally-controlled return.

On reuse/desal. Favorable on reuse, neutral-to-cautious on desalination. GRIC is already building an $83M reclaimed-water pipeline and operates managed aquifer recharge (e.g., MAR-5 at Olberg Bridge), so large-scale reuse aligns with active investments and augments supply they can then conserve or lease. Large-scale desalination (e.g., Sea of Cortez / augmentation imports) is more distant from their footprint; they would likely support it only if it adds basin supply without diluting the value of their senior entitlement or their conservation payments, and if tribes share in governance and benefits. They are unlikely to oppose augmentation, but they will not let it be used as an argument to cut their allocation or their compensation.

A win for them. A structure where the tribe monetizes its water and energy assets on its own terms without ceding entitlement or sovereignty: durable, above-market compensation for conserved/leased water; on-reservation clean-energy buildout that creates jobs, revenue, and resilience (they already pair solar with evaporation savings); infrastructure capital (pipelines, recharge, reuse) fully funded by outside parties; and a permanent seat shaping post-2026 operating guidelines. A win is being the model tribal nation that others emulate, with cash flow and control both increasing.

Public record. GRICUA is actively developing multiple solar projects, including a solar-over-canal pilot and its own utility-scale solar farm, to move toward majority renewable energy consumption.

Position. Google is a major Colorado River Basin water consumer through data centers in both Nevada and Arizona, and it has staked out a public position of water stewardship rather than denial. Its Henderson, NV campus (~750k sq ft, ~60 MW) consumed roughly 352 million gallons in 2024 (water not recycled back to Lake Mead), making it roughly half of all Southern Nevada data-center water use that year. Its Mesa, AZ facility ($600M, broke ground 2023) holds a permit for up to ~5.5 million cubic meters/year (~23,000 Arizonans' worth); roughly half its water is sourced from the drought-stressed Colorado River and half from on-site wells/water rights, ramping from ~1 to up to 4 million gallons/day as it builds out. Longstanding position: Google publicly commits to a 2030 goal of replenishing more water than it consumes at data-center sites (announced 2021, reaffirmed/expanded June 2026 amid backlash). By 2025 it replenished 7+ billion gallons via 165 projects across 97 watersheds, targeting 19+ billion gallons/year by 2030 (double its 2024 consumption of 7.9B gallons). Its June 2026 five-part framework: (1) replenish > consume by 2030; (2) $500M+ committed to water/wastewater infrastructure and utility partnerships; (3) air-cooled/dry-cooling designs in at-risk watersheds; (4) annual public water-use disclosure; (5) reclaimed wastewater and alternative supplies. Notably, its flagship 2026 replenishment announcement ($17M across GA, IA, MI, MN, MO, NE, TX) did NOT include any Colorado River Basin projects, and made no mention of the Colorado River, even though its two biggest thirsty Basin sites are in NV and AZ. Google already touts using advanced dry/air-cooling at Mesa specifically to cut long-term water use, and cites 2023 Basin replenishment claims for Henderson.

On conservation. Likely receptive but demanding on rigor. Google already buys watershed 'replenishment' credits at scale (165 projects, 19B+ gal/yr target) and prizes third-party-verifiable, publicly disclosable metrics, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market fits its existing playbook and its stated preference to 'push water standards.' It would value a market that lets it retire real, additional, Basin-local consumptive-use savings it can defend against greenwashing critiques, closing the credibility gap that its NV/AZ sites replenish elsewhere. Caveats: it will scrutinize additionality, measurement, and permanence (its critics already question whether replenishment offsets local depletion), and it will resist any structure that concedes legal liability for river depletion or caps its ability to expand. Net: a strong persuadable, provided the accounting is credible and the credits are usable in its public disclosures.

On solar+water. Most natural fit of the three. Google is already the archetype of a hyperscaler financing clean-firm power in exactly these states (150 MW NV geothermal, NV Clean Transmission Tariff to front utility capital, SRP long-duration storage R&D in AZ, large national solar/hydro/CCS PPAs). A solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly matches its demonstrated willingness to pay upfront for infrastructure and its $500M+ water/wastewater commitments. It reduces off-site power-plant water intensity (a hidden part of its exposure) while giving it a bundled clean-energy-plus-water story it can market as standard-setting. Expect strong interest if the structure is bankable, gives Google procurement/reliability benefits for Henderson and Mesa, and produces disclosable water outcomes. Primary friction is deal complexity and whether the water benefit is verifiable and additional rather than cosmetic.

On reuse/desal. Supportive of reuse, more cautious on desalination. Reclaimed/alternative water is already commitment #5 in Google's 2026 framework (e.g., its Douglas County, GA treated-wastewater cooling project), and reused/recycled water is the cleanest way to shrink its Lower Basin freshwater draw at Henderson and Mesa, so a large-scale reuse buildout aligns tightly with its stated strategy and reputational needs. Desalination is a weaker fit: it is capital-intensive, coastal/energy-heavy, and geographically removed from its inland NV/AZ sites, so Google would more likely support it indirectly (as a Basin-supply-augmentation play that frees Colorado River water, or via funding) than adopt it directly for cooling. Overall persuadable-to-ally on reuse; conditional/financial supporter on desal.

A win for them. A win lets Google keep building and operating Southwest AI/data-center capacity while credibly claiming, with third-party verification, that it is net-positive or at least non-harmful to the Colorado River, specifically in the Basin where it operates rather than only in unrelated watersheds. Concretely: audited Basin-local replenishment/reuse that plugs the NV/AZ gap in its portfolio and goes straight into its annual public water disclosure; secured, drought-resilient water and clean-firm power for Henderson and Mesa so expansion is de-risked against tightening AZ/NV rules; defusing the 'thirsty data center' reputational threat and the local backlash around Lake Mead; and a first-mover, standard-setting role (Google has said it wants to push water standards) that raises the bar for competitors like Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta. Reused water, verified conservation credits, and hyperscaler-funded solar+storage that also funds water all let Google convert a liability into a leadership narrative.

Public record. Google has a public goal to operate on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030 and has pledged to replenish 120% of the freshwater it consumes, actively using reclaimed water and investing in renewable energy projects.

Position. The Grand Canyon Trust (Flagstaff, AZ; founded 1985) is a Colorado Plateau conservation and advocacy nonprofit whose Colorado River work is oriented to the river's ECOLOGICAL health through Grand Canyon and to tribal water justice, not to any single water user's supply. Longstanding public line: 'The Colorado River is overtapped. We need new rules to sustain the river's flows,' framing the 1922 Compact as having over-promised water that never existed (they cite ~16.5 MAF/yr of paper allocation against far lower recent flows, 2000-2023). In the post-2026 operating-guidelines fight, their formal asks to Reclamation are: (1) manage the river sustainably and live within real hydrology; (2) follow the Grand Canyon Protection Act of 1992 so Glen Canyon Dam releases 'protect and improve' canyon cultural/ecological values; (3) keep Lake Powell above 3,525 ft (temporarily 3,540 ft) to enable high-flow experiments and block non-native fish, with cool-water release infrastructure and physical modification of Glen Canyon Dam's aging outlet works so water can still pass at low reservoir levels; and (4) end the exclusion of the 30 basin tribes from state-federal negotiations. They center 'following the leadership of the 30 tribal nations' and equity 'for both people and nature' as supplies shrink. A defining behavioral pattern: they aggressively OPPOSE new consumptive/extractive uses of basin water for profit. They are the leading opponent of the Pinyon Plain (Canyon) uranium mine's aquifer dewatering (80M+ gallons pumped, heavy-metal contamination near Havasupai springs) and of proposed Little Colorado River pumped-storage hydro dams (Big Canyon), which they call 'an unconscionable waste of water' for pumping 10,000-15,000 AF/yr of ancient groundwater to generate power. That energy-vs-water opposition is the single most predictive fact about how they will read any energy-linked water proposal.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, and potentially a strong ally, IF the market genuinely reduces total consumptive use rather than merely re-shuffling paper rights. A rigorously verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with their core demand that the basin live within real hydrology and put water back in the river. They will support it when: (a) verification is independent and credible (they distrust modeled/paper savings and will want measured net acre-feet); (b) the conserved water demonstrably stays in the system / benefits river health and canyon flows rather than freeing capacity for new demand; and (c) tribes are structured as full participants and beneficiaries, not bystanders, with protection against being pressured to fallow or sell under duress. Watch-outs: they will oppose a market that becomes a mechanism for wealthy users or new industrial load to buy their way into continued over-extraction, or that monetizes water at tribes' expense. Framed as 'demand reduction that heals the river and includes tribes,' this is the proposal most naturally aligned with their mission.

On solar+water. Most skeptical of the three, and the one most likely to draw active opposition, given their track record. Their defining recent fights are AGAINST energy projects that consume Plateau water: they call Little Colorado pumped-storage hydro 'an unconscionable waste of water' and lead opposition to aquifer-dewatering mining. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout will be read first through 'does this create new water-consuming load or new extractive claims on groundwater/the river?' They are not anti-renewable per se (they welcomed the shift off coal in the region), so solar+storage that is genuinely low-water and sited to avoid springs, aquifers, and tribal/sacred lands starts neutral. But 'that also funds water' will get hard scrutiny: they will ask whether it is real wet water returned to the river or a PR wrapper, whether the data-center/industrial demand it enables competes for the same water and land, and whether tribes consented to and benefit from the siting. Make-or-break details: no new consumptive water draw, no siting on contested Plateau groundwater or tribal lands, tribal co-design, and independently verified net-positive water. Absent those, expect a public campaign against it.

On reuse/desal. Conditionally supportive but not their priority, and viewed through an ecology-and-equity lens rather than a supply lens. Large-scale reuse and desalination that produces genuinely NEW supply and thereby relieves pressure on the overtapped river is consistent with their 'live within real hydrology / put water back in the canyon' goal, so in principle they would rather see augmentation than continued mainstem over-extraction. They will be cautious about: energy intensity and its emissions/land footprint (they weigh climate and Plateau impacts), whether desal simply enables continued growth and demand rather than actual river recovery, coastal/marine and cross-border (Sea of Cortez) ecological effects, and equity in who pays and who benefits. Reuse inside cities is lower-friction and more clearly welcome than a mega-desal megaproject. Their support is contingent on the new supply translating into measurably more water left in the river through Grand Canyon and on tribes and ecosystems, not just corporate or municipal growth, benefiting.

A win for them. A win is a durable, enforceable REDUCTION in total consumptive use of the Colorado River and its aquifers that leaves more water in the river through Glen and Grand Canyons, is designed with and consented to by the 30 basin tribes, and does not create a new extractive claim on Plateau groundwater or the mainstem. Concretely: post-2026 rules that keep Lake Powell high enough for canyon flows and non-native fish control, physical fixes to Glen Canyon Dam so the river can pass at low levels, tribes seated at the negotiating table with quantified and protected water, and any market/energy/technology solution that is additive water rather than a license for new demand. If a proposal can show measured net acre-feet returned to the system plus tribal benefit, they will champion it publicly.

Public record. The organization explicitly advocates for responsible water use, supports tribal leadership in water management, and opposes unsustainable water withdrawals, aligning with a conservation-first agenda.

Position. Headwaters municipal provider serving most of the Town of Winter Park (Grand County, CO), drawing supply from Little Vasquez and Big Vasquez Creeks, tributaries of the Fraser and upper Colorado. Longstanding position: the District is on the depleted (source) side of Colorado's biggest transmountain diversions. Roughly 60-70% of native eastern Grand County water is already exported to the Front Range via the Moffat Tunnel (Denver Water) and Adams Tunnel (Northern Water), with proposed expansions (Moffat/Gross Reservoir enlargement, Windy Gap Firming/Chimney Hollow) pushing depletion toward ~80%. The District has fought for supply reliability and environmental mitigation through negotiated settlements rather than pure opposition: it is a signatory/beneficiary of the 2013 Colorado River Cooperative Agreement (CRCA) with Denver Water and of the Windy Gap Firming Project intergovernmental agreements with Northern's Municipal Subdistrict. Its own supply security is tied to Windy Gap water held via the Middle Park Water Conservancy District (~3,000 AF), which the District has said must be firmed and made reliable or its ability to keep diverting could be jeopardized. It participates in the region's collaborative Learning By Doing (LBD) partnership and stream management planning aimed at protecting cold-water (trout) ecology and Fraser/Colorado flows below Windy Gap, where its wastewater discharges. Recent basin frame (2025-2026 Post-2026 guidelines fight): aligns broadly with Colorado/Upper Basin insistence on durable, supply-driven management and protection of headwaters flows, though the District itself has not published a distinct Post-2026 position (its voice is carried through Grand County, the Colorado River District, and the Colorado Basin Roundtable).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but wary. A verified consumptive-use conservation market mostly targets large agricultural and lower-basin users; a small headwaters municipal provider has little consumptive use to sell and would not be a natural seller. The District would support it insofar as it relieves basin-wide pressure and strengthens the Upper Basin's negotiating hand, but would scrutinize any design that could be gamed to justify or 'pay for' additional transmountain diversions, or that treats conserved West Slope water as available for export. Persuadable-to-supportive if the market is structured to keep conserved water in-stream in the basin of origin and cannot become a new export mechanism.

On solar+water. Mixed and cautious; likely the most sensitive of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive on the mitigation-dollars axis (they are used to third-party money funding watershed work). But a Grand County headwaters community will worry about: (1) a large new industrial water demand (data centers) landing anywhere in the basin and competing for the same scarce supply, and (2) any structure where the 'water funding' effectively underwrites more diversion or new consumptive load. They would engage if the water funding is clearly additive, local, and tied to keeping flows in the Fraser/upper Colorado, and if the compute/water load is sited off their watershed. Persuadable, contingent on where the load and the benefits actually land.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, low direct stake. Large-scale reuse and desalination are downstream/lower-basin supply-augmentation strategies that, if they reduce lower-basin calls on the river, relieve pressure on the Upper Basin and headwaters over time. The District already runs a reuse-adjacent system (its wastewater is treated at the Upper Fraser Valley WWTP and discharged back to the Fraser, augmenting local flows). It would welcome basin-scale reuse/desal that reduces the rationale for more transmountain diversion, while being indifferent-to-skeptical about paying for distant infrastructure that doesn't benefit Grand County. Ally-leaning on this axis, but not a driver.

A win for them. A durable, firmed water supply for Winter Park customers and reasonable build-out, decoupled from the risk that expanded Front Range diversions leave their creeks and the Fraser too depleted or too warm to meet obligations and protect trout habitat. Concretely: firmed Windy Gap/Middle Park supply, reliable augmentation, healthier and cooler Fraser/upper Colorado flows below Windy Gap, and local mitigation/restoration funding they help direct. A win is measured as reliability plus a restored river, not as maximizing their own consumptive use.

Public record. Serving Winter Park, the district's focus is on local drought response, such as implementing mandatory outdoor watering restrictions, rather than broader basin-wide policies like large-scale solar or desalination exchanges.

Position. Growing Coachella Valley is a grower-advocacy nonprofit ('championing agricultural stewardship') representing date, citrus, table-grape and specialty-crop farmers in the Coachella Valley. Led by ED Janell Percy with a board of prominent grower families (George Tudor/Tudor Ranch, Anthony Bianco/Anthony Vineyards, Dennis Jensen/Sea View Packing, Blaine Carian/Desert Fresh, Greg Kirkjan/Desert Valley Date, plus PCAs/CPAs/engineers serving ag). Its members farm ~78,000 acres served by CVWD's 123-mile Coachella Canal, a branch of the All-American Canal drawing Colorado River water; more than two-thirds of local farmland is irrigated partly with river water. LONGSTANDING PUBLIC POSITIONS: (1) River water is framed as the lifeblood of a ~$600M/yr crop economy and 12,000+ jobs, and of U.S. food/date security (90% of U.S. dates grown here). (2) The org leads with an efficiency-and-stewardship narrative rather than crisis-advocacy: it touts that 85%+ of Coachella growers use drip/micro-spray, and its members participate in CVWD's compensated Colorado River conservation program ($340/AF, Reclamation-funded; CVWD reports 118,000+ AF saved since 2022). CVWD holds SENIOR river rights, which shapes GCV's underlying posture: conserve voluntarily and for compensation, but resist any framing that treats grower water as the first place to cut. (3) GCV is politically active and litigious in DEFENSE OF GROWER ECONOMICS: in 2021 it joined Western Growers and the California Fresh Fruit Association to sue the City of Coachella over an urgency wage ordinance, arguing irreparable economic harm and that growers are price-takers who lose to Mexican imports. It has appeared at CA Assembly/Senate water and natural-resources committees. It has NOT published a detailed Colorado River crisis policy platform on cuts, allocation reform, or the 2026 post-2026 guidelines; its site is informational on where water comes from, not advocacy on scarcity (MARK: crisis-specific policy stance largely UNKNOWN/implicit).

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE IF THE PRICE AND STRUCTURE ARE RIGHT, cautious on the details. GCV members already sell conserved consumptive use into CVWD's Reclamation-funded program at $340/AF and have invested heavily in drip/micro-spray, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in their comfort zone as a REVENUE tool, not a threat, so long as it is (a) voluntary and compensated at rates that beat crop margins, (b) additive to existing CVWD/Reclamation programs rather than a backdoor to permanent right reductions, (c) protective of senior priority and of the underlying water right when water is not being sold, and (d) careful about Salton Sea/fallowing dust and third-party (labor, community) impacts they were burned by in the wage fight. Expect them to push for grower-controlled, meter-verified accounting and to resist any market that regulators could ratchet into mandatory cuts. This is the single most tractable engagement lever.

On solar+water. OPEN BUT SKEPTICAL / TRANSACTIONAL. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could appeal on two axes: (1) new revenue for landowners via solar leases on marginal or fallowed acreage, and (2) an outside funding source for water reliability/conservation that does not come out of grower pockets. But GCV has shown it fiercely defends AGRICULTURAL LAND USE and grower economics, and it is wary of farmland conversion (development pressure is a stated concern). They will oppose anything that reads as permanent loss of prime farmland or ag water to data centers, and will scrutinize whether 'funds water' means real, senior-right-preserving benefit to Coachella growers versus a PR wrapper for a datacenter's own consumption. Persuadable if structured as: solar on genuinely marginal/retired ground, ironclad protection of remaining ag deliveries, local jobs, and water dollars that flow to grower-controlled conservation/efficiency rather than to buying growers out. Mark specifics UNKNOWN; reaction depends heavily on land-use terms.

On reuse/desal. GENERALLY FAVORABLE as supply augmentation, indifferent-to-supportive on cost grounds. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the system reduces pressure to cut agricultural river deliveries, which serves GCV's core interest in protecting Coachella Canal reliability and senior priority. CVWD already invests in groundwater replenishment and recycled/imported water, so the concept is familiar and non-threatening. Concerns will be: who pays (they will resist ag-rate surcharges to fund urban/coastal desal), whether new supply is used to justify reallocating existing ag water rather than genuinely adding to it, and Salton Sea/brine and energy-cost implications. They are unlikely to lead on this but will support it if it takes pressure off farm deliveries and does not raise their water costs.

A win for them. A win is durable, low-cost, reliable Colorado River water preserving their senior-priority deliveries and permanent-crop investments, PLUS new outside-funded revenue streams (compensated conservation above crop margins, solar leases on marginal ground, reuse/desal that adds rather than reallocates supply) that they control and that do not convert prime farmland or shift costs onto growers. Politically, a win means Coachella agriculture is treated as an essential domestic food producer to be sustained and paid for its flexibility, not as the cheapest acre-foot to retire. Preserving the ~$600M/12,000-job economy, the U.S. date supply, and grower autonomy over their own water is the outcome they will call success.

Public record. Represents growers who are direct beneficiaries of the Coachella Valley Water District's extensive and expanding agricultural water recycling program, which is promoted as a drought-proof and cost-effective supply.

Position. The Hopi Tribe is a federally recognized tribal nation of ~14,000-19,000 members on a ~1.5 million-acre reservation in northeastern Arizona, surrounded by the Navajo Nation. Their longstanding public position is a demand for secured, wet water rights and the infrastructure to deliver it, after generations of exclusion. Roughly a third of homes in the region lack running water; Hopi councilmembers publicly describe hauling untreated water in 5-gallon buckets from livestock windmills and villages (e.g., Mishongnovi) with no indoor plumbing. Sacred springs are failing (Hopi councilmember Marilyn Fredericks: seven springs once fed a terraced community garden, now only two flow, 'six years since there was enough to plant'). Their central recent position is support for the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement, signed by AZ Gov. Hobbs Nov 2024 and approved by the Hopi in May 2024, and its ratification via the pending Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act of 2025 (H.R.2025 / S.953). Under it the Hopi would receive ~3,600 AFY of Fourth Priority Lower Basin Colorado River water (incl. 100 AFY Cibola), with N-aquifer pumping capped at 5,600 AFY, plus a share of ~$5 billion in federal infrastructure funding for a Lake Powell pipeline (Reclamation deadline 2040). Chairman Timothy Nuvangyaoma frames it as water security 'for our future growth' and 'a humanitarian effort.' The Hopi back the settlement's off-reservation water leasing provision (a chance for economic revenue until local demand grows), which is exactly the provision the four Upper Basin states (CO, NM, UT, WY) are stalling in Congress. Historically the Hopi litigated the Little Colorado River adjudication for decades and once even sued to keep the coal-fired Navajo Generating Station open (2018) because coal royalties were their economic lifeline. On groundwater they have a decades-long grievance over Peabody Energy's Black Mesa coal-slurry pumping (~1,236-1,300 AFY, up to 1.3 billion gallons/yr) draining the pristine N-aquifer that is their primary drinking water and culturally sacred spring source; USGS documented 2-46 ft water-level drops 2013-2015 with no recovery.

On conservation. Cautiously positive but conditional. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with the settlement's leasing logic the Hopi already endorse: it turns a secured paper/wet right into revenue for a tribe that just lost 85% of its income. The Hopi have real upside as a potential seller of temporarily unused allocation (like the Gila River and other AZ tribes that lease to cities such as Chandler). BUT three hard conditions: (a) they must first have quantified, ratified, wet rights and delivery infrastructure , until the settlement passes and the pipeline is built, they have little to market and fear locking in a 'sell-don't-develop' status; (b) any market must be structured so leasing does not cap or forfeit their future development right (the settlement explicitly preserves leasing only until local demand grows); (c) deep sensitivity to sacred springs and the N-aquifer , they will resist any market mechanism that monetizes or accelerates groundwater depletion. Net: persuadable-to-ally on a conservation market if it is voluntary, revenue-generating, protects the underlying right, and stays out of sacred groundwater.

On solar+water. Most likely their strongest positive of the three. This directly answers their two biggest wounds at once: (1) it replaces the ~85% coal revenue and jobs the tribe lost, matching their stated, funded strategy of building a 'Hopi-led clean energy transition' and a solar economic cluster via Hopi Utilities Corporation; and (2) the water co-funding addresses the settlement's chronic gap , federal delivery money is contingent and their $25M solar electrification grant was just clawed back. A hyperscaler willing to finance solar+storage AND water infrastructure fills exactly the hole Trump-era EPA/IRA cuts opened. Conditions: sovereignty and ownership (they want Hopi-owned generation and revenue, not a land-lease colony model , reference Kayenta Solar where the tribe captured jobs and revenue); genuine local benefit (jobs, electrification of the ~500 homes left unpowered after the Solar for All cut, not just power exported to data centers or LA); water must serve Hopi homes and agriculture, not just enable the buildout; and cultural/land protections around sacred sites and the N-aquifer. Strong ally potential if structured as tribal-owned/tribal-benefiting.

On reuse/desal. Lukewarm and lowest-priority of the three, but not opposed. Large-scale reuse/desalination is geographically distant from the Hopi (interior high-desert plateau, far from ocean desal and from major municipal wastewater streams), so direct benefit is weak , they cannot easily pipe desalinated coastal water to Black Mesa. Their interest is indirect and strategic: any 'new water' that relieves pressure on the Colorado River system and on Lower Basin cities strengthens the political case for honoring tribal rights and reduces the zero-sum framing Upper Basin states use to block their settlement. So they would likely offer conditional, rhetorical support for basin-scale augmentation IF it is genuinely additive (not an excuse to shortchange tribal allocations or defer their pipeline) and IF costs are not loaded onto tribes. They will be wary of expensive, energy-intensive megaprojects that soak up federal water dollars that could otherwise fund their delivery infrastructure. Net: neutral-to-mildly-supportive, low salience.

A win for them. A win is (1) Congressional ratification of the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act, locking in their ~3,600 AFY of Colorado River water plus protected N-aquifer rights and the federally funded Lake Powell pipeline delivered by 2040 , turning paper rights into wet water at the tap for homes that now haul buckets; (2) a durable replacement for the ~85% of tribal revenue and the jobs lost when coal collapsed, via Hopi-OWNED solar+storage generation (not a land-lease arrangement) that also restores the ~500 homes de-funded by the Solar for All clawback; (3) the ability to lease temporarily unused water for revenue WITHOUT forfeiting their right to develop it fully later; and (4) protection and, ideally, recovery of the N-aquifer and their sacred springs. In short: secured wet water, a self-owned post-coal economy, and cultural/hydrological protection , self-determination, not dependency.

Public record. The Tribe is pursuing a major water rights settlement that would provide funds for water infrastructure and allow for leasing, indicating openness to compensated conservation, but its primary focus is securing a reliable water supply for its communities.

Position. The Hualapai Tribe holds newly secured Colorado River rights under the Hualapai Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 2022 (P.L. 117-349), signed January 2023 as the first Indian water rights settlement of the Biden administration. The settlement grants ~4,000 acre-feet/year of Central Arizona Project agricultural-priority water plus authority to divert/treat/convey up to 3,414 AF/yr from the Colorado River for municipal, commercial, and industrial use on-reservation. It created a $312M-scale trust package (widely cited as $180M trust fund + $5M implementation, plus additional water-project authorizations) to build the Hualapai Water Project piping river water to Peach Springs and Grand Canyon West, targeted for full implementation ~2028. The Tribe's longstanding public position: it fought for more than a decade for a firm, wet, senior entitlement to end reliance on stressed groundwater and to water its tourism economy. On the basin crisis, the Tribe aligns with the Colorado River Basin Tribal Coalition / Ten Tribes Partnership posture demanding a seat in post-2026 operations negotiations and insisting Reclamation honor its trust responsibility by protecting tribal entitlements (many tribal comments urge subtracting tribal water off the top before allocating cuts to states). The Tribal Utility Authority (HTUA, established 2014) is an electric utility, not a water utility: it manages newly awarded Hoover Dam (Boulder Canyon Project) and Glen Canyon (CRSP) federal hydropower allocations to deliver low-cost power directly to the Tribe rather than through a third party, and is building out solar plus transmission (Diamond Bar Road line to Grand Canyon West). It already operates a ~993 kW solar PV + 750 kW/1,500 kWh storage microgrid supplying ~50% of Grand Canyon West power (replacing diesel), and has studied 100-150 MW utility-scale solar at Nelson/Clay Springs.

On conservation. Cautiously open / persuadable. Precedent from peer tribes (Navajo, Hopi offering to leave water in reservoirs) shows basin tribes will support voluntary, compensated conservation when it does not forfeit the underlying right. The Hualapai settlement explicitly permits in-state leasing to fund infrastructure, and peers frame leasing as strictly temporary (only until distribution infrastructure is paid for). So a verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays the Tribe for water it is not yet physically able to divert (pipeline not built until ~2028) could be attractive as bridge revenue to finance that very pipeline. Hard conditions: the payment must not impair or be construed as relinquishing the entitlement, terms must be time-limited and revocable, use of proceeds should fund the Hualapai Water Project, and any structure must respect the in-state/CAP-transport and no-permanent-off-reservation-transfer limits. Framed as sovereignty-preserving bridge financing, likely a yes; framed as a permanent forbearance, likely a no.

On solar+water. Most likely of the three to be an enthusiastic partner. HTUA is already a builder of utility-scale solar (100-150 MW studied), storage, and transmission, is carrying USDA debt to do it, and its core need is capital plus offtake. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps directly onto the Tribe's two binding constraints (transmission/power buildout and the water pipeline) and its revenue-diversification goals. Attractive elements: anchor offtake for tribal solar, capital that reduces reliance on USDA debt and the settlement trust, jobs, and a way to fund the Hualapai Water Project without leasing away water. Watch-outs the Tribe will insist on: tribal ownership/equity and control (not a land-lease-only extraction deal), protection of Grand Canyon West viewsheds and cultural sites, water for a data center must not compete with the Tribe's municipal supply, and consent-based, sovereignty-respecting terms. High-potential but consent- and control-sensitive.

On reuse/desal. Low direct relevance / mild support, low priority. The Hualapai Reservation sits on the Colorado River in northwestern Arizona, is inland and far from coastal desalination, and its own solution is a direct river diversion + treatment pipeline, not reuse or desal. Large-scale reuse/desalination matters to the Tribe mainly indirectly: if it augments basin supply and takes pressure off the shared river, it protects the reliability of the Tribe's entitlement and is welcome in principle. The Tribe would likely support basin-scale augmentation that reduces the chance of future curtailment, but would resist any framing that positions augmentation as a substitute for honoring existing tribal rights or as justification to reopen/reduce its settlement. Not a natural funder or lead adopter; a supportive-but-peripheral stance.

A win for them. A win is a fully funded, fully built Hualapai Water Project delivering firm Colorado River water to Grand Canyon West and Peach Springs on or ahead of the ~2028 schedule, without drawing down the settlement trust or taking on unsustainable debt, and without ceding any part of the entitlement. Adjacent wins: cheaper and more reliable power for the tourism economy (their primary, largely un-subsidized revenue source), completion of the Grand Canyon West transmission line, monetized surplus solar, and a durable seat protecting tribal priority in post-2026 basin operations. In short: water security + energy security + revenue diversification that strengthens sovereignty rather than trading it away.

Public record. The Tribe has developed a solar-plus-storage microgrid to power its Grand Canyon West enterprise, reducing reliance on diesel and saving millions.

Position. The Hualapai Tribe is a federally recognized tribal nation of ~2,300 members whose ~1-million-acre reservation borders the Colorado River for over 100 miles through the western Grand Canyon, yet historically the Tribe could not use that water: it had no quantified reserved right and no infrastructure to divert, lift, and treat water from the deep canyon. Its core public position for over a decade was to secure a settled, wet water supply. That culminated in the Hualapai Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 2022, signed into law January 2023 (the first Indian water rights settlement enacted under the Biden administration). The settlement gives the Tribe rights to divert/use/store 4,000 acre-feet/year of fourth-priority (former non-Indian agricultural) Central Arizona Project water, usable on or off reservation in the Lower Basin, plus recognized on-reservation groundwater and surface water. Of the 4,000 AF, only 1,115 AF/year is 'firmed' (guaranteed through 2108, half by the U.S. and half by Arizona) against shortage; the remaining ~2,885 AF is subject to Colorado River shortage cuts. The settlement funds the Hualapai Water Project (a Diamond Creek to Peach Springs to Grand Canyon West pipeline sized for ~3,414 AF/yr), backed by a $180M Water Trust Fund plus ~$5M implementation, ~$32M OM&R trust, and ~$7M for intermittent/technical costs. Longstanding positions: (1) tribal sovereignty and self-determination over water and land (demonstrated by Grand Canyon West / Skywalk, which they built precisely because it lets them permit activities banned in the adjacent national park); (2) water is existential to their tourism economy and future growth, not agriculture; (3) as a Lower Basin tribe not in the Ten Tribes Partnership, they and allied tribes have pressed Reclamation for a real seat in the post-2026 operating-guidelines negotiations. Chairman Damon Clarke framed the settlement as generational: 'hope for the future... not for us at this time, but for the generations ahead.'

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to interested, but guarded. A verified consumptive-use conservation market could let the Tribe monetize water it cannot yet physically deliver: with 4,000 AF of CAP entitlement (usable on OR off reservation in the Lower Basin) and an unbuilt pipeline, the Tribe holds a paper asset it could lease or conserve for compensation, generating non-tourism revenue while infrastructure lags. Tribes broadly have pushed to be paid participants in conservation, and paid tribal water leasing/System Conservation deals are already precedent in the Lower Basin. Caveats that make them persuadable not automatic ally: (1) sovereignty and permanence concerns, they will resist anything that looks like alienating a right they fought a decade to secure or that could be cited against future claims; (2) they need the firmed 1,115 AF and eventual municipal supply protected, so they will only market the surplus/unfirmed portion; (3) verification and price must be credible and tribally controlled. Frame it as leasing surplus for compensation, not giving up water, with an explicit sovereignty carve-out.

On solar+water. Likely the most attractive of the three, if structured to respect sovereignty and land. The Tribe's binding constraint is capital and firm supply for Grand Canyon West, plus a chronic need for economic diversification beyond tourism. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps almost perfectly onto their gap: it could finance or accelerate the Diamond Creek to Grand Canyon West pipeline / treatment, provide reliable behind-the-meter power to a remote reservation, create jobs, and diversify revenue. The Tribe has demonstrated appetite for large infrastructure and outside partners (Skywalk was built with private investment). Real friction points: (1) siting on or near a culturally sensitive canyon landscape, cultural-resource and viewshed impacts near Grand Canyon West would be a hard line; (2) sovereignty over land, water, and revenue share, they will want ownership/equity or long-term lease revenue, not a landlord-only deal; (3) any water 'funding' must deliver wet water or firmed supply the Tribe controls, not just offsets elsewhere. Persuadable-to-ally on this if the deal centers tribal ownership and avoids sacred/scenic land.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but low salience for them specifically. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the Lower Basin indirectly helps the Tribe by easing shortage pressure on its unfirmed CAP water and on the system that firms its 1,115 AF. The Tribe already embraces reuse-style conservation at Grand Canyon West and would not object in principle. But desal/reuse megaprojects are distant, Phoenix/Tucson/California-scale solutions that do little for a remote canyon-rim reservation whose problem is lifting/treating/conveying water to Grand Canyon West, not raw basin supply. They are unlikely to lead or fund such projects and could be wary if costs are socialized onto tribes or if new 'augmentation' supply is used to justify denying tribal firming/priority. Supportive bystander, not a driver.

A win for them. A win is turning a paper settlement into wet, reliable, tribally controlled water at Grand Canyon West on a faster timeline than federal appropriations alone allow, while opening a durable non-tourism revenue stream and protecting sovereignty. Concretely: financed/built pipeline and treatment delivering their 3,414 AF municipal supply; protection or expansion of firmed supply against shortage; the option to earn compensation from surplus/unfirmed water via a verified market WITHOUT ceding the right; tribal-owned solar+storage that powers and helps fund the water system and diversifies the economy; jobs and equity for members; and a real, respected seat in post-2026 Colorado River governance. The losing outcome they will fight: any arrangement that leaves their water stuck as a paper asset, weakens their priority/firming, or puts infrastructure or projects on culturally sensitive canyon land.

Public record. The Tribe has publicly supported voluntary, compensated water conservation programs and has developed its own solar-plus-storage microgrid to reduce reliance on fossil fuels.

Position. IID is the single largest user of Colorado River water in the entire basin, holding ~3.1 million acre-feet/year of entitlement, of which ~2.6 MAF are present perfected rights with an 1901 priority date, among the most senior on the river (iid.com, congress.gov/CRS). Longstanding public posture: (1) fiercely defends its senior priority and the 'Law of the River' as the non-negotiable framework, insisting any post-2026 operating plan be 'lawful, durable, and basinwide' and warning that reductions must respect priority rather than be imposed pro rata (iid.com news releases 1407/1449). (2) Positions itself as the basin's proven conservation leader, citing >9 million acre-feet conserved since 2003 (more than twice California's annual allocation) via efficiency and voluntary fallowing under the 2003 QSA (iid.com; watereducation.org). (3) Willing to expand conservation, up to 200,000 AF of additional system conservation in 2026 and a 100,000 AF SCIA amendment, but explicitly conditioned on federal cost-share and on Salton Sea mitigation (doi.gov 2023 100kAF deal; western-water.com 2026-05). (4) Salton Sea is the hard red line and the source of its 'rage': IID historically refused to sign the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan without ~$200M in Salton Sea funding and was excluded, prompting board member Jim Hanks' 'the elephant in the room... our memory and rage is long' and President Erik Ortega's 'not [the Sea] as its first casualty' (KQED). Every acre-foot of conservation/fallowing means less agricultural runoff feeding the Sea, exposing toxic playa and worsening asthma/dust; IID insists conservation cannot proceed without restoration funding. (5) Ratepayer-first energy posture: Dec 2025 Resolution 37-2025 requires large industrial/data-center loads to fully fund their own infrastructure; IID Chair Karin Eugenio publicly opposed a data center (IVCM) that then sued IID for 260M gallons/yr of river water (CalMatters, KPBS, 2026-06).

On conservation. Cautiously supportive, likely the most receptive of the three, but on strict terms. IID already runs the largest voluntary compensated-conservation programs in the basin and has repeatedly said it will do more IF paid. A verified, arms-length consumptive-use conservation market monetizes exactly what IID already does and hands farmers durable revenue. But IID will demand three guardrails: (a) it must be VOLUNTARY and priority-preserving, not a backdoor for forced pro-rata cuts that erode its 1901 senior rights; (b) a meaningful share of proceeds must fund Salton Sea mitigation, because verified consumptive-use reductions directly shrink agricultural return flows to the Sea and expose toxic playa, IID will not sell conservation that worsens the Sea without offsetting restoration dollars; (c) rigorous, IID-trusted measurement of 'consumptive use' vs. gross diversion, so it is credited fairly. Get those right and IID is a willing, high-volume seller. Get them wrong (mandatory, no-Sea-money, or credited on the wrong baseline) and IID becomes a litigious opponent.

On solar+water. Mixed and the most nuanced. Two IID instincts collide. Pro: IID is actively courting Lithium Valley / geothermal / solar+storage as economic diversification and owns the land and the utility, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water aligns with its >$4B energy-revenue ambition and its desire to decouple the local economy from agriculture-tied river water. Con: IID just adopted a 'ratepayer-first' framework (Res. 37-2025) precisely because a data center (IVCM) that promised recycled water pivoted to suing for 260M gallons/yr of Colorado River water. IID is now wary that big-tech load arrives promising to 'fund water' and then reaches for the river. So IID would engage only if the deal is structured so the hyperscaler load fully funds its own infrastructure AND the 'funds water' component is real, enforceable, and additive (e.g., dedicated Salton Sea restoration money and/or new supply like reuse), not a claim on IID's senior river entitlement. Framed as ratepayer-neutral + Salton-Sea-funding + no new draw on the 1901 right, IID is a plausible partner; framed as another thirsty load, IID fights it.

On reuse/desal. Guardedly favorable if it is NEW supply that relieves pressure on its entitlement and helps the Salton Sea, wary if it becomes a rationale to reallocate its water. IID's own posture in the IVCM dispute is telling: it prefers large new users to source from recycled municipal wastewater (upgrading El Centro/Imperial treatment plants) with excess reclaimed water returned to the Salton Sea, exactly a reuse-plus-Sea model. So IID would likely welcome large-scale reuse and desal that (a) creates genuinely additional water for new industrial/urban loads instead of drawing on IID's river right, and (b) routes return flows to stabilize the Sea. Skepticism points: cost and who pays (IID will insist developers/hyperscalers/state fund it, not ratepayers or farmers), and any implication that 'new water exists, so IID should give up more river water' , which it will resist as an attack on priority. Desal specifically (Sea of Cortez / brackish) is geographically plausible for Imperial and could be attractive, but IID will treat it as complementary to, not a substitute for, its senior rights.

A win for them. A durable, voluntary, well-paid deal that (a) leaves IID's 1901 senior priority and 3.1 MAF entitlement legally intact and explicitly protected in any post-2026 framework; (b) secures large, committed Salton Sea restoration funding (state + federal + private) so conservation no longer means an expanding toxic playa and worsening local public health; (c) delivers reliable compensation to Imperial Valley farmers for voluntary conservation, keeping the ag economy whole; and (d) advances IID's Lithium Valley / geothermal / solar economic-diversification upside with new industrial load that funds its own water and infrastructure rather than drawing on the river. In short: IID keeps its senior water, gets paid to conserve, gets the Sea funded, and captures the energy/lithium boom, all without ceding legal ground on priority.

Public record. IID actively pays its water users for conservation to aid the Colorado River system but opposes the siting of large-scale solar projects on productive agricultural land.

Position. {'longstanding': ['Imperial Valley agriculture is wholly dependent on Colorado River water; water security is treated as existential.', 'Senior water rights (1901 priority, Present Perfected Rights) must be protected and preserved through any deal; growers want to conserve without surrendering the underlying right.', 'Strong preference for paid, voluntary, on-farm conservation (land leveling, drip/sprinkler, pump-back/tailwater recovery, efficiency infrastructure) over permanent farmland retirement.', "Deep hostility to uncompensated or permanent fallowing: 'fallowing is the F-word for us.' Fallowing is a last-resort tool acceptable only if paid, temporary, and it doesn't dry up the valley economy.", 'Any conservation must reckon with the Salton Sea: ~1/3 of applied water drains to the Sea, so pulling ag out of production worsens Salton Sea dust/public-health and habitat problems.'], 'recent': ["Accepts that the 2026 post-guidelines deadline and California's agreement to lasting Lower Basin cuts mean some fields will be idled; wants that done via compensated, seasonal, voluntary programs (e.g., ~2-month summer fallow) that preserve senior rights.", 'Supportive of the money flowing in: IID has conserved/transferred ~500K AF/yr since 2003 and growers have been paid rising rates (from ~$60/AF in 2004 toward $125+/AF) for water saved; federal packages exceeding $600M have been weighed for Imperial conservation.', "Aligned with IID's stance that too much productive farmland is being converted to solar (and increasingly data centers, geothermal/lithium, batteries), with the power/benefits exported to coastal cities while local ag land and jobs shrink.", "Frames Imperial Valley on-farm conservation as the linchpin 'key to saving the Colorado River' , i.e., we are already doing the heavy lifting, pay us to keep doing it efficiently."]}

A win for them. A durable, well-paid conservation revenue stream that lets member growers save large volumes of Colorado River water while keeping their senior rights, their most productive farmland, and their workforce fully intact , with the Salton Sea's air-quality and habitat impacts funded and managed, and with any energy/data-center/desal money treated as additive capital that pays for water infrastructure and local jobs rather than a lever to retire farmland or strip water from the valley. In short: get paid to be the river's conservation engine without becoming its sacrifice zone.

Public record. The association's primary focus is ensuring water certainty for its members who hold senior water rights, but it has engaged in policy discussions and highlighted its water use efficiency in the face of shortages.

Position. The USIBWC is the U.S. federal agency (a State Department-supervised body, headed by a U.S. Commissioner; Chad McIntosh named in 2025 after Dr. Maria-Elena Giner resigned April 21, 2025) that administers the 1944 U.S.-Mexico Water Treaty on the Colorado River. Its core institutional position is treaty compliance and binational cooperation, not advocacy for any allocation faction. Longstanding role: it guarantees Mexico a 1.5 million acre-feet/year delivery (reduced under shortage rules; Mexico's 2026 initial allocation is ~1,352,595 AF) and administers salinity obligations under Minute 242 (1973), which caps salinity of treaty deliveries at 115 ppm above Imperial Dam water. Recent posture (2017-2026) is defined by a series of 'Minutes' (amendments) that build binational drought-sharing: Minute 323 (2017) had the U.S. contribute $31.5M to Mexican conservation infrastructure (~200,000 AF/yr saved) plus $18M habitat restoration, and let Mexico store water in Lake Mead (ICMA); Minute 330 (April 2024) commits Mexico to conservation generating ~400,000 AF of system water, funded partly by $65M in U.S. funding channeled through IBWC, plus reduced Mexican allocations and recoverable savings in shortage years. Public statements from the U.S. Commissioner consistently frame these as 'partnership' and using water 'more efficiently' rather than taking sides. IBWC also owns the Tijuana border-sanitation and Rio Grande sewage portfolios, which currently consume much of its political oxygen. It is a party to the Post-2026 operations process (2007 Interim Guidelines, 2019 DCPs, and the binational Minutes all expire end of 2026), where it must negotiate a successor Minute with Mexico's Section before the August 2026 deadline.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but institutionally cautious. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that produces auditable, attributable savings aligns with IBWC's core need for measurable 'system water' it can count toward binational obligations and write into a successor Minute (Minutes 323/330 already monetize conservation this way). Their non-negotiable is measurement and verification integrity and clear legal accounting of who owns the saved water. They would not champion a private market politically, but they would readily use its verified output if it strengthens the U.S. position with Mexico. Persuadable, contingent on rigorous, treaty-compatible accounting.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-mildly-positive, but largely outside their lane. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is not something IBWC would evaluate as an energy project; they would only care about the water tranche. If the water funding produces verifiable savings or supply that helps meet treaty delivery/quality obligations, they would welcome it as another funding channel (they already accept U.S. funds routed to Mexican conservation). They have no mandate over power markets and would defer siting/energy questions to Reclamation, states, and utilities. Low salience unless the water benefit is concrete and binationally creditable.

On reuse/desal. Most institutionally resonant of the three, given their salinity mandate and desalting history. Large-scale reuse/desalination speaks directly to the Minute 242 salinity obligation and the Yuma Desalting Plant legacy: new supply or quality improvement that eases treaty deliveries to Mexico or offsets Colorado River draws is squarely useful. Caveats: they are acutely aware desalting is power-hungry and expensive (the reason YDP rarely ran), and any facility near the border or affecting delivered-water salinity/return flows raises binational accounting and Mexican-consent questions they would need to manage. Supportive in principle where it improves delivery reliability or water quality; will scrutinize cost, brine disposal, and treaty-accounting implications.

A win for them. A win is credible, verifiable water that de-risks their binational obligations: enough auditable system water or savings to keep meeting the 1.5 MAF Mexican delivery through the drought, improved salinity/quality of treaty deliveries (retiring the perennial Minute 242 / Yuma Desalting Plant headache), and a durable, low-conflict successor Post-2026 Minute with Mexico that they can point to as another chapter of successful cooperation. Anything that hands the U.S. Section additional, well-documented supply or quality margin to bring to the table strengthens their negotiating hand and their institutional relevance.

Public record. The USIBWC co-negotiated and implements Minute 323 and its successor agreements with Mexico, which explicitly use U.S. funding for water conservation projects in Mexico to create water savings for environmental flows and system storage.

Position. Hamby is arguably the single most powerful California voice in the post-2026 Colorado River negotiations. Longstanding, non-negotiable core position: defend California's and IID's senior priority rights under the Law of the River. IID controls roughly one-quarter of the river's flow (more than 10x Nevada's allocation, exceeding Arizona's entire state share) and Hamby insists 'That is the law, which everybody agreed to.' He accepts that climate-driven cuts are necessary but frames them as temporary/short-term reductions that must NOT permanently alter senior rights or the priority system. He is a farmer-interest champion: protects Imperial Valley's ~$5.1B ag economy against urban water transfers and campaigned on referendums before water leaves the valley. Conservation record is his credibility anchor: IID has conserved 9M+ acre-feet since 2003 and cut consumptive use ~22% in 2025; California use projected at 3.76 MAF in 2025, lowest since 1949. In Dec 2025 he led California's framework committing to conserve 440,000 acre-feet/yr on top of existing efforts, as part of a Lower Basin 1.5 MAF/yr plan including Mexico. He has evolved from a combative 23-year-old to a consensus-builder praised by Arizona's water director as 'collaborative,' 'measured,' 'intelligent.' Explicitly supportive of 'developing new supplies' including desalination, advanced reuse, and efficiency as ways to relieve pressure on the river while preserving existing rights. HARD line drawn July 2025: he leads IID opposition to utility-scale solar on Imperial Valley farmland ('It's time to draw a line... Covering it with solar panels that send electricity elsewhere and leave us with the consequences is unacceptable'), citing lost farmland, diminished Salton Sea return flows, and little local benefit. He supports renewables sited on non-ag/desert/industrial land and prefers local, neighbor-to-neighbor solutions over Sacramento mandates.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE, with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to Hamby's ideal instrument: it pays IID/farmers to reduce use voluntarily, monetizes the very conservation IID already leads (9M+ acre-feet since 2003), and avoids mandated cuts that would erode the priority system. He already operates inside this model via System Conservation and federally funded fallowing. Conditions he will impose: (a) participation must be voluntary and adequately compensated per acre-foot; (b) it must not become a backdoor to permanently transfer or reallocate senior rights; (c) it must account for Salton Sea impacts (reduced return flows expose playa) and fund mitigation; (d) rigorous, credible verification of actual wet-water savings (he distrusts paper water). Sell it as a tool that rewards IID's existing leadership and protects rights, not as a lever to pry water away from agriculture.

On solar+water. MIXED-TO-HOSTILE if it touches farmland; conditionally open if sited right. This is the sharpest fault line. Hamby publicly drew a hard line in July 2025 against utility-scale solar on Imperial Valley farmland, explicitly rejecting projects that 'send electricity elsewhere and leave us with the consequences.' A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout will trigger his opposition IF it converts productive farmland or reduces Salton Sea return flows. BUT he and IID are explicitly pro-renewable when sited on non-agricultural desert, industrial, or long-fallowed land, and he responds to projects offering tangible LOCAL benefit. The water-funding hook is a genuine draw: if the buildout funds conservation, Salton Sea mitigation, or local water infrastructure, it aligns with his 'develop new supplies / local solutions' frame. To win him: site on non-farmed/desert land, guarantee local economic benefit and jobs, protect return flows, and route funding to Salton Sea and IID water programs. Pitched as a Sacramento/outsider land grab on farmland, it fails.

On reuse/desal. FAVORABLE. Hamby explicitly cites 'develop new supplies' and California's investments in 'recycling, desalination, and local supply development' (urban SoCal cut imported-water demand ~60%) as part of California's leadership story. Large-scale reuse and desalination fit his priorities perfectly: they add supply and reduce pressure on the river WITHOUT touching senior rights or the priority system, and they let upstream urban users lean less on the Colorado. The main caveats are cost, who pays, and whether new supply is used as an excuse to reallocate IID's water. He would want assurance that augmentation benefits accrue basin-wide/statewide without being conditioned on IID surrendering entitlement, and he favors projects that keep ag whole. Low friction, high alignment.

A win for them. A win for Hamby: measurable river stabilization achieved through VOLUNTARY, compensated, verified conservation that leaves IID's senior priority rights and the priority system fully intact; substantial federal/third-party dollars flowing to Imperial Valley for conservation, Salton Sea mitigation, and local water/energy infrastructure; renewable energy and new-supply (reuse/desal) investment that adds capacity and jobs WITHOUT paving farmland or drying return flows; and a durable, legally-defensible basinwide post-2026 agreement he can credibly claim credit for as the leader who protected both the river and Imperial Valley. In short: California/IID cast as the responsible conservation leader who gave real water reductions on its own terms, got paid and mitigated for it, and never signed away the rights.

Public record. As California's lead negotiator, Hamby helped secure $1.2 billion in federal funds to pay for conservation and agreed to cuts, but his non-negotiable position is defending California's senior water rights, making him pragmatic but not a pure ally to agendas that might undermine those rights.

Position. JW Water Holdings is a private, ACC-regulated water and wastewater utility platform founded in 2013 and headquartered in Prescott, Arizona. Since November 2024 it has been owned by CVC DIF (the infrastructure arm of PE firm CVC Capital Partners, via DIF Infrastructure VII); the acquisition combined JW's ~10 utilities (~9,000 customers) with 8 legacy Robson/Pima utilities into an 18-utility, ~50,000-customer platform. Named subsidiaries include Payson Water Company, Pima Utility Company, Picacho Water Company, Picacho Sewer Company, Pine Meadows Utilities, and Pine Water. Its systems are small-to-mid-sized rural and exurban Arizona utilities (Payson/Rim country, Prescott, Pine, and the Robson Ranch retirement community near Eloy/Picacho), largely groundwater- and local-surface-water dependent rather than direct CAP/Colorado River wholesale customers. JW has NO documented public position on the Colorado River crisis, interstate allocation, or basin-scale negotiations. Its only supply-facing statements are marketing/rate-case framing: it acknowledges 'surface and imported supplies are tighter than past plans assumed, while communities continue to grow,' says utilities 'must be more proactive... using every drop as efficiently as possible,' and states a goal of 'stronger drought resilience through diversified supplies and increased storage.' Its dominant recent public activity is aggressive rate-increase filings at the Arizona Corporation Commission (filed March 2025): ~125% water and ~188% sewer increases at Robson Ranch/Picacho (Eloy), and a Payson increase from ~$33 to ~$67.83/month (~106%). JW justifies these on cost-of-service grounds (rates unchanged since the late 1990s, a negative -2.15% rate of return, deferred infrastructure), NOT on drought or water-scarcity grounds. This has generated organized customer opposition among fixed-income retirees, with public accusations that increases benefit 'foreign investors' rather than infrastructure.

On conservation. Low direct relevance and mild interest, not opposition. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is built around Colorado River / CAP entitlement holders paying to fallow or forbear water. JW's systems mostly do not hold large CAP/Colorado River entitlements, so they are neither obvious sellers nor buyers at scale, and would likely view a basin conservation market as someone else's arena. Where it could matter: if any JW system holds CAP subcontract/M&I allocations or effluent credits, monetizing unused entitlements or buying firmed supply through such a market could be attractive. Likely reaction: cautiously neutral-to-curious, contingent on whether it touches assets they actually control and whether the ACC would let them monetize or recover related transactions. They will not champion it unprompted.

On solar+water. Most likely to generate genuine interest, because it maps to their PE/rate-base logic and their growth-constrained, energy-and-pumping-intensive rural systems. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could cut their large groundwater-pumping and treatment energy costs, provide a co-funded capital source for supply/reuse/storage assets that ease Assured-Water-Supply constraints, and let them add resilience without another double-digit rate case that inflames customers. Caveats/tensions: data-center water demand competes for the same scarce Arizona groundwater their customers rely on, so JW would scrutinize net water impact and siting; and CVC will want clear ownership, recoverability, and control terms. Likely reaction: the most engageable of the three, especially if structured as behind-the-meter energy plus co-funded water assets that lower customer bills and support growth.

On reuse/desal. Reuse is a plausible fit; desalination is largely irrelevant to their footprint. JW already operates wastewater/sewer utilities (Picacho Sewer, Pima, Pine Meadows), so expanded reclaimed-water reuse, effluent recharge, and aquifer storage and recovery align with their assets and with Arizona's ADAWS 'reduce reliance on groundwater over time' pathway, and can be capitalized into rate base. Reuse could directly firm supply for their groundwater-stressed systems and support 100-year demonstrations. Large-scale desalination (e.g., Sea of Cortez / Colorado River delta projects) is a state/CAP/interstate-scale endeavor far outside a small rural utility platform's capital and geography, so JW would treat it as spectator policy unless it became a wholesale supply they could buy into. Likely reaction: supportive of localized reuse/recharge if ACC-recoverable; indifferent to desalination.

A win for them. A win is a bankable, rate-recoverable path to firmer long-term supply for their groundwater-dependent systems that (1) supports 100-year Assured Water Supply / ADAWS demonstrations and unlocks connection growth, (2) reduces reliance on a single stressed aquifer or an imported supply they don't control, and (3) can be capitalized into rate base with ACC blessing so CVC earns its regulated return, all while easing rather than inflaming the affordability backlash from their retiree customer base. Concretely: a new firm supply source, a reuse/storage asset, or an offsite generation-plus-water arrangement that they can point to in a rate case as prudent, growth-enabling investment rather than a customer cost with no service benefit.

Public record. As a private water utility, the company promotes customer-side water conservation tips to ensure the long-term viability of its water supplies.

Position. Dr. John 'Jack' Schmidt is the Janet Quinney Lawson Chair and Director of the Center for Colorado River Studies at Utah State University (Watershed Sciences faculty since 1991), former chief of the USGS Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center, and a member of the Colorado River Research Group (with Anne Castle, John Fleck, Eric Kuhn, Kathryn Sorensen). He is one of the most-cited independent scientific voices on the basin. Longstanding and recent positions, well documented: (1) The basin is fundamentally over-allocated and aridifying; reservoir and groundwater 'buffers' are depleted. He warns 'We've got the onset of an extremely dry year, and we're on the brink of collapsing the system' and that operating rules in place through 2026 are insufficient to avert a supply crisis. (2) DEMAND reduction, not supply augmentation, is the only realistic fix. He and colleagues estimate a 2.4-3.2 million acre-feet/yr (22-29% of direct use) permanent cut is needed to stabilize reservoirs, with more cuts (1-3 MAF) required by 2050 due to climate change. (3) He is explicitly skeptical of supply-side technology: 'system-wide supply augmentation, such as desalination, isn't cost-effective or realistic' and 'it can't be implemented quickly enough.' (4) Agriculture (~74% of consumptive use, dominated by alfalfa/cattle-feed) must make PERMANENT cuts; temporary paid fallowing is a bridge, not the endgame. (5) Shared responsibility: 'Everyone who's benefited from the river has a responsibility to conserve water,' and the core problem is political ('states look at each other and say YOU should use less'). He is a rigorous, data-first analyst who reframes basin debates around hydrologic reality and rejects optimism (e.g., hoping for another 2023 'gangbuster' snow year is 'highly unlikely').

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but demanding on the details. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with his core thesis that demand must fall and that 'everyone who benefits must conserve.' He would likely welcome rigorous MEASUREMENT and VERIFICATION of actual wet-water savings (consumptive use, not paper/return-flow accounting), which is a recurring theme in his work. Key conditions/skepticism: (1) He'll insist savings be real, additive, and permanent, not temporary fallowing that reverts. (2) He shares the widely documented 'buy and dry' concern about agricultural communities and would want ag-community protections. (3) He'll scrutinize whether the market actually closes the 2.4-3.2 MAF gap or just monetizes marginal, non-permanent cuts. Verdict: persuadable-to-ally IF the verification is scientifically credible and savings are permanent.

On solar+water. Skeptical and conditional. Schmidt is wary of solutions framed as 'new money/new supply solves the crisis' and would resist any narrative that lets large water users (or the basin) avoid the primary work of cutting consumptive use. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would draw hard questions: Does the data-center load itself add consumptive water demand? Does the 'funds water' component produce verified, permanent consumptive-use reductions, or is it green-washing continued growth? He would not oppose clean energy per se, but he'd refuse to treat private capital as a substitute for demand management. Persuadable only if the water contribution is quantified in net acre-feet of permanent consumptive-use reduction and is transparently accounted; otherwise he'd publicly frame it as a distraction.

On reuse/desal. This is where he is most openly skeptical, on the record. He has stated that 'system-wide supply augmentation, such as desalination, isn't cost-effective or realistic' and 'can't be implemented quickly enough,' favoring 'limiting demand and reallocating water' instead. He would view large-scale desalination as slow, expensive, energy-intensive, and geographically mismatched to the basin, and unable to close the gap on the timeline the crisis demands. He is somewhat more open to REUSE (municipal water recycling reduces net demand and is local), but even there he'd insist it's incremental and no excuse to defer agricultural/demand cuts. Verdict: leans opponent on desalination as a headline solution; neutral-to-mildly-positive on reuse as a supplementary demand-reducing measure.

A win for them. A win for Schmidt is the basin acting on hydrologic reality: durable, permanent reductions in consumptive use that stabilize Lake Powell/Lake Mead storage, done with transparent accounting and equitable shared responsibility across all users. Secondarily, protecting river/Grand Canyon ecosystem health. He 'wins' when his analysis shifts the policy conversation from wishful supply thinking to honest demand management. He gains nothing financial or operational from any specific project; his currency is scientific credibility and being proven right. Any proposal that measurably and verifiably reduces consumptive use, is honestly accounted, and doesn't crowd out the needed permanent demand cuts is one he could endorse.

Public record. As a leading academic, his research and public statements consistently argue that basin-wide water use must be significantly and immediately reduced to match the declining supply caused by climate change.

Position. The Janet Quinney Lawson Foundation is a private family philanthropy in Salt Lake City (EIN 87-0481508), established 1991, ~$59M in assets, giving ~$4.3M/yr across ~44 grants. Its named beneficiaries are performing arts, children's/social services, medical centers, and zoos. It takes NO public policy positions on the Colorado River crisis and does not accept unsolicited applications. Its only Colorado-River nexus is a $7M lead naming gift (Oct 2021) that created the Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water & Air (ILWA) at Utah State University, plus continued large annual gifts to USU ($1.38M in 2024). ILWA -- the operational entity the Foundation funds -- is the substantive Colorado River actor: it runs a Colorado River Project, hosts the statewide Colorado River Collaborative (a 2024 newsroom partnership for solutions-focused water coverage), and is affiliated with USU's Center for Colorado River Studies (Jack Schmidt), whose white papers argue the basin has a structural supply-demand imbalance that reservoir operations alone cannot fix and that 'water managers will have to match demands to continuously changing supplies using new forms of demand management.' The Institute brands itself explicitly non-partisan, data-driven, and multi-stakeholder (convening TNC, Trout Unlimited, state agencies, and ag producers) rather than an advocate for any single mechanism. Utah's official state posture (which ILWA informs but does not set) is to operate 'on supply, not on demand' and to protect Upper Basin development rights. So the Foundation's revealed values are conservation-friendly and science-forward (Janet Q. Lawson was a noted conservation/outdoor-recreation supporter), but institutionally it is a passive check-writer, not a position-taker.

On conservation. Likely favorable-to-neutral, mediated through the Institute. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market fits the Center for Colorado River Studies' own conclusion that new forms of demand management are unavoidable, and its emphasis on measurement/verification (e.g., its landscape water-use efficiency monitoring tools) aligns with a market that pays for verified consumptive reductions. Expect ILWA to engage it as a research/measurement question -- how to quantify real, additional, permanent savings -- rather than to endorse or oppose it. Caveat: Utah's state stance ('operate on supply, not demand') and Upper Basin sensitivity to anything resembling forced cuts means ILWA will stay studiously neutral and stress voluntary, verified, compensated participation. The Foundation itself: no direct reaction; supportive by inference given its conservation values.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-cautiously-interested via the Institute. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is squarely in ILWA's 'land, water, AND air' remit and its mandate to facilitate business-community innovation, so it is the kind of cross-sector, data-rich proposition ILWA is designed to convene and study. Expect interest in modeling the water-energy nexus and in a Utah-sited demonstration, paired with rigorous scrutiny of claims (additionality of the water funding, evaporation/consumptive-use effects, grid/land tradeoffs). Not an economic stakeholder, so no self-interested opposition. The Foundation could conceivably be a philanthropic co-funder of a neutral evaluation, but only through the Institute. Low confidence on enthusiasm; high confidence they engage analytically rather than reactively.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously supportive as a supply-augmentation research topic, with technical scrutiny. Large-scale reuse/desalination aligns with the Center's framing that operational tweaks won't close the structural deficit and with Utah's supply-side orientation, so ILWA would likely treat it as a serious option to evaluate (cost, energy, brine, Great Salt Lake and ecosystem effects -- notably ILWA also runs a Great Salt Lake Project, so it will weigh basin-wide water balance, not just Colorado River supply). Expect neutral, evidence-first engagement rather than advocacy, and attention to whether reuse/desal genuinely reduces Colorado River draw versus enabling more consumption. Foundation itself: no direct stake; supportive by inference if framed as science-based stewardship.

A win for them. A win for the Foundation is legacy and impact: its namesake Institute becoming the trusted, non-partisan 'red telephone' that shapes sound Utah water policy, and its philanthropic dollars visibly advancing conservation and outdoor-recreation values without political entanglement. For the Institute it funds, a win is being the credible convener whose data drives basin decisions -- so any proposal that arrives as a fundable, studyable, verifiable pilot (with transparent measurement and multi-stakeholder buy-in) advances their mission. Concretely: fund or host a rigorous evaluation of a consumptive-use conservation market or an energy-funds-water buildout, generate an authoritative report to the Governor/Legislature, and get solutions-focused coverage through the Collaborative.

Public record. The foundation is a significant funder of Utah-based environmental and conservation groups, but its public record does not show a specific, declared strategic focus on large-scale clean energy infrastructure or paid agricultural water-shepherding programs.

Position. Cacioppo became Nevada State Engineer and Administrator of the Nevada Division of Water Resources (NDWR) effective March 30, 2026, promoted from Deputy Administrator after the abrupt departure of Adam Sullivan. He is an Army veteran and licensed civil engineer with ~30 years in Nevada water law, water rights administration, and civil engineering design. Before joining NDWR in February 2026 he spent nearly 28 years at Resource Concepts Inc. (RCI), one of the state's largest water-rights consulting firms, most recently as a principal engineer and expert witness. CRITICAL INSTITUTIONAL FACT: the Nevada State Engineer regulates and adjudicates ALL waters in the state EXCEPT the Colorado River. Colorado River allocation is federal (Secretary of the Interior is sole contracting authority in the Lower Basin) and is handled for Nevada by the Colorado River Commission of Nevada (CRC) and SNWA, not by Cacioppo. So he has no direct river-crisis portfolio; his leverage is over the in-state groundwater and surface-water system that surrounds and feeds the river problem (tributary ICS credits from the Muddy/Virgin Rivers and Coyote Spring Valley, over-appropriated basins, and the water rights that new load like data centers, solar, and desalination/reuse plants must secure). Stated priorities are administrative and neutral: 'make sure we're communicating better, being more transparent, and working through applications as efficiently as possible' plus digitizing operations, building a public application-tracking system, staff training, and clearing a backlog of 2,000+ pending cases (only ~30% of applications finish within six months). He has made NO public statements specifically on the Colorado River crisis, conservation markets, hyperscaler energy/water deals, or desalination. He inherits a state where ~50% of groundwater basins are over-appropriated (25% over-appropriated by more than 2x perennial yield) against a booming data-center pipeline (713 MW operating, 5,900+ MW planned in Northern Nevada).

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but strictly on his own terms. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that operates on Colorado River / Lake Mead water (ICS-style) largely sits OUTSIDE his jurisdiction (that is federal + CRC + SNWA), so he would defer on the river piece. Where a market touches in-state water rights, tributary ICS credits (Muddy/Virgin/Coyote Spring), or requires quantifying and transferring consumptive use, he is the gatekeeper and cares intensely about verification rigor: real, wet-water, additional savings that hold up legally, not paper transfers that injure other right-holders or over-draft a basin. His RCI/water-rights-transfer background means he understands transaction mechanics deeply and could be a constructive technical partner, but the revolving-door scrutiny pushes him toward conservative, well-documented approvals. Net: persuadable-to-supportive on the in-state mechanics if verification is bulletproof; deferential on the river-allocation core.

On solar+water. This is where he has the most direct leverage and the most tension. Nevada's data-center boom (5,900+ MW planned) is colliding with over-appropriated basins, and he is the regulator who must approve the water rights those loads need. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water would be attractive to him IF the water funding translates into real reductions in net groundwater demand (efficiency retrofits, dry-cooling, reuse offsets, retiring senior ag rights) rather than just underwriting new extraction. He will be wary of anything that looks like buying his approval or fast-tracking a favored developer, given the Coyote Springs optics. Frame it as: the project makes his basins more sustainable and comes with verifiable, self-funded mitigation he can put in the public record. Persuadable, leaning positive, if the water component is genuine and documented; skeptical if it is a growth play dressed as conservation.

On reuse/desal. Structurally the most aligned with his mandate, because large-scale reuse and desalination create NEW supply that relieves pressure on his over-appropriated groundwater basins and on the strained Colorado River share. As a civil engineer he will engage on the engineering and permitting merits. His concerns are jurisdictional and practical: reuse/return-flow credits and any groundwater component still run through his water-rights process; desal is largely coastal (California/Mexico) and outside Nevada, so his role there is limited to how imported/exchanged supply interacts with in-state rights and interstate agreements handled by CRC. He would want clear water-rights accounting, protection of existing right-holders, and defensible permitting. Most likely supportive on in-state reuse; interested-but-peripheral on out-of-state desal.

A win for them. A win is administrative and reputational: clearing his backlog faster, running a transparent and modernized office, and making allocation decisions that survive protests and appeals without being cast as favoring developers or his former consulting clients. He wins when a large new water use (data center, solar plant, treatment facility) comes in with a net-neutral or net-negative groundwater footprint and airtight documentation, so he can approve it on the record and defend it to both the growth lobby and conservation critics. He also wins by demonstrably protecting over-appropriated basins (e.g., Mason Valley) while still enabling Nevada's economic growth, threading the needle Governor Lombardo appointed him to thread.

Public record. As the new State Engineer, he oversees Nevada's water management and conservation laws, but his personal policy positions on compensated conservation, solar, and desalination are not yet on the public record.

Position. Longstanding: Nevada's core identity is 'most water-secure city in the desert southwest' built on aggressive conservation and near-total indoor reuse. SNWA recycles ~99% of indoor water and returns it to Lake Mead for return-flow credits, so Nevada's ~300,000 AF/yr apportionment (the smallest of any basin state, ~1.8% of the river) stretches to effective withdrawals >300k AF because only CONSUMPTIVE use counts against the cap. This makes Entsminger the basin's most credible champion of consumptive-use accounting over gross-diversion accounting, and of demand management by real, measured savings. He turned turf bans, tiered rates, and the $1.5B Intake No. 3 + Low Lake Level Pumping Station into a 10-year supply cushion. Recent (2026): Calls this 'the driest year in the history of the Colorado River' and says the river is 'out of easy solutions.' After the Feb 2026 collapse of the 7-state framework, he publicly declared the states 'failed'; he no longer believes a 20-year deal is possible and pushes a pragmatic ~5-year operating plan 'to keep us out of court' ('There's a reasonable rational operating plan for the next two-plus years right in front of our face, and we should take that'). Backed the Lower Basin stabilization proposal (up to 3.2M AF through 2028) as 'moving from ideas to implementation.' Signed June 2026 nonbinding MOU with Arizona and California/San Diego to explore ocean desalination-for-river-water swaps. Deeply skeptical of desal economics: desalinated water ~\$2,200/AF vs ~\$350/AF SNWA charges member agencies; calls desal 'not a silver bullet... silver buckshot, and desalination may be one of the pellets, but it's not the entire solution.' Prefers funding Southern California wastewater purification (MWD's regional recycling) so Nevada leaves water in Lake Mead in exchange - a reuse-for-credits swap.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE / likely champion, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to Entsminger's own worldview: he already lives and breathes consumptive-use (not diversion) accounting and measured, verified savings. He would welcome a market that pays for real, measured reductions and rewards return-flow/reuse - it validates Nevada's model and lets Nevada monetize or leverage its efficiency edge. Watch-outs: he will insist on rigorous verification (no paper water), on consumptive-use accounting being honored basin-wide, and that a market not become a way for large Upper Basin or agricultural users to sell savings Nevada effectively already banked. He wants implementation, not more 'ideas.' Positive framing: this is exactly the 'move from ideas to implementation' he called for.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / persuadable, transactional. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps onto his revealed preference for 'strategic investments that strengthen water resilience' and for third-party capital solving basin problems (he signed an MOU explicitly to 'explore forward-thinking, strategic investments'). Nevada is a data-center growth magnet, so aligning tech-sector energy money with water is politically and economically attractive to him. He would engage IF the water benefit is real, measured, and creditable to Lake Mead elevation (his true metric), and if it doesn't induce new consumptive water demand (data-center cooling) that offsets the gift. He will be skeptical of anything that reads as greenwashing or that doesn't survive the accounting/verification bar. Not an automatic yes, but a serious meeting.

On reuse/desal. SPLIT: reuse YES, desal NO (as primary). Reuse/recycling is the foundation of his entire strategy - he is arguably the basin's leading practitioner and would enthusiastically back large-scale reuse, especially funding Southern California (MWD) purification in exchange for Nevada leaving water in Lake Mead. Desalination he treats as marginal and overpriced: ~\$2,200/AF vs ~\$350/AF, 'not a silver bullet,' at most 'one pellet in the buckshot.' He will entertain desal ONLY as a swap mechanism (California builds/expands desal, frees river water Nevada can use) and only if someone else's economics carry it - not as something Nevada funds or relies on directly. Pitch reuse as the headline and desal as an optional accounting swap, never the reverse.

A win for them. A win for Entsminger is: (1) Lake Mead elevation stabilized in the near term (2-5 yrs) so Nevada's \$1.5B intake investment stays productive and Las Vegas keeps its 'most water-secure' status; (2) consumptive-use accounting and return-flow credits protected and, ideally, adopted basin-wide so Nevada's efficiency is rewarded not penalized; (3) an enforceable operating plan that keeps the seven states out of Supreme Court litigation; (4) new third-party capital (tech/energy/reuse) that adds water resilience WITHOUT forcing Nevada - which has little left to cut - to shoulder disproportionate reductions. He wins by being the pragmatist who delivered a workable deal after the grand bargain collapsed.

Public record. As head of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, he has championed aggressive conservation, near-total indoor water reuse, and has been a vocal proponent of paying for conservation across the basin to protect Lake Mead levels.

Position. Fleck is the basin's leading writer-analyst and self-described 'optimist in the room.' Longstanding thesis (from 'Water is for Fighting Over,' 2016): scarcity is real but communities cooperate and conserve rather than fight, and the myth of inevitable water war is destructive. In 'Science Be Dammed' (2019, w/ Eric Kuhn) he documents that the river was over-allocated from the 1920s because boosters ignored contemporaneous science showing insufficient water. Core current positions on the post-2026 crisis: (1) the basin must 'live within its means' and match use to the (declining) physical supply; (2) shared pain / basin-wide cuts are essential -- he co-authored the May 2025 'modest proposal' and related work arguing reductions must be shared across Upper and Lower basins, not fought over; (3) the 1922 Compact remains the foundation but its meaning is genuinely contested; (4) tribes must be essential partners, including compensation for foregone use; (5) demand reduction and conservation are far more cost-effective and faster than big engineering/supply projects ('even if they'd rather just have the feds build them another pipe'); (6) he has warned that recent negotiators shifted from stewarding the whole interconnected basin to defending only their own community's interests. Co-author of the Lake Powell/Grand Canyon/Lake Mead Ecosystem environmental-flows proposal (w/ Jack Schmidt, Eric Kuhn), a major post-2026 alternative.

On conservation. Supportive, likely his single most-aligned option, but conditionally. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits his core belief that demand reduction is cheaper and faster than engineering and that the basin must live within its means. He would insist on rigor: real, additive, verified *consumptive-use* savings (not paper water or shifted depletions), strong measurement/verification, and governance that prevents gaming -- he explicitly notes markets 'don't just exist magically' and require institutions. He would also press on equity (does it advantage deep-pocketed cities/tribes fairly, does it compensate rather than coerce). Get the verification and institutional design right and he could become an active public advocate and chronicler.

On solar+water. Cautiously skeptical-to-neutral, persuadable on strict conditions. He is wary of big capital and infrastructure being sold as a way to avoid the hard work of demand reduction ('build us another pipe'). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would draw two questions from him: does it actually reduce net consumptive use (data centers themselves consume water and power), and does the water money buy real, verified conservation rather than greenwashing or a license to keep over-using. If the water dollars fund verified consumptive-use reductions and tribal/environmental outcomes, and don't crowd out shared cuts, he could give it qualified support and coverage. If it reads as a supply-side or PR play, he would critique it publicly.

On reuse/desal. Most skeptical of the three. Reuse he is relatively comfortable with -- it is efficiency-adjacent and he has discussed wastewater reuse as a legitimate tool decided through public process. Large-scale desalination he treats as the classic expensive, slow 'build our way out' engineering fix that lets users defer conservation; he consistently argues conservation is more cost-effective and quicker. He would not oppose desal categorically but would frame it as a costly last resort that must not substitute for living within the basin's means, and would scrutinize its energy, cost, brine, and consumptive-use footprint. Expect him to be a critical, caveating voice rather than a champion.

A win for them. A win is the basin credibly getting to balance -- use matched to a shrinking, climate-adjusted supply -- through cooperation and shared, equitable cuts (including honored tribal water and environmental flows), with the outcome documented in a clear, science-honest narrative he can tell. He 'wins' when a cooperation story turns out to be true and he can point to it as evidence against the water-war myth. He does NOT win if a shiny supply project lets users dodge conservation, or if numbers/claims outrun the underlying science.

Public record. Fleck's writings and public statements consistently advocate for market-based solutions like paying for conservation, and he promotes a collaborative approach to managing scarcity, which aligns with a conservation-focused agenda.

Position. Longstanding position rooted in dispossession, not high-volume river politics. The 120,840-acre Kaibab-Paiute Reservation sits on the Arizona Strip north of the Grand Canyon; the Tribe holds federal reserved (Winters) water rights to surface and groundwater in the Colorado River system but they remain UNQUANTIFIED. As of the most recent public reporting (Grist/ProPublica/High Country News, 2023), Kaibab is the ONLY federally recognized tribe in Arizona that has not yet filed a claim for its water. With ~400 members (~240 residents) and minimal resources, the Tribe faces a prohibitively expensive path: adjudicating Kanab Creek (the one waterway crossing the reservation), funding hydrology studies, and possibly interstate Supreme Court litigation. Tribal attorney Alice Walker frames it as 'about creating and sustaining that permanent homeland,' with the barrier being the 'complex, expensive steps.' Historical grievance is central: Mormon settlers appropriated Pipe Spring in the 1860s; a 1933 agreement splits Pipe Spring water in thirds (National Monument / Tribe / stockmen) and spring flows have declined sharply since the 1970s, with two springs ceasing discharge by 1999. The Tribe is a longstanding participant in Colorado River governance forums via the Southern Paiute Consortium (formed 1993 with the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah) in the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program, and has engaged on the Lake Powell Pipeline. Public stance on the broader river crisis (cuts, Basin renegotiation) is thin/unstated -- their fight is about first securing and funding a quantified right, not defending an existing large allocation.

On conservation. Cautiously interested but with a hard precondition. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is far more relevant to tribes with large quantified allocations; Kaibab has almost nothing to sell (~56 AFA) and an unquantified right, so they cannot participate meaningfully until their right is quantified. Likely reaction: 'quantify and fund our right first, then talk markets.' They could see a market as a future revenue path IF a settlement gives them a paper allocation larger than local use -- but they will be wary of any scheme that pressures small tribes to lease/forbear water they need for homeland development. Persuadable if the market design explicitly protects and even advances unquantified/small tribes rather than rewarding only large incumbents.

On solar+water. Most promising lever of the three, but engage carefully. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses two of their acute constraints: no capital for water-rights work/infrastructure, and no utility-scale energy base. Precedent among sister Paiute bands (Moapa's 250 MW plant) shows the model is culturally and legally feasible. Positive reaction likely IF: (1) funding can underwrite the hydrology studies, legal work, and water infrastructure they can't afford, (2) the Tribe retains sovereignty/ownership and gets durable revenue and jobs for a ~400-member community, and (3) siting respects cultural resources near the Grand Canyon/Pipe Spring and does not itself consume scarce local groundwater (dry-cooled/low-water). Opposition risk if it looks like an outside developer extracting land/water with the Tribe as a minor landlord. This is the clearest 'win-win' framing for them.

On reuse/desal. Low salience and skeptical. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a lower-basin/urban-supply play (coastal desal, metro reuse) with little direct benefit to a remote, high-elevation Arizona Strip reservation far from any desal source or major reuse system. They would likely view it as a supply-augmentation project for cities and big users, and be neutral-to-wary about whether it is used as political cover to avoid quantifying and funding tribal rights ('build desal instead of settling with us'). Persuadable only if paired with an explicit commitment that new-water supply frees senior/Basin water to settle and fund tribal claims like theirs, or if reuse funding is routed to on-reservation systems.

A win for them. A funded, quantified, legally secure water right that guarantees a permanent homeland -- achieved without ruinous litigation cost -- plus durable non-water revenue and reliable local water/energy infrastructure for their ~400 members. Concretely: outside capital and technical support that lets them file and settle their Kanab Creek/Winters claim; restored or replaced dependable domestic supply (Pipe Spring decline reversed or substituted); and a tribally owned solar+storage project that funds water work, creates jobs, and keeps sovereignty intact. A win is measured in security and self-determination, not acre-feet sold.

Public record. The tribe's public stance focuses on its own water rights and resource management, with no specific public record on broader basin-wide pay-for-conservation programs, large-scale solar on non-tribal lands, or desalination exchanges.

Position. LPWWA is a small, young (formed Nov 2007) rural water authority in southwest La Plata County, Colorado, created by the Animas-La Plata Water Conservancy District and the La Plata Water Conservancy District. Its mission is narrow: design, build and operate a rural domestic distribution system for a sparsely populated corner of the basin, serving 150+ subscribers with a Phase 2 goal of ~100 more. It is not a policy actor on the Colorado River crisis. There is NO public record of LPWWA taking a longstanding or recent position on Lake Mead/Lake Powell shortages, the post-2026 operating guidelines, or upper-vs-lower-basin allocation fights (marked unknown). Its water source is Animas-La Plata (A-LP) Project allocation water drawn from Lake Nighthorse, delivered via a ~30-inch raw-water pipeline and treated near Lake Durango. The A-LP project exists primarily to satisfy the settled water rights of the Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute tribes, both of whom sit on LPWWA's board (one voting member each). Its implicit posture: secure a firm domestic supply for an area historically short on reliable water, leaning on tribal/A-LP allocations and Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) / Southwest Basin Roundtable grant funding rather than on river-wide policy advocacy.

On conservation. Neutral-to-mildly-wary, not hostile. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is oriented toward large agricultural and municipal users who can fallow or curtail; LPWWA is a growing domestic system trying to ADD demand (Phase 2), so it is a marginal buyer of supply, not a seller. It has little consumptive use to monetize and would not want its A-LP/tribal allocation treated as sellable out from under future subscribers. It could warm to a market only if framed as a way to firm up its own supply or fund infrastructure. Low salience overall.

On solar+water. Most likely positive of the three, because this is fundamentally a grant-and-loan-funded entity that assembles capital from any willing source. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps directly onto its core need: money for pipeline extension, treatment capacity and Phase 2. It has no ideological objection to private/outside capital. Caveats: a new large industrial water user in the arid A-LP service area would raise local concern about competing for the same scarce Lake Nighthorse supply, and the tribes on its board would scrutinize any deal touching A-LP allocations. Engage on the 'funds water' half, keep the new-load water footprint modest and behind-the-meter on power.

On reuse/desal. Low relevance / likely indifferent. LPWWA is inland, high-desert, and far from any brackish or ocean source, so seawater desalination is not applicable. Large-scale reuse could matter only at a scale far above its ~150-subscriber system and would more plausibly be a Durango/regional undertaking. It would not oppose reuse in principle (more regional supply eases pressure on shared A-LP water) but it lacks the scale, capital and wastewater volume to be a participant. Marked largely unknown; no public statements exist.

A win for them. A win is a firmer, cheaper path to finishing Phase 2 and beyond: outside capital (grant, low-cost loan, or infrastructure-funding partnership) that lets them extend service to the additional ~100+ rural subscribers and shore up existing delivery without raising rates on a tiny customer base or taking on unsustainable USDA debt. Secondarily, anything that strengthens the reliability of their A-LP/Lake Nighthorse supply and keeps the tribes and Lake Durango Water Authority partnership in good standing. Success is measured in connected households and stabilized finances, not in policy influence over the wider Colorado River system.

Public record. As a small rural water provider, its primary focus is securing a reliable water supply for its customers, making it open to but not leading on broader basin-wide conservation or clean energy initiatives.

Position. The Las Vegas Tribe of Paiute Indians (Las Vegas Indian Colony + Snow Mountain Reservation, ~3,850 + ~3,800 acres in Clark County, NV; small enrollment, on the order of a few hundred members) is a federally recognized Southern Paiute (Nuwuvi/Tudinu, 'Desert People') nation whose ancestral territory includes the lower Colorado River valley and Mojave Desert. Its LONGSTANDING public posture on water is stewardship-and-sovereignty framed rather than allocation-politics framed: Chairman Benny Tso repeatedly invokes a 'seven generations' ethic, says managing water is 'part of our way of life,' and pushes for Indigenous representation in regional resource discussions. Operationally the tribe's water is GROUNDWATER, not a direct Colorado River apportionment: a 1996 Clark County settlement with the Las Vegas Valley Water District let the tribe pump up to ~2,000 acre-feet/yr from the Las Vegas Artesian Basin (roughly 10x its prior allotment, but far below its original ~40,000 af-yr claim). The tribe deliberately built the Las Vegas Paiute Golf Resort (three courses, opened 1995, at Snow Mountain) in part to put that groundwater to beneficial use so control would not revert toward the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) under Nevada 'use it or lose it' prior-appropriation doctrine. Southern Paiute peoples in the broader Great Basin (Goshute/Shoshone-led coalition) were prominent opponents of SNWA's now-defeated Las Vegas Pipeline groundwater-export project, so the regional Paiute alignment has historically been PROTECTIVE of local aquifers against big municipal extraction. The 2026 landmark Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (Navajo/Hopi/San Juan Southern Paiute) does NOT include this tribe; there is no public evidence the Las Vegas Paiute hold a quantified Colorado River mainstem right or a seat in the current Basin/Lower-Basin rulemaking. As of mid-2026 the tribe is in an expansion/economic-development mode (NuWu Cannabis marketplace + 110,000 sq ft grow, smoke shops, minimart, golf resort, possible hotel/conference center) and is openly willing to work with Clark County, the City of Las Vegas, NV Energy and SNWA to pass the Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act to expand its reservation.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but self-protective. A verified consumptive-use conservation market rewards actual water NOT used, which philosophically aligns with the tribe's 'seven generations' stewardship rhetoric and could reward it for efficiency on its golf resort and grow operations. BUT two frictions: (a) the tribe's beneficial-use of groundwater is precisely what shields its right from reverting toward SNWA, so any market that looks like 'stop using and lose control' will trigger the same defensive instinct that drove it to build the golf course in the first place; it will want ironclad assurance that conserved/leased water preserves, not erodes, its underlying right and sovereignty. (b) As a groundwater (not mainstem) holder it may not even be eligible for a Colorado River consumptive-use market, so its interest is more as a potential template/precedent-setter and as a party wanting tribal water sovereignty and lease authority affirmed broadly. Likely reaction: 'interested, but only if it strengthens tribal control and includes tribes at the design table.'

On solar+water. Most likely the WARMEST reaction of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto the tribe's current strategy: it is actively diversifying revenue, courting NV Energy and SNWA, seeking a reservation-expansion lands bill, and floating a hotel/conference center. Tribal land + sovereign siting authority + federal energy incentives make it a natural host/partner for a datacenter-adjacent solar+storage project, and 'funds water' addresses its stewardship narrative and its groundwater-sustainability exposure. Risks that make it persuadable rather than automatic ally: land-use and cultural-resource sensitivities (Snow Mountain and ancestral sites), insistence on genuine co-ownership/revenue rather than a lease-and-extract deal, and wariness of anything that increases regional groundwater/energy stress. Frame it as tribal-owned or co-developed with a dedicated tribal water-sustainability fund and it becomes a strong yes.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive, low salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a Lower Basin supply-augmentation play (e.g., helping SNWA/Nevada stretch its ~300,000 af Colorado River share via recycling and imported desal offsets). Because the tribe draws groundwater and sits inside the SNWA service region, anything that eases pressure on Southern Nevada's shared aquifers and reduces SNWA's incentive to reach for tribal or rural groundwater is indirectly GOOD for the tribe. It has little direct stake or cost exposure, so it is unlikely to lead on this. Watch-items that could turn it skeptical: brine/energy footprint, any desal/reuse infrastructure sited on or near ancestral lands, and cost pass-throughs. Expect a supportive-but-passive stance unless a project touches its land or aquifer.

A win for them. A durable win: (1) reservation expansion / permanent land protection at Snow Mountain enacted via the lands bill; (2) their groundwater right (~2,000 af/yr Las Vegas Artesian Basin) affirmed and future-proofed with no 'use it or lose it' exposure, ideally decoupled from needing a water-hungry golf course to defend it; (3) a new, tribally-owned or co-owned revenue stream, e.g., a solar+storage / datacenter-adjacent project on tribal land with a dedicated water-sustainability fund; (4) a formal seat and recognized Indigenous voice in Southern Nevada and Colorado River Basin water/energy decisions, advancing their stated 'seven generations' stewardship into actual governance influence. In short: more land, secured water sovereignty, diversified sovereign revenue, and a real seat at the table.

Public record. The Moapa Band of Paiutes, a related Southern Paiute group, has developed multiple utility-scale solar projects on their reservation land, indicating a favorable position toward such development.

Position. Leprino Foods is a privately held, Denver-headquartered dairy processor and the world's largest producer of mozzarella cheese. Its public identity on water is that of a conservation-forward corporate steward rather than a Colorado River advocate per se. Longstanding position (2017-present): its flagship Greeley, CO plant is a self-described 'net water producer' that returns roughly 30% more treated, temperature-corrected water to the Cache La Poudre River than it withdraws from Greeley's municipal system (about 600 acre-feet / ~600,000 gallons per day of clean water returned, enough for ~1,000-2,000 households). In 2020 Colorado water court granted Leprino a water right tied to the net volume it conveys to the Poudre after deducting municipal intake, and it licenses most recovered 'condensate of whey' byproduct water to the City of Greeley. Its Roswell, NM plant treats and reuses effectively all process water to irrigate adjacent feed cropland. Associate general counsel Erik Nielsen frames water as existential to the business ('It seems like you shouldn't be doing business in Colorado if you're not thinking really deeply about water'). CAVEAT ON BASIN GEOGRAPHY: Leprino's headline water assets are NOT physically in the Colorado River hydrologic basin. Greeley drains to the South Platte (Atlantic side); its California plants (Lemoore, Tracy) sit in the San Joaquin Valley on CVP/SWP supplies, not Colorado River water. Its genuine Colorado River exposure is INDIRECT and runs through the dairy feed supply chain (alfalfa, silage, corn), which is the single largest consumptive use of Colorado River water. No public evidence found of Leprino taking a direct stance on Colorado River allocation, Lower Basin cuts, Lake Mead/Powell operations, or the post-2026 guidelines. Mark that specific dimension UNKNOWN.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / persuadable-to-ally. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with Leprino's existing brand as a company that measures, recovers, and returns water and that already holds a quantified water right for water it 'produces.' If the market credibly pays for verified saved consumptive use, Leprino could benefit two ways: (a) monetize or get credit for its Greeley net-water-producer volumes and Roswell reuse, and (b) support feed-shed dairies/farmers who participate, stabilizing its milk supply. Main hesitation: it will want rigorous, defensible measurement (it is litigation- and water-court-sophisticated via its GC's office) and will resist anything that looks like greenwashing or that exposes it to double-counting claims. Engage on verification integrity and it leans yes.

On solar+water. NEUTRAL-TO-CAUTIOUSLY-POSITIVE, lower salience. Leprino already brands itself on energy + water sustainability (its Greeley plant won CDPHE and U.S. Dairy sustainability awards for conserving/producing electricity alongside water). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would be attractive if it lowers the plant's energy costs or supplies clean power to its energy-intensive evaporation/refrigeration load, and if the water funding flows to its milkshed. Risk/friction: hyperscaler data centers compete with dairy processing for the same grid, land, and water in places like the interior West and Texas, so Leprino may view large hyperscaler water demand as a competitor for local supply. Net: supportive if structured as co-benefit to its plants and feed-shed; wary if it reads as data centers crowding out agricultural/industrial water.

On reuse/desal. STRONGLY ALIGNED IN PRINCIPLE - reuse is literally Leprino's core competency. The company's entire water story is advanced recovery and reuse of condensate-of-whey water treated to stream quality. It would credibly champion large-scale reuse and be a natural reference case/partner. Desalination is more distant from its operations (its plants are inland, not coastal) and it has no public position; likely indifferent-to-mildly-positive if desal augments Southwestern supply and takes pressure off the river feeding its milksheds, but sensitive to the energy cost and brine/discharge permitting that could complicate its own wastewater regime. Summary: enthusiastic on reuse, neutral/unknown on desal.

A win for them. A win for Leprino is: (1) formal recognition and, ideally, monetizable credit for verified water they already produce/recover (Greeley net-return volumes, Roswell reuse) without exposing them to double-counting or greenwashing risk; (2) a more secure, lower-cost milkshed - feed-shed dairies and farmers kept economically viable through conservation payments or supply augmentation so Leprino's local milk supply and plant utilization stay stable; (3) reputational leadership as the reference case for industrial water reuse and 'net water producer' operations, reinforcing a brand they already invest in and market; (4) lower energy costs / clean-power supply for their energy-intensive plants if bundled with the water program. The ideal outcome lets them say 'we are part of the solution' with defensible numbers, protects their inputs, and asks nothing that jeopardizes their private, low-political-profile posture.

Public record. The company's Greeley, CO facility is a net water producer, returning more water to the local river than it takes in through extensive water reuse and reclamation processes.

Position. Lorelei Cloud is Vice Chairman of the Southern Ute Indian Tribe (Colorado) and, since May 2025, the first Indigenous chair of the Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) in its history; she was already the first tribal member ever appointed to the board (2023). She has held leadership roles with the Ten Tribes Partnership, the Water and Tribes Initiative, The Nature Conservancy Colorado, and the Indigenous Women's Leadership Network. Longstanding positions, grounded in the record: (1) Tribes must have a real seat at the Colorado River negotiating table, 'not just at a side table.' She frames her CWCB role as reconciliation and 'a seat at the table that we've been wanting for such a long time.' (2) Deep distrust of federal follow-through: 'We're tired of broken promises.' The Colorado Ute settlement (1988 Act; Animas-La Plata) delivered paper rights but the federal government has not funded the infrastructure to wet them, and $20M in Southern Ute irrigation grants plus Ute Mountain Ute pipeline funding were caught in a 2025-2026 federal funding freeze (only ~15% of the tribe's 175 miles of canals are in good condition; full repair ~$126M). (3) Water as sacred, not merely a commodity: 'When we pray, we always pray about water.' (4) She personally championed a compensated tribal forbearance / paid-conservation program so the tribe could be paid for NOT developing its unused Lake Nighthorse/ALP water; Reclamation ruled it ineligible for IRA 'Bucket 2' conservation funding in Sept 2024 because unused water yields no 'measurable, new' system addition. Cloud, visibly emotional: 'We had something on the table until Wednesday when that changed. Sorry, this is emotional.' She and Colorado's congressional delegation (Polis, Hickenlooper, Bennet) want that rule changed. (5) On post-2026 guidelines (current rules expire end of 2026): she and the six Upper Basin tribes secured a 2024 MOU with the Upper Colorado River Commission mandating bi-monthly tribal consultation for the first time in the commission's ~76-year history, and back principles that compensation frameworks must NOT preclude paying tribes for foregoing unused/undeveloped quantified rights. (6) Pro-collaboration in tone: describes Colorado as 'ahead of many other states' on including tribal voices and says 'we're making strides,' i.e. a bridge-builder rather than a scorched-earth litigant.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE, conditionally and enthusiastically, IF the market is designed to pay for foregoing unused or undeveloped quantified tribal rights (compensated forbearance), because that is precisely the program Cloud personally put on the table and lost to Reclamation's eligibility rules. A 'verified consumptive-use conservation market' is her cause if 'verified' is defined to credit tribal forbearance, not to exclude it. The danger: most verification regimes (like IRA Bucket 2) require a measurable REDUCTION in current use to prove 'new' water, which structurally locks out tribes whose water is unused. If the market repeats that design she flips to opponent-of-this-version and calls out the double standard. So she is a natural anchor ally for a conservation market, but only one whose accounting recognizes senior unused tribal rights as legitimate, sellable conservation. She will also insist the tribe, not a broker, captures the value, and that participation is voluntary and does not waive rights or set precedent against future development.

On solar+water. Likely CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / persuadable, leaning positive. The tribe already runs energy businesses (oil and gas via the Growth Fund) and directs energy/project revenue toward water infrastructure, so a model where private capital funds solar+storage AND funds water infrastructure maps onto how the tribe already thinks (revenue-to-water). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds tribal water infrastructure (the $126M canal problem, Pine River irrigation, pipelines to reach ALP water) directly addresses her top operational pain: paper rights with no federal money to wet them. Persuadable rather than ally because: (a) she will scrutinize water CONSUMPTION of the datacenter/energy load itself, given water-as-sacred framing and basin scarcity; solar+storage that is low-water is a strong fit, water-hungry cooling is a hard no; (b) sovereignty and revenue capture must run through the tribe, on tribal terms, not extractive lease deals reminiscent of past federal broken promises; (c) siting on or near tribal land must respect cultural/environmental values. Frame it as tribal-owned or tribal-revenue-sharing infrastructure that funds the water buildout the federal government failed to.

On reuse/desal. Likely NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-SUPPORTIVE but lower salience, and watchful. Large-scale reuse/desalination that augments Lower Basin or municipal supply can relieve pressure on the system and, in principle, reduce demands on senior Upper Basin/tribal water, which she would welcome. But there is no public evidence she has staked out a position on desal/reuse, so this is partly unknown. Her likely concerns: (1) that 'new water' from desal/reuse not become an excuse to keep ignoring unfunded tribal infrastructure or to deny tribes conservation compensation ('we solved supply, so tribal claims can wait'); (2) energy and water intensity and environmental/cultural impacts of large desal; (3) that benefits flow to downstream urban users while Upper Basin tribes still lack basic clean-water access. She would support it if paired with, not substituted for, meeting federal obligations to tribes. UNKNOWN on specifics; mark as inferred from her broader equity-and-obligation framing rather than a stated position.

A win for them. A win for Lorelei Cloud and the Southern Ute Tribe: (1) The tribe gets PAID, on a durable and verified basis, for foregoing unused/undeveloped quantified water rights, correcting the Bucket 2 denial and ending the double standard; compensation that does not waive or diminish the right to develop later. (2) Real dollars flow to wet the paper rights: funded, completed water infrastructure (Pine River irrigation, ALP/Lake Nighthorse delivery, clean drinking water) so decades of federal broken promises finally get resolved by capital that actually shows up. (3) Tribal sovereignty and revenue capture: the tribe owns or shares in the upside of any energy/water deal on its terms. (4) A permanent, binding seat in post-2026 governance where tribal forbearance and rights are structurally recognized, not discretionary. (5) Statewide credibility for her CWCB chairmanship, proving tribal inclusion produces collaborative, basin-wide solutions rather than conflict. In short: money for conservation of unused senior water, funded infrastructure to use the rest, and durable governance power, without surrendering the right to develop.

Public record. As the first Indigenous chair of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, she champions tribal water rights, conservation, and integrating Indigenous knowledge into modern water management.

Position. LADWP is the largest municipal utility in the US and a member agency of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD). Its Colorado River exposure is INDIRECT: LADWP does not hold a Colorado River entitlement of its own. It buys imported supplemental water from MWD, and roughly 40-50% of LA's supply in recent years has come from MWD via the Colorado River Aqueduct and the State Water Project's California Aqueduct (FY2016-2020 mix: ~48% LA Aqueduct/Owens Valley, ~41% MWD imports, ~9% local groundwater, ~2% recycled). Its longstanding, publicly stated position is to REDUCE dependence on imported (including Colorado River) water. Under the 2019 LA Green New Deal / Sustainable City pLAn, Mayor's Executive Directive 5, and the 2020 Urban Water Management Plan, LA has codified goals to cut imported water purchases by 50%, source 70% of water locally, recycle 100% of wastewater for beneficial reuse, and capture 150,000 AFY of stormwater, all by 2035. Its flagship is Operation NEXT / Pure Water Los Angeles, retrofitting the Hyperion plant with advanced treatment to produce up to ~170 MGD (~190,000 AFY) of purified recycled water for indirect potable reuse (groundwater replenishment), potentially meeting up to a third of city demand. On the river crisis itself LADWP mostly speaks through MWD, which has backed the Lower Basin conservation plan, funded ~$55M/yr in efficiency programs, and stored ~1.5M AF in Lake Mead via Intentionally Created Surplus. LADWP's own public framing (e.g. its 2026-27 below-average snowpack forecast and 'proactive water management') treats imported-supply volatility and rising MWD costs as the core risk driving local-supply investment.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but somewhat indirect. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates mainly at the entitlement-holder level (MWD, IID, agricultural districts), where LADWP is a buyer of MWD's blended product, not a direct seller of river water. LADWP would likely support a credible, MRV-backed market because (a) it lowers system risk on the MWD supply it depends on, (b) it aligns with LA's own demand-reduction and efficiency goals, and (c) it could let MWD stretch supplies and moderate the imported-water price escalation LADWP is exposed to. Skepticism to expect: LADWP will care that 'verified' means truly additive, permanent, and not double-counted against ICS storage MWD already claims, and it will resist any structure that raises its MWD bill without commensurate reliability. It is unlikely to be a lead protagonist here; it will follow MWD's posture.

On solar+water. Most likely genuinely interested, given LADWP is BOTH a water and a power utility. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits LADWP's two mandates at once: it is aggressively decarbonizing its power fleet (100% clean energy targets) AND financing a multi-billion-dollar local water program. Data-center load growth in/near its service territory is a live commercial issue for the power side. LADWP would welcome outside (hyperscaler) capital that de-risks or co-funds Operation NEXT / Pure Water LA or offsets rate pressure on ratepayers. Cautions: LADWP is a public, ratepayer-owned utility with strong local-hire, environmental-justice, and governance expectations (Board of Water and Power Commissioners, City Council oversight), so any deal must clear public-benefit, transparency, and procurement scrutiny, and must not be seen as subsidizing private data-center water/power at ratepayer expense. Framed as ratepayer-protective co-financing of local supply and clean power, this is the offer most likely to move LADWP.

On reuse/desal. Strongly favorable on reuse; lukewarm/skeptical on ocean desalination. Large-scale REUSE is literally LADWP's core strategy: Operation NEXT / Pure Water LA and Hyperion 2035 are among the largest recycled-water programs in California, and 100% wastewater reuse by 2035 is codified city policy with mayoral backing. LADWP would be an enthusiastic partner and likely a national reference case for reuse. DESALINATION is a weaker fit: LA has deprioritized ocean desal in favor of recycling, stormwater capture, and groundwater cleanup, which are cheaper, less energy-intensive, and face less coastal/environmental permitting resistance in California. LADWP is unlikely to lead on desal but would not necessarily oppose others' desal if it relieved pressure on the shared MWD/Colorado system. Public evidence for its desal stance is thin, so treat the anti-desal read as inference from its revealed reuse-first priorities rather than an explicit stated position.

A win for them. A win is cheaper, more reliable, more drought-proof local supply that lets LA hit its 2035 self-sufficiency goals faster and at lower ratepayer cost, while cutting exposure to rising and volatile MWD/Colorado River import prices. Concretely: outside capital or a market structure that de-risks Operation NEXT / Pure Water LA (accelerated Hyperion advanced treatment, groundwater replenishment, stormwater capture), a moderated MWD import bill, and demonstrable public benefit (rate stability, local jobs, EJ improvements, clean-energy co-benefits on the power side). Being able to point to LA as the national model for large-scale potable reuse and for a hyperscaler-financed water+power buildout is itself a reputational win the utility and City Hall would value.

Public record. LADWP is aggressively pursuing a 100% clean energy future by developing large-scale solar-plus-storage projects like Eland and local solar, while also implementing 'Operation NEXT' to recycle 100% of available wastewater.

Position. Squillace is one of the most cited academic voices on Colorado River law reform, and his positions are longstanding and consistent. Core diagnosis: the basin structurally over-consumes (use exceeds average supply), so any durable fix must permanently reduce consumptive use, not paper over it. Specific published/testified positions: (1) Close the basin to most new appropriations, including tributary groundwater, as a preliminary step ('A Bold Plan for Saving the Colorado River,' Brown Journal of World Affairs, 2023). (2) Redefine water rights around measured CONSUMPTIVE USE rather than the traditional 'beneficial use' diversion standard, requiring states to modernize prior-appropriation law on a common timeline. (3) Adopt a NEW flexible interstate compact modeled on the Great Lakes Compact (2008), with a central oversight authority and side agreements with Mexico and the 30 basin tribes; he has said 'we can't just keep appropriating water' and that reallocation must make room for tribal rights. (4) On money: 'I would hate to see us waste our money on temporary things when we know we have a permanent problem' -- he wants federal dollars spent on PERMANENT reductions (e.g., paying farmers to permanently switch to lower-consumption crops/practices, retiring an alfalfa cutting late in the season, which he estimates could save ~845,000 AF/yr in the Lower Basin). (5) On water markets: he is a long-standing DEFENDER of water markets ('Don't Blame Water Markets for Trouble With Western Rivers,' Water Deeply, 2017) -- his position is that markets are not the problem, the failure to protect the PUBLIC INTEREST is; he treats water as public property held for public benefit ('Restoring the Public Interest in Western Water Law,' Utah L. Rev. 2020). His 'Marketing Conserved Water' (Environmental Law, 2016, with Anthony McLeod) lays out the mechanics he trusts: trade only true saved consumptive use, protect historical return flows, and set consistent, transparent, verifiable consumptive-use measurement standards so buyers/sellers have certainty and third parties aren't harmed.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE, and this is the single best-aligned item. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the mechanism he has advocated for a decade. He co-authored the playbook: trade real, measured saved consumptive use; protect return flows; enforce transparent measurement. His conditions are the ones to design toward: (a) rigorous, independent verification that only ACTUAL saved consumptive use (not paper water or diverted-but-returned water) is monetized, (b) explicit return-flow / third-party (junior downstream, environmental) protection, (c) a public-interest guardrail so the market doesn't just move water to the highest bidder at the expense of the river or communities. Give him those and he becomes an active ally and validator. Skip verification or return-flow protection and he becomes the most articulate critic in the basin.

On solar+water. SKEPTICAL / PERSUADABLE, and this is the highest-risk item -- treat with care. There is no public statement from Squillace specifically on a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-plus-water buildout (UNKNOWN on the exact scheme). But his framework predicts his reaction: he is wary of NEW industrial/data-center demand on an over-allocated system and of 'temporary' fixes financed to preserve consumption rather than cut it. He will ask the hard questions: Does this ADD net consumptive demand to a basin that must shrink demand? Is the water contribution permanent and additional, or a one-time offset that greenwashes a new thirsty load? Does it serve the public interest or privatize a public resource for a private tech buyer? Framing matters enormously. Pitched as 'clean energy that also finances permanent ag demand retirement and puts saved consumptive use back in the river, with no net new consumptive draw' he could be won. Pitched as 'we fund water so data centers can take Colorado River supply' he opposes. The energy/decarbonization angle alone will not move him; the water math will.

On reuse/desal. CAUTIOUS / LIKELY SECONDARY. No direct quote from Squillace on desalination or large-scale reuse (UNKNOWN on specifics), so mark this partly inferred. His consistent hierarchy puts DEMAND REDUCTION first and treats supply augmentation as at best complementary and at worst a distraction that lets the basin avoid the permanent cut it needs ('waste our money on temporary things when we know we have a permanent problem'). He would likely view reuse more favorably than desal (reuse reduces net consumptive draw and fits a public-interest, efficiency frame), while treating ocean desal (energy-intensive, expensive, often a Lower Basin offset that enables continued over-use) as a costly last resort rather than a solution. He is not a categorical opponent of new supply, but he will resist it being sold as a substitute for reforming water law and cutting consumptive use.

A win for them. A win for Squillace is structural, not transactional. He wins if the effort (a) establishes rigorous, transparent, independently verified consumptive-use measurement as the currency of Colorado River management -- exactly what he has argued for; (b) demonstrates a real, replicable conservation market that produces PERMANENT reductions and protects return flows and third parties, proving markets can serve the public interest; and (c) moves the basin toward modernized water law and a durable, tribe-inclusive governance framework rather than another temporary fix. If a hyperscaler-financed or reuse project is structured so it funds permanent ag demand retirement and adds no net consumptive draw, he can claim it as proof that private capital can be harnessed to the public interest -- a headline that fits his scholarship. He also wins reputationally when his framework (consumptive use + public interest + new compact) is visibly adopted by real programs and cited as the basis for reform.

Public record. As an academic expert, he has consistently advocated for major reforms to Colorado River law, focusing on conservation, market-based solutions, and addressing the structural deficit.

Position. Meta is a hyperscale data center operator, not a formal party to Colorado River governance, so it has no compact position, negotiating role, or water-rights litigation posture. Its 'positions' are corporate sustainability commitments and the operational choices it makes as a large new consumptive-water and power load in the Lower Basin. LONGSTANDING/CORPORATE POSITIONS: (1) 'Water positive by 2030' - Meta pledges to restore MORE water than it consumes in the watersheds where it operates, via three pillars: maximize on-site efficiency, fund watershed restoration projects, and publish water data transparently. Since 2017 it reports funding/supporting 40+ restoration projects across nine watersheds; in 2024 operational projects returned ~1.59 billion gallons; at full implementation it projects 2.9-3.4 billion gallons/yr restored. (2) 100% renewable energy / net-zero framing for its facilities, matched via new-build solar+storage PPAs rather than existing grid supply. (3) In Arizona specifically Meta says it supports ~12 regional water conservation/restoration projects expected to put hundreds of millions of gallons back into AZ watersheds, including an N-Drip flood-to-drip irrigation retrofit with the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) projected to restore ~64.9M gallons/yr (30-52% field savings in pilot), plus Colorado River and Salt River basin restoration. (4) Efficiency-first cooling design: Mesa uses a closed-loop, multi-pass recirculating system and free-air (outside-air) cooling for more than half the year to cut evaporative use; Meta's newest 1-GW AI data center design (first online later 2026) moves to closed-loop liquid cooling with dry coolers, i.e. effectively zero-water evaporative cooling. On siting/water sourcing, Meta's public stance is that it secures supply without new stress on the river: at Mesa it purchased long-term storage credits (Colorado River water banked underground, partly via SRP's Gila River Indian Community settlement supply) and transferred them to the City of Mesa, and structured deals to 'acquire water rights and transfer them' rather than claim new depletions. Meta does NOT publicly take adversarial positions on conservation, reuse, or basin governance; it positions itself as a responsible corporate water steward and courts local goodwill.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE / natural buyer and funder. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to a purpose-built instrument for Meta's water-positive strategy: it already pays for third-party-verified consumptive-use REDUCTIONS (N-Drip flood-to-drip with CRIT, agricultural efficiency, watershed restoration) and needs credible, additional, auditable 'wet water' savings to offset its own consumption and defend its 2030 claim. A market that produces rigorously measured consumptive-use savings would let Meta scale procurement, standardize verification (replacing bespoke project-by-project deals), and buy political cover in the exact basin where it operates. Meta becomes an anchor demand-side participant if the market (1) certifies REAL, additional, verifiable consumptive-use savings (Meta is reputationally exposed to 'paper water' / greenwashing accusations and needs defensible accounting), (2) lets it claim credits toward its water-positive goal and specifically within the Colorado/Salt watersheds it draws from, (3) channels dollars to farmers and especially to tribes (CRIT/Gila River) in ways that read as community benefit, and (4) has credible governance so purchases can't be attacked as offset theater. Risk/limit: Meta will resist any framing that treats its data centers as the market's villain or that mandates cuts rather than letting it BUY savings; it prefers voluntary, reputation-enhancing procurement to regulatory obligation.

On solar+water. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE / likely lead adopter and co-funder. This is essentially Meta's revealed strategy already: it self-funds large new solar+storage (Eleven Mile 300 MW + 300 MW battery, West Line, Brittlebush; ~450-600 MW total) to hit 100% renewable, AND separately funds ~12 AZ water restoration/conservation projects. A structured hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water bundles two things Meta is doing piecemeal into one vehicle, which it would find attractive because it (a) locks in clean firm-ish power for AI load growth, (b) generates the water offsets its 2030 commitment and social license require, and (c) lets it point to a single, legible 'we added energy and water' story instead of defending consumption. Meta has the balance sheet to anchor such a buildout and a strong incentive to be seen leading it. Conditions for enthusiasm: the water funded must be genuinely NEW or verified-additional (not accounting-only), the energy must be incremental clean supply it can claim, tribal and community partners should share the upside, and Meta will want branding/first-mover credit and control over how contributions are counted toward its goals. It will be cool only if the structure forces obligations without letting it claim the offsets, or if costs are loaded onto it disproportionately versus peers (Google, Microsoft, Amazon, TSMC) also siting in AZ.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE, with a clear preference order. Reuse (recycled/reclaimed municipal water and on-site closed-loop recirculation) is squarely aligned with Meta's efficiency-first design: it already runs closed-loop multi-pass cooling, is moving to zero-evaporative liquid cooling, and benefits directly if AZ expands reclaimed-water availability for industrial cooling (reduces its potable/Colorado-River draw and its exposure to the 'drinking water for servers' attack). Meta would welcome and likely help fund reuse infrastructure that lets its campuses run on non-potable supply. Large-scale desalination (brackish groundwater or a Sea-of-Cortez/coastal import augmenting the basin) is viewed positively but more as system-level new supply than as something Meta directly operates: it eases the regional scarcity that threatens Meta's license-to-operate and the durability of its storage credits, and Meta could co-fund it as part of a water-positive/community-benefit package, but it is capital-intensive, slow, energy-hungry (which ironically raises Meta's own power/clean-energy stakes), and carries concentrate-disposal and cost-allocation questions Meta would not want pinned on data centers alone. Net: reuse = eager near-term adopter/funder; desal = supportive of regional new supply and a potential co-funder, but prefers it framed as shared regional infrastructure, not a data-center tax.

A win for them. A durable, publicly defensible outcome in which Meta (1) keeps its \$1B+ Mesa/AZ investment operating with secure, affordable, low-controversy water and clean power for AI-load growth, (2) can credibly claim its 2030 water-positive and 100%-renewable goals in the very basin where it operates, backed by third-party-verified consumptive-use savings and real new supply rather than contested offsets, (3) converts its water/energy spending from bespoke, one-off projects into scalable market participation where it is an anchor buyer/funder with first-mover credit, (4) neutralizes the 'data centers are draining the desert' narrative by visibly restoring more water than it consumes and funding new solar+storage and reuse/desal infrastructure that benefits the whole region, and (5) does so in partnership with tribes (CRIT/Gila River), farmers, cities (Mesa) and SRP so the goodwill and license-to-operate are broad and durable. In short: secure water and clean power for AI growth, an airtight sustainability story, and community/tribal goodwill - purchased through verified conservation, new supply, and co-funded buildouts rather than forced cuts or reputational damage.

Public record. Meta is funding multiple water conservation and restoration projects in the Colorado River Basin, including with the Colorado River Indian Tribes and in New Mexico, to meet its goal of being water positive by 2030.

Position. MWD is the largest urban water wholesaler in the U.S., serving ~19 million people across six SoCal counties, and is the single largest municipal user of Colorado River water in the Lower Basin. The Colorado River Aqueduct (CRA), which MWD owns and operates, supplies roughly half of MWD's imported water and about 20% of all water used in Southern California. Longstanding position: MWD holds high-priority Colorado River rights largely through its 'sharing' arrangements with agricultural districts (Palo Verde Irrigation District, Imperial Irrigation District via the Quantification Settlement Agreement) rather than a large direct priority entitlement, so it is structurally exposed to cutbacks. In 2003 MWD lost ~800,000 AF of surplus river water, roughly halving its river supply, which drove a decades-long pivot to storage ('we're the squirrels of the water system'), conservation, and local supply. Recent public posture (2023-2026): MWD openly accepts that it, like all users, must reduce Colorado River use, and has become one of the most active PARTICIPANTS in demand-management deals rather than a holdout. It co-funded and helped design the 2023 Lower Basin system conservation package, is paying Palo Verde Valley farmers to fallow ~26,000 acres (nearly 30% of valley farmland) to add ~117,000 AF/yr to Lake Mead through 2026, and secured ~$160M in federal Reclamation funding to conserve up to 269,000 AF into Lake Mead by 2031. It runs $55M/yr in water-efficiency/turf-replacement programs (FY2025-26). On post-2026 operations, MWD (via Colorado River Resources manager Bill Hasencamp and former GM Deven Upadhyay) is working toward a seven-state consensus, warns against federal imposition / reversion to pre-2007 annual allocations (which destroys its ability to plan), and has publicly signaled 'growing interest in market-based tools' and interest in monetizing unused water in wet years to build drought flexibility. Local-supply strategy centers on the ~$8B Pure Water Southern California recycling program (~150 MGD, ~half a million homes, EIR certified Feb 2026, first water ~2032) as its primary hedge against river cuts.

On conservation. Strongly favorable / likely ally. MWD is already the model buyer in a consumptive-use conservation market: it funds Palo Verde and Lower Basin system-conservation fallowing, has paid for Lake Mead 'ICS' credits for years, and its leadership has publicly voiced growing interest in market-based tools and monetizing unused water. A verified, measured consumptive-use market is squarely aligned with how MWD already operates and would let it buy down its river exposure with dollars rather than absorb involuntary cuts. Concerns MWD will raise: (1) rigorous, independent measurement/verification of actual consumptive-use (not just diversion) reductions so it isn't paying for paper water; (2) durability and legal defensibility of transferred savings under the Law of the River and the QSA; (3) protection of its priority and its ICS/storage credits; (4) avoiding programs that trigger fallowing backlash in ag communities (hence its $8M Palo Verde community-improvement fund). It would want the market to reward, not strand, its existing conservation investments.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested; persuadable but not a natural champion. Two hooks: (a) MWD's CRA pumping is enormous and historically tied to Hoover/Parker hydropower that is now at risk from low reservoirs, and MWD already curtails pumps as grid demand-response and has a Climate Action Plan targeting carbon neutrality by 2045, so hyperscaler-funded solar+storage that lowers or hedges its pumping energy cost is attractive. (b) A structure where datacenter capital also funds water (conservation, recycling, offset purchases) fits MWD's pattern of leveraging outside federal/state dollars ($160M Reclamation, $80M state, federal recycling grants) to stretch ratepayer money. Skepticism to expect: MWD is a deliberate public utility, not a fast-moving deal counterparty; it will scrutinize whether new datacenter LOAD in the basin worsens the water/energy squeeze it is trying to escape, whether commitments are durable, and whether the arrangement respects its governance and procurement rules. Best framed as reducing its energy exposure and adding a funding stream, not as enabling new consumptive demand.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: enthusiastic champion. Large-scale reuse IS MWD's flagship strategy via the ~$8B Pure Water Southern California program (EIR certified Feb 2026), which it frames as its central hedge against Colorado River and State Water Project cuts. Any policy or capital that de-risks or co-funds recycling is a direct win. Desalination: supportive but more measured and pragmatic. MWD has historically subsidized member-agency local supply including desal (e.g., its Local Resources Program and past willingness to subsidize Poseidon/Huntington Beach output for Orange County), but the 2022 Coastal Commission rejection of Poseidon on cost, energy, and marine-life grounds reinforced MWD's revealed preference to prioritize recycling over energy-intensive, permit-fraught ocean desal. Expect MWD to back reuse first, treat seawater desal as a case-by-case, high-cost backstop, and weigh desal's heavy energy footprint against its own decarbonization and pumping-cost concerns.

A win for them. Securing predictable, plannable Colorado River supply through negotiated, market-based demand management (not federally imposed annual allocations), while protecting its water priority, its Lake Mead ICS storage credits, and the low-cost Hoover/Parker hydropower that runs the aqueduct. Concretely: a verified conservation market it can buy into to hedge cuts; outside (federal/state/private) capital that stretches ratepayer dollars and de-risks the $8B Pure Water recycling program; reduced or hedged CRA pumping-energy cost; and member-agency water rates that stay politically defensible. In short, replace involuntary shortage with purchasable, durable, well-measured flexibility.

Public record. The district is advancing the Pure Water Southern California project, one of the world's largest water recycling programs, which will produce a new, sustainable local water supply.

Position. Microsoft is a large hyperscale data center operator in Arizona's West Valley (Goodyear and El Mirage campuses in the West US 3 Azure region, launched June 2021). Its 279-acre Goodyear campus was estimated to consume up to ~56 million gallons of drinking water/year at full build-out, and Microsoft initially redacted exact figures from city records as proprietary, drawing local scrutiny in a state whose supply is squeezed by a shrinking Colorado River and declining groundwater. Public-facing, Microsoft has staked out an aggressive water-stewardship posture: a 2020 pledge to be 'water positive' by 2030 (replenish more than it consumes in stressed basins), a target of 40% water-use-intensity reduction by 2030 (25% achieved by 2025), and a 2024 next-generation closed-loop, direct-to-chip 'zero-water cooling' design that it says all new datacenters adopt globally. It reports ~90% of its 2025 fleet on low/zero-water cooling and a 23% YoY water-efficiency gain at Phoenix datacenters in FY25. Crucially for Arizona, a Microsoft spokesperson said the company will build only zero-water datacenters in Arizona going forward, and its existing water-cooled AZ facilities consume net water only above 85F. In a March 2023 development agreement with Goodyear, Microsoft agreed that buildings 4 and 5 must be air-cooled and committed over $40M to wastewater infrastructure ($36M toward a $90M treatment-plant expansion, $5M sewer-line assurance, $800K for a city coordinator). Its replenishment portfolio in the over-allocated Colorado River basin focuses on urban leak detection/repair (AI-enabled, via FIDO Tech), agricultural demand reduction, wetland/oxbow restoration and infiltration, plus a 'Water United' multi-partner collaboration. On energy it matches 100% of consumption with renewables (met 2025), anchored AZ demand with a 20-year PPA off First Solar's 150 MW Sun Streams 2, and is deploying a global multi-GW solar/storage build-out (Brookfield >10.5 GW framework, Qcells 12 GW).

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE and an early adopter. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is almost purpose-built for Microsoft's water-positive-by-2030 replenishment accounting: it needs high-integrity, additional, measurable volumes in stressed basins, and this is exactly the Colorado River basin where it already funds leak-detection and ag-demand-reduction projects. The main friction is price and MRV credibility (they will demand rigorous additionality and third-party verification to defend the claim publicly), and possibly a preference to originate/co-design rather than be a pure buyer. Would want to avoid any structure that implies its consumptive footprint is larger than its zero-water-cooling narrative admits.

On solar+water. Likely the STRONGEST fit of the three, and plausibly a lead/anchor participant. Microsoft is already spending tens of billions on solar+storage (Brookfield >10.5 GW, Qcells 12 GW, First Solar AZ PPA) and matches 100% of load with renewables, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds Colorado River water lets it stack its two flagship commitments (100% renewable + water-positive) into one branded vehicle. It answers both the grid-strain and water-strain critiques of AI data centers simultaneously. Caveats: it will want governance/attribution control, clean additionality on the water side, and structures that ride on committed capex rather than new obligations.

On reuse/desal. Likely CONDITIONALLY SUPPORTIVE but more selective. Microsoft already prioritizes recycled/non-potable water elsewhere (74% Quincy, 79% San Antonio, 99% Singapore) so reuse aligns with its playbook. But in Goodyear it found local recycled/reclaimed supply cost-prohibitive due to high total dissolved solids, and it responded by moving to air/zero-water cooling rather than treating water, which reduces its own direct demand for large-scale reuse/desal at its sites. It would more likely support basin-scale reuse/desal as a replenishment-portfolio investment or policy position (augmenting overall basin supply) than as an operational input it depends on. Large desalination's energy intensity and cost, plus its distance from the Lower Basin, make it a lower-priority, longer-horizon interest than conservation or solar+water bundles.

A win for them. A win is verifiable, low-controversy progress toward water-positive-by-2030 concentrated in the Colorado River basin where they operate and are scrutinized, purchased/co-funded through instruments rigorous enough to survive audit and NGO/press scrutiny, that (a) protects their Arizona license to operate and expansion runway, (b) generates a defensible 'we replenished more than we used in this stressed basin' claim, and (c) ideally bundles with their solar+storage and renewable-PPA commitments so it extends existing capex rather than adding standalone cost. Bonus: a first-mover, co-branded role that sets the hyperscaler standard and preempts tougher mandatory regulation.

Public record. Microsoft has a corporate goal to be water positive by 2030 and powers its Arizona data centers with 100% renewable energy, including a large power purchase agreement from a solar plant.

Position. As NM State Engineer (2022-2024), Hamman's public record on the Colorado River crisis centered on: (1) NM's structural vulnerability - he said the state 'really feels the shortages' because it lacks the large reservoirs of other basin states, so any Lower Basin / Lake Powell shortfall hits NM water users with little buffer; (2) minimizing economic pain from cuts - his defining frame was 'the dilemma is looking at how we can reduce demand with as soft a blow as possible,' i.e. demand reduction is necessary but must protect ag and rural communities; (3) collaborative, negotiated solutions over litigation - 'I'm optimistic that we're going to sort through some of these more sticky problems with a good collaborative solution.' As NM's representative among the Upper Division States (CO, NM, UT, WY), his office signed onto the July 2022 5-Point Plan responding to Commissioner Touton's call to action, which included studying the feasibility of a temporary, voluntary, compensated Demand Management program. He chaired Gov. Lujan Grisham's Water Policy and Infrastructure Task Force (report Feb 2023) and drove the 50-year state water plan; his stated near-term priorities were relief to water users, Rio Grande Compact debt to Texas, and tribal water settlements. His deepest fights were on the Rio Grande (Texas v. New Mexico), not the Colorado, but he consistently treated interstate compact obligations and negotiated interstate cooperation as paramount. No public record of him opposing conservation markets; the Upper Basin demand-management framing he operated within is compensated-conservation-friendly in principle, tempered by NM's worry that it lacks storage to bank saved water.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but with a hard technical caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns directly with his 'reduce demand with as soft a blow as possible' philosophy and with the Upper Basin demand-management concept NM already signed onto in 2022 - compensated, voluntary reductions are exactly the tool he framed as the humane path. His caveat, repeatedly implied in his public statements, is that NM lacks the storage to hold and later use conserved water, so he would press hard on 'verified' meaning genuine, measured, additional wet-water savings that actually improve system conditions rather than paper transfers, and on whether saved water can be protected from downstream re-appropriation. Also sensitive to third-party and rural-community impacts (fallowing hollowing out farm towns). Persuadable-to-ally on this if verification and additionality are rigorous.

On solar+water. Likely CAUTIOUSLY OPEN, evaluated on the water math not the megawatts. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure fits his emphasis on funding (he did press appearances specifically on water AND funding) and on relief for water users. He would welcome outside capital for NM water systems, tribal water projects, and reuse. But as a career water engineer he would scrutinize the data-center water-consumption footprint (cooling demand) and insist net water benefit be real and verified, not offset accounting. New industrial load in a basin that 'feels the shortages' would draw his skepticism unless the package is clearly water-positive. Persuadable; the funding-for-water hook is the wedge, the consumptive footprint is the objection.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE, arguably his most natural fit. His task force and 50-year water plan work explicitly pushed new supply and infrastructure; NM has an active brackish-groundwater desal and produced-water/reuse policy agenda that overlapped his tenure. Reuse and desalination create new water without taking from over-allocated compact-governed rivers, which directly answers his structural-shortage worry. Expect support conditioned on cost, energy, and brine-disposal practicality, and on regulatory fit. Ally-leaning on this axis.

A win for them. A win for Hamman is a durable, negotiated, collaboratively-reached solution that reduces NM's Colorado River / compact exposure with 'as soft a blow as possible' to farmers, rural communities, and tribes - real verified wet-water savings and genuinely new supply (reuse/desal) backed by outside funding, achieved without litigation and without NM bearing disproportionate cuts relative to other basin states. Reputationally, being the engineer who set up NM's 50-year water future and protected water users during the crunch is his legacy frame. Anything that brings money and durable supply to NM water systems and tribal projects while honoring compact obligations lets him say the collaborative path worked.

Public record. As New Mexico's former State Engineer, he facilitated a 10-year lease of the Jicarilla Apache Nation's water to the state for conservation and endangered species, showing support for compensated conservation, but his record on large-scale solar or desalination is less defined.

Position. The Moapa Band is one of 30 federally recognized tribal nations in the Colorado River Basin and among ~22 tribes with recognized rights to Colorado River system water (tribes collectively ~3.2 MAF/yr, ~22-26% of basin supply). Its water footprint is concentrated in the Muddy River (historically 'the Moapa') and the interconnected Lower White River Flow System (LWRFS), which feeds Lake Mead. Longstanding public position: protect senior/instream water rights and the endangered Moapa dace at the Warm Springs headwaters against over-pumping. The tribe was a party to the 2006 Memorandum of Agreement (with MVWD and USFWS) tying groundwater pumping to spring-flow protection, and approved a 2016 MOU with Moapa Valley Water District to protect future supply, grant well easements, and mutually protect each party's rights in any adjudication (partially waiving sovereign immunity to resolve disputes cooperatively). The tribe has raised concerns in the Coyote Springs / LWRFS proceedings, aligning with the Nevada State Engineer's move (upheld by the Nevada Supreme Court in 2024) to manage six basins conjunctively and cap combined pumping (~8,000 AF/yr) to preserve the dace. Separately, the tribe is one of the most aggressive tribal renewable-energy developers in the basin: the 250 MW Moapa Southern Paiute Solar Project (First Solar, 2017, LADWP 25-yr PPA) was the first utility-scale solar on U.S. tribal land, followed by Arrow Canyon (EDF, 200 MW + 75 MW storage, 2022-23), Eagle Shadow Mountain (Arevon, 300 MW, 2023), and the Chuckwalla portfolio (up to 700 MW announced 2022). Public posture is pragmatic and development-forward: use tribal land and legal leverage to build revenue and jobs while defending the water base.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive as a potential revenue stream layered on the tribe's already commercial approach to its assets (it monetizes land via solar leases and has shown willingness to trade access/rights via MOUs). Because the tribe's mainstem consumptive use is modest and much of its value is in-place instream/environmental flow (dace protection) rather than diverted ag, the volume it could sell into a market may be limited, and it will insist that any market not erode senior rights or Warm Springs flows. Expect strong interest paired with hard conditions: rigorous verification, tribal sovereignty over its own accounting, no precedent that weakens unquantified/senior claims, and protection of instream/ecological water. Reid-era political relationships and prior deal-making (LADWP PPA, MVWD MOU) suggest they will engage constructively if the structure respects tribal control.

On solar+water. Most favorable of the three. This maps almost exactly onto what the tribe already does successfully: leasing reservation land for utility-scale solar+storage with external offtake (LADWP) and using the proceeds for jobs and revenue. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure would extend a proven, popular model and diversify offtake toward data-center load. Likely an eager partner, provided lease economics are strong, tribal members get construction/O&M jobs and training, siting avoids culturally sensitive and dace-critical areas (they insist on cultural/environmental/archaeological surveys), and the 'funds water' component is structured to protect Muddy/LWRFS flows rather than enable new consumptive pumping. This is the clearest near-term win-win and the best lead offer.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive, lower salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination that augments Lower Basin supply reduces pressure on Lake Mead and, indirectly, on the Muddy River system the tribe depends on, which the tribe would welcome in principle. But desal is geographically and financially distant from the tribe's core interests, offers little direct revenue or land-lease upside, and could be viewed warily if framed as justification for continued regional groundwater over-pumping. Expect polite support if it demonstrably relieves stress on their watershed and endangered species, indifference otherwise, and mild opposition only if it is used to license more LWRFS extraction.

A win for them. A durable new revenue and jobs stream from their land and water assets that does NOT compromise senior/unquantified water rights or the Warm Springs / Moapa dace ecosystem: expanded solar+storage leases with data-center-grade offtake, funded water infrastructure that protects Muddy River/LWRFS flows, optional participation in a conservation market on tribal terms, formal recognition and legal certainty of their rights in any adjudication, and a genuine seat at the post-2026 Colorado River negotiating table historically denied to tribes.

Public record. The Tribe hosted the first utility-scale solar power plant on tribal land in the U.S. and has multiple large solar-plus-storage projects on its reservation.

Position. MVWD is the culinary water provider for Overton, Logandale, Glendale, Moapa and the adjacent Moapa River Indian Reservation, serving ~8,500 residents ~50 miles NE of Las Vegas. Its supply is not diverted Colorado River water: it pumps carbonate-aquifer groundwater and artesian spring water (Baldwin, Jones, MX Well, Arrow Canyon) from the Warm Springs / Lower White River Flow System (LWRFS), which feeds the Muddy River that flows into Lake Mead. So MVWD is hydrologically a CONTRIBUTOR at the head of Lake Mead rather than a Colorado River offtaker, but it is bound into the same over-appropriated basin governance. Longstanding position: defend its junior/senior groundwater rights and operational certainty. In the Order 1309 / LWRFS proceedings its counsel (Gregory Morrison) called the State Engineer's draft language 'ambiguous and overbroad,' worried the 8,000 afa system-wide cap and senior-rights protection could impair MVWD's junior rights even when senior holders (tribe, SNWA, Coyote Springs Investment) were not fully using allocations, and invoked Western 'use it or lose it' doctrine. MVWD was a party on the appeal that led to the Jan 2024 Nevada Supreme Court decision upholding conjunctive management of surface and groundwater and Order 1309. Despite litigating the details, MVWD is a signatory to the Muddy River Recovery Implementation Program MOA (with SNWA, USFWS, Moapa Band of Paiutes, Coyote Springs Investment) protecting the endangered Moapa dace, and is an operational PARTNER of SNWA: it conveys SNWA's Coyote Springs Valley water into Lake Mead through MVWD's own transmission/distribution system and lets SNWA use MVWD's Jones Spring right to support the Warm Springs Natural Area. In July 2024 MVWD, SNWA and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints closed a 'landmark' deal in which MVWD bought 2,329.55 afa of senior Warm Springs groundwater rights from the Church for $6M ($3M state grant + $3M zero-interest 15-year SNWA loan at $200K/yr). Net stance: pragmatic, science-accepting on the groundwater-surface connection, but fiercely protective of supply reliability and rate affordability for a small rural ratepayer base.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but not the natural first mover. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is oriented to Colorado River mainstem/Lake Mead offtakers; MVWD is upstream of Lake Mead and its water is groundwater, so it does not obviously hold marketable Colorado River consumptive-use credits. It could see two angles: (1) if reduced groundwater pumping / spring-flow protection in the LWRFS translates into measurable Muddy River inflow to Lake Mead that could be monetized as system water, MVWD would want a share and would insist any such accounting NOT come at the cost of its own delivery reliability or 'use it or lose it' rights; (2) it would be wary that a conservation market becomes another vehicle for senior holders (SNWA, tribe) to claim its junior water. Net: interested if the market pays for verified spring-flow/Muddy River contributions and explicitly protects small-district supply, skeptical and defensive if it looks like reallocation. Persuadable, needs the accounting designed so a small contributor benefits rather than being squeezed.

On solar+water. Most likely the strongest positive lever. This is a small, cash-poor district already habituated to funding supply and infrastructure with outside money (state grants, SNWA loans, WaterSMART). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure fits a region that already hosts major tribal solar next door (250MW First Solar Moapa Southern Paiute, 300MW Eagle Shadow Mountain, EDF 200MW+375MWh storage on the Moapa River Reservation) and has the land, transmission proximity and solar resource. MVWD would welcome capital for its $18.6M capital plan (storage tank, new well, pipeline, meters) and rate relief for ratepayers. Caveats it will raise: any new data-center or industrial load must NOT add consumptive water demand on the capped LWRFS aquifer, and benefits must flow to the district/ratepayers and coordinate with the Moapa Band of Paiutes (who own the reservation land and the solar revenue). If structured as water-neutral or water-positive (funding efficiency/storage in exchange for siting energy), MVWD is an ally on this specific path.

On reuse/desal. Lukewarm to skeptical at its own scale, open as a regional beneficiary. MVWD is a small groundwater/spring system with limited wastewater volume, so on-site large-scale reuse or desalination is likely oversized and unaffordable for it directly, and there is no seawater nearby (any desal would be brackish groundwater treatment). It would engage if (a) someone else funds it and (b) it augments or protects the LWRFS supply or offsets demand so the district is not forced to over-pump the capped aquifer. Regionally, MVWD benefits from anything that relieves SNWA/Las Vegas pressure on the shared basin and on Lake Mead, since less regional demand eases the reallocation risk to its junior rights. Persuadable as a downstream beneficiary of grant-funded reuse, not a self-financing adopter of desal.

A win for them. A win is durable, affordable water security for ~8,500 rural ratepayers plus outside capital that clears its infrastructure backlog without a punishing rate increase. Concretely: (1) confirmed, protected access to its permitted LWRFS/Warm Springs supply (its ~7,200 afa Arrow Canyon rights plus the new 2,329.55 afa senior rights) with no further erosion from Order 1309 reallocation; (2) grant/third-party funding that covers more than the current 41% of its $18.6M capital plan (Muddy River Narrows storage tank, new Arrow Canyon well, pipeline and meter replacement) so rate increases are minimized or avoided; (3) a water-neutral or water-positive energy/data-center arrangement that pays the district and its ratepayers (mirroring the tribe's solar-revenue model next door) without adding consumptive demand to the capped aquifer; and (4) preserved good-partner standing with SNWA, the Moapa Band of Paiutes and the Muddy River dace-recovery program. In short: keep the water, protect the rights, get someone else to pay for the pipes and tanks, and hold rates down.

Public record. The district has an approved water conservation plan and is investigating a secondary system for non-potable water to save 17% of its potable water, but faces challenges with agricultural land fallowing by other entities impacting its service area.

Position. Molson Coors' flagship Coors brewery in Golden, CO has drawn on Clear Creek since 1873 and holds senior Clear Creek water rights; the company frames its water use as 'diversion heavy, but depletion light' (Director Ben Moline). The Golden brewery diverts ~2.7 billion gallons/yr from Clear Creek (~782M gal into products, ~2B gal process water), and cleans and returns ~95% of process water to the creek, also treating much of Golden's municipal wastewater. The company invested 'several hundred million dollars' in the G150 modernization (150th anniversary) expected to save ~80M gallons/yr from end-2024, targets a 22% water-efficiency improvement vs 2016 baseline (water-to-product ratio ~2.8 hl/hl at large breweries), and hit its 2025 watershed-restoration goal a year early, restoring ~3.5 billion gallons to stressed watersheds (Upper South Platte in CO and Trinity River Basin in TX). It is a founding member of the Clear Creek Watershed Foundation (orphaned-mine cleanup) and runs 'Cheers to Our Rocky Mountain Water' ($50K donated + up to $50K public match). IMPORTANT GEOGRAPHIC NUANCE: Clear Creek is a South Platte tributary, NOT the Colorado River, so the Golden brewery's direct withdrawals are outside the Colorado River basin. Its Colorado River exposure is INDIRECT: Front Range municipal supply (Denver Water and neighbors) imports ~50% of its water from Colorado River headwaters via transbasin diversion, so basin-wide shortage and any curtailment of transmountain diversions would tighten the regional water market the brewery sits in. No public evidence found of Molson Coors taking an explicit position on Lower Basin cuts, the post-2026 operating guidelines, or interstate Colorado River allocation fights.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / PARTICIPANT. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns tightly with their existing 'diversion heavy, depletion light' identity and their quantified watershed-restoration program (3.5B gal restored, hit early). They already buy/fund watershed benefit voluntarily. They would likely engage as a corporate funder/buyer of verified consumptive-use reductions IF measurement is rigorous (they value auditable volumes for ESG/marketing) and IF it does not expose their own senior Clear Creek rights to forced reallocation. Risk: they will resist anything that treats their senior water rights as a market asset to be curtailed rather than protected. Persuadable-to-ally on a well-designed voluntary market.

On solar+water. LIKELY NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-POSITIVE, LOW SALIENCE. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is not core to their business, but they run large energy-intensive breweries with their own decarbonization goals, so cheaper clean power plus a water co-benefit is attractive if it lowers their energy cost or advances renewable targets. They are unlikely to lead or fund it and could be wary of being associated with data-center water demand narratives (which compete with their 'good water steward' brand). Best positioned as a potential offtaker/partner for clean power at the Golden or Fort Worth sites, with the water fund as a bonus they can co-message. Persuadable but not a champion.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / CAUTIOUS. Molson Coors already practices large-scale water reuse (returns ~95% of process water, treats municipal wastewater) and would be technically comfortable with reuse. It would likely SUPPORT reuse that augments regional/municipal supply reliability, since that de-risks its Front Range backup water. Desalination is far less relevant to an inland Rocky Mountain operation and raises cost/energy/brine concerns; they are unlikely to fund large desal directly and could quietly worry about energy-cost and 'industrial water' optics against their pure-mountain-water brand. Net: supportive of reuse framed as supply resilience, indifferent-to-skeptical on large desal.

A win for them. A win is protecting the long-term reliability and brand equity of 'Rocky Mountain / Clear Creek water' at low cost and high story value: verified, third-party-audited water-restoration credits in the Colorado River system they can bank toward existing replenishment/efficiency goals and marketing ('Cheers to Our Rocky Mountain Water'), continued positive standing with Golden and Colorado water regulators, insulation of their Front Range municipal backup supply from shortage-driven cost and curtailment, and modest, PR-generating capital outlays rather than open-ended operational risk.

Public record. The company is investing hundreds of millions in modernizing its Golden brewery to save millions of gallons of water annually and has a global commitment to reduce water use and invest in renewable energy.

Position. MVIC is a mutual ditch (nonprofit) company formed in 1920, delivering water to individual shareholders irrigating roughly 37,500 acres in the Montezuma Valley of southwest Colorado. It holds among the most senior water rights on the Dolores River (priority dates 1885/1888), decreed for direct flow of roughly 538.5 cfs and encompassing the first ~795 cfs of the Dolores River; MVIC controls on the order of ~130,000 acre-feet of Dolores River Basin water annually, stored in Narraguinnep, Groundhog, Totten, and (via its senior rights) McPhee reservoirs. Longstanding stance is fiercely protective of senior water rights and local control. MVIC willingly surrendered half its direct-flow rights in 1977 to enable creation of McPhee Reservoir / the Dolores Project, showing it will deal when the local benefit is clear. It has repeatedly litigated to defend its rights, including against the Dolores Water Conservancy District (2010). MVIC sat on the legislative subcommittee for the proposed Lower Dolores River National Conservation Area and, alongside Montezuma County and the San Juan Basin Farm Bureau, opposition centered on fear that a federal NCA designation could cloud or create litigation risk to its water rights. Its own materials stress that 'it is important to conserve water' and it actively promotes efficiency (NRCS sprinkler-nozzle upgrades, drought-tolerant crop selection consultations), so it is not anti-conservation per se; it is anti-anything that threatens rights or local control.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but guarded. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive if it is voluntary, compensated, temporary, and comes with airtight no-injury/no-forfeiture protection so participating in it never erodes their senior priority. They already do efficiency work (NRCS nozzle upgrades, crop selection) and surrendered rights in 1977 for local benefit, so paid, verified conservation is within their comfort zone. The hard constraints: they will resist anything that looks like a permanent transfer, that could be cited later to reduce their historical consumptive-use quantification, or that hands control to state/federal actors. Expect them to demand shareholder-by-shareholder voluntariness and legal indemnification of their rights before touching a market.

On solar+water. Likely the most appealing of the three, if structured right. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water gives them exactly what they lack: non-farm revenue that decouples shareholder income from snowpack, plus capital for system modernization. Land- and canal-adjacent solar leasing and datacenter-funded water infrastructure fit their local-control instincts as long as MVIC/shareholders own the deal and it does not require surrendering water rights. Concerns will be siting on productive irrigated land, water use by the datacenter/cooling itself competing with agriculture, and any covenant that ties up their water rights. Frame it as diversified revenue + infrastructure grants that protect farming, not replace it.

On reuse/desal. Largely indifferent to mildly skeptical, and lowest-priority for them. Large-scale reuse/desalination is geographically and economically remote from an inland high-desert ditch company on the Dolores; it does not touch their senior-rights buffer or their drought exposure directly. They would support it only insofar as it takes pressure off the broader Colorado River system and reduces the odds of top-down curtailment reaching their seniority. They will not fund or champion it, and would oppose any version financed by reallocating or 'buying down' upper-basin agricultural water, which they would read as a threat to rights. Neutral-to-positive if it is someone else's water and someone else's money; wary if it becomes a lever to pry loose ag water.

A win for them. A win is stronger, more reliably-filled senior rights plus new non-farm revenue that reduces shareholder exposure to drought, all without ceding priority or local control. Concretely: guaranteed no-forfeiture / no-injury legal protection for any water they conserve or lease; cash to shareholders and to system modernization (lining, piping, measurement, sprinkler upgrades) that stretches every acre-foot; diversified revenue so a 30% water-short year no longer means a 30% income hit; and defense of the seniority that buffers them at low flows.

Public record. The company has participated in federally-funded system conservation programs to leave water in upstream reservoirs, indicating a willingness to engage in paid conservation if the terms are favorable.

Position. {'summary': 'NPS is a resource-protection and public-access agency, not a water-rights holder or water utility. Its Colorado River stake is threefold: (1) protect the Grand Canyon river ecosystem below Glen Canyon Dam (sediment/sandbars, beaches, endangered native fish, riparian habitat) via managed dam releases; (2) maintain recreational access and the visitor economy at Lake Powell (Glen Canyon NRA) and Lake Mead, both of which collapse as reservoirs fall; (3) protect scenic, wilderness, cultural and dark-sky values in its units. It does not consume Colorado River water in any material quantity, so it is not a party to the interstate allocation fight, but it is a formal cooperating/commenting agency on federal operations.', 'longstanding': ["Co-manager, with USFWS and Reclamation, of the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program (AMP) and the 20-year Long-Term Experimental and Management Plan (LTEMP) governing dam releases through the Grand Canyon (296 river miles, Glen Canyon Dam to Pearce Ferry). NPS's institutional position for decades has been that dam operations should include High-Flow Experimental (HFE) releases to rebuild sandbars/beaches and mimic pre-dam flooding, and flows that protect the endangered humpback chub (downlisted to threatened partly on the strength of the Grand Canyon population).", 'Consistent advocacy that ecosystem and native-fish flows be treated as a hard requirement, not a residual: NPS/USFWS joint input to the post-2026 process pressed for operational language requiring flows that benefit native fish and Grand Canyon sandbars unless it is physically impossible to pass the water through the dam. The reach hosts ~10 federally listed species and 4 endangered/threatened endemic fish.', 'Active concern about smallmouth bass and other nonnative predators establishing below the dam as warm water is released at low reservoir levels; NPS supports experimental flows and management to suppress invasives threatening humpback chub.'], 'recent': ["Since ~2021 NPS has been in continuous crisis-adaptation mode at Glen Canyon NRA: it has spent well over $100 million extending and relocating boat ramps, docks and river-runner takeouts as Lake Powell fell. By April 2026 only 2 of Lake Powell's 11 launch ramps were operable; Wahweap Main and Halls Crossing ramps went inoperable in 2025; Bullfrog marina was relocated to deeper water. Long-term low-elevation ramp projects (Antelope Point, Stanton Creek, Hite North) are still in planning and won't be ready for summer 2026.", "NPS is a commenting agency on Reclamation's near-term operations SEIS and the post-2026 guidelines. It filed scoping/comment input flagging protection of listed species, sediment/sandbar flows, and recreation-access impacts of falling reservoirs.", 'NPS has publicly warned visitors and concessioners (Aramark, Antelope Point Holdings) of continued marina and access disruption for the 2026 boating season, and is collaborating with Utah state agencies to sustain access.', "Its downstream operational nightmare is the Glen Canyon Dam river outlet works (bypass tubes): below minimum power pool (3,490 ft) water can only pass through 4 jet tubes with ~15,000 cfs combined capacity; those tubes suffered cavitation damage during the 2023 low-reservoir HFE, and Reclamation now judges they can be safely operated only ~24 ft above dead pool (3,370 ft). NPS's Grand Canyon ecosystem and any downstream delivery depend on this fragile plumbing."]}

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market keeps more water in the system, which is directionally good for NPS because higher reservoir elevations preserve recreation access at Powell/Mead and reduce the risk of falling below the fragile bypass-tube regime that jeopardizes Grand Canyon releases. But NPS will be neutral-to-wary about WHERE conserved water lands: if a market simply reallocates saved water to other consumptive users or shifts it downstream past Glen Canyon Dam, it may not raise the elevations that protect park access or guarantee the sandbar/native-fish flows NPS needs. NPS's support hinges on the market crediting or protecting ecosystem and recreation flows (system/reservoir storage, HFE water, chub-protective flows), not only enabling user-to-user transfers. NPS won't lead or fund such a market, but as a cooperating agency it would likely endorse a well-designed, verified one that measurably shores up in-system storage and does not weaken flow protections.

On solar+water. Mixed and location-sensitive; persuadable to supportive off-park, guarded on-viewshed. NPS has a stated sustainability posture (Green Parks Plan, Climate Friendly Parks, existing solar at Grand Canyon visitor centers) and would welcome new water made available to the basin that reduces pressure on reservoirs and river flows. The upside it cares about is the water, not the megawatts. The friction is scenic/dark-sky/cultural: NPS aggressively protects Grand Canyon's International Dark Sky status, natural viewsheds, wilderness character and cultural resources, and would formally oppose or seek mitigation for solar+storage or transmission sited within park units or their sightlines. Verdict: broadly supportive of a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water IF it is sited outside park viewsheds/dark-sky zones and if the water benefit is real and reaches in-system flows/storage; a NEPA/Section-106 review and viewshed/lighting fight is likely for any nearby infrastructure.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, largely as a beneficiary rather than an actor. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply and relieves demand on the Colorado River is favorable to NPS because it can slow reservoir decline and protect river flows the Grand Canyon ecosystem and park recreation depend on. NPS has no direct role in building or paying for such projects and no water demand of its own to satisfy, so its engagement is as a resource-protection commenter: it would want assurance that the freed-up water actually stays in-system (raising Powell/Mead or protecting managed releases) rather than being redirected to growth, and that any coastal/inland desal or brine-disposal infrastructure does not sit in or affect a park unit. Net: a quiet, conditional ally to reuse/desal that demonstrably reduces river withdrawals.

A win for them. A win for NPS is water that stays in and moves through the system: reservoir elevations high enough to keep Lake Powell and Lake Mead recreationally accessible and out of the danger zone near minimum power pool / dead pool, and reliable managed releases through Glen Canyon Dam that sustain Grand Canyon sandbars, beaches, riparian habitat and endangered native fish (especially humpback chub, kept ahead of smallmouth-bass predation). Concretely: any intervention that raises or stabilizes storage, funds or protects HFE and ecosystem flows, relieves capital pressure on NPS's endless ramp/marina chase, and is sited to avoid harming park viewsheds, dark skies and cultural resources. NPS wins when the crisis is de-escalated without park ecosystems or public access being used as the shock absorber.

Public record. The NPS's Colorado River Management Plan's primary purpose is to conserve park resources, which aligns with and is supported by upstream conservation efforts that increase flows and protect ecosystems in parks like the Grand Canyon.

Position. Longstanding grievance: the Navajo hold some of the most senior (Winters, 1908) rights on the Colorado River yet ~30-40% of homes lack running water, and non-tribal farmers/cities have used unclaimed tribal water 'for free' for over a century (former AG Ethel Branch: water 'stolen for over a century'). The Nation lost Arizona v. Navajo Nation at SCOTUS (2023) seeking federal enforcement (Gorsuch dissent: 'Try again'). Core current position (Nygren administration): quantify and fund delivery of Navajo water NOW. In May 2024 the Navajo Nation Council unanimously approved, and President Buu Nygren signed, the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (with Hopi + San Juan Southern Paiute), the largest tribal water settlement in U.S. history (~$5B federal ask; ~$1.75B for a Lake Powell pipeline). As of mid-2026 the settlement is STALLED in Congress: Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming (Upper Basin) oppose the cross-basin leasing provisions, and cost concerns were raised (Sen. Murkowski, Interior). Nygren's rebuttal: 'We shouldn't be punished for being in two basins.' The Nation frames leasing to Phoenix-area cities as a temporary, self-limited tool to finance its own distribution infrastructure, not a permanent water-market play. Separately holds ~700,000 AF/yr recognized in NM/Utah (81,500 AF Utah via the 2022 Navajo Utah settlement, $220M federal) plus large unresolved AZ claims; across NM/AZ/UT tribes divert only ~half their entitlement.

On conservation. Cautiously positive to neutral, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market could pay the Nation for water it cannot yet physically deliver, converting stranded senior paper rights into cash to fund distribution infrastructure , directly aligned with Nygren's 'fund delivery now' priority and with the settlement's own leasing/System Conservation logic. BUT the Nation will be wary of: (a) anything that looks like permanently forgoing rights rather than temporary, self-limited transactions; (b) mechanisms that let Upper Basin states or cities lock in continued free use of tribal water; (c) sovereignty , they will insist on tribal control of price, term, and buyer, not a state-administered pool. Persuadable if the market explicitly respects tribal seniority, is opt-in, time-limited, and routes revenue to Navajo infrastructure.

On solar+water. Most likely NET POSITIVE and the strongest wedge , but politically sensitive. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits three Navajo priorities at once: replaces lost coal jobs/revenue, monetizes the freed NGS water and existing transmission, and pays for water delivery. The Nation is already courting exactly this (Painted Desert Solar, carbon credits, right-of-way revenue, DOE tribal data-center track). Caveats that make it persuadable-not-automatic: data-center water consumption is a live community concern (Gallup/Teraplex backlash in Navajo Times), solar jobs don't match coal headcount, and the Nation will demand equity/ownership and long-term revenue share, not just land leases and rights-of-way. A structure where the hyperscaler funds water infrastructure and the Nation retains an ownership stake and water-use guardrails is close to an ideal offer.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, low-priority in practice for their own footprint. The Nation backs the federal water-infrastructure package that funds recycling/reuse/desalination ($8.3B), and reuse is relevant locally (data centers using reclaimed water). But desalination is geographically distant from the reservation (no coast; brackish groundwater is niche), so it reads mainly as a basin-wide supply-augmentation tool that could relieve pressure on the shared river and reduce competition for Navajo water. Reuse/recycling for community and industrial (data-center) supply is genuinely useful to them. Expect endorsement of these as part of a portfolio, but not as a substitute for delivering their own settled river water , they will resist any framing that says 'the basin builds desal, so tribes don't need their full allocation.'

A win for them. A win = wet water in homes plus durable revenue, on Navajo terms. Concretely: (1) Congress ratifies the Northeastern Arizona settlement with cross-basin leasing intact and the ~$5B (incl. ~$1.75B Lake Powell pipeline) funded; (2) a financing mechanism (conservation-market payments and/or hyperscaler-funded solar+water) that pays the Nation for its senior water and funds last-mile distribution so the 30-40% without running water get connected; (3) replacement of lost coal jobs and the ~$40M/yr revenue via tribally-owned solar+storage and data-center deals with equity stakes and water guardrails, not just land leases. The through-line: recognition of and payment for their senior rights, tribal control over any transaction, and delivery infrastructure funded by someone other than the Nation's thin budget.

Public record. The Navajo Nation has approved multiple large-scale solar energy projects on its lands, including a 750 MW project, to create economic opportunities and move towards energy independence after the closure of the Navajo Generating Station.

Position. The Navajo Nation Water Rights Commission (NNWRC) is the Nation's public-facing advocacy and negotiating body for water, operating under the banner 'Securing Navajo Water Rights Through Public Advocacy' across Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Longstanding position: the Nation was excluded from the 1922 Colorado River Compact and every major operating agreement since, yet ~26-30% of Navajo residents still lack reliable access to clean running water. The Commission frames this as a justice and survival issue, not merely an allocation dispute. Its central, defining priority is ratification and funding of the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (NAIWRSA) covering the Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe, and San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe, reintroduced in the 119th Congress as S.953 / H.R.2025 (2025) after failing to pass in 2024. Under the settlement the Navajo Nation would secure roughly 48,300 acre-feet/year of Colorado River water in Arizona (~44,700 AFY Upper Basin + ~3,600 AFY Lower Basin), plus rights in the Little Colorado, Gila, and groundwater, with ~$5 billion in federal funding including a ~$1.7-1.75B pipeline from Lake Powell required by 2040. A load-bearing provision lets the Navajo and Hopi LEASE unused water off-reservation (likely to Phoenix-area cities) to help pay for infrastructure until on-reservation demand is met. The four Upper Basin states (CO, NM, UT, WY) are stalling the deal specifically over that leasing/basin-crossing provision. On the river crisis broadly, the Commission names 'climate change, drought, and competing water claims' as the top threats to Navajo rights, is actively commenting on the post-2026 operating guidelines (2007 Interim Guidelines, 2019 DCP, and 2023 measures all expire Dec 31 2026), and insists the ~30 basin tribes have a seat at the table this time. Historically the Nation has entered voluntary shortage-sharing arrangements and states it works 'within what Mother Nature provides,' so it is not reflexively opposed to conservation as a concept.

On conservation. Cautiously positive / persuadable, with hard guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market monetizes water the Nation cannot yet physically use, which is economically similar to the off-reservation leasing revenue the Nation is already fighting to preserve. The Nation has a track record of voluntary shortage-sharing and explicitly wants revenue streams to fund delivery infrastructure, so payment for verified, temporary, non-forfeiting conservation is attractive IN PRINCIPLE. But the reaction is conditional: (1) it must not trigger 'use it or lose it' forfeiture or weaken senior priority; (2) it must be structured so participation is voluntary and reversible; (3) it cannot become a backdoor that lets downstream cities/states permanently capture tribal water or set precedent against the leasing rights they are defending. Framed as tribally-controlled, revenue-generating, and rights-protective, this is a likely ally issue; framed as states buying down tribal claims, it becomes an opponent issue.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical, high due-diligence. The Nation has a deep grievance memory here: Navajo land and water historically powered neighboring states (Navajo Generating Station, coal, the pumps that moved CAP water) while Navajo homes lacked power and running water. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water infrastructure directly addresses the two things the Nation needs most (revenue + delivery capital) and fits its post-coal economic-transition needs. It would be received well IF: the water funding is real, additive, and tribally governed (not a token offset); land/energy leases carry sovereignty-respecting terms and local jobs; and it does not repeat the extractive 'resources leave, benefits leave' pattern. Expect the Commission to scrutinize who controls the water, whether it competes with or complements the settlement, and whether the datacenter load itself competes for scarce regional water. Persuadable-to-ally if the water dollars are concrete and the Nation holds governance.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-supportive but lower priority for them directly. Large-scale reuse and desalination are basin-supply-augmentation plays that mostly benefit downstream Lower Basin cities; the Nation's core problem is delivery infrastructure to remote communities, not aggregate basin supply. The Commission would likely support reuse/desal to the extent it takes pressure off the shared river (reducing the shortage-sharing burden that falls on juniors and on tribes) and to the extent any augmented supply or the political capital it frees up is paired with tribal delivery funding. It would oppose or stay cold if reuse/desal is used as a rationale to deprioritize or delay the settlement ('cities solved their own supply, so tribal claims can wait'). Net: mild ally on basin-supply grounds, indifferent on direct benefit, watchful that it not be used to sideline them.

A win for them. A win is 'wet water,' revenue, and respect: (1) NAIWRSA ratified and fully funded (~$5B) with the Lake Powell pipeline built, so their ~48,300 AFY becomes physically deliverable and ~26-30% of residents without running water get it; (2) the off-reservation leasing right preserved intact, giving the Nation a durable, self-controlled revenue stream and defeating the Upper Basin states' precedent objection; (3) a permanent, respected seat in post-2026 and future basin governance so they are never again negotiated around; (4) any new mechanism (conservation market, hyperscaler-funded water/energy) that adds tribally-controlled revenue and delivery capital WITHOUT forfeiting seniority or setting adverse precedent. A partner who helps deliver those, especially the funding and the defense of leasing rights, converts them from persuadable to durable ally.

Public record. The Nation is actively pursuing large-scale solar and battery storage projects on its lands and is a key party to a major water rights settlement that includes provisions for compensated conservation.

Position. NTUA is the multi-utility enterprise of the Navajo Nation (chartered 1959), operating electric, water, wastewater, natural gas, communications, and solar generation across the 27,000-sq-mi reservation in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Its Colorado River posture is defined by scarcity of delivered water, not surplus: roughly one-third of homes on the Navajo Nation lack running water, and NTUA runs the water-hauling/loading points and 92 water systems that keep those households supplied. Deputy GM Rex Kontz (39-yr tenure, honored 2026) has publicly framed the crisis in human terms, noting many older residents may not live to see running water in their homes. NTUA itself has issued voluntary water-conservation/restriction requests to customers during shortages, so it already lives the demand-side reality. Institutionally, NTUA is the on-the-ground infrastructure builder/operator that the Nation relies on to translate water into taps. The Nation's overarching legal-political win is the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (signed by the three tribes 17 Jul 2024; AZ Gov. Hobbs signed 19 Nov 2024), authorizing ~$5.0-5.1B in federal funds for delivery infrastructure incl. the iina ba-paa tuwaqatsi pipeline from the Colorado River. As of July 2026 the settlement is STALLED in Congress, blocked by the four Upper Basin states (CO, NM, UT, WY) over the off-reservation water-leasing provision the tribes need to help fund infrastructure. NTUA's institutional interest aligns with the Nation: secure firm wet water, get infrastructure funded, and preserve monetization tools (leasing) that pay for pipes. NTUA is also mid-energy-transition after the 2019 closure of the Navajo Generating Station and Kayenta Mine (~$40-50M/yr in lost Nation revenue and ~1,000 jobs), pivoting hard into solar (Kayenta I+II ~55MW; first tribally owned utility-scale solar in the U.S.; new USDA PACE ~$100M+ for >30MW solar+storage for ~40,000 customers).

On conservation. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE, but as a beneficiary/operator rather than a seller of its own water. A verified consumptive-use conservation market matters to NTUA mainly through the Nation's settlement economics: the tribes' plan explicitly relies on LEASING water (incl. off-reservation, to Phoenix-area growth) to fund infrastructure, and a transparent, verified market for consumptive-use / conserved water gives that monetization a legitimate price signal and precedent. NTUA would welcome a market that (a) pays the Nation for water it forgoes or conserves and channels proceeds into delivery infrastructure, and (b) treats tribal water as a bankable asset. Caveats: NTUA/the Nation will resist any market framing that pressures them to sell scarce wet water they still need to bring to unserved homes, or that Upper Basin states could weaponize to deny leasing. So the reaction hinges on design: verified conservation that generates revenue for tribal water infrastructure = ally; a market that commodifies away tribal water before their own people have taps = opponent. Persuadable, leaning yes, if structured as tribes-as-paid-conservers with revenue ring-fenced for their pipelines.

On solar+water. STRONGLY FAVORABLE and the single best-fit offer for NTUA. NTUA is already executing exactly this playbook minus the hyperscaler check: tribally owned utility-scale solar (Kayenta 55MW, half sold to Salt River Project), a USDA-financed >30MW solar+storage build, and an explicit energy-sovereignty/economic-diversification strategy to replace lost coal revenue. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits three NTUA needs at once: (1) new generation revenue and load to replace NGS/Kayenta Mine losses; (2) capital for the water infrastructure the stalled settlement hasn't yet delivered; (3) jobs and sovereignty optics the Nation prizes. NTUA has the land, the SRP/utility offtake relationships, the tribal-ownership structures, and the federal-financing muscle to be a ready counterparty. Risks to manage: data-center water consumption on/near tribal land is politically radioactive given the running-water crisis, so the water contribution must be genuinely additive (funding taps for Navajo homes, not consuming scarce supply). Framed as 'your solar powers the datacenter, the datacenter capitalizes your pipelines, and it uses no local drinking water,' this is close to an unqualified yes.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / CONTEXT-DEPENDENT, tilting to interested-but-skeptical. NTUA already runs wastewater treatment upgrades (Chinle, Kayenta, Tuba City) and understands reuse operationally, so non-potable reuse to stretch scarce supply is plausible and welcome where it reduces hauling and lets scarce Colorado River water reach homes. But large-scale desalination is remote from NTUA's near-term reality: the Nation is far inland (no coastal brine), brackish-groundwater desal is energy- and capital-intensive, brine disposal is hard in arid terrain, and the settlement/pipeline path (bringing Colorado River water directly to reservations) is the funded, preferred solution. NTUA would view a big reuse/desal program favorably only if it (a) is funded by others, (b) lowers the cost or increases the reliability of getting water to unserved homes, and (c) doesn't become an excuse for Upper Basin states or Congress to deny the settlement/leasing rights. Persuadable on reuse; low-priority/skeptical on desal absent a specific inland-brackish + energy-bundle case.

A win for them. A win for NTUA is firm, funded, wet water reaching Navajo homes plus a durable new revenue base that doesn't depend on coal or on a settlement Congress keeps stalling. Concretely: (1) capital that actually gets built, pipelines, treatment plants (LeChee), and tens of thousands of new home water connections, whether or not the $5.1B settlement clears Congress soon; (2) a monetization pathway (verified conservation payments and/or protected water-leasing rights) that funds that infrastructure without forcing the Nation to sell water its own people still lack; (3) a hyperscaler- or anchor-financed solar+storage buildout that replaces lost NGS/Kayenta revenue, adds load and jobs, and strengthens energy sovereignty; and (4) all of it structured to reinforce, not undercut, tribal sovereignty and the settlement. In one line: get taps into Navajo homes and a coal-independent revenue engine, with tribal water treated as a bankable, tribe-controlled asset.

Public record. Is a leader in utility-scale and residential solar development on the Navajo Nation and has participated in paid water conservation pilot programs.

Position. The Nevada Division of Water Resources (NDWR), headed by the State Engineer, is the state agency that administers and enforces Nevada water law: appropriation of surface and groundwater, water-rights permitting, adjudication of vested rights, and curtailment of junior rights (created 1903; NRS Chapters 532-534). CRITICAL DISTINCTION: NDWR does NOT hold or negotiate Nevada's 300,000 acre-foot Colorado River mainstem allocation or the post-2026 operating-guideline talks. That role belongs to the Colorado River Commission of Nevada (CRCNV) and the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA). Under the Law of the River, the Colorado River mainstem is carved out of NDWR's jurisdiction. NDWR's connection to the river crisis is instead structural and indirect but material: (1) it regulates the Colorado River TRIBUTARIES inside Nevada -- the Muddy River and Virgin River and the spring-fed Lower White River Flow System (LWRFS) -- whose flows reach Lake Mead and are credited toward Nevada's long-term supply. Through Order 1309 (2020) NDWR combined seven basins into the LWRFS 'superbasin', capped sustainable pumping at ~8,000 acre-feet to protect Muddy River flows and the endangered Moapa dace, and blocked the Coyote Springs development's overallocated groundwater. The Nevada Supreme Court unanimously affirmed Order 1309 and NDWR's authority in Sullivan v. Lincoln County Water District (Jan 25, 2024), establishing that the State Engineer can conjunctively manage groundwater and surface water as interconnected. (2) NDWR is the agency that would operationalize any in-state curtailment or market-based offset regime. Former State Engineer Adam Sullivan drafted an order contemplating 'Capture Management Zones' where groundwater users would offset streamflow depletion via mitigation or market-based mechanisms or face curtailment after a five-year window (Humboldt River focus). POLITICAL VOLATILITY: Sullivan was abruptly fired in January 2026 by the Director of DCNR with the Governor's approval, and the Humboldt draft order is on indefinite hold. Chris Thorson now serves as acting administrator. This signals the agency's aggressive conservation posture met political resistance, and its near-term direction is uncertain.

On conservation. Likely favorable to strongly favorable, at the technical/mechanism level. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to what NDWR itself tried to build: the Capture Management Zone concept explicitly relied on 'market-based mechanisms' and offsets as an alternative to curtailment. Rigorous, verifiable, monitored consumptive-use accounting is the agency's core competency and its stated preference (conjunctive management on defensible technical footing). The agency would insist on measurement integrity, protection of senior rights, and no injury to ESA-listed species/spring flows. Caveats: (1) mainstem Colorado consumptive-use markets sit with CRCNV/SNWA and federal Reclamation, not NDWR -- NDWR's enthusiasm applies mainly to in-state groundwater/tributary offset markets; (2) the January 2026 political backlash means the agency may be more cautious than its 2024-2025 posture until leadership stabilizes. Net: persuadable-leaning-ally on a well-designed, verified market.

On solar+water. Mixed and conditional; this is where NDWR is most cautious. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would be evaluated by NDWR primarily through its permitting lens: large data-center/industrial load in Nevada means new water-rights demand in already-stressed or fully-appropriated basins, which cuts against the agency's conservation mandate. The 'also funds water' component (funding reuse, offsets, monitoring, or retirement of consumptive rights) is what would move NDWR from skeptical to supportive -- money that buys verified consumptive-use reductions or new firm supply reduces its curtailment burden. Without a credible, verified water-neutral or water-positive commitment, NDWR would treat a hyperscaler buildout as net new demand and a permitting problem, not a solution. Solar+storage itself is low-water and not objectionable; the swing factor is whether the water funding produces real, measurable offsets in the right basins. Genuinely unknown how the post-Sullivan leadership weighs economic-development pressure (data centers) against conservation, given the Governor's office intervened to remove the more aggressive regulator.

On reuse/desal. Favorable to reuse; neutral-to-cautiously-favorable on desalination-for-exchange. Reuse aligns tightly with NDWR's interest: Nevada already relies heavily on indirect potable reuse (return-flow credits on the Colorado system are central to SNWA's model), and Nevada has established water-reuse guidelines. New reuse capacity that stretches existing supply reduces pressure on groundwater and tributary basins NDWR must protect, lowering curtailment risk -- a clear win for the agency. Large-scale ocean desalination is out of NDWR's jurisdiction (no coastline) and would matter to it only as a supply-augmentation-for-exchange deal that frees Colorado River water; NDWR would view that positively insofar as it eases in-state stress, but it is a CRCNV/SNWA/interstate-and-federal deal, not an NDWR decision. NDWR's concerns would be cost, energy/water tradeoffs, and ensuring any exchange accounting is verifiable and does not create new paper-water problems. Net: reuse is a natural ally position; desal is peripheral to its authority.

A win for them. A win is durable, legally defensible water accounting that lets the agency avoid the political and economic pain of blunt curtailment. Concretely: (1) verified, monitored offset/market mechanisms that let it manage streamflow depletion without shutting off junior users (exactly what the shelved Capture Management Zone order sought); (2) new firm supply (reuse, and to a lesser extent desalination-for-exchange) that reduces stress on the Colorado system and protects the tributary credits feeding Lake Mead; (3) tools and data that strengthen its Order-1309-style conjunctive management on defensible technical footing so its decisions survive appeal; (4) political cover -- a conservation pathway that does not require it to be the agency that curtails farms and towns, which is what got its aggressive posture politically punished.

Public record. The agency is a signatory to a memorandum of understanding to pursue coastal desalination exchanges and is responsible for implementing water conservation plans statewide.

Position. New Mexico is an Upper Basin (Upper Division) state whose Colorado River nexus is the San Juan River, a major tributary, not the main stem. The State Engineer (Elizabeth 'Lisa' Anderson, P.E., first woman appointed, Aug 2024) is also Secretary of the Interstate Stream Commission (ISC), which is New Mexico's Colorado River compact-compliance and interstate-negotiation body. Deputy State Engineer Tanya Trujillo (former Interior Assistant Secretary for Water and Science under Biden) is a senior water-policy adviser and, per June 2026 reporting, a fresh voice in the state's Colorado River negotiating posture; Estevan Lopez has been the long-time lead negotiator. LONGSTANDING POSITIONS: (1) Upper Basin solidarity - New Mexico negotiates alongside Colorado, Utah and Wyoming through the Upper Colorado River Commission and consistently argues that the Lower Basin (Arizona, California, Nevada) owns the 'structural deficit' and must reduce use accordingly. (2) Hydrology-based operations - in its official comment on the post-2026 Draft EIS (via ISC, chair Mark Sanchez), New Mexico stresses that Upper Basin supply is uncertain every year due to snowpack/precipitation variability and that Upper Basin use already adapts to available supply independent of Lake Powell/Mead levels; it rejects the concept of hypothetical 'Gap Water' as 'hydrologically unrealistic' with 'no legal basis.' (3) Protect the San Juan-Chama Project (SJCP), which trans-basin diverts ~96,000 AF/yr of Colorado River tributary water across the Continental Divide to supplement the Rio Grande and supply Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Los Alamos and Bernalillo County; SJCP is federal Reclamation water, allocated proportionally (not by seniority), and its authorizing law bars 'injury, impairment, or depletion' of Colorado's rights, making it a first-cut casualty in any Lower Basin compact call. (4) Tribal water is central - New Mexico has leased 20,000 AF/yr from the Jicarilla Apache Nation via the ISC/Strategic Water Reserve; the Navajo Nation holds 405,950 AF under settlement (priority date moved to 1955/1968, junior despite pre-1922 claims). (5) Conservation/demand management - the ISC has run a stakeholder demand-management investigation (temporary, voluntary, COMPENSATED consumptive-use reduction stored in the Upper Basin for future compact compliance), building on the 2015-2018 Upper Basin System Conservation Pilot, and expanded the Strategic Water Reserve (created 2005, expanded 2025) to acquire water/water rights for compact compliance and endangered species. Recent public statements missing on some specifics are marked unknown below.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / likely ally on this specific mechanism, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps directly onto tools New Mexico already builds and endorses: the ISC's own demand-management model (temporary, voluntary, compensated consumptive-use reduction), the 2015-2018 System Conservation Pilot precedent, the Strategic Water Reserve's water-rights acquisition authority, and the Jicarilla lease. Persuade-to-ally is realistic IF the market (1) rigorously VERIFIES real, additional, wet-water consumptive-use savings (New Mexico is sensitive to 'paper water' and rejected phantom 'Gap Water'), (2) credits the Upper Basin for savings stored to meet future compact obligations rather than simply gifting them to the Lower Basin's structural deficit, (3) respects tribal sovereignty and settlement water (no priority-call coercion of tribes), and (4) works within Reclamation/UCRC frameworks. Risk: New Mexico will resist any market design that operationally becomes a one-way transfer from Upper to Lower Basin or that pressures SJCP/Albuquerque supply.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / persuadable. New Mexico is actively courting large data centers and clean-energy manufacturing; the 2025 Strategic Water Supply Act explicitly aims to support 'manufacturing and clean energy needs' while preserving drinking water, and OSE is a named implementing agency. Anderson's public stance on Project Jupiter (a hyperscaler that self-generates power and bought existing water rights) is that transferring an existing right to a new use is acceptable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water would be attractive as long as it does not create NEW consumptive depletions on stressed sources, does not rely on speculative supply, and ideally funds brackish desal, reuse, or conservation that offsets its own footprint. OSE is a regulator, not an economic-development champion, so it will scrutinize the water accounting (New Mexico's data-center water demand numbers 'keep changing,' a stated concern) and interstate-compact implications before endorsing. Ally potential if the water funded is genuinely new supply or verified conservation and the deal is transparent about consumptive use.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE, with a sharp line between brackish desalination (strongly favored) and produced-water reuse (currently disfavored). New Mexico's 2025 Strategic Water Supply Act (HB 137, $75M) funds BRACKISH groundwater desalination and names OSE (with NMED) to contract and grant for those projects; this is core state policy under the 50-Year Water Action Plan. The legislature deliberately STRIPPED produced-water (oilfield wastewater) reuse from the bill over treatment-science and public-health concerns, though the Governor signaled continued produced-water research and the Water Quality Control Commission is finalizing reuse regulations. Municipal/industrial reuse is generally embraced as a freshwater-preserving 'new water' source. So: large-scale desal of brackish groundwater = ally; municipal reuse = supportive; produced-water desal/reuse = proceed carefully, expect regulatory caution and public-health scrutiny. OSE will also weigh whether desal/reuse concentrate-disposal and any Colorado River-basin depletions are handled correctly.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 outcome in which (1) the Lower Basin absorbs the structural deficit and hydrology-based operations protect Upper Basin flexibility, (2) the San Juan-Chama Project and Albuquerque/Rio Grande municipal supply are insulated from first-cut curtailment, (3) New Mexico gains VERIFIED, compensated conservation and new-supply tools (brackish desal, reuse, funded conservation) that reduce compact-call and litigation risk without forcing in-state cuts the OSE cannot legally administer, (4) tribal water rights and sovereignty are honored and tribes share in the upside, and (5) outside capital (hyperscaler/clean-energy) funds new or offsetting water so economic growth does not deepen depletion. In short: interstate security for New Mexico's Colorado River interests plus new money and new water, delivered through mechanisms the ISC/OSE already trust, before the August 2026 deadline forces a worse, litigated outcome.

Public record. New Mexico's 50-Year Water Action Plan identifies water reuse as a critical strategy to supplement existing freshwater supplies and protect rivers and aquifers from being overdrawn.

Position. NGVIDD irrigates ~6,320 acres in the North Gila Valley just north/east of Yuma, delivering Colorado River water via turnouts on the Gila Gravity Main Canal (Gila Project, built out through the 1950s). It is one of three districts (with Yuma Mesa IDD and Yuma ID) that make up the Yuma Mesa Division of the Gila Project. The Division holds a single undivided Consumptive Use entitlement of 250,000 AF of Priority-3 Colorado River water, with each district taking an 'appropriate and equitable share.' The district's public posture tracks the broader Yuma-area agricultural bloc, which rests on two pillars: (1) fierce defense of seniority. Yuma's Priority-3 mainstem rights are protected as Present Perfected Rights predating the 1922 Compact, treated as private property, and the districts insist any curtailment must fall on junior users (CAP/central-Arizona ag and cities) before it reaches Yuma. Through joint counsel, four Yuma-area districts formally objected to the Bureau's post-2026 operations plan, arguing 'the impacts of water reductions to Yuma would be especially severe,' that agriculture is ~two-thirds of Yuma's economy, and that the federal proposal fails to account for the disruption. (2) 'We conserve, but on our terms and for pay.' Yuma-area districts have signed compensated System Conservation Implementation Agreements (fallowing / leaving water in Lake Mead at ~$400/AF, e.g. Yuma Mesa IDD's 2023-2025 SCIA) and pursued federally cost-shared efficiency projects (NGVIDD's own McPherson Lateral piping application under Reclamation's WaterSMART SWEP program). The framing: Yuma consumes ~8% of basin irrigation water but produces ~18% of crop sales and most of the nation's winter vegetables, so cutting Yuma is economically irrational. Longstanding identity is a small, high-value, senior-rights winter-vegetable district that views itself as the most productive and defensible water use on the river.

On conservation. Warm-to-favorable, and the most likely near-term point of engagement. The district's revealed behavior (SCIA participation at ~$400/AF, WaterSMART efficiency projects) shows it will conserve consumptive use when the price is right, the transaction is voluntary, and seniority is not waived. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely in that lane: it lets NGVIDD monetize its senior water without permanently surrendering rights, and it converts a defensive asset (Priority-3 PPR) into a revenue stream. Conditions it will demand: prices at or above the ~$400/AF SCIA benchmark (and likely higher given produce margins), airtight protection that participation cannot be used later to argue its baseline right shrank ('use it or lose it' fear), robust and independent measurement/verification of actual consumptive-use savings, short/renewable terms rather than permanent fallowing, and assurance the saved water is not simply reallocated to junior users or Mexico without compensation. Sell it as a voluntary, per-acre-foot, senior-rights-preserving lease and it is an ally on this specific instrument.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but skeptical, and gated on water terms. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive as a capital source for the modernization NGVIDD cannot self-finance (canal piping, on-farm efficiency, drainage). Yuma has abundant solar resource and the district could host or lease land. Two big reservations: (1) Water first, energy second. The district will judge the deal almost entirely on whether the 'funds water' piece delivers durable, senior-rights-preserving benefit (paid efficiency, paid conservation, or infrastructure capital) rather than a mechanism to justify transferring its water to a data center. Any hint that a hyperscaler ultimately wants its water, not just to fund it, flips the district to opponent. (2) Local control and ag primacy. It will resist converting productive winter-vegetable ground to panels at scale and will want energy sited on marginal/drainage-impaired land, with the district and its growers capturing lease/royalty value. Structured as 'data center capital pays to modernize and conserve, farmers keep farming and keep their rights,' it is persuadable-to-favorable.

On reuse/desal. Broadly supportive as long as it is someone else's supply, not a substitute that strands Yuma ag. NGVIDD benefits if large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., ocean desal for coastal California/Mexico, or expanded reuse in central Arizona and the metros) adds new water to the system and relieves pressure to pull water 'off the river and out of Yuma County agriculture.' That is directly aligned with its core interest in keeping juniors whole so curtailment never climbs the priority ladder to Priority-3. It is likely to publicly endorse desal/reuse as the 'grow the pie' alternative to cutting senior ag. Reservations: cost allocation (it will refuse to have desal costs assessed onto its growers), and any scheme that treats new desal supply as a reason to reallocate Yuma's existing senior entitlement. The nearby Yuma Desalting Plant history also makes the district a knowledgeable, and somewhat wary, audience on desal economics. Net: supportive of new-supply projects that protect its seniority; opposed to any framing that swaps its river water for someone else's desal water.

A win for them. A win is durable senior-rights security plus new money and modernized infrastructure, without giving up the water or the farming. Concretely: (1) formal recognition that Yuma Priority-3 Present Perfected Rights sit above CAP juniors and are curtailed last, ideally locked into the post-2026 framework; (2) a voluntary consumptive-use conservation market that pays them well above $400/AF to lease savings on short renewable terms with airtight no-forfeiture protection, turning their senior water into a cash-flowing asset; (3) outside capital (federal cost-share, hyperscaler/energy developers, conservation buyers) financing canal piping and on-farm efficiency so the district modernizes without raising grower assessments; (4) new-supply projects (desal/reuse) that add water elsewhere and take the political target off Yuma ag; and (5) the winter-vegetable economy stays intact, with the district positioned as the model of 'most productive acre-foot on the river' rather than a curtailment target.

Public record. As a senior water rights holder, the district's primary interest is protecting its water supply, making it open to paid conservation programs that provide revenue without jeopardizing long-term rights.

Position. Northern Water is the largest transbasin diverter on Colorado's Front Range and one of the biggest single users of Upper Colorado River water. It operates and co-manages (with the Bureau of Reclamation) the Colorado-Big Thompson Project, which pulls roughly 215,000 acre-feet/yr of snowmelt from the Upper Colorado headwaters (Grand County / Rocky Mountain National Park) across the Continental Divide to ~1 million Front Range residents and ~720,000 acres of farmland. Its Municipal Subdistrict owns the Windy Gap Project and just completed the Windy Gap Firming Project (Chimney Hollow Reservoir, 90,000 AF, ~$561M), and is the sponsor of the Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP), now roughly a $2B build. Longstanding public position: secure and firm up existing (largely junior) Colorado River rights, build new storage to buffer variability, and protect the C-BT/Windy Gap yield. On the basin crisis, Northern Water sits inside the Upper Basin camp via the Front Range Water Council (alongside Denver Water, Aurora, Colorado Springs, Pueblo), which in the post-2026 federal comment period backed 'supply-driven' management, argued Upper Basin users already absorb hydrologic shortage (>40% cuts to proven rights in dry years), and opposed frameworks that shift risk upstream to preserve Lower Basin predictability. It is not a public champion of mandatory curtailment or demand management; its instinct is to protect firm yield and add supply. It participates in headwaters restoration (Kawuneeche Valley Restoration Collaborative with Grand County, TNC, RMNP) as mitigation for its West Slope diversions.

On conservation. Cautiously interested, with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive to Northern Water as a voluntary, compensated alternative to mandatory curtailment of its junior Windy Gap/C-BT-adjacent rights, and as a possible way to generate offset credits or firm supply without building another contested $2B reservoir. But it will scrutinize verification rigor (it does not want to pay into or rely on a market whose 'saved' water is not real and additional), worry about 'buy-and-dry' optics on its ag constituents, and insist that participation not create a precedent that erodes its senior C-BT rights or Colorado's compact position. Persuadable-to-supportive if the market is genuinely voluntary, additional, and structured so Front Range diverters can be buyers/beneficiaries rather than forced sellers.

On solar+water. Open and potentially enthusiastic. Northern Water's core pain is capital cost and yield risk on new supply. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure (storage firming, reuse, quarry/uranium remediation, headwaters restoration) directly offsets the ratepayer burden that is driving members out of NISP and stranding Chimney Hollow. It would welcome outside capital that reduces per-acre-foot costs and de-risks projects it is already committed to. Main caveats: it will guard its water rights and operational control (it will not cede governance of C-BT/Windy Gap), will want any co-located load to respect its priority system, and will be sensitive to new large water demands (data centers) competing for the same Front Range supply. Net: a natural persuadable-to-ally on this option if the capital comes with strings it can live with.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, especially potable reuse. Colorado and the Front Range treat reuse/recycling as a central lever to close the supply-demand gap, and Northern Water benefits when its municipal customers stretch existing supply through reuse (reducing pressure on the very C-BT/Windy Gap yield it is trying to firm). Reuse also aligns with Colorado's stated reuse strategy and WateReuse Colorado activity. Ocean desalination is largely irrelevant to landlocked Colorado and would only interest Northern Water indirectly (e.g., if Lower Basin coastal desal frees Colorado River water and eases compact pressure). Brackish groundwater desal is a marginal possibility but not core. Overall: pro-reuse as demand-side firming, neutral/indirect on desalination.

A win for them. A win for Northern Water is firm, reliable, lower-cost Colorado River supply for its 1M+ Front Range constituents that survives the crisis without mandatory curtailment of its rights. Concretely: outside (e.g., hyperscaler) capital that de-risks and pays down Chimney Hollow/NISP so members stop leaving and per-acre-foot costs fall; a path to actually fill Chimney Hollow (uranium remediation + wetter years or supplemental supply); reuse and voluntary compensated conservation that stretch existing yield so they avoid building yet another contested reservoir; and a post-2026 basin framework that protects Colorado's compact position and their senior C-BT rights. Being seen as a solutions partner that brought capital and reliability to the Front Range, rather than a diverter forced into cuts, is the political win.

Public record. As a major trans-basin diverter, Northern Water's primary focus is securing reliable water supplies for its constituents, and it has not taken a clear public position on paying users to conserve water for Lake Mead or on large-scale solar buildouts.

Position. Founded 1937 to build and operate the federal Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) Project, Northern Water is one of Colorado's largest Front Range transmountain diverters, collecting West Slope headwaters of the Colorado River and moving them over the Continental Divide to ~1.1M people and ~615,000 acres of farmland across eight NE Colorado counties. Its longstanding public posture is supply-development and reliability first: it is actively building new storage (Chimney Hollow / Windy Gap Firming Project, ~90,000 AF capacity delivering ~30,000 AF/yr, began filling April 2026) and advancing NISP (Glade Reservoir; scaled back in 2026 from the full $2.7B two-reservoir plan to a ~$2B Glade-only phase yielding ~20,000 AF/yr after deferring Galeton and losing 6 of 15 original participants). On the basin crisis it is cautious and status-quo-protective: in 2024 it publicly questioned the Colorado River District / Xcel Shoshone Power Plant water-rights purchase ($99M), with water-rights manager Kyle Whitaker warning 'if we start messing with what we've all gotten used to ... who knows if you pull on that string what unravels' and disputing the historic-use quantification (est. ~1,050 cfs actual vs 1,408 cfs capacity) as a possible unlawful expansion harming upstream rights. It has not staked out an aggressive basin-wide conservation or demand-management leadership position; it emphasizes preserving existing water-sharing protocols and securing new supply for a growing service area.

On conservation. Likely cautiously interested but wary of precedent. A verified consumptive-use conservation market could give Northern Water a tool to reduce compact-call risk and monetize/hedge its junior transmountain exposure without permanent right loss (temporary, voluntary, compensated reductions, the Upper Basin demand-management concept). But its Shoshone reaction shows deep suspicion of any mechanism that 'messes with what we've all gotten used to' or that could be read as reallocating or re-quantifying rights. It will demand rigorous, verified historic-use accounting (it already argues for consumptive-use rather than diversion-based numbers), guarantees against permanent injury to its rights, and clarity that participation is voluntary and does not set a curtailment precedent. Persuadable if the market is framed as protecting senior/junior-right holders and buying down compact-call risk, opposed if it looks like a backdoor buy-and-dry or forced reallocation.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-open, low prior engagement (unknown in public record). Northern Water is a wholesale water supplier, not a power developer, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout is not its core business. It would evaluate it primarily on whether the co-funding materially augments its supply reliability or offsets its escalating capital costs (Glade/NISP at $85K-$95K/AF). New-load datacenters inside its service area could also increase demand it must serve. Likely receptive to third-party capital that funds water infrastructure or conservation without ceding control of its rights or governance, but skeptical of arrangements that add large new consumptive demand or that it perceives as outside actors steering Colorado River water. No public statements found; treat specifics as unknown.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle for reuse; desal largely irrelevant to its geography. Reuse and supply-stretching fit Northern Water's supply-development mission and could reduce pressure on its exposed transmountain diversions, so it would likely welcome reuse partnerships that add firm yield to its Front Range service area. Ocean desalination is geographically inapplicable (landlocked NE Colorado); interest would only extend to brackish groundwater treatment where locally relevant, which is minor for it. It will judge any such project on cost per acre-foot versus its own storage projects and on who controls the resulting supply.

A win for them. A win is firm, reliable supply for a fast-growing NE Colorado service area at manageable cost, with their C-BT and Windy Gap water rights protected from curtailment. Concretely: reduced compact-call / curtailment risk on their junior transmountain diversions; new or hedged yield that offsets the ~20,000 AF Chimney Hollow/NISP shortfalls and the drought-driven fill delays; relief from $85K-$95K/AF capital cost escalation and participant defections; and a verified, defensible accounting framework they can stand behind. Any deal that lets them tell their ~1.1M customers and farmers that supply is secure and rights are safe, without ceding governance or setting a reallocation precedent, is a win.

Public record. While its primary mission is delivering water which makes it cautious about permanent reductions, it actively promotes water efficiency, offers conservation grants, and is installing solar panels on its own facilities.

Position. The Pacific Institute is a nonpartisan global water think tank founded 1987 (co-founder Peter Gleick, now President Emeritus; Heather Cooley is Director of Research). It has worked the Colorado River for 25+ years (a 1996 sustainable-use report; early climate-impact modeling of the Colorado/Sacramento-San Joaquin basins). Longstanding intellectual core is the 'soft path for water': meet water-service needs through efficiency, reuse, decentralized infrastructure, flexible institutions and innovative economics rather than building new centralized supply. Their 2003 work argued existing technology could cut urban water use ~1/3, with 85%+ of savings cheaper than new supply. On the Colorado specifically they frame a structural deficit (more water leaves than enters) and a permanent shift to a hotter, drier climate, not a temporary drought. Senior Fellow Michael Cohen's 'Deadlines & Incentives' framework calls for decisive federal leadership with a credible threat of an imposed plan because consensus negotiation has failed; it endorses 'reasonable and beneficial use' standards (non-functional turf removal, ag metering + volume-based pricing, plumbing/landscape efficiency), storage-tied graduated Lower Basin cuts, expanded Intentionally Created Surplus (ICS) accounts and water-trading eligibility, mandatory mitigation of community/environmental impacts, and better accounting (they stress basic use data is still unmeasured). Program 'Managing the Unmeasured' pushes detailed accounting of where/how the river is used. Ranks demand management, reuse and agricultural efficiency far above new hard supply.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE, conditional on rigor. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns directly with their soft-path priorities and Cohen's endorsement of expanded ICS/water trading and volume-based ag pricing. Their support hinges on measurement integrity: they repeatedly stress the river is 'unmeasured' and would demand that 'consumptive-use' savings be truly additional (not paper water or fallowing that shifts depletion), independently verified, and paired with mandatory mitigation for affected farm communities and ecosystems. Expect them to be a constructive critic and a credible validator if the accounting is real, and a sharp critic if it is not.

On solar+water. MIXED / cautiously persuadable, most complicated of the three. Two instincts collide. (1) Their corporate-stewardship arm (CEO Water Mandate, Water Resilience Coalition) explicitly wants large companies, including AI/data-center operators, to fund water resilience, so a hyperscaler-financed buildout that also funds water fits that theory of change. (2) They have publicly flagged that AI data centers strain local water and energy and have called for responsible siting that weighs water availability, not just power and workforce. They will treat solar+storage favorably on the energy-water nexus (avoids thermoelectric water use) but will scrutinize the water 'funding' claim: is it net-additional water resilience or greenwashing/offset for the data center's own consumptive footprint? Persuadable if the water benefit is verified, local-to-basin, community-governed and not a license to expand net depletion.

On reuse/desal. SPLIT by technology. Water REUSE/recycling: strongly SUPPORTIVE, it is a named soft-path pillar (Gleick: reuse is a reliable high-quality supply that doesn't drain another river or aquifer; PI estimates large untapped reuse potential). Large-scale DESALINATION: SKEPTICAL/CAUTIOUS. PI's multi-report desal series (Cooley) treats desal as a last resort behind efficiency and reuse due to high energy use and GHGs, high capital/operating cost, and marine/intake-brine impacts. They won't categorically oppose desal but will insist it follow a least-cost hierarchy (efficiency, reuse first), be paired with clean energy, and mitigate marine harm. Expect them to reframe any 'reuse/desal' push toward reuse and away from desal.

A win for them. A win is the river managed on measured, verified consumptive-use accounting with efficiency and reuse doing the heavy lifting, corporations funding genuine, additional basin water resilience (not greenwash), affected farm communities and ecosystems mitigated, and federal leadership forcing action. Concretely: if a conservation market or hyperscaler-funded program adopts rigorous verification, prioritizes reuse over desal, and demonstrably reduces net depletion, the Pacific Institute gets to point to it as soft-path theory validated at scale, strengthening its influence and funding case.

Public record. The Institute promotes corporate co-funding for conservation projects, such as the Colorado River Indian Tribes' System Conservation project, to bolster water levels in Lake Mead.

Position. PITU is a federally recognized tribe headquartered in Cedar City, UT, composed of five bands (Cedar, Kanosh, Koosharem, Indian Peaks, Shivwits) on ~4,770 acres across ten parcels in Iron, Millard, Sevier, and Washington counties. It sits in the Lower Colorado sub-basin tributary systems (Virgin and Santa Clara rivers for the Shivwits Band; Sevier/Great Basin drainages and Pine Valley groundwater for the interior bands) rather than on the mainstem, so its public posture is shaped by local water-security and reserved-rights defense more than by the mainstem allocation fight. LONGSTANDING: The Shivwits Band settled its rights via the Shivwits Band of the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah Water Rights Settlement Act (PL 106-263, enacted Aug 18, 2000), securing a perpetual right to divert/use/reuse 4,000 acre-feet/year from the Virgin and Santa Clara river systems in a settlement with the U.S. and the City of St. George. The Kanosh and Indian Peaks bands have unsettled reserved-rights claims still to be quantified. RECENT/ACTIVE: On April 1, 2026 the Indian Peaks Band filed an appeal with the Interior Board of Land Appeals challenging BLM's March 2026 Record of Decision approving the Pine Valley Water Supply Project (Central Iron County / Cedar Valley Water Conservancy District), a proposed ~15,000 AF/yr groundwater-mining-and-pipeline project to Cedar City. The Band argues the pumping exceeds Pine Valley's recharge (~11,000 AF/yr per an independent estimate), harms its federally reserved water rights (the Band held a Pine Valley reservation until 1950s termination-era policy dissolved it, but the reserved water rights survive), violates NEPA, and breaches the federal trust responsibility. Chairwoman Tamra Borchardt-Slayton frames the water as 'fundamental to our Band's history, culture, and future' and as 'interwoven with our ancestral land, our culture, our religion, and our existence as native people.' The tribe is thus an active litigant against a large urban groundwater-export project. PITU is NOT part of the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (that involves the separate San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe, Navajo Nation, and Hopi Tribe); do not conflate them.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but wary. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays senior right-holders to reduce use would let the Shivwits Band potentially monetize part of its 4,000 AF/yr entitlement and generate revenue for a capital-poor tribe, which aligns with its economic-development goals. But PITU will insist that (a) participation is voluntary and never a lever to strip or diminish reserved rights, (b) unquantified interior-band claims are settled/protected first so they are not traded away before they are recognized, and (c) any market cannot be used to justify export projects like Pine Valley. Expect conditional interest, not opposition, contingent on tribal sovereignty and rights protection.

On solar+water. Most likely positive of the three, if structured right. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly serves PITU's stated CEDS priorities (renewable energy revenue, drought mitigation, land-use optimization, workforce training via university partnerships). The tribe has land parcels and existing interest in energy enterprises (geothermal, renewables). A deal that puts projects on or near tribal land, shares revenue, funds tribal water infrastructure/reserved-rights protection, and hires locally would be attractive. Risks that make them wary: projects that increase regional water demand, that site on culturally sensitive land without consultation, or that route benefits to non-tribal utilities. Engage with genuine co-ownership/revenue-share and water benefits and this is their best path to a yes.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-skeptical, and largely indirect. Large-scale reuse/desalination is geographically distant from PITU's southwest-Utah groundwater and tributary concerns, so it does not directly relieve their Pine Valley or Virgin River pressures. They would view it favorably ONLY to the extent it reduces regional pressure to mine local aquifers (i.e., if new supply removes the rationale for projects like Pine Valley). They would oppose or distrust it if it is framed as a reason to keep exporting rural/tribal-adjacent groundwater, if it carries energy-water tradeoffs that raise local demand, or if tribes are excluded from the benefits. Reuse rights are already embedded in the Shivwits settlement, so reuse concepts are familiar and not inherently threatening.

A win for them. A win is durable water security and recognized rights plus new revenue on tribal terms: (1) the Pine Valley groundwater-mining project stopped or bounded so the aquifer tied to Indian Peaks' ancestral lands and reserved rights is protected; (2) the interior bands' (Indian Peaks, Kanosh) reserved water rights quantified and settled with federal funding and infrastructure, giving them the certainty Shivwits already has; (3) a revenue stream, ideally an energy (solar/storage/geothermal) partnership with real revenue-share or co-ownership that also funds tribal water infrastructure and drought resilience, advancing their 2022 CEDS; (4) all of it achieved without trading away sovereignty or reserved rights, and with genuine government-to-government consultation. In short: protect the water, quantify and settle the unsettled claims, and turn scarcity into revenue without surrendering rights.

Public record. There is no public record of the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah's position on paying for water conservation, large-scale solar, or water reuse/desalination exchanges.

Position. PVID is the most senior water-rights holder in California on the Colorado River: unquantified Priority 1 rights for 104,500 acres in the Palo Verde Valley near Blythe, traceable to Thomas Blythe's 1877 filing and codified in the 1931 Seven Party Agreement (also holds Priority 3b on ~16,000 acres and Priority 6b on ~16,000 Mesa acres). The Colorado River is its sole water source; average consumptive use ~4.9 AF/acre and it returns more than half its diversion to the river. Its longstanding, self-described position (2026 Post-2026 EIS comment, GM JR Echard) is that the 'Law of the River' should govern the renewed framework, that it has been a major conservation contributor for 20+ years, and that it will 'take aggressive measures to protect the river' while defending food/fiber production and its senior priority. Its central asks to Reclamation: (1) explicitly authorize voluntary, COMPENSATED interstate transfers of conserved water with streamlined NEPA, and (2) pre-clear conservation infrastructure (canal lining, up to three regulating reservoirs modeled on Drop 2, potentially saving 13,200-17,600 AF/yr). It runs a 35-year fallowing program with MWD (~20% of irrigated acreage idled per year, paid, water sent to urban SoCal) and joined the 2023-2026 federal deal fallowing ~26,000 acres (~30% of valley farmland) to conserve ~117,000 AF/yr for Lake Mead, funded by Reclamation/IRA money. It is now standing up its own 'Conserved Water Supply Program' (CEQA scoping 2026) to sell conserved water to other Lower Basin users. Critically, PVID is protective of its farmland and community: it sued MWD in 2017 (dropped 2018) alleging MWD's $255M purchase of ~12,000 valley acres and six farm leases with 'draconian' water-use restrictions violated CEQA and breached the fallowing agreement's ~29% cap on idled land meant to protect the local ag economy.

On conservation. Strongly favorable, and this is squarely aligned with what PVID is already building. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the formal version of PVID's own Conserved Water Supply Program and its ask in the Post-2026 EIS for streamlined, compensated, voluntary transfers. PVID has 20+ years of measurement, its own Tracking and Verification Reporting Plan, and MSCP habitat coverage, so it can supply verified savings credibly. Caveats that determine support: it wants the district (not individual landowners or outside land buyers) to control the program, wants a cap so the local ag economy and jobs survive (the ~29% fallowing ceiling and its Community Benefits Plan are load-bearing), and wants durable price/NEPA certainty rather than one-off federal money that expires in 2026. Structure it as compensated, district-administered, rotational, and community-reinvesting and PVID is an anchor seller; structure it as permanent buy-and-dry and it resists.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but guarded, and the details decide it. Blythe/Palo Verde already hosts large solar (e.g., the 485 MW Blythe Solar PV project), and idled/fallowed farmland plus abundant sun is an obvious solar host. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water could be attractive: it offers a second income stream on fallowed acres, keeps money and jobs in the valley (aligning with the Community Benefits Plan), and could underwrite PVID's canal-lining/regulating-reservoir infrastructure asks. But PVID's history makes it wary of outside entities acquiring land or water: the MWD land-buy and the Verbena/Harvard acquisitions triggered real community backlash and its 2017 lawsuit. It will support a model where PVID/landowners retain the land and water rights and the developer leases/co-locates, and where 'funds water' means real, verified basin benefit rather than a vehicle to strip water off the land permanently. Lead with land/water retention and local benefit and it engages; lead with land acquisition and it opposes.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive, low salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination that creates new supply for urban/coastal users reduces pressure on the river and, in principle, on demand for PVID's transferred water, which is a mild long-term commercial negative for a seller of conserved water. But PVID's stated frame is river protection and Law-of-the-River stability, so it is unlikely to oppose augmentation that keeps senior rights intact and doesn't come out of its allocation. It has no operational role in desal/reuse and little public position on it. Likely posture: supportive of anything that adds water to the system and eases shortage politics, indifferent to the technology, and watchful only if augmentation costs are used to justify pressuring senior Priority 1 rights or cutting the compensation value of its conservation.

A win for them. A durable, self-controlled conservation revenue model that outlasts the 2026 federal funding cliff: PVID monetizes its senior, high-value water through district-administered, voluntary, rotational fallowing and infrastructure savings, sells verified conserved water to other users at bankable long-term prices, and Reclamation's Final EIS gives it streamlined NEPA for compensated interstate transfers and pre-cleared infrastructure (canal lining, regulating reservoirs). The win keeps Priority 1 rights fully intact, keeps land and water in local hands (no repeat of MWD/Verbena buy-and-dry), keeps the ~29% fallowing cap protecting the farm economy, and channels new money (federal, urban-buyer, or hyperscaler) into the Palo Verde Valley through the Community Benefits Plan so Blythe's community and jobs are strengthened, not hollowed out.

Public record. PVID has a long-standing, multi-decade paid land fallowing program with the Metropolitan Water District and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to conserve Colorado River water.

Position. The Pascua Yaqui Tribe is a small federally recognized nation on a reservation southwest of Tucson, AZ. Its Colorado River nexus is a December 11, 1980 CAP contract for 500 acre-feet/year of Indian-priority Central Arizona Project water, which it describes as fully used ('every drop') for municipal needs. Its aboriginal/reserved water rights remain UNQUANTIFIED in Arizona's General Stream Adjudication; the Tribe is in active settlement negotiations (unresolved as of 2026, and NOT part of the 2024 Northeastern AZ or Yavapai-Apache settlements). Longstanding position, stated in the Chairman's Dec 20, 2022 comment to Reclamation's post-2026 Interim Guidelines SEIS: (1) any reduction to its CAP supply threatens its ability to meet reservation needs and must be avoided; (2) Reclamation must honor the federal trust responsibility and protect tribal deliveries 'to the greatest extent possible'; (3) where tribal Colorado River supplies are threatened or reduced, Reclamation should provide assistance to replace them by other means, especially where public health, a tribal economy, or a pending settlement is at stake; (4) river operations directly affect the Tribe's ability to negotiate a 'full and fair' settlement, so protecting supply and protecting settlement leverage are linked. Historically framed: 150 years of western water management 'destroyed entire Tribal economies' and the Tribe fears drought/climate will again fall hardest on tribes. Operationally pragmatic and cooperation-oriented: pioneered the first tribe-to-tribe CAP leases (2012, with Ak-Chin and San Carlos Apache), leases 500-2,230 AF/yr from San Carlos Apache, and uses a storage-and-wheeling deal with the City of Tucson (deposits CAP water in SAVSARP; Tucson wheels potable water to the reservation) because it lacks its own treatment plant.

On conservation. Cautiously open, likely persuadable-to-supportive if it is genuinely voluntary and compensated and does NOT touch Indian-priority CAP water or settlement leverage. The Tribe already monetizes water flexibility through tribe-to-tribe CAP leasing, so it understands and participates in market mechanisms; a verified consumptive-use conservation market is conceptually familiar. Two hard conditions: (1) participation must be voluntary and the Tribe must not be pressured or expected to bear cuts that senior non-Indian users avoid; the Chairman's letter explicitly warns tribes must not 'once again' be the ones disadvantaged. (2) Nothing in the market design can be read as quantifying or capping its unsettled rights, or as precedent that erodes trust-based protection. If those are met, a conservation market is actually attractive: it could turn the Tribe's high-priority, currently fully-used water and future settlement water into a revenue stream, and it aligns with its innovative, lease-based playbook.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical, and highly dependent on terms and consent. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could be attractive: it offers exactly the 'assistance to replace water supplies through other means' and infrastructure funding the Tribe asked Reclamation for, plus potential lease/economic-development revenue and reservation energy resilience. But the Tribe will scrutinize (1) sovereignty and land control (siting on or near reservation land requires tribal consent and benefit, not extraction), (2) whether the water funding is real wet-water/infrastructure or a PR wrapper, (3) that a data-center/hyperscaler load does not become a new senior competitor for the very Colorado River water the Tribe depends on. Given its small footprint, a right-sized project (funding the treatment plant it lacks, the CAP pipeline to ballfields it already pursued via WRDA, or wheeling infrastructure) that lets the Tribe keep control is a plausible win. A large regional buildout that mainly benefits a corporation and consumes basin water would be opposed.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, especially if it augments basin supply and reduces pressure on CAP without cost or obligation falling on the Tribe. Reuse/desal that adds 'new water' is consistent with the Tribe's explicit request that Reclamation help replace threatened tribal supplies 'through other means,' and it eases the zero-sum competition the Tribe fears. Caveats: (1) the Tribe will not want to fund large-scale reuse/desal itself and will resist any cost allocation or rate impact on its small system; (2) it will insist that new-supply projects not be used as a pretext to reduce or reprioritize tribal CAP deliveries; (3) tribal consultation and, where relevant, cultural/environmental concerns must be honored. Net: a favorable-to-neutral reaction, more favorable if the project explicitly earmarks capacity or funding to protect/augment tribal municipal supply.

A win for them. A durable, 'wet' outcome that (1) locks in and ideally grows their firm municipal supply beyond the fragile 500 AF CAP + annual San Carlos Apache lease, (2) funds the infrastructure they lack (own treatment capacity or secured wheeling, delivery pipelines) so they are not dependent on borrowed capacity, (3) protects rather than prejudices their unquantified rights and moves them toward a full, fair, funded settlement with real deliverable water, (4) creates optional revenue (compensated conservation or leasing of high-priority/settlement water) on their own terms, and (5) treats them as a sovereign co-designer with consent and benefit, honoring the trust responsibility. In short: more secure water + funded infrastructure + settlement leverage preserved + a revenue upside, with sovereignty intact.

Public record. The Tribe is actively investing in water reuse infrastructure and has joined a coalition to advocate for conservation and responsible stewardship of the Colorado River.

Position. Longstanding: tribal water rights are ~25% of all Colorado River water and tribes must be seated at the management table (secured a permanent Upper Basin tribal foothold at the UCRC ~2024). Believes water rights are implied in the 1868 treaty even absent explicit language; sharply critical of the 5-4 Arizona v. Navajo Nation ruling as eroding federal trust responsibility. The Tribe holds JUNIOR rights on the Dolores River (1988 Colorado Ute settlement gave up senior 1868 Mancos rights for junior 1940s-era McPhee/Dolores rights plus infrastructure funding), so during drought it has received as little as 10-14% of its 24,517 AF allocation. This gutted the 7,700-acre Farm & Ranch Enterprise (fallowed ~60% of land, layoffs, 2026 supply <14%). Core asks: (1) let the Tribe be COMPENSATED for conserving / letting its unused water pass, e.g. via the System Conservation Pilot Program; (2) unlock legally-stranded A-LP water in Lake Nighthorse the Tribe cannot physically access or use (settlement restricts it to M&I use inside CO); (3) more legal flexibility to lease/use water in new ways; (4) federal funding for tribal water infrastructure (pipelines, La Plata West Water Association). Frames stewardship in centuries: 'I'd hate to see our farms turned to dust.' Open, collaborative tone: 'if we can all work together to utilize that water, it will be best for the entire region.'

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE and self-identified. He has explicitly asked whether the Tribe can be paid to let water pass its lands via the System Conservation Pilot Program, and is in preliminary talks to lease unused A-LP water. A verified consumptive-use conservation market directly answers his top ask, converting junior, drought-cut, hard-to-use water into revenue that could offset Farm & Ranch losses. Caveats he will press: payments must not prejudice the Tribe's underlying rights (no 'use it or lose it' forfeiture), must respect settlement use-restrictions or relax them, and tribes must set terms rather than have terms imposed. Verification/measurement he tends to welcome given his rights-protection instinct.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY PERSUADABLE. New capital that funds tribal water infrastructure (pipelines, La Plata West Water Association) and provides revenue aligns with his funding ask, and reservation land could host solar+storage. But he will scrutinize: sovereignty and consent (tribe as owner/partner, not host), whether the water it 'funds' actually reaches the Tribe vs. subsidizing others' consumption, long-horizon stewardship (he thinks in centuries about contamination/land), and trust-responsibility implications. Sell it as tribally-owned or tribally-benefiting infrastructure, not a corporate extraction play.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-MILDLY-SUPPORTIVE, secondary priority. Anything that adds net supply and eases basin-wide pressure indirectly protects junior users like the Tribe, and he supports regional cooperation. But desal/large reuse is geographically remote from the Tribe's isolated SW-Colorado/Four Corners lands and does not solve his immediate stranded-water and delivery-cut problems. He would support it as basin relief while insisting it not become an excuse to keep denying tribes access, funding, or a seat at the table.

A win for them. A durable, revenue-generating pathway to put the Tribe's otherwise-stranded and drought-cut water to beneficial use WITHOUT weakening its rights: (1) getting paid for verified conservation / passing water; (2) legal ability to lease or flexibly use A-LP/Lake Nighthorse water; (3) federal or third-party funding for tribal water infrastructure; (4) a permanent, respected tribal seat in post-2026 Colorado River governance; and ultimately (5) keeping the Farm & Ranch Enterprise alive and its people employed rather than watching the farms 'turn to dust.'

Public record. As general counsel for the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, he has publicly supported leasing tribal water for in-state municipal use and the tribe is developing one of the largest solar farms in the U.S. to generate revenue and clean energy.

Position. Pisces Foundation is a San Francisco environmental grantmaker (~$54.5M assets; ~$16.7-20.3M/yr distributed; pay-as-you-go, no endowment), co-founded 2006 by Bob and Randi Fisher (Gap heir) and led by ED David Beckman, a former NRDC water attorney. Its three programs are Water, Climate & Energy, and Environmental Education. Longstanding water position: 'One Water' / 'smart water' , reject managing water quality and supply in silos; push integrated, equitable urban water management (reuse and efficiency, green stormwater infrastructure, community-driven planning). Its 2022 Urban Water RFP funded 8 city-scale groups ($780K) on stormwater and reuse. On the Colorado River specifically Pisces has NO direct programmatic footprint; its Western/basin exposure is INDIRECT, via the Water Foundation, which Trustee Bob Fisher helped launch in 2011 and which Pisces has funded (~$1.5-1.85M) , the only foundation exclusively focused on Western water management, working on Colorado River quantity/quality including agricultural conservation and demand management. Climate & Energy program targets super-pollutants (black carbon, methane, HFCs). Liberal environmental orientation. No public Pisces statements found on water markets, desalination, or hyperscaler energy; those positions are UNKNOWN and inferred from its integrated-management and pro-regulation frame.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits Pisces/Water-Foundation interest in demand management and getting real, measured water back in the system (Upper Basin demand-management framing). Verification/additionality would appeal to a funder that prizes measurable outcomes. Caveats grounded in its equity lens: it would scrutinize who benefits, effects on farmworkers, tribes, and disadvantaged communities, and whether the market entrenches inequitable allocation. Persuadable-to-ally if framed as verified, equitable, and river-health-positive; skeptical if it reads as a way for wealthy users or extractive industry to buy their way out.

On solar+water. UNKNOWN, leaning cautious-but-curious. No public Pisces position on data centers or hyperscaler-funded infrastructure. Its Climate & Energy program (clean energy, super-pollutant reduction) means a solar+storage buildout is thematically welcome, and a private-capital mechanism that also funds water could resonate with its integrated 'co-benefits' worldview. But its equity and healthy-rivers framing means it would question whether the arrangement lets large corporate energy/water users capture public water benefits, and whether community and ecological interests are protected. Treat as persuadable only with strong equity, transparency, and additionality guarantees; do not assume endorsement.

On reuse/desal. SPLIT. Reuse/recycling is a CORE Pisces priority , its One Water strategy explicitly funds water reuse and efficiency and green stormwater infrastructure, so large-scale reuse would be strongly SUPPORTED, especially urban and community-benefiting reuse. Desalination is UNKNOWN and likely met with more skepticism: no public Pisces support found, and its healthy-rivers/streams/lakes and equity framing tends to view energy-intensive, capital-heavy desal as a later-resort supply option behind conservation, reuse, and efficiency. Net: enthusiastic on reuse, neutral-to-wary on desal.

A win for them. A win is a demonstrably integrated, equitable, verified outcome they can point to: real, measured consumptive-use reductions or reuse capacity that keeps more water in a healthier river while protecting disadvantaged communities, tribes, and farmworkers , advancing their One Water thesis and their grantee (Water Foundation) portfolio. Bonus wins: a clean-energy/climate co-benefit consistent with their Climate & Energy program, and a replicable, community-driven model that validates philanthropy-catalyzed private capital without ceding public-water benefits to large corporate users.

Public record. As an environmental grantmaker focused on water, the foundation's core mission aligns with funding conservation and innovative water management solutions.

Position. Platte River Power Authority (PRPA) is a not-for-profit wholesale electric generation/transmission joint power authority (Colorado political subdivision, formed 1973) serving four owner communities in the South Platte basin of northern Colorado: Fort Collins, Loveland, Longmont, and Estes Park. Its connection to the Colorado River crisis is indirect but real: it holds a contractual right (via the Municipal Subdistrict of Northern Water) to Windy Gap water, transbasin water diverted from the Colorado River headwaters and delivered east over the Continental Divide, which it uses for cooling and process water at the Rawhide Energy Station north of Fort Collins. PRPA has publicly acknowledged the Colorado River supply squeeze: it states Windy Gap cannot pump during wet periods (no dedicated storage) or dry periods (no available water), and that northern Colorado faces projected water shortfalls. Its longstanding position is to secure firm supply rather than take a stance on basin allocation: it is the second-largest participant in the Chimney Hollow Reservoir (16,000 acre-feet of dedicated storage) precisely to firm up Windy Gap deliveries. Rawhide is run as a zero-liquid-discharge facility and supplements Colorado River water with reclaimed effluent from Fort Collins' Drake Water Reclamation Facility via a 26-mile pipeline, signaling a water-efficiency and reuse orientation. PRPA's dominant public commitment is its 2018 Resource Diversification Policy targeting a 100% noncarbon mix by 2030, with Rawhide coal Unit 1 retiring by end of 2029/2030 (16 years early). It does not appear to publicly advocate on Lower Basin cuts, the 2026 post-interim-guidelines negotiations, or structural river-crisis policy; its river-relevant behavior is that of a transbasin water user securing supply for power generation.

On conservation. Likely favorable to neutral. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not threaten PRPA's core interest and could help it: PRPA is a supply-securer that benefits when reliable water is freed up in a stressed system, and its own declining thermal draw (post-coal) could even position it as a modest seller/participant of firmed or unused Windy Gap-adjacent water in some structures, though its rights run through Northern Water so participation would be indirect. Main caveat: PRPA will insist any market not jeopardize the reliability of deliveries to its four owner communities or raise costs. It is unlikely to champion the market publicly (not its mission) but would not oppose a credible, verified one.

On solar+water. Likely the most interesting offer to PRPA and a genuine persuadable point. PRPA is mid-transition, needs 250-350 MW of new solar and 300-400 MW of wind plus firm dispatchable capacity by 2030, and must do it affordably for member cities. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water addresses both its capital constraint and its water constraint simultaneously, and dovetails with data-center load growth pressures on Front Range utilities. Fit is strong if the deal preserves reliability, avoids rate increases, and counts toward the 2030 noncarbon goal. Risk/caution: PRPA guards its independence and financial sustainability, so it will scrutinize contract terms, offtake structure, and who bears reliability risk; a hyperscaler load also raises the specter of new firm-capacity needs (more gas), which could cut against decarbonization if not paired with clean firming.

On reuse/desal. Split. Reuse: strongly favorable and already in their playbook. PRPA pipes 26 miles of secondary-treated Fort Collins effluent to Rawhide and runs zero-liquid discharge, so expanding reclaimed-water reuse to serve new dispatchable generation is directly aligned with demonstrated behavior and would be welcomed. Desalination: low relevance and likely cool. PRPA is an inland Front Range transbasin user with no brackish/ocean source and no obvious desal nexus; large-scale desal is geographically and economically off-mission for them, so expect indifference or skepticism on cost and applicability rather than active support.

A win for them. A win is firm, affordable, low-carbon capacity for four owner communities with secured and shrinking water exposure, delivered without raising wholesale rates or risking reliability during the coal-to-clean transition. Concretely: locked-in Chimney Hollow storage that makes Windy Gap deliveries dependable; falling Colorado River consumptive use as Rawhide coal retires; and continued expansion of reclaimed-water reuse so that any remaining thermal or new dispatchable generation leans on effluent rather than fresh Colorado River water. Any conservation, reuse, or renewables-plus-water proposal wins with PRPA if it (a) preserves or improves supply reliability for its member cities, (b) does not add cost or rate pressure, and (c) advances or at least does not conflict with the 2030 noncarbon goal.

Public record. PRPA has a board-adopted goal of a 100% non-carbon energy mix by 2030 and is actively developing large-scale solar and battery storage projects.

Position. Pronatura Noroeste is the northwest-Mexico arm of the Pronatura National System, Mexico's oldest and largest conservation NGO, and one of six member organizations of the binational Raise the River / Alianza Revive el Rio Colorado coalition (with TNC, National Audubon Society, Sonoran Institute, Restauremos el Colorado, and the Redford Center). Its longstanding and current public position is that the Colorado River Delta ecosystem is a legitimate water user whose restoration must be secured through binational cooperation and dedicated, legally-delivered environmental water. It was a key actor in negotiating and implementing IBWC Minute 319 (2012, ~195 million m3 / pulse flow) and Minute 323 (2017, 210,000 acre-feet for delta restoration through 2026, plus scientific monitoring obligations). Concretely it favors: (1) acquiring water rights from voluntary sellers in the Mexicali Valley via a Mexican water trust to dedicate flows to the delta; (2) science-designed environmental flows timed to natural spring hydrology to recharge aquifers, improve soils, and recover bird/wildlife populations; and (3) on-the-ground riparian restoration (1,000+ acres cleared/planted, 230,000+ native cottonwoods and willows from local nurseries). It frames water management as serving both ecological and socioeconomic needs of delta communities, and it hires local residents to do restoration work. It supports reuse infrastructure as a delta water source (the Las Arenitas wastewater treatment plant project returning ~treated freshwater to the delta annually).

On conservation. Broadly favorable but with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns directly with Pronatura Noroeste's proven model of buying real, wet water from voluntary sellers and dedicating it to the environment, and rigorous verification of actual consumptive-use reduction is exactly what makes environmental water durable rather than paper. Likely support IF the market (a) guarantees some verified savings can be dedicated to the delta / instream environmental flows rather than only reallocated to other consumptive users, (b) protects Mexicali-Valley farm communities and local livelihoods it works with from fallowing harm, and (c) is binationally credible. Would be wary of a market that only serves U.S. Basin users or that drives up the price of the Mexicali water rights it depends on.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, not a natural champion. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would appeal to its need for durable, non-grant funding for delta flows and restoration, and it has precedent partnering with corporate donors. But it would scrutinize siting and ecological impact (desert/delta habitat, bird flyways along the Pacific/Sonoran corridor are central to its shorebird mission), demand that the 'funds water' component deliver actual wet environmental water to the delta with verification (not offsets or vague pledges), and want local-community benefit. Support is contingent on habitat safeguards and a real, measurable delta-water deliverable.

On reuse/desal. Most favorable of the three, especially reuse. Pronatura Noroeste already backs treated-wastewater reuse as a delta water source (the Las Arenitas plant near Mexicali returning treated freshwater to the delta), so large-scale reuse that augments supply and can free water for the environment fits its agenda well. Large-scale desalination is viewed more cautiously: it can relieve pressure on the river only if it genuinely substitutes for river withdrawals and if brine discharge and coastal/Upper Gulf of California habitat (a Pronatura priority region) are protected. Likely support reuse strongly and support desalination conditionally on marine-ecosystem and brine safeguards plus a guarantee that saved river water reaches the delta.

A win for them. A durable, legally-secured, verified stream of wet water and funding to the Colorado River Delta beyond the 2026 horizon of Minute 323 , restored riparian and estuarine habitat, recovering bird and wildlife populations, recharged aquifers, and sustained local restoration jobs , achieved through binational cooperation that also protects Mexicali-Valley communities and Upper Gulf coastal ecosystems, and that reduces their dependence on year-to-year philanthropic grants.

Public record. As a leading conservation NGO in Mexico, Pronatura Noroeste is a key partner in implementing binational agreements like Minute 323, which dedicates water and funding for Colorado River delta habitat restoration.

Position. Protect Our Rivers (protectourrivers.org) is a small Colorado-based 501(c)(3) founded Feb 2021 by Sarah Nelson (ED) and Scott Coe (board chair), based in Lakewood, CO. Its stated mission is river conservation through three pillars: hands-on cleanups, watershed education (elementary/middle school), and river access for at-risk/underprivileged youth (rafting, fishing). Reported impact: 161 cleanups across 22 rivers in 7 states, ~12,500 volunteers, ~281,500 lbs of trash removed. It is a '1% for the Planet' partner with outdoor-brand backers (Orvis founding partner; Down River Equipment, Kokopelli, Odell Brewing, Astral, Rocky Mountain Rafts, etc.). CRITICAL FINDING: This is NOT a water-policy or allocation-advocacy organization. On the Colorado River crisis, interstate compacts, drought/DCP, consumptive-use, water markets, reuse, desalination, and energy/solar, it has NO documented public positions. Its 'conservation' is defined as trash removal, not flow/allocation policy. Founder Nelson has publicly framed 'a seat at the table for policy advocacy' as a future aspiration, not current work. Longstanding orientation: river health, recreational access, youth stewardship, and clean water in Western rivers. Marked persuadable rather than unknown because its clear river-health values let its likely reactions be inferred, but its specific policy stances are genuinely undocumented.

On conservation. Likely mildly-to-moderately supportive but not deeply engaged. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that keeps more water instream would align with its river-health and recreation values (more/cleaner flows help rafting, fishing, and habitat). It has no stake in ag/urban water economics and no documented market ideology, so it would not oppose a market on principle. Expect passive endorsement or willingness to lend its youth-education/clean-water brand if asked, rather than active campaigning. Caveat: it cares about water quality and access, not acre-foot accounting, so framing must connect the market to visibly healthier, floatable, fishable rivers, not to compliance mechanics.

On solar+water. Cautiously neutral-to-positive if the water-funding component is real and visible; wary of greenwashing. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds river/water work could be attractive as a sponsorship and mission-funding channel (it already runs on corporate outdoor-brand partnerships and would understand a brand-funded conservation tie-in). But it has an ecosystem/land-and-water-health lens: it would scrutinize whether the water funding actually improves river flows/quality and whether the buildout harms riparian corridors or public land access. Likely persuadable to partner if the dollars fund tangible cleanups, restoration, or youth access and the siting avoids sensitive river reaches. No documented pro- or anti-datacenter position, so this is inference, not record.

On reuse/desal. Likely quietly supportive of reuse; neutral/agnostic on desalination, with mild ecosystem caution. Water reuse that reduces new diversions and keeps more water in Western rivers fits its river-health frame and would probably earn passive support. Large-scale desalination is geographically and topically distant from its cleanup/access work (it is a headwaters/river-recreation group, not a coastal or supply-engineering advocate), so expect no strong stance; any concern would be secondary, around energy footprint or discharge/ecosystem effects rather than opposition. It is unlikely to be a vocal advocate or opponent on either.

A win for them. A win is more funding and visibility for their core mission plus, eventually, the 'seat at the table' the founder has said she wants. Concretely: sustained sponsorship for cleanups, education, and youth access; measurable river-health and access outcomes they can show donors; and being treated as a legitimate community conservation voice (not tokenized) in basin conversations. If a conservation market, energy+water deal, or reuse program is framed and delivered so that it visibly produces cleaner, fuller, more accessible rivers and channels real dollars into hands-on stewardship and kids-on-the-water programming, they can credibly claim their mission advanced, which is the outcome they optimize for.

Public record. As a small 501(c)(3) founded in 2021 focused on river conservation in Colorado, its public positions on large-scale solar, desalination, and paid conservation are not yet widely documented in verifiable records.

Position. Zuni is a federally recognized Pueblo whose homeland sits in the Little Colorado River sub-basin of the Colorado River system: the Zuni River rises at the Continental Divide in NM, runs through the Zuni Reservation, and joins the Little Colorado, a direct tributary of the Colorado River. Two positions are longstanding and well documented. (1) Water scarcity and rights: for over a century upstream diversions dewatered the once-perennial Zuni River to a seasonal trickle, threatening traditional (waffle-garden) agriculture in an arid region. Zuni has pursued adjudicated water rights for decades, first in the Arizona Little Colorado River adjudication (the 2003 Zuni Indian Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act, PL 108-34, ~$19.25M federal contribution, secured 5,500 af/yr to restore the Sacred Lake Hadin Kyaya wetland on the Zuni Heaven Reservation), and now in NM via the Zuni Indian Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 2025 (S.564 / H.R.1444), a $685M settlement affirming rights for irrigation, livestock, storage, and domestic use, capitalizing a settlement trust (~$655.5M) plus an O&M/replacement account (~$29.5M), and transferring ~92,000 acres around Zuni Salt Lake into trust by ~2030. Gov. Arden Kucate testified to the House Natural Resources Committee urging immediate passage for 'safe water and sovereignty.' (2) Sacred-site / groundwater protection: Zuni led the ~20-year Zuni Salt Lake Coalition fight that in Aug 2003 forced Salt River Project to relinquish permits for the Fence Lake coal strip mine, which would have pumped desert-aquifer groundwater (85+ gal/min for 40 years) that Zuni feared would dry the spring-fed, hypersaline Zuni Salt Lake, a sacred pilgrimage/salt-gathering site tied to the deity Salt Woman (Ma'l Oyattsik'i). Frame: water is life ('agua es vida'), sovereignty, cultural/religious survival, and climate resilience for a drying homeland.

On conservation. Cautiously open, conditional. A verified consumptive-use conservation market could pay Zuni for demonstrable reductions and create revenue for a capital-poor nation, but tribal reactions turn hard on sovereignty and on protecting unquantified/settlement rights. Zuni will not trade away or appear to cap adjudicated rights, will insist on tribal control over what is offered and priced, and will want assurance that participation does not enable upstream users to keep depleting the Zuni River. Persuadable if structured as tribally governed, additional (not baseline-eroding), and paired with respect for the 2003/2025 settlements.

On solar+water. Mixed, high-scrutiny. The water-funding angle is attractive to a capital-constrained nation, and clean solar+storage is far preferable to the fossil legacy Zuni fought (Fence Lake/SRP). But hyperscaler datacenters are water- and groundwater-intensive, and Zuni's defining modern victory was stopping a large groundwater draw near a sacred lake. Any buildout touching the shared C aquifer or near Zuni Salt Lake would trigger deep suspicion. Persuadable only with ironclad groundwater safeguards, genuine consultation/consent, on-reservation benefit (jobs, power, water infrastructure dollars), and no threat to sacred sites; otherwise likely opposition.

On reuse/desal. Generally favorable in principle, indifferent-to-skeptical in specifics. Reuse and desalination that add new supply and relieve pressure on the depleted Zuni River and shared aquifers align with Zuni's interest in a drying homeland. Zuni is inland, brackish-groundwater desal (not seawater) is the only locally relevant form, and cost/energy/brine-disposal near sacred waters would need scrutiny. Supportive if it reduces stress on tribal waters and does not create new groundwater or sacred-site impacts; not a lead priority relative to securing the settlement.

A win for them. Federal ratification and full funding of the 2025 settlement ($685M trust) giving quantified, protected water rights plus infrastructure and O&M money; permanent protection of Zuni Salt Lake and its groundwater, with the ~92,000-acre sanctuary in trust; a restored, more reliable Zuni River and secure aquifer for traditional agriculture and domestic supply; and any new arrangement (market payments, energy+water funding, or reuse) that adds tribally controlled revenue or supply WITHOUT eroding adjudicated rights, drawing down sacred aquifers, or compromising sovereignty. In short: water security, sacred-site protection, and self-determination that builds resilience against a drying climate.

Public record. The Pueblo is pursuing a major water rights settlement that includes nearly $685 million in federal funding to rehabilitate its irrigation network and support sustainable water management and infrastructure.

Position. RiversEdge West (REW), founded 1999 as the Tamarisk Coalition and renamed in 2018, is a Grand Junction-based 501(c)(3) whose mission is to 'restore riverside (riparian) ecosystems through education, collaboration, and technical assistance' across the Western U.S. It removes invasive tamarisk and Russian olive and re-establishes native riparian forest and floodplain habitat; it reports supporting ~20 multi-stakeholder partnerships and restoring on the order of 11,500 acres. Its longstanding public posture on the river crisis is deliberately APOLITICAL and collaboration-first: its mission/history materials state its work respects 'existing water laws' and 'property rights' and it convenes diverse groups rather than advocating specific allocation or flow policy. Crucially, REW's own science lineage (rooted in USGS/tamarisk-control research) holds that tamarisk removal yields little measurable water salvage (studies cite ~0-1.5 acre-feet/yr because replacement vegetation, evaporation and groundwater sinks absorb the savings). So REW frames its work as habitat, wildlife, floodplain resilience and community benefit, NOT as a water-supply or consumptive-use-reduction lever. It has not taken a public stance on interstate allocation, Lake Powell/Mead operations, cutbacks, or market-based conservation. Health-of-river framing (native vegetation, in-channel habitat) is its lens, and it depends on healthy flows but treats flow policy as outside its advocacy lane.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but not a natural champion. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not touch REW's core work (it holds no water rights and its tamarisk-removal work is not credible water salvage, per its own science). It would likely welcome a market IF a slice of proceeds or created flows funded riparian restoration, floodplain reconnection, and native revegetation, and if 'verified' includes ecological co-benefit accounting rather than pure wet-water accounting. Watch-outs: REW would resist any framing that resurrects the discredited 'rip out tamarisk to salvage water' narrative or that treats vegetation clearing as a tradeable conservation credit, because it spent years correcting that myth. It would want assurance that fallowing/buy-and-dry driven by a market does not strand and degrade riparian corridors. Net: persuadable-to-supportive if the market is paired with habitat funding and honest ET accounting.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-open, low salience, with diligence caveats. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is outside REW's lane and it has no public position on energy siting. It would evaluate through a habitat/land-disturbance lens: supportive if the 'funds water' component is directed to riparian restoration, floodplain and watershed health, and if solar siting avoids sensitive riparian corridors and floodplains (utility-scale solar on riparian/bottomland would be a concern). As a small grant-dependent org, corporate restoration funding is materially attractive to it, so the money is a real draw. Persuadable: the deciding factors are where the water dollars land (habitat vs. pure supply augmentation) and whether the energy footprint harms the riverside ecosystems it protects. It is unlikely to publicly champion or oppose the energy piece itself.

On reuse/desal. Largely indifferent-to-mildly-favorable, low engagement. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a supply-side, engineered-infrastructure play far from REW's riparian mission; it has no public stance. To the extent reuse/desal reduces pressure to divert or dry up rivers and floodplains, REW would see indirect ecological upside (more water potentially left in-channel for habitat). But it is not a supply advocate and would not weigh in on plant siting, cost, or energy demand except where a facility or its brine/discharge threatens riparian habitat or water quality. Expect quiet, conditional openness rather than advocacy; unknown whether leadership has formed any view, so treat as low-priority for this option.

A win for them. A durable, diversified funding stream for riparian restoration and floodplain reconnection at scale, with their partnership model and technical-assistance role reinforced. Specifically: new corporate/market/utility dollars flowing to on-the-ground habitat work (thousands more restored acres), the Confluence Center funded as a lasting education/collaboration hub, and their scientific credibility protected by honest accounting (no revival of the water-salvage myth attributed to them). A win looks like REW being the trusted neutral implementer/convener that turns basin conservation and corporate water commitments into measurable riverside-ecosystem recovery, expanding their ~$1.5-1.7M program base and their 20-partnership footprint without dragging them into allocation politics.

Public record. The organization's mission is focused on holistic riverside restoration, which aligns with conservation, but it has not taken a public stance on large-scale solar development or paid water transfers to Lake Mead.

Position. The Riverside County Farm Bureau (RCFB) is a general-membership agricultural advocacy nonprofit ('The Voice of Farmers and Ranchers') whose 2025-2026 leadership is President Ellen Way and Executive Director Rachael Johnson, with a ~14-member board. Its stated focus areas are air quality, 'water quality and reliability,' invasive pests, and rural crime. It does not publish a detailed, standalone Colorado River policy platform; water shows up as a generic 'reliability' concern rather than a hard, quantified position. Because RCFB represents growers countywide, its Colorado-River-facing interests run mainly through the Palo Verde Valley (Blythe/Ripley) and eastern Coachella Valley, where irrigation is Colorado River water delivered via the Palo Verde Diversion and the 123-mile Coachella Canal. The operative Colorado River positions in RCFB's territory are carried by the Palo Verde Irrigation District (PVID), which holds California's most senior (1877, first-priority) Colorado River rights and runs the long-standing MWD fallowing/land-management program (a 35-year deal since 2005; ~$180M+ paid to farmers; 2023-2026 the fallowing is federally funded by Reclamation at ~117,000 AF/yr; 2024 landowners agreed to fallow ~26,000 acres). The longstanding local stance visible in the public record: farmers participate in compensated, VOLUNTARY, ROTATIONAL fallowing but are deeply wary of MWD as a permanent water-grabbing landowner. PVID sued MWD in 2017 over land purchases/leases alleged to illegally capture water rights (dropped 2018); MWD now owns ~29,000 acres in the district (largest landowner), which locals say drains ~$6-8M/yr from the Blythe economy because MWD-owned land pays less into the community. RCFB's implicit position tracks this grower base: pro-farm-economy, protective of senior water rights and of keeping land in production, open to paid conservation but hostile to anything that permanently dries up the valley or hollows out Blythe. Marked persuadable rather than opponent because RCFB itself has no published anti-conservation-market stance and its members already transact in water via PVID; the swing variable is whether a deal is voluntary, well-compensated, reversible, and community-protective.

On conservation. Likely cautiously supportive to supportive IF the market is voluntary, rotational (not permanent buy-and-dry), pays real premiums, and verifies consumptive-use savings without forfeiting underlying senior rights. Palo Verde growers already run exactly this model with MWD and Reclamation, so the concept is familiar and monetized, not foreign. The persuadable-not-ally caution: RCFB's base has watched compensated fallowing morph into MWD land acquisition and worries a 'market' becomes a one-way transfer of water and rights to cities. A verified consumptive-use market that (a) keeps title and water rights with the farmer, (b) is capped/rotational to protect the valley's agronomic base and the Blythe tax/spend economy, and (c) proves savings transparently would be welcomed as better than the status quo. Frame it as 'get paid for water you genuinely don't use, keep your land and your rights' and it lands; frame it as permanent retirement and they fight it.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-cautiously-favorable, contingent on land use and who controls the water dividend. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive if it puts money into the valley without permanently retiring prime farmland or handing more leverage to an outside entity (the MWD-style fear). Palo Verde/Coachella have abundant sun and marginal/fallowed acreage that could host solar, and a program that pays growers lease income AND funds water reliability (canal lining, on-farm efficiency, community grants like the existing $8M PVID/MWD Community Enhancement Collaborative) fits RCFB's economic-development instincts. Risks they will probe: solar sprawl onto 'Farmlands of Statewide Importance,' loss of ag jobs, an outside tech player becoming the next dominant landowner, and whether the 'water funding' actually flows to farmers/community vs. cities. Persuadable with guardrails on prime-farmland protection and local benefit-sharing.

On reuse/desal. Broadly favorable in principle, low direct engagement. Large-scale reuse/desalination that adds new supply to the Lower Basin reduces pressure to take agricultural water and is the outcome ag most prefers ('grow the pie instead of cutting our slice'). RCFB and its growers would likely support urban/coastal reuse and desal as ways to keep cities whole without further fallowing Palo Verde or Coachella. Caveats: they will be skeptical of who pays and whether new supply is used to justify still deeper ag cuts anyway; and desal/reuse is geographically remote from their farms, so it is a supportive-but-secondary issue rather than a core fight. No public RCFB statement specifically on desal/reuse was found (unknown at the org level), so this is inferred from the ag-sector interest in supply augmentation over reallocation.

A win for them. A win is durable farm-economy security: growers get paid well for genuinely conserved consumptive use while KEEPING their land, their senior water rights, and a working agricultural valley, and the Blythe/Coachella communities keep (or grow) local income and jobs rather than being hollowed out by absentee ownership. Concretely: voluntary, rotational, transparently verified conservation with premium payments; new supply (reuse/desal, efficiency, solar-funded water) that takes cut-pressure off ag; local benefit-sharing and community-improvement funding; and hard protections for Farmlands of Statewide Importance and against any single outside entity accumulating land/water control. In short, they win when conservation and outside investment make farming in their valley more secure and more profitable, not when it becomes the exit ramp for permanently retiring their water.

Public record. While generally focused on protecting agricultural water rights, the proximity to UC Riverside's extensive solar and grid integration research suggests an environment where exchanges for clean energy infrastructure could be considered.

Position. SRPMIC holds fully quantified, adjudicated water rights, so it enters the crisis from a position of security rather than grievance. Its rights were settled by the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act of 1988 (P.L. 100-512, 102 Stat. 2549), one of the earliest and most-cited Arizona Indian water settlements. That settlement combined senior Salt River rights (the Kent Decree of March 10, 1910), ~7,000 AF of reregulation capacity from Roosevelt Dam modifications, ~32,000 AF of surface water transferred by neighboring Salt River Valley cities, purchase of 22,000 AF of Colorado River mainstem consumptive use from willing irrigation districts, and a Central Arizona Project (CAP) allocation of ~13,300 AF/yr of high-priority Colorado River water. LONGSTANDING POSITION: the Community has been a market-maker for water for nearly four decades. It leases its CAP entitlement (up to ~13,300 AF/yr) to Phoenix-area cities (Phoenix, Scottsdale, and others) under a long-term arrangement running to 2098, and the settlement itself monetized water leases (~\$16M) and forbearance. It also retains options to forbear/assign portions of its allocation to downstream users for cash. So SRPMIC's revealed position is that water is a sovereign economic asset to be leased, banked, and monetized on the Community's own terms, not a commons to be surrendered. RECENT POSITION: SRPMIC participates in the Bureau of Reclamation post-2026 operations consultation process (tribal consultation May 16, 2024) as one of ~30 basin tribes, and aligns broadly with the pan-tribal push for a formal tribal seat in Colorado River governance and respect for tribal sovereignty/senior priority. It has not been a vocal firebrand in the 2026 fight the way Gila River or the unsettled-claims tribes have been; its settled status makes it a quieter, more transactional actor. Note: SRPMIC's core supply is Salt River / SRP watershed water, which somewhat insulates it from Lower Colorado mainstem shortage relative to CAP-dependent tribes.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / participant, on its own terms. SRPMIC already operates as a water-market principal: it leases CAP water for cash and holds forbearance/assignment options, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is a familiar instrument, not a threat. With ~12,000 acres of irrigated agriculture and a diversified non-farm revenue base, the Community can fallow or deficit-irrigate for payment without existential harm to its budget. Conditions it will insist on: (1) participation must be voluntary and compensated at rates it sets, never mandated; (2) conserved water must not be treated as forfeited or as a downward reset of its quantified right ('use it or lose it' must be explicitly waived); (3) measurement/verification must respect tribal data sovereignty and not become a federal audit of on-reservation use; (4) the Community, not the state or CAP, captures the economic value. Given those guardrails, SRPMIC is one of the more natural sellers/participants in a well-designed market.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY INTERESTED / persuadable, with a strong economic-development lens. SRPMIC is an experienced commercial developer and landlord (industrial parks, Phoenix Cement, large retail/hospitality) in the heart of the Phoenix data-center corridor, and it controls land, power-adjacency, and its own utility/telecom capacity (Saddleback Communications). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water reads to SRPMIC as a potential revenue and jobs opportunity IF structured as a partnership on tribal land with the Community as owner/equity participant rather than as a host for an off-reservation project that consumes shared water. Concerns: data-center water demand competing with tribal supply, energy projects sited to benefit non-tribal load, and any structure that treats the reservation as a pass-through. The persuasion path is co-development and ownership: put the solar+storage (and any water-recycling infrastructure) on Community terms, with the water-funding component flowing to tribal priorities. This is the offer most aligned with SRPMIC's revealed preference for monetizing its assets.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, low direct stake. Large-scale reuse and desalination that adds new 'wet water' to the system relieves pressure on the shared Colorado River and can raise the value/security of SRPMIC's leasable CAP entitlement, which is a plus. The Community is not itself a coastal or large-scale reuse operator, so its direct role is limited; it will care mainly about (1) who pays (opposition to cost burdens landing on tribes), (2) whether augmentation is used as a pretext to weaken tribal priority or justify not delivering settled tribal water, and (3) whether tribes share in any new supply or the economic upside. Expect quiet support, conditioned on tribal rights being held harmless and tribes not subsidizing infrastructure that primarily serves non-tribal growth.

A win for them. A win is money plus sovereignty plus precedent, with zero erosion of the 1988 settlement. Concretely: (1) new, durable revenue from monetizing water it does not need to consume (paid conservation, forbearance, extended/repriced leases) at rates the Community sets, with an explicit federal/state guarantee that participating never reduces its quantified right; (2) equity ownership or long-term revenue in energy/water infrastructure sited on or benefiting the reservation (hyperscaler-funded solar+storage plus water funding), creating jobs and diversifying beyond gaming; (3) affirmation of tribal sovereignty and a formal tribal role in post-2026 Colorado River governance, so SRPMIC helps write the rules rather than living under rules written for it; (4) protection of its senior Salt River / Kent Decree priority and its high-priority CAP status as untouchable baselines. The Community 'wins' when the crisis is turned into a market it profits from while its settled rights are made more, not less, secure.

Public record. SRPMIC's settled water rights give it security, and while it promotes on-reservation conservation and has created treatment wetlands, its primary external policy actions have focused on securing and utilizing its own water rights rather than broader basin-wide infrastructure initiatives.

Position. SRP is a dual water-and-power utility for metro Phoenix. Its water business rests on the Salt and Verde watersheds (in-state, senior rights), NOT primarily on the Colorado River, which structurally lowers its direct Colorado River supply exposure relative to CAP-dependent providers. Its longstanding public posture is pragmatic infrastructure-and-storage: (1) it partners with the Central Arizona Project (CAP) on system resilience, including a new bidirectional SRP-CAP Interconnection Facility (SCIF) so the two systems can move water both ways (historically CAP could only send to SRP); (2) it has proposed expanding conservation storage on the Verde (~350,000 AF, ~1.1M households/yr) and modifying Roosevelt Dam flood-control operations (extending the evacuation window from 20 to 120 days for ~110,000 AF) to capture and bank more water, some of it usable outside SRP's service area to help central Arizona; (3) it received, with CAP, ~$257.6M in federal (IRA) funding for long-term conservation and advanced water purification. On the Colorado River proper, SRP's most consequential historical link was operating the Navajo Generating Station (NGS), whose federal power share ran CAP's pumps; NGS closed Nov 2019, and SRP handed the site to the Navajo Nation. SRP has NOT been a loud voice in the post-2026 Lower Basin allocation fight the way CAP, ADWR, and the tribes have been, consistent with its lower direct Colorado exposure. SRP signed the June 2025 seven-party MOU (with Reclamation, SDCWA, MWD, SNWA, ADWR, CAWCD) to explore an interstate framework for exchanging desalinated and recycled water across the basin, signaling openness to augmentation-and-exchange solutions. Separately, SRP the electric utility is at the center of Arizona's data-center boom: it reported ~42 data-center projects in queue totaling >10,255 MW of demand and sought ~1.2 GW of new peak capacity, tying its interests tightly to how AI load, power, and water are governed.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market fits SRP's demonstrated comfort with paid conservation, storage banking, and moving water 'on paper' (it already backs the interstate desal/reuse-exchange MOU and IRA-funded conservation). SRP could be a seller/enabler of conserved or banked water outside its service area (it has explicitly floated making stored Verde water available to central Arizona). Risks it will scrutinize: rigorous, independently verified measurement of 'consumptive' savings (it is an engineering-driven utility and will distrust paper-only accounting), protection of its senior Salt/Verde rights and priority, and assurance that a market doesn't erode its own storage flexibility. Persuadable-to-ally if verification is credible and its rights are ring-fenced.

On solar+water. Most strategically interested, and the strongest lever to move SRP. SRP is simultaneously the electric utility fielding >10 GW of hyperscaler demand AND a water steward. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses SRP's two hardest problems at once: meeting explosive data-center load without over-relying on new gas, and financing water conservation/purification without raising customer rates. SRP has already sought ~1.2 GW of new capacity and is procuring generation for this load, so a structured deal where hyperscalers underwrite clean generation plus water offsets aligns with its planning. Likely conditions: reliability/dispatchability of the power (SRP will insist storage/firming actually covers peak), tariff and cost-allocation fairness so non-data-center ratepayers aren't subsidizing hyperscalers, and clear, additional water benefit. This is the pitch most likely to convert SRP into an active ally.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle. SRP is a signatory to the June 2025 seven-party MOU exploring interstate exchange of desalinated and recycled water, so it is already on record backing reuse/desal-plus-exchange as a supply-augmentation path. It favors approaches that use existing infrastructure and 'paper' exchanges over costly new conveyance, and it co-funds advanced purification via the IRA money. Caveats: SRP will weigh the energy intensity of desalination (relevant given its power-side load growth), cost, and who pays; it will prefer reuse/purification it can integrate with its own storage and the CAP interconnection over a distant, capital-heavy ocean-desal megaproject it doesn't control. Net: a willing partner and potential early adopter, especially for regional reuse and purification tied to its storage assets.

A win for them. A win for SRP is meeting the >10 GW data-center load pipeline with reliable, largely clean power while keeping customer rates stable, AND strengthening central-Arizona water security in a way that leaves its senior Salt/Verde rights and storage flexibility intact or enhanced. Concretely: hyperscaler/federal capital underwrites solar+storage plus water conservation and purification so SRP grows its power business, gets paid, and expands its role as the region's resilient swing water supplier and water banker, without becoming the utility blamed for either blackouts or draining the aquifer. Being cast as the pragmatic problem-solver that made AI growth and water security compatible is the reputational win.

Public record. SRP was a majority owner of the coal-fired Navajo Generating Station but decided to close it due to the high cost of operation compared to other sources like natural gas and renewables, and is now significantly investing in large-scale solar projects.

Position. SCIP is a federal project operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (Interior), authorized by the San Carlos Project Act of 1924, that delivers Gila River water and generates/distributes power in Pinal County and adjacent AZ counties. It has two divisions: Joint Works (irrigation) and Power. It serves ~100,000 acres split roughly 50/50 between the Gila River Indian Community (GRIC, Indian lands) and the non-Indian San Carlos Irrigation and Drainage District (SCIDD) in the Florence-Casa Grande Valley. As a BIA operating agency, SCIP itself takes essentially NO public political stance on Colorado River negotiations; it is a deliverer/operator, not an advocacy voice (largely unknown/silent on the crisis directly). Its Colorado River exposure is INDIRECT but real: the surface-water supply for its service area is a blend of Gila River natural flow (governed by the 1935 Globe Equity Decree, GRIC ~219 cfs / SCIDD ~192 cfs) and Central Arizona Project (CAP) water, i.e. Colorado River water delivered through CAP exchanges/interties. Bureau of Reclamation has proposed CAP-Gila exchange agreements and new interties to firm up SCIP reliability during canal rehabilitation. The two beneficiary bodies DO have loud, divergent public positions. (1) GRIC is the single most prominent tribal participant in Colorado River conservation markets: it signed IRA-funded system-conservation agreements to leave ~125,000 AF/yr in Lake Mead, drawing up to $233M (2023-2025, ~$50M/yr) plus ~$107M for reuse/reclaimed-water infrastructure projects, and it holds senior settled water rights (Arizona Water Settlements Act of 2004) it guards fiercely. (2) SCIDD, via joint Central Arizona Districts scoping comments (with CAIDD, MSIDD, NMIDD, QCID), argues for equitable/proportional shortage allocation, lost its CAP 'excess pool' Colorado River supply in the 2022 Tier 1 shortage (Pinal ag CAP went to ~zero by 2023), and is pivoting hard to groundwater; it has ~200+ miles of century-old unlined canals that lose water and has repeatedly asked for federal infrastructure money (canal lining alone estimated to conserve >50,000 AF/yr).

On conservation. PERSUADABLE-to-POSITIVE, but the reaction splits by beneficiary. GRIC is already the flagship proof case FOR a verified consumptive-use conservation market: it has voluntarily fallowed/conserved ~125,000 AF/yr and monetized it for ~$50M/yr under IRA system-conservation deals, so a durable, well-verified market extends a revenue stream it has embraced. GRIC's precondition is that the market respect its settled senior rights and be genuinely voluntary (no forced curtailment). SCIDD/non-Indian farmers are warier: many are already cut to near-zero CAP and reverting to groundwater, so a conservation market only helps them if they still hold marketable Colorado River/CAP entitlements to sell, or if it funds efficiency (canal lining that frees >50,000 AF/yr they could monetize). SCIP the BIA agency itself would be a neutral operational conduit, supportive if the accounting is clean and it does not add administrative liability. Net: a verified market is broadly welcome IF verification and rights-priority are airtight and participation is voluntary.

On solar+water. PERSUADABLE, likely POSITIVE, especially on the power side. SCIP-Power is a wholesale-buy/resell utility with aging substation infrastructure and only trickle federal funding; a hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure aligns with its need to modernize generation/distribution and could replace the lost Coolidge Dam generation with a bankable revenue partner. GRIC has land, senior water rights, and a demonstrated appetite for infrastructure capital, and could host/partner on datacenter-adjacent solar. SCIDD gains if the water-funding tranche pays for canal lining, groundwater wells, or CAP recovery that offsets its Colorado River losses. Cautions: tribal sovereignty, land-lease terms, and BIA process must be respected (deals on GRIC/SCIP lands run through federal and tribal governance, not fast); water-for-power tradeoffs must not draw down the aquifer Pinal ag now depends on. Framed as capital that firms both grid and water reliability, this is an easy yes for the beneficiaries; SCIP itself would follow its beneficiaries and Interior.

On reuse/desal. POSITIVE, with GRIC already leading. GRIC has taken ~$107M in Reclamation funding for reuse/reclaimed-water and pipeline projects expected to create 70,000+ AF of system conservation over a decade, so large-scale reuse is a proven, welcomed lever for the SCIP beneficiary set. Reuse that augments or substitutes for stressed Colorado River/CAP supply directly relieves the Pinal groundwater crunch that SCIP/SCIDD face. Desalination is more distant and less discussed for this inland, groundwater-and-canal system; SCIP would view desal favorably only insofar as it adds firm supply to the CAP/Colorado system that backstops their deliveries, but capital intensity, energy cost, and brine disposal make it a lower near-term priority than reuse and canal-efficiency for this stakeholder. Net: reuse is a clear yes; desal is a soft, conditional yes tied to whether it firms the broader Colorado/CAP supply they depend on.

A win for them. A win is firmer, cheaper water and power reliability without surrendering water rights or sovereignty. Concretely: (GRIC) continued or expanded paid conservation and reuse revenue that monetizes voluntary savings while protecting its senior settled rights; (SCIDD) federal or private capital to line >200 miles of leaky century-old canals (>50,000 AF/yr saved), add groundwater/recovery capacity, and restore some CAP reliability to offset the Colorado River cuts that idled its farms; (SCIP-Power) modernized generation and substations, ideally a solar+storage partner that replaces the dead Coolidge Dam hydro and stabilizes wholesale power costs for its ~13,000 customers. Overarching win: outside capital (hyperscaler energy dollars, conservation-market payments, reuse funding) that de-risks their aging system and buffers Colorado River/CAP shortfalls, delivered through processes that respect tribal sovereignty and existing water-rights priority.

Public record. The project, operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, is actively pursuing infrastructure modernization to conserve water, with a portion of conserved water designated for environmental purposes like maintaining a fishery pool in San Carlos Reservoir.

Position. SDCWA holds senior-priority, independent conserved Colorado River supplies won in the 2003 Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA): up to ~200,000 AF/yr transferred from Imperial Irrigation District plus ~77,700 AF/yr from All-American/Coachella canal lining, delivering 30M+ AF to the region over the life of the deals. Longstanding posture: aggressively diversify away from Metropolitan Water District (MWD) dependence and secure drought-proof, independent supply. Built the Carlsbad desalination plant (7-10% of regional supply) and backs member-agency potable reuse (Pure Water San Diego/Oceanside, East County AWP). On the current crisis, SDCWA frames itself as reliable and protected: it has NOT been asked to make voluntary Colorado River cuts, says the region has enough water through 2050 even in multi-dry years, and has participated collaboratively in the Lower Basin voluntary conservation program (1.8M+ AF in WY2024). The 2020s twist: 35 years of a ~50% per-capita demand drop plus population stall left SDCWA water-LONG and over-contracted at high cost. It is now a net water SELLER , 2026 long-term transfers to Western and Eastern Municipal (Riverside), worth ~$100M+ over five years, and a June 2026 first-of-its-kind interstate MOU (Reclamation, MWD, SNWA, Arizona DWR, CAP, SRP) to swap its Lake Mead Colorado River supplies for its desalinated water so the saved river water stays upstream for Arizona/Nevada to buy. Motivation is explicitly financial: offload surplus and relieve rate pressure (GM Dan Denham: ~$7M cuts rates 1%; plans to sell ~50,000 AF, ~15% of obligated purchases).

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to supportive, with strong self-interest. SDCWA already participates in Lower Basin voluntary conservation and , critically , is trying to become a SELLER of conserved/surplus consumptive use, not a buyer. A verified, credibly-measured consumptive-use market is directly aligned with its 2026 interstate-swap strategy: it wants to be paid for river water it forgoes. It would push hard for (a) rigorous verification/additionality (its whole 'new water' pitch depends on the saved water being real and stay-upstream), (b) protection of its senior QSA/IID priority and California-first delivery, and (c) revenue accruing to the seller's ratepayers. Watch the tension with IID, which has signaled it wants California's needs met before water leaves the state , SDCWA's ability to sell its IID-sourced supply interstate is politically contested.

On solar+water. Persuadable and potentially very interested, but on cost, not scarcity. SDCWA's pain is that its supply is expensive (desal energy costs) and it is water-long. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that lowers desalination energy cost would directly attack its worst unit-cost problem and could make its desal exchange product cheaper/more competitive to sell interstate. Water co-funding is less compelling to SDCWA specifically (it does not need more water), but attractive to its member agencies and to the broader deal if it subsidizes reuse or offsets ratepayer costs. Best framed to SDCWA as 'cut the cost of the water you already over-bought,' not 'new supply.' Low grid-interconnection sensitivity is a plus given SDG&E cost exposure.

On reuse/desal. Strongly supportive , this is core identity. SDCWA built Carlsbad desal and its board has repeatedly, unanimously reaffirmed support for member-agency potable reuse (Pure Water San Diego/Oceanside, East County AWP), which it treats as critical local supply toward drought-proofing. Caveat: it is now over-supplied, so NEW large desal/reuse that adds volume without a buyer would worsen its stranded-cost problem. It will favor reuse/desal that (a) is member-agency-led, (b) displaces imported MWD water rather than piling on surplus, or (c) creates a sellable/exchangeable product (the desal-for-river-water swap model). It would resist being forced to underwrite additional supply it cannot monetize.

A win for them. A durable, federally-blessed mechanism to sell or exchange their surplus/senior Colorado River supply (and expensive desal output) at prices that materially relieve ratepayer rate pressure, without surrendering QSA/IID senior priority or being cut in a shortage. Concretely: Interior/Reclamation approval of the interstate desal-for-river-water swap, cheaper desal energy, and recurring transfer revenue offsetting the detachment/take-or-pay losses , letting them turn a stranded, over-bought, high-cost portfolio into a revenue center.

Public record. SDCWA signed a memorandum of understanding in June 2026 with federal and state agencies to explore interstate exchanges of desalinated and recycled water to improve regional water reliability.

Position. The San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe (SJSPT) is a small, federally recognized tribe in northern Arizona that, uniquely among Colorado River basin tribes, has NO reservation of its own and currently rents its government building. Its entire public agenda on the river is bound up in one instrument: the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (NAIWRS), the largest tribal water rights settlement in U.S. history, negotiated jointly with the Navajo Nation and Hopi Tribe. The tribe's councils unanimously approved the settlement in May 2024. For SJSPT the deal is existential and dual-purpose: it would (1) ratify a 2000 Treaty with the Navajo Nation and establish a ~5,400-acre permanent reservation (roughly 5,100 acres near Tuba City, AZ and ~300 acres near Navajo Mountain, UT), and (2) secure water. Their own blog frames it as heritage and survival: 'A tribe without land is a tribe without a future,' and 'Not only will the settlement ratify the 2000 Treaty, but it also provides for the water we need to make our reservation a true homeland for our people.' The tribe explicitly advocates for 'equitable representation in the negotiations surrounding Colorado River water rights' and that 'the voices of all tribes need to be heard.' Vice President Johnny Lehi Jr. has stressed urgency, noting elders wanting to see a homeland 'before their time is up.' The settlement is currently STALLED: Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming (Upper Basin states) oppose codification, objecting to provisions that would let Navajo/Hopi lease water off-reservation (fearing an open-market precedent). At a March 2026 Senate hearing, tribal leaders pleaded for passage; Sen. Murkowski and Interior flagged the ~$5B price tag, and the tribes and Interior are now negotiating to shrink cost. SJSPT itself has taken no independent public stance on conservation markets, hyperscaler energy, or reuse/desal beyond the settlement.

On conservation. Cautiously persuadable, with a caveat. A verified consumptive-use conservation market has little direct upside for SJSPT because their allocation is tiny and tied to groundwater delivery, so they have almost nothing to sell. The real risk is political optics: the Upper Basin states are blocking their settlement precisely out of fear that any 'monetary transaction that moves water downstream' sets a market precedent. A conservation-market push framed as open water trading could deepen that opposition and further delay their homeland. They would likely support a conservation market only if it were carefully walled off from their settlement politics, explicitly tribal-benefiting, and did not give the four states fresh ammunition. Net: not opposed on principle, but wary of anything that inflames the leasing-precedent fight.

On solar+water. Most promising avenue and likely their warmest reaction of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water speaks directly to their two deepest needs: capital and water infrastructure that does not wait on the stalled $5B federal appropriation. With a new reservation potentially coming online, land-based revenue (energy leases) plus water funding is exactly the 'economic opportunity' and 'homeland' they say they want. Caveats: they have no secure land base until NAIWRS passes, staff and legal capacity are thin, and any deal must be structured so it survives whether or not the settlement is ratified. Persuadable-to-ally if the offer is genuine, sovereign-respecting, and near-term.

On reuse/desal. Largely neutral / low-salience. Large-scale reuse and desalination are Lower Basin metro-supply strategies far removed from a small tribe whose need is local groundwater delivery on a not-yet-established reservation. They would probably view basin-wide reuse/desal favorably to the extent it relieves pressure on the mainstem and reduces the zero-sum framing that fuels Upper Basin resistance to their settlement, but it does nothing directly for them and they have no capital to participate. Likely a mild, abstract supporter rather than an active player. Mark as low direct interest.

A win for them. A win is concrete and near-term: (1) Congressional ratification and funding of NAIWRS, delivering a legally secure ~5,400-acre reservation and firm water rights (up to 350 AF/yr) plus the ~$29.8M SJSPT trust funds ($28M groundwater infrastructure, $300K agricultural conservation); (2) failing full passage, any bridge that funds groundwater/water infrastructure and housing on their claimed lands now rather than after the federal logjam clears; and (3) recognition as a sovereign at the negotiating table. Essentially: land + reliable water + the capital to make the homeland livable.

Public record. The Tribe's primary focus is securing federally recognized water rights and a land base for the first time through the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement Act, which is a prerequisite to any stance on conservation or infrastructure programs.

Position. SEMARNAT is Mexico's cabinet-level environment ministry (headed since Oct 2024 by Alicia Barcena under President Sheinbaum). It sits atop Mexico's Colorado River institutional stack in two ways. (1) CONAGUA, Mexico's National Water Commission, is an 'organo desconcentrado' (deconcentrated body) of SEMARNAT; CONAGUA co-negotiates and implements the binational Colorado River 'Minutes' to the 1944 Water Treaty through CILA (the Mexican section of the IBWC, formally under the Foreign Ministry). (2) SEMARNAT is the federal environmental permitting/regulatory authority for works that could cause ecological imbalance, and is the ministry of record for delta ecosystem restoration and standards such as NOM-001-SEMARNAT-2021 (wastewater reuse/discharge). Longstanding institutional positions, grounded in evidence: (a) Mexico is a fixed-allocation treaty partner (1.5 MAF/1,850 hm3 base, ~9% of the river) and has cooperated on shortage-sharing via Minutes 319 (2012), 323 (2017) and 330 (2024), accepting proportional cutbacks during low Lake Mead elevations in exchange for US-funded conservation infrastructure (~$96.5M combined US contribution; ~200 kAF/yr from Minute 323 projects plus 400 kAF committed under Minute 330 and a Mexican Water Reserve in Lake Mead). (b) Support for Colorado River Delta environmental restoration: Mexico is a partner (with US and the Raise the River NGO coalition) in dedicated environmental water deliveries and the Cienega de Santa Clara, with pulse/base flows delivered 2014-2025. SEMARNAT is the environmental ministry behind Mexico's side of that commitment. (c) Under Sheinbaum/Barcena, a sovereignty-forward, 'human right to water,' de-privatization and agricultural-efficiency agenda (National Agreement for the Human Right to Water and Sustainability, Nov 2024; recovery of >4 billion m3 of over-concessioned water; irrigation modernization; agriculture = ~76% of national use). Barcena has publicly signaled reduced deference to the US ('we cannot depend solely on the United States,' Oct 2025), which colors the bilateral posture as cooperative but increasingly protective of Mexican allocation and dignity. Caveat: on day-to-day Colorado River volumetric negotiation, CONAGUA/CILA are the operational faces; SEMARNAT's own direct public statements specifically on Colorado River volumetrics are thin, so ministry-level negotiating positions are partly inferred from its parent role over CONAGUA and its environmental mandate (marked where uncertain).

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but conditional. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with the existing Minute 323/330 logic (Mexico already trades conserved water for US-funded infrastructure and Lake Mead storage credit) and with Barcena's agricultural-efficiency/de-privatization agenda. SEMARNAT/CONAGUA would likely engage IF: (a) verification is rigorous and binational (avoids the Mexicali unpaid-compensation grievance repeating), (b) conserved water benefits accrue to Mexico's allocation, reserve, or delta rather than being captured by US users, and (c) it does not become a backdoor to permanently privatize or re-concession Mexican national water, which cuts against Sheinbaum's constitutional 'water belongs to the nation' framing. Risk: a market framed as US-driven or as monetizing Mexican farmers' hardship would trigger sovereignty and equity objections.

On solar+water. Skeptical-to-neutral, permitting-gated. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water would be evaluated by SEMARNAT primarily as (1) an environmental-impact-authorization matter and (2) a sovereignty/equity matter. Positives: new water funding for the delta or municipal supply, and clean energy, fit its climate mandate (Barcena's climate-week and clean-energy posture). Frictions: SEMARNAT under Sheinbaum is wary of large private/foreign actors capturing national water or land, and of data-center/industrial water demand competing with the human-right-to-water priority. It would want the water benefit to be additional and durable, not a license for a foreign hyperscaler to establish a water/energy claim on Mexican territory. Reaction depends heavily on siting (Mexican vs US side), who controls the funded water, and whether it reads as genuine benefit-sharing or greenwashed extraction.

On reuse/desal. Most naturally aligned option, with ecological guardrails. Large-scale reuse and desalination directly match Sheinbaum/Barcena's stated strategy: Sheinbaum has publicly backed desalination provided no adverse marine-ecosystem impact (e.g., the Rosarito plant in Baja California, slated as Latin America's largest), and reuse is governed by NOM-001-SEMARNAT-2021. Reuse/desal create NEW supply that eases pressure on the fixed Colorado allocation without requiring treaty renegotiation, which is strategically attractive to Mexico. SEMARNAT would be supportive in principle but would gate approvals on brine/marine-ecosystem impact, energy source, and cost/equity (must serve the human right to water, not just industry). This is the offer most likely to land as a genuine win rather than a sovereignty threat.

A win for them. A win for SEMARNAT is: (1) NEW water supply (reuse/desal/efficiency) that relieves stress on Mexico's fixed Colorado allocation without renegotiating the 1944 treaty to Mexico's disadvantage; (2) durable, additional, Mexico-controlled funding for delta ecosystem restoration and municipal/agricultural supply, delivered with verified binational accountability (no repeat of unpaid-compensation disputes); (3) advancing the human-right-to-water and de-privatization agenda while keeping national water under Mexican sovereignty; (4) clean-energy and climate co-benefits it can claim publicly; and (5) demonstrating that Mexico cooperates on the shared river from a position of dignity and reciprocity rather than dependence on the US. Enforceable environmental guardrails (marine ecosystems, brine, delta flows) intact throughout.

Public record. SEMARNAT actively participates in binational water conservation projects with the U.S. under the Minutes of the Mexican Water Treaty, including funding for conservation, and is pursuing large-scale renewable energy projects like the Plan Sonora.

Position. SCSA (now branded SADER BC, Secretaría de Agricultura y Desarrollo Rural de Baja California), currently led by Secretary Mónica Vargas Núñez, is the Baja California state agriculture agency responsible for the ~200,000-ha farm economy of the Mexicali Valley, which is irrigated almost entirely by Colorado River water via Irrigation District 014 'Río Colorado.' Its longstanding institutional role is to protect and grow the Mexicali Valley farm sector (alfalfa, cotton, wheat, white corn) while coordinating water use with CONAGUA, CILA (the Mexican section of the IBWC), and the 22 water-user irrigation modules. Its recent public position on the river crisis is adaptive rather than denialist: it publicly acknowledges that Baja California's Colorado River quota is projected to be cut by roughly 350 million cubic meters (Mm³) by 2027 (per COLEF's Alfonso Cortez Lara), and it is actively urging farmers toward 'reconversión agrícola' , switching from water-intensive alfalfa/cotton to climate-resilient, higher-value, lower-water crops , and supporting hydro-agricultural modernization ('tecnificación'). It backs the federal program to technify ~10,000 ha of DR-014 with ~5 billion pesos to recover up to 30% of applied water by 2028. It works inside the binational Minute 323/330 framework (the U.S.-Mexico agreements paying for Mexican conservation, fallowing and canal lining). Where it is squeezed: SCSA sits between farmers who feel underpaid for conservation and a federal government (Sheinbaum's Dec 2025 national water-law reform) that has banned water sales/transfers and is reasserting federal control over surplus water. Farmers demand the Minute-established ~USD 1,258/ha/yr for land rest; state/federal authorities offered only ~7,000 pesos/ha plus 2,500 pesos fallowing labor, which District 014 users rejected. In Dec 2025 Mexicali farmers threatened to resume full Colorado River use (threatening Tijuana/Ensenada urban supply) after losing water-sale income. SCSA is a negotiating party in these disputes but is not the lead water authority (CONAGUA/CILA/the governor's office lead on allocations); its lever is the farm-transition and compensation-delivery side.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive, conditional on money actually reaching farmers. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to what SCSA is already trying to operationalize (fallowing/land-rest under Minutes 323/330 plus crop reconversion), so the concept is familiar and welcome. But SCSA's live grievance is exactly a verification-and-payment failure: farmers say they've been paid for only half the land they idled and reject sub-scale offers (7,000 pesos/ha vs the ~USD 1,258/ha Minute rate). A market that (a) pays the real opportunity cost per acre-foot/hectare, (b) verifies conserved consumptive use rigorously and transparently (satellite/ET-based, credible to both farmers and funders), and (c) pays promptly and directly to concession-holders would be strongly embraced , it solves SCSA's twin problem of shrinking water and farm income collapse. Risks that would turn them skeptical: any structure that looks like an uncompensated federal water grab (post-Sheinbaum reform, surplus water reverts to the nation, so farmers fear 'conservation' becomes confiscation), or thin per-hectare pricing. Persuadable-to-ally on this if the price is right and payment is guaranteed.

On solar+water. Interested but not the natural lead; would engage as a farm-economy beneficiary rather than owner. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive to Baja California broadly (the state and CFE already pair the Rosarito desal with the Presidente Juárez thermoelectric site, and BC courts industrial/data-center-adjacent investment). For SCSA specifically, the appeal is indirect: if data-center/energy money funds the ~5-billion-peso-class tecnificación of DR-014, canal lining, on-farm efficiency, or pays for fallowing/reconversion, that directly relieves its budget and its farmers. Mexicali has abundant solar resource and idle/marginal farmland that could host generation, giving landowners a new revenue line to replace lost water-sale income , a natural fit for a crop-to-kilowatt or agrivoltaic pitch. Frictions: the federal government (CFE/CONAGUA) controls the energy-and-water nexus and the post-2025 water law, so SCSA can advocate but cannot unilaterally deliver; and any 'water for data centers' optics in a farm valley under cuts is politically radioactive unless the water clearly nets positive for agriculture. Persuadable; wants the water benefit ring-fenced for the valley's farmers.

On reuse/desal. Supportive of reuse for agriculture; neutral-to-skeptical on desal as a farm solution. Large-scale desalination in BC (Rosarito) is real and state-backed, but it is coastal and urban-facing , it substitutes for Tijuana/Ensenada's Colorado River draw and thereby can free river water upstream, which indirectly helps the system, but it does not deliver water to inland Mexicali farms and is expensive per m³ for irrigation. SCSA would welcome desal chiefly as a way to take urban demand off the river so more stays available (or is not clawed back) for agriculture, and as leverage in the farmer-vs-city fight (if cities get desal, farmers' river share is less contested). Water reuse/recycling is more directly attractive: treated municipal wastewater from Mexicali could substitute for or supplement irrigation and drainage-water reuse, keeping farmland productive under a shrinking river quota. Best received if reuse is funded from outside the farm budget and explicitly increases (or protects) deliverable water to DR-014 rather than becoming a rationale to cut the district's allocation.

A win for them. A win for SCSA is a Mexicali Valley farm economy that survives the ~350 Mm³/yr river cut without mass fallowing, farmer bankruptcy, or unrest: farmers voluntarily shift to lower-water, higher-value crops and modern irrigation, and are paid fairly and on time for the water they conserve (at or near the Minute-323/330 ~USD 1,258/ha rate, not the rejected sub-scale offer), with new outside funding (binational, federal, or private/hyperscaler) covering tecnificación and transition so it doesn't fall on the state budget. Concretely: the ~5-billion-peso, 10,000-ha DR-014 modernization delivered and its ~30% water-recovery target met; the conservation-payment backlog cleared; and a durable, verified conservation-market or reuse pipeline that keeps water and income flowing to the valley's producers. Politically, SCSA wants to be seen as the agency that kept farmers whole and food production intact through the crisis , protecting jobs, the ejido base, and food security , rather than the agency that presided over the valley drying up.

Public record. As the agricultural agency for Baja California, its position would be critical for any binational conservation program, but there is no clear public record of its stance on paying farmers to conserve water for binational benefit, large-scale solar, or desalination exchanges.

Position. LONGSTANDING: Sierra Club treats the Colorado River as an aridifying, over-allocated system (native flow down ~31% vs 20th-century average per its Water Sentinels page) and calls to 'shift the paradigm of past management...to accommodate the reality of climate change driven aridification and reduced flows' and 'live within the native flow.' Its Colorado River Task Force (reactivated March 2022 under the Grassroots Network Water Sentinels / Western Waters sub-team, spanning chapters in all 7 basin states plus a CA Water Committee) frames water as a public trust and non-commodity: 'Water is sacred, needed by all life,' 'not a commodity to be seen as private property,' and it explicitly commits to 'guard against the monetizing of the waters of the Colorado River.' It flags that 'the water rights of Native Tribes and Environmental needs have been largely ignored' and champions tribal rights (endorsing CRIT and river-personhood framings) and environmental flows. Legacy 'Drain Lake Powell'/Fill Mead First posture (board-adopted 1996 via David Brower) still colors its skepticism of Glen Canyon Dam management; the Task Force has since focused on watershed-scale management and formal comments on Reclamation's post-2026 SEIS. RECENT: In its 2026 analysis it criticized all of Reclamation's modeled alternatives as failing under real drought and rejected 'crossing your fingers' band-aids; it defends Imperial Valley agricultural flows as ecologically load-bearing (32 endangered species, full-length river flow). ENERGY-WATER: A May 2026 Colorado chapter blog opposes hyperscale data centers on water and energy grounds ('Colorado can't afford the water needed for new data centers'; cites 20-30 MGD/facility, ~80% cooling water evaporated, unmetered withdrawals, opaque reporting, and refuses to 'give away our resources to companies earning billions'). It supports utility-scale solar and storage but ONLY under responsible-siting rules (its March 2026 renewable siting guidance and support for the DRECP / updated Western Solar Plan: previously disturbed/degraded land near existing transmission, avoid intact desert wildlands).

On conservation. MIXED / CONDITIONAL, tilting cautious. Sierra Club has stated conservation 'is essential in order to bolster dwindling storage' (Joan Taylor, CA Conservation Chair) and supports demand reduction in principle. But a *market* that pays for verified consumptive-use cuts runs straight into its stated commitment to 'guard against the monetizing of the waters' and its 'water is not a commodity' framing, so it will not endorse a market on its face. The IID suit is the template: it will support the conserved volume but demand (a) full CEQA/NEPA environmental review, (b) mitigation of third-party/ecosystem harms (fallowed-land dust, Salton Sea, wildlife, groundwater), (c) protection of tribal and environmental water shares, and (d) safeguards against permanent 'buy-and-dry' of farmland and profiteering. Persuadable if the market is structured as public-benefit conservation with hard environmental guardrails and equity/tribal provisions rather than a commodity exchange; a live opponent if it reads as speculative water trading.

On solar+water. MOST HOSTILE of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water triggers two active Sierra Club fronts at once. On water it has explicitly argued the basin/state 'can't afford the water needed for new data centers,' attacking hyperscalers for large, opaque, evaporative water draws and for extracting public resources for private billions. On energy it welcomes solar+storage in the abstract but conditions it hard on responsible siting (disturbed land near transmission, no intact-desert sacrifice) and will scrutinize the new load's grid and emissions footprint. The 'also funds water' sweetener reads to them as pay-to-pollute / license-to-consume unless the net basin water balance is clearly negative-draw and transparent. Expect opposition or heavy conditioning: demand metered/audited water use, net-water-neutral-or-better accounting, siting review, community benefit and rate protections, and independent verification. Persuadable only if the package is genuinely water-additive (returns more to the river than the datacenter consumes) and fully transparent; default posture is skeptical-to-opposed.

On reuse/desal. MOST FAVORABLE of the three, but conditioned. Sierra Club (esp. California) has publicly endorsed wastewater recycling as 'the largest source of untapped local water' and brackish/coastal desalination within its 'Water Renaissance' vision, crediting recycling+stormwater+conservation with 1.8-2.0 MAF/yr of new local supply by ~2045. It prefers reuse over new diversion because it reduces pressure on the river. Caveats it will raise: energy intensity and emissions of desal, brine disposal and marine/coastal ecosystem impacts, cost and equity, and (critically for the basin) that any desal-for-river swap must not simply free up Colorado River water to enable MORE total consumption or new sprawl/datacenter load. On the June 2026 Reclamation desal-trade MOU (SDCWA/MWD/SNWA/AZ/CAWCD/SRP interstate swaps) no Sierra Club reaction is on record yet (UNKNOWN), but its pattern predicts conditional support gated on lifecycle/environmental review and a guarantee the freed water benefits the river and tribes, not expanded demand.

A win for them. A durable, transparent solution that keeps more water in a healthier river and its ecosystems, honors long-ignored tribal and environmental water rights, and does NOT convert water into a speculative commodity or reward large private consumers. Concretely: paid conservation that is real, verified, and coupled with full environmental review and third-party/dust/Salton Sea mitigation; reuse-and-efficiency (recycling, brackish desal, stormwater) that cuts new diversions rather than enabling more demand; renewables sited responsibly on degraded land; and any datacenter/hyperscaler involvement delivering net-additional water to the river with metered, audited transparency. A win lets them claim they moved the basin from over-allocation toward living within native flow while protecting rivers, wildlife, tribes, and frontline communities, on terms they helped write, without endorsing water commodification.

Public record. The Sierra Club supports well-sited renewable energy and water conservation but scrutinizes large-scale projects on public lands for environmental impacts, making their support conditional.

Position. {'summary': "SCE is California's second-largest investor-owned utility (~15 million people across central, coastal and Southern California). Its connection to the Colorado River is ENERGY, not water rights: SCE holds a 5.5377% allocation of Hoover Dam hydropower and is one of the dam's largest single customers, historically among the sources that power the pumping plants lifting Colorado River Aqueduct water ~1,600 ft across the desert (the aqueduct itself is Metropolitan Water District's, not SCE's). SCE does not hold Colorado River water rights and, as best as public evidence shows, does not take formal positions on interstate river allocation, cuts, or the Law of the River. Its public 'positions' are about the clean-energy transition, not the water crisis per se: net-zero by 2045, a 'Reimagining the Grid' / 'Countdown to 2030' roadmap calling for ~30 GW of added renewables by 2030, heavy solar+storage procurement, and electrification of transport and buildings.", 'longstanding': "SCE was one of the original operators of Hoover powerplant (it and LADWP ran the plant under Reclamation supervision until 1987) and has held a Boulder Canyon Project allocation for decades. Its allocation and those of other California entities were locked in long-term by the 2011 Hoover Power Allocation Act, which extended contracts to 2067 (new arrangement effective Oct 1 2017, after setting aside 5% for tribes, co-ops and others). So SCE's Colorado River hydropower stake is durable and contractually secured for the long term. Longstanding corporate posture: aggressive decarbonization advocate, publicly arguing California must move faster on renewables, storage and electrification to hit 2030/2045 goals.", 'recent': "SCE disclosed roughly 5 GW of data center load in its interconnection request queue (published at the California Energy Commission's request for the 2024 IEPR), and projects electricity demand growing ~35% faster over the next decade than it estimated just two years earlier - a load-growth story driven partly by data centers and electrification. On the Colorado River side, the salient recent development is supply-side risk: Reclamation's April 2026 emergency plan could cut Hoover Dam electricity output by up to ~40% by fall 2026, because at Lake Mead elevation ~1,035 ft only 5 of 17 turbines can generate. That directly shrinks the volume and firmness of the cheap federal hydropower SCE is entitled to."}

A win for them. A win = SCE reliably serves its surging load (data centers + electrification) with firm, affordable, carbon-free power, cushioned against the loss of Hoover hydropower as Lake Mead falls, and does it with someone else's capital. Concretely: (1) hyperscaler- or third-party-financed solar+storage that SCE interconnects and can count toward resource adequacy, replacing weakening Hoover megawatt-hours; (2) new firm clean load (reuse/desal, data centers) that grows revenue while carrying its own water-stewardship story and reducing political blowback on large loads; (3) basin-stabilization efforts that protect Lake Mead's head and thus SCE's low-cost hydropower entitlement and the affordability of aqueduct pumping - all achieved within CPUC/CAISO rules and without SCE having to take a position in interstate water fights it has no standing in.

Public record. As a major utility, SCE is a primary procurer of large-scale renewable energy to meet state mandates and actively runs programs at the water-energy nexus, viewing new loads like desalination as a business opportunity.

Position. SCPPA is a California Joint Powers Authority (formed 1980) that jointly plans, finances, builds, and operates power and transmission projects for 12 member agencies: the municipal utilities of Anaheim, Azusa, Banning, Burbank, Cerritos, Colton, Glendale, Los Angeles (LADWP), Pasadena, Riverside, and Vernon, plus the Imperial Irrigation District (IID), serving 5M+ people across ~9,000 sq mi. It is an electricity organization, not a water agency, and takes no public institutional position on Colorado River water allocation or the interstate drought negotiations. Its river exposure is indirect but real, running along three channels. (1) Hydropower: SCPPA and several member cities descend from the original Boulder Canyon Project Act (1928) Hoover Dam power contractors (Pasadena, Glendale, Burbank, LA, Anaheim, Riverside, Azusa, Banning, Colton). SCPPA has historically held an 18.68% interest in the contingent capacity of the Hoover Uprating Project and participated in the Lower Colorado River Multi-Species Conservation Program (LCR MSCP). Per its own audited financials, SCPPA is transitioning out as a direct Hoover energy contractor, moving LCR MSCP agreements/permits and Hoover participation to the individual member utilities. So the Hoover dependency is modest at the JPA level and concentrated in member cities. (2) Member IID is the single largest Colorado River water user (3.1 million acre-feet annual entitlement), the basin's most active large-scale agricultural conservation actor, and the entity tying SCPPA's footprint directly to the Salton Sea and Colorado River water-energy nexus. (3) Generation strategy: SCPPA runs a rolling RFP for renewables and standalone storage across CAISO, IID, and LADWP territories on a path to 100% fossil-free electricity by 2045, and already procures Imperial Valley / Salton Sea geothermal (e.g., an Ormat Casa Diablo geothermal PPA resold to Colton) plus solar and storage. Net: SCPPA's revealed preference is aggressive clean-energy and storage procurement, indifference-by-mandate to Hoover's decline (it is diversifying away from it), and no political stance on the water fight itself.

On conservation. Neutral-to-mildly-positive, but not a decision-maker. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a water instrument; SCPPA has no water rights and no institutional role in it, so at the JPA level the reaction is indifference. The nuance is through member IID: a well-designed, verified conservation market that pays IID (and its farmers) for measured, additional consumptive-use reductions could stabilize IID's finances and Salton Sea obligations, which indirectly supports SCPPA's IID power partnership and its Imperial Valley procurement pipeline. SCPPA would want any such market structured so it does not strand or devalue the water-energy-nexus assets (geothermal, solar, storage) it is helping finance in that region. Verdict: passive ally-by-proxy, driven by IID's stance rather than SCPPA's own.

On solar+water. This is SCPPA's strongest natural fit and where it is most persuadable-to-ally. SCPPA already runs rolling RFPs for solar and standalone storage across CAISO, IID, and LADWP territories toward 100% fossil-free by 2045, and is an active offtaker of Imperial Valley solar and Salton Sea geothermal. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto its core competency (joint financing/procurement of large clean generation and transmission for member load). SCPPA is a credible aggregator, financier, and PPA counterparty for exactly this kind of project, and datacenter load growth in the Southwest is a demand tailwind for its members. Caveats it would raise: transmission deliverability/interconnection (IID OATT and CAISO queue issues are real constraints); ensuring member-utility benefit and rate impacts are protected; and that new large loads do not worsen water stress in already-stressed Southern California basins. Engaged as a procurement/financing partner rather than lobbied as a policy actor, SCPPA is a likely enthusiastic participant.

On reuse/desal. Supportive as an energy supplier, not a lead. Large-scale reuse and desalination are extremely energy-intensive, and firm clean power plus storage is exactly what SCPPA sells. It would view a reuse/desal buildout as new load and a procurement opportunity for its solar+storage+geothermal pipeline (especially if paired with datacenter or industrial load in Imperial/Coachella valleys). It has no role in siting, permitting, or financing the water infrastructure itself and would defer to member water agencies and the state. Reaction: cooperative, opportunistic on the power-supply side, silent on the water-policy side.

A win for them. A win is more firm, low-cost, carbon-free power and storage for member utilities that (1) replaces the eroding Hoover hydropower resource with new deliverable clean generation, (2) turns Southwest datacenter/industrial/reuse load growth into long-term offtake and financing deals it can aggregate for members, (3) unlocks the Imperial Valley / Salton Sea geothermal-solar-storage-lithium pipeline by solving transmission/interconnection, and (4) does so while protecting member ratepayers and keeping its IID partnership financially healthy. Concretely: signed PPAs and jointly financed projects on its rolling RFP, resolved IID/CAISO deliverability, and progress toward 100% fossil-free by 2045 without a rate shock from Hoover's decline. Water outcomes are a win only insofar as they stabilize IID and enable the energy assets SCPPA finances.

Public record. SCPPA is a joint powers authority that actively procures large-scale renewable energy, including a 2024 power purchase agreement for the 300 MW Bonanza solar and storage project on federal land in Nevada.

Position. SNWA is the regional water wholesaler for the Las Vegas metro (~2.4M people, ~40M annual visitors) and manages Nevada's small but strategically distinct 300,000 AF Colorado River apportionment (~1.8% of the river, the smallest of the seven states). Its longstanding public posture is that it is the basin's conservation and efficiency leader: it cut per-capita use 58% from 2002-2025 while adding ~876,000 residents, banned ornamental/'non-functional' turf by law (SB151, 2021), and now consumes far below its cap (198,000 AF net consumptive use in 2025, well under 300,000 AF). Its defining structural argument is return-flow credits: ~99% of indoor water is recycled and returned to Lake Mead via the Las Vegas Wash, and Nevada only counts NET consumptive use against its allocation, so indoor reuse is effectively 'free' water. GM John Entsminger is Nevada's lead Colorado River negotiator (since 2014). Recent positions (2025-2026): Nevada offered a ~17% cut as part of the AZ/CA/NV Lower Basin post-2026 proposal (AZ 27%, CA 10%); Entsminger has publicly said he no longer believes a 20-year deal is achievable and that a 5-year interim operating plan is the realistic path 'to keep us out of court' as the federal government must set 2027 operations by roughly Aug 2026. He consistently frames Nevada as 'in the best place of any state on the river' because of conservation and the most secure delivery system in the basin. SNWA champions demand-side reduction as the primary lever, supports a negotiated seven-state consensus, and is actively pursuing supply-augmentation partnerships (interstate exchanges, ocean desalination) rather than pure allocation fights.

On conservation. Strongly favorable in principle, but with a distinctive twist. SNWA is the basin's model for demand-side conservation and already participates in Reservoir Protection Conservation (contributed 233,000 AF toward the Lower Basin 3 MAF commitment through 2024) and system-conservation funding. A verified consumptive-use market fits its core belief that reductions should be measured, real, and rewarded. The nuance: SNWA's own low-hanging fruit is largely picked (turf banned, indoor water already ~99% recycled), so it is more likely to be a BUYER of conserved consumptive use elsewhere (or a rules-architect) than a big seller. It will insist on rigorous measurement of NET consumptive use, not diversions, because its entire return-flow-credit system depends on that distinction being honored, and it will be wary of any market accounting that ignores return flows and thereby undervalues Nevada's efficiency. Likely an enthusiastic supporter and credibility anchor for a well-governed market, provided the accounting is consumptive-use-based and it keeps a seat shaping the rules.

On solar+water. Interested and unusually well-positioned to broker it, because the datacenter/hyperscaler boom is landing squarely in Nevada (Las Vegas/Reno). SNWA has direct incentive to shape how new datacenter load interacts with water: datacenters that use dry/closed-loop cooling and buy into local supply keep Nevada's consumptive footprint low, and hyperscaler capital that funds solar+storage plus water augmentation aligns with SNWA's supply-partnership strategy (it is already pursuing interstate exchanges and desalination). The 'also funds water' hook is exactly the kind of third-party capital SNWA needs to offset its multi-billion-dollar capital plan and any desalination buy-in. Cautions: SNWA will scrutinize whether datacenter water use is genuinely net-neutral or offset, will want energy that lowers pumping/treatment cost (the Low Lake Level station and treatment trains are energy-intensive), and will guard against optics of tying scarce public water to private hyperscalers. Persuadable-to-favorable if the mechanism is net-water-positive and channels capital into Nevada's supply resilience.

On reuse/desal. This is SNWA's home turf and its most differentiated position. On REUSE: SNWA is arguably the national leader in indirect potable reuse via return-flow credits (Las Vegas Wash returns ~99% of indoor water to Lake Mead; Henderson and other reclamation plants feed the Wash, with a recent ~$100M Henderson upgrade). Any program accelerating reuse is squarely aligned, though Nevada has already maximized indoor reuse, so marginal gains are smaller than for peers. On DESALINATION: SNWA is a leading proponent of a novel model, funding ocean desal OUTSIDE Nevada to gain Colorado River water via exchange. Its board approved an MOU (June 2026, with Reclamation, San Diego County Water Authority, MWD, Arizona DWR, CAP, SRP) to explore paying for Carlsbad-plant desalinated water (~56,000 AF, expandable to ~62,000 AF) that San Diego would consume in exchange for leaving equivalent Colorado River water in Lake Mead for Nevada. Terms and price are unsettled ('not clear how much a transfer would cost'), but SNWA sees investing in coastal desal as a way to acquire additional river water without building in-state. So on reuse/desal SNWA is enthusiastic across the board, and uniquely, it treats large-scale desalination as a positive strategic tool (funded via interstate exchange) rather than something to resist.

A win for them. A win is cementing Nevada's status as the secure, efficiency-leading state while offsetting the capital and access costs that its small allocation makes disproportionately expensive per acre-foot. Concretely: a negotiated post-2026 operating plan (even a 5-year interim one) that keeps the basin out of court, honors return-flow credits and net-consumptive-use accounting, and rewards its conservation; supplemental supply via interstate exchange (the San Diego/Carlsbad desal model) that adds firm water without in-state buildout; outside capital (hyperscaler or market) that shrinks its ratepayer/connection-charge burden and funds resilience projects; and cheaper, reliable energy for its energy-intensive low-lake pumping and treatment. Politically, a win lets Entsminger and the board show Nevada punched above its ~1.8% weight, protected Las Vegas growth and the tourism/datacenter economy, and shaped the river's rules rather than merely absorbing cuts.

Public record. SNWA has implemented one of the nation's most comprehensive water conservation programs, is actively developing large-scale solar energy, and is pursuing interstate desalination and water reuse agreements.

Position. {'summary': "The Southern Ute Indian Tribe is a sovereign Upper Basin senior water-rights holder and a sophisticated energy operator, not a passive conservation partner. Its core, non-negotiable position is that its water is UNDERDEVELOPED, that it has an affirmative right to develop and put that water to use, and that decades of federal underinvestment (no delivery infrastructure for its ALP water) have denied it the benefit of a settlement it gave up litigation and other stream claims to obtain. It has largely priority-1868 senior rights to divert up to ~128,939 acre-feet/year and ~38,000 AF of stored M&I water in Lake Nighthorse. It insists tribes get a real seat at Colorado River governance and that any basin-wide 'save water' scheme not be built on the backs of tribes who have never gotten to use their full entitlement. It is open to being paid to forbear developing water, but on its own terms and with compensation and infrastructure it controls.", 'longstanding': ["Settled its federally reserved water rights via the 1986 Final Settlement Agreement, the 1988 Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights Settlement Act, and the 2000 amendments. In exchange for the Animas-La Plata Project the Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute tribes dropped ~15 years of water litigation against the U.S. and relinquished claims on other local streams. SUIT holds roughly 35% of ALP's water allocation; most rights carry an 1868 priority date (some subordinated to priorities up to 1976 as part of the deal).", "Long-running grievance that the federal government broke its promises: ALP was authorized in 1968 but scaled down dramatically (Lake Nighthorse not filled until 2011) and left WITHOUT the delivery infrastructure to actually move tribal water onto the reservation. Vice-Chairman Lorelei Cloud's framing, 'We're tired of broken promises,' captures the tribe's baseline stance.", "Consistent assertion of the RIGHT to develop its water: the Tribe publicly states it 'has the right to develop its water resources and plans to do so,' and warns other basin users that they currently rely on undeveloped tribal water that will not stay undeveloped forever.", 'Advocacy for a formal tribal seat in Colorado River governance: SUIT is a member of the Ten Tribes Partnership and the Water & Tribes Initiative, and its leaders have pushed for tribal inclusion in the Upper Colorado River Commission and post-2026 operating-guideline negotiations. Lorelei Cloud became the first tribal member on the Colorado Water Conservation Board (2023) and its first Indigenous chair (elected May 2025), giving the Tribe an unusual direct hand on statewide Colorado water policy.', "Longstanding sophistication as an energy sovereign: through its Growth Fund and Red Willow Production Company (founded 1992, now a top-25 U.S. privately held oil-and-gas producer with assets in the Gulf of Mexico, the Delaware Basin, and Wyoming's Jonah Field), plus a first-of-its-kind Tribal Energy Resource Agreement (TERA) with the U.S. and clean-energy moves (multiple on-reservation solar arrays; a NET Power / 8 Rivers zero-emissions gas plant partnership announced 2021)."], 'recent': ["May 2025: for the FIRST TIME since ALP's 1968 authorization, a tribe used its ALP water. SUIT's Tribal Council approved use of up to 2,000 AF/year and ran miles of temporary rubber water lines to pull Animas River water for oil-and-gas well-completion operations (work concluded mid-July 2025). The Tribe plans to reinvest revenues into deteriorated systems like the Pine River Indian Irrigation Project. This is a deliberate, on-the-record demonstration that its water is real and developable.", "2023-2024: SUIT and the Ute Mountain Ute asked the State of Colorado (via the Colorado River Drought Task Force) for a PILOT FORBEARANCE program to compensate the tribes for water they aren't yet using; SUIT water attorney Lisa Yellow Eagle presented the tribes' issues in Sept. 2023.", "Oct. 2024: the Bureau of Reclamation reconsidered and EXCLUDED tribal forbearance from the next round of IRA-funded Upper Basin 'Bucket 2 Water' (B2W) conservation payments. Lorelei Cloud publicly called it unfair that federal conservation funding would pay other users but not pay tribes for their unused water. Colorado's congressional delegation (Bennet, Hickenlooper) and Gov. Polis pressed Reclamation to reverse. A proposed forbearance concept (estimated ~$450M) would compensate the tribes for deferring development and fund water infrastructure while reducing junior/senior conflict.", 'March 2026: Colorado lawmakers again publicly urged federal action to secure tribal water access, signaling the infrastructure-funding fight is still open going into the post-2026 guideline endgame.', "May 2025: Cloud elected chair of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, materially raising the Tribe's leverage inside Colorado's water-policy machinery during the post-2026 negotiations."]}

On conservation. Conditionally favorable, and potentially the single most important tribal player to bring in, but with hard conditions. SUIT has ALREADY asked for exactly this kind of mechanism: a paid forbearance/pilot program compensating it for deferring development of unused water. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is directionally aligned with that ask. But its support hinges on terms it has drawn a line on: (1) tribes must be PAID on par with other users, not excluded (the Oct. 2024 B2W exclusion is a live grievance and a trust test); (2) verification/accounting must credit undeveloped tribal water fairly and not treat the tribe's non-use as free water the system already banks; (3) compensation should be paired with, or fund, the delivery infrastructure the Tribe still lacks; (4) it must NOT lock in a permanent forfeiture of the Tribe's affirmative right to develop later. Framed as 'we pay you, transparently and verifiably, for water you choose to leave in the system, and it does not waive your right to develop,' SUIT is a strong ally. Framed as another program that quietly assumes tribal water stays unused for free, it becomes an opponent.

On solar+water. Likely receptive, more than almost any other tribe, because SUIT is itself an energy developer. It runs Red Willow, holds a first-ever TERA giving it expanded energy authority, has built on-reservation solar (1.3 MW array online 2017; ~800 kW displacing ~40% of building fuel), and partnered with 8 Rivers / NET Power on a zero-emissions gas plant expected to draw hundreds of millions in capital and create 1,000+ jobs. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water fits its identity as a capital-deploying sovereign seeking to diversify beyond hydrocarbons and to fund water infrastructure it cannot otherwise afford. Key conditions: the Tribe will want ownership/equity or a genuine development role (not to be a passive land/water host), tribal jobs and revenue, respect for sovereignty and cultural/land resources, and assurance the 'water funding' actually builds ITS delivery/irrigation infrastructure and does not quietly commit its senior water to someone else's data centers. If the deal is structured as a tribal-led or tribal-equity energy+water project on or near the reservation, SUIT is a natural partner; if it is an outside developer extracting water and siting infrastructure with the Tribe as a bystander, it will resist.

On reuse/desal. Broadly supportive but largely as an interested outsider, not a direct actor. SUIT is an Upper Basin, inland tributary tribe with senior rights; large-scale reuse/desalination (typically Lower Basin or coastal) does not directly serve or threaten it, and it has no coastal exposure. Its interest is systemic and strategic: any new 'wet water' or augmentation supply that relieves basin-wide pressure reduces the political temptation to solve the shortage by leaning on tribes to keep leaving their entitlements unused. The Tribe would likely welcome augmentation that takes the pressure off its own undeveloped rights and strengthens its argument that it should be allowed to develop and even (someday) lease its water. Caveats: it will insist reuse/desal be treated as ADDITIONAL supply that expands the pie, not as an excuse to further defer honoring tribal settlement obligations or funding tribal infrastructure, and it will watch that costs/obligations are not shifted onto Upper Basin or tribal users. Net: a quiet, conditional supporter with no operational role.

A win for them. A win is turning a paper entitlement and a history of broken promises into real, funded, tribally controlled benefit WITHOUT surrendering the right to develop. Concretely: (1) permanent delivery and irrigation infrastructure (ALP conveyance onto the reservation, Pine River Indian Irrigation Project rehabilitation) built and paid for; (2) fair, guaranteed compensation for any water it agrees to leave in the system, on equal footing with non-tribal users, reversing the B2W exclusion; (3) an explicit, durable preservation of its right to develop its ~128,939 AF/yr and ~38,000 AF Lake Nighthorse storage later, and progress toward the long-sought ability to lease/market tribal water off-reservation; (4) real tribal ownership, jobs, and revenue in any energy+water buildout, extending its Growth Fund/TERA model into clean energy and water; (5) a permanent, respected seat at the post-2026 and Upper Colorado River Commission table, consistent with Lorelei Cloud's CWCB role. In short: money, infrastructure, and sovereignty honored, with optionality to develop or monetize its water preserved.

Public record. The Tribe has advocated to be paid for the non-development of its quantified water rights, viewing it as compensation for propping up the system, but has been met with federal eligibility challenges.

Position. Statutory water-development and compact-protection district for nine SW Colorado counties (Archuleta, Dolores, La Plata, Montezuma, San Juan, San Miguel, and parts of Hinsdale, Mineral, Montrose), created 1941 to 'protect, conserve, use and develop' the San Juan/Dolores basin waters and 'safeguard for Colorado all waters of the basin to which the state is entitled.' Longstanding development-and-entitlement orientation: SWCD's core frame is that Colorado should be able to USE its full Upper Basin compact apportionment, not permanently forgo it. On the crisis, SWCD supports Colorado's participation in the Upper Basin Drought Contingency Plan and its three strategies (CRSP reservoir reoperation, supply augmentation via cloud seeding/phreatophyte removal, and a voluntary/temporary/compensated demand-management investigation). Its hard qualifier is repeated: 'any exploration of a program to reduce consumptive use in Colorado must have parameters that ensure the viability of Western Slope communities.' The affiliated West Slope Water Bank Work Group and River District economic study reached a unanimous recommendation that the state NOT rely solely on demand management, and warned that compensation funded from within Western Colorado only shifts money regionally with no net benefit, so any conservation payments must come from OUTSIDE the region. Deep concern about 'buy-and-dry' of senior West Slope agricultural rights by East Slope/Front Range providers. Recognizes real risk of Lake Powell hitting critical elevation 3,525 ft. Heavy engagement on post-2026 operating guidelines and on tribal/interstate water (San Juan basin overlaps Ute Mountain Ute, Southern Ute, Navajo).

On conservation. Cautiously open but conditional, not opposed. SWCD already supports investigating a voluntary/temporary/compensated demand-management program, so a VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market fits their stated framework IF it is additive rather than a sole solution and funded from outside Western Colorado. A rigorous MRV/verification layer actually helps them, since their fear is uncompensated or coerced fallowing. Watch items: they will insist on West Slope viability parameters, anti-buy-and-dry protections for senior ag rights, outside funding, and no erosion of Colorado's right to use its entitlement. Verification credibility and equitable price discovery are the swing factors.

On solar+water. Likely receptive if framed as new outside capital. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with their explicit requirement that conservation dollars originate outside the region and adds economic activity to the nine-county tax base. Concerns to preempt: rural land-use and siting friction, water demand of the data-center load itself, and any implication that the deal pressures local ag water. Sell it as pressure relief on fallowing plus regional investment, and avoid overclaiming grid/interconnection benefits.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-supportive in principle but geographically indirect. SWCD is an inland headwaters/Upper Basin district; large reuse and (especially) desalination mainly help Lower Basin/coastal demand and are not a local supply tool for the San Juan/Dolores basins. They would welcome anything that reduces Lower Basin calls on the system and lowers the odds of Powell hitting 3,525 ft, easing compact-curtailment risk on the Upper Basin. They will resist any framing that positions West Slope conservation as the substitute for Lower Basin augmentation. Their 'Fluid Horizons' seminar shows genuine openness to innovation, so present reuse/desal as system-wide risk reduction that protects their entitlement, not as a local fix.

A win for them. A durable outcome where SW Colorado keeps using its full compact entitlement, senior West Slope ag rights stay wet (no permanent buy-and-dry), and any consumptive-use reductions are voluntary, temporary, fairly compensated with money raised outside Western Colorado, and paired with supply augmentation and infrastructure investment. Bonus wins: new outside capital flowing into the nine-county region, protected local property-tax/economic base, and tribal (Ute Mountain Ute, Southern Ute, Navajo) settlement obligations advanced rather than crowded out.

Public record. The district supports Colorado's participation in drought contingency planning and has secured federal funds for environmental and drought mitigation projects, but its primary statutory mission is to develop and protect regional water resources for its constituents.

Position. Lewis is one of the single most consequential non-state voices on the Lower Colorado River. His community holds the largest Central Arizona Project (CAP) entitlement of any single user (~311,800 acre-feet/yr, larger than the City of Phoenix), stemming from his late father Rodney Lewis's landmark 2004 Arizona Water Settlement Act. LONGSTANDING POSITION: water is sovereignty and leverage. The tribe deliberately leaves large volumes in Lake Mead in exchange for federal payment, has leased CAP water to Phoenix/Goodyear/Peoria/Scottsdale/Phelps Dodge, and reinvests in on-reservation farming, riparian restoration, and managed aquifer recharge (MAR). RECENT (2023-2025): (a) Signed a 2023 system-conservation deal to conserve 125,000 AF/yr in Lake Mead for ~$150M ($50M/yr); (b) Publicly REJECTED the Lower Basin states' post-2026 proposal (March 2024) as inequitable, saying it favors California, dumps the largest cuts on Arizona, and offers 'no path to mitigate' the tribe's expected losses; (c) Announced the Community would advance its OWN third competing post-2026 proposal to Reclamation and demand it be studied in the federal environmental review; (d) Received $107M in IRA funds for three conservation projects and broke ground on canal lining + irrigation efficiency (Blackwater canals, Gila River Farms). Signature quote: 'This is not the time to be standing on the sidelines... The Community can't support the current Lower Colorado River approach as it stands now.' He is pro-conservation-for-payment, pro-innovation, but hard-nosed about equity and tribal water rights not being used to backfill others' overuse without compensation.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the model Lewis has already validated and profited from at scale (the 125,000 AF/yr Mead deal is exactly this). He would be a marquee early participant and likely a design partner. His conditions, learned from the post-2026 fight: (1) payments must reflect the true value of tribal water, not lowball system-conservation rates; (2) rigorous, independent measurement/verification of consumptive-use savings (he distrusts paper water and inequitable accounting); (3) explicit recognition that tribal participation is voluntary and does not waive settlement rights or become a permanent expectation; (4) revenue must be reinvestable in the community. Risk: he will oppose any market structure that lets senior users (esp. California) avoid cuts by relying on tribal conservation without sharing the pain.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE and arguably the best-positioned tribal partner in the basin for this. Lewis has ALREADY built the template: solar-over-canal generation (energy + evaporation savings on the same asset) and Gila River Water Storage selling recharge/storage credits to Microsoft. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto assets he owns and controls. He would engage hard IF: the tribe is an equity/ownership partner (not just a land lessor or offtaker), the water benefit is real and additive (recharge, evaporation reduction, reuse) rather than greenwashing a net-new datacenter water draw, and tribal energy sovereignty/jobs are part of the deal. He will be skeptical of any structure where datacenters increase regional water stress while the tribe absorbs reputational or hydrological risk. Frame it as tribal-owned infrastructure that sells firmed clean power and monetizes saved/recharged water, and he is a near-ideal anchor.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, with a strong 'augmentation-not-substitution' caveat. Lewis's core post-2026 demand is that any plan 'identify alternative water sources' or provide compensation, so basin-scale reuse/desal that adds new supply and relieves pressure on the overallocated river aligns with his stated ask. He already runs MAR and reclaimed-water recharge on-reservation, so reuse is culturally and operationally familiar. CAVEATS: (1) he will resist framing that treats augmentation as a reason to strip tribal priority or delay owed settlement water; (2) large desal (Sea of Cortez / Gulf) is expensive, slow, and politically fraught, and he is pragmatic about timelines, so he'd treat it as a long-horizon supplement, not a near-term substitute for equitable cuts; (3) any project must not impose environmental or cost burdens on the community. Net: a useful part of the portfolio he'd endorse, but not a silver bullet in his eyes.

A win for them. A win for Lewis is a deal that (1) pays the community full fair value for verified conservation and monetizes its water/energy assets, (2) is structured as tribal ownership or co-development so the community captures upside and jobs, not just lease fees, (3) explicitly protects settlement water rights and priority (no waiver, voluntary participation), (4) delivers on his post-2026 demand for identified alternative supply AND mitigation/compensation so Arizona and tribes aren't shouldering disproportionate cuts, and (5) funds on-reservation water goals (riparian/wetland restoration, farm-economy rebuild, MAR recharge). If a proposal lets him say the community led on a solution, got paid fairly, kept its rights, and made the basin more equitable, he flips from skeptic to the highest-value tribal champion in the Lower Basin.

Public record. As Governor of the Gila River Indian Community, he has signed multiple agreements to conserve large volumes of the community's water in Lake Mead for compensation and is spearheading first-of-their-kind solar-over-canal projects.

Position. {'summary': "Switch is a Las Vegas-founded hyperscale data center operator (Core Campus in the SW valley near the Strip is the largest data center cluster in Southern Nevada). It has publicly positioned itself as the water- and carbon-conscious counterexample to the data center industry, and it has real receipts: 100% renewable power since Jan 2016; net-zero Scope 1&2 as of 2024; closed-loop / air cooling with 'near zero' operational water (new SW-valley facility uses <1,000 gal/day of public water, only for restrooms/kitchenettes); a stated 'net positive water' pledge to replenish up to 2x the water it uses operationally over the decade; and proprietary chemical-free water-reuse cooling tech. Critically, Switch actively lobbied WITH the Southern Nevada Water Authority to ban evaporative cooling in new commercial/industrial construction (enacted Feb 2024) - i.e., it helped write the toughest data center water rule in the US, one that raises its own competitors' costs while Switch already complies.", 'longstanding': "Founder Rob Roy has for a decade framed Nevada's desert as an asset for solar, not a liability. Switch built Gigawatt Nevada with Capital Dynamics/Arevon/Con Edison CEB: ~555 MW solar + 800 MWh storage (~$1.3B, First Solar panels, Tesla Megapacks), plus a 127 MW behind-the-meter array in Storey County. Switch buys power from third parties and uses NV Energy only for delivery, explicitly to beat NV Energy's Green Rider tariff and hold power in the ~5 cent/kWh range. So Switch's default posture is 'we solve resource constraints with our own capital and technology, not by drawing down shared pools.'", 'recent': 'Amid a 2026 Nevada data center backlash (Clark County/Henderson pause discussions, Sierra Club pressure, resident opposition, a possible new county ordinance), Switch still won unanimous Clark County approval (June 17 2026) for a SW-valley expansion, scoring 6.5/7 on the county sustainability rubric. VP of construction Steven Roberts publicly defended the closed-loop, no-evaporative-cooling design. Switch is simultaneously buying more Southern Nevada land ($86M) and expanding out of state (382-acre campus near Pittsburgh), signaling it wants to keep growing in NV but is diversifying geographically as scrutiny rises.'}

A win for them. A win = Switch is codified as the low-water, self-powered gold standard, so new water/energy rules and any data center moratorium carve out or advantage compliant operators like it (turning its early compliance into a durable competitive moat against evaporative-cooled rivals). Concretely: (1) verified-consumptive-use accounting that credits its closed-loop design and validates its 'replenish 2x' pledge; (2) a hyperscaler solar+storage+water structure that preserves its ~5c/kWh behind-the-meter cost edge and REC assignments while funding basin water; (3) permitting certainty in Clark County/Henderson so its land and expansion bets clear. It gets to be the good actor the region points to - reputational and regulatory tailwind, not a target.

Public record. Switch has committed to 100% renewable energy for its data centers since 2016, developing massive solar projects like Gigawatt 1, and publicly promotes its net-positive water and recycled water strategies.

Position. TSMC is a Colorado-River-dependent industrial water user, not a policy advocate. Its Arizona campus near 43rd Ave and Dove Valley Road in north Phoenix is building toward six fabs on a 2,000+ acre site as part of a $165B US investment (largest FDI in US history). Publicly, TSMC's stated position is one of water stewardship framed as compatible with growth: it signed a development agreement with the City of Phoenix for access to ~11.4 MGD, and repeatedly cites Phoenix's designated '100-year water supply' and 'thoughtful and thorough planning' as reasons it chose the site. Its flagship public commitment is an in-house 15-acre Industrial Reclamation Water Plant (broke ground Aug 2025, operational 2028) engineered for 'near zero liquid discharge,' recycling 85% initially with a goal of 90%. Company messaging (via Mayor Kate Gallego) frames this as aligning economic growth with Phoenix's water-security commitments. TSMC has taken NO public position on Colorado River allocation policy, interstate/Basin negotiations, the CAP shortage tiers, or a conservation market. It works through the City of Phoenix as its water intermediary and lets the city carry the Colorado River / CAP allocation risk. Its water is supplied by Phoenix from unused CAP (Colorado River) allocation supplemented by Salt and Verde Rivers, so it is indirectly exposed to Colorado River shortages but insulated by the municipal contract.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but as a buyer/beneficiary, not a seller. A verified consumptive-use conservation market lets TSMC (or Phoenix on its behalf) buy down net-consumptive risk and secure firm supply through paid, audited conservation elsewhere in the basin. TSMC's near-zero-liquid-discharge design already minimizes its own consumptive footprint, so it has little supply to sell but strong motive to pay for reliability and ESG cover. Likely reaction: supportive if the market provides supply certainty and clean sustainability accounting, indifferent-to-wary if it exposes the true marginal cost of its water or invites scrutiny of a six-fab draw during shortage. It would prefer Phoenix to be the market participant while TSMC underwrites via its water contract.

On solar+water. Strongly aligned and a natural anchor participant. TSMC's expansion is explicitly framed as powering AI, and its customers (NVIDIA, Apple) and co-located AI data-center demand overlap with hyperscaler interests. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water addresses TSMC's two largest constraints at once: clean firm power and water reliability, both stated ESG and siting priorities. TSMC would likely welcome or co-fund such a structure, especially if it de-risks the shared regional water supply that Phoenix draws on. This is the offer most likely to move TSMC from passive user to active partner.

On reuse/desal. Highly favorable in principle; already the direction it is moving. TSMC is self-funding a 90%-recycling reclamation plant, and Phoenix's parallel 91st Ave Wastewater plant expansion (up to 80 MGD purified water by 2033) is regional reuse that directly benefits TSMC. Large-scale reuse/advanced purification is squarely in TSMC's interest because it grows firm, drought-proof supply without visible new Colorado River draw. Desalination (e.g., Sea of Cortez / augmentation concepts) it would support as a supply-augmentation backstop but is unlikely to lead or fund unilaterally, given cost and its preference to let the city/state carry augmentation. Net: an enthusiastic beneficiary and potential co-investor in reuse, a supportive-but-hands-off backer of desal.

A win for them. A win for TSMC is firm, drought-proof water and clean power for all six fabs at predictable cost, with a sustainability narrative that survives investor, customer (Apple/NVIDIA), and community scrutiny during an active Colorado River shortage. Concretely: a revised Phoenix development agreement that guarantees supply while it recycles 90% on-site; access to expanded regional reuse (91st Ave) and, ideally, hyperscaler-funded solar+storage that also underwrites shared water so TSMC's marginal draw is de-risked and it is seen as net-additive to regional water security rather than a drain on the river.

Public record. TSMC is building an industrial water reclamation plant in Arizona to achieve a 90% or greater water recycling rate and has a corporate goal of 100% renewable energy use by 2040.

Position. Extensive, well-documented public record. (1) River management: rejects reopening the 1922 Compact; favors 'forward-looking innovation' and expanding flexibility tools within existing legal frameworks. On joining NM's team she said the state will take a 'fresh look' with an eye toward collaboration and that 'we need to think differently about some things.' (2) Upper Basin defender: as Interior AS and as NM's negotiator she has consistently protected Upper Basin interests, hydropower revenue that funds basin programs, and Glen Canyon Dam operational/structural integrity at low water levels. (3) Conservation via compensation: as Interior AS (2021-2023) she oversaw Reclamation and helped structure the system-conservation architecture funded by the IRA's ~$4B (compensated Lower Basin cuts; Upper Basin drought-mitigation and demand-management pilots) and BIL drought/WaterSMART programs. (4) Reuse/desal champion: she publicly announced and celebrated BIL Title XVI reuse (~$550M) and desalination (~$250M) funding and touted El Paso's Advanced Water Purification (direct potable reuse) as 'one of the first of its kind,' framing innovation as necessary because water resources are 'less reliable year-after-year.' (5) 20+ years across BOTH basins: NM Interstate Stream Commission counsel during the 2007 Interim Guidelines, Executive Director of the Colorado River Board of California, Colorado River Sustainability Campaign, then Interior. Rare dual-basin fluency. (6) Pro-science and pro-tribal-engagement in tone, though her specific tribal-rights positions are not deeply documented publicly.

On conservation. SUPPORTIVE / likely champion, with conditions. She personally built and defended the federal compensated-conservation model (IRA/BIL). A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a natural extension of the demand-management and system-conservation tools she has advocated. Her conditions: rigorous verification of actual wet-water savings (she is a lawyer and scientist-adjacent, wary of paper savings), durability, and that a market not disadvantage small Upper Basin states or become a vehicle for Lower Basin states to buy their way out of structural cuts. Sell it as accountable, measured, science-based conservation and she is an ally on this axis.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / persuadable, not a natural yes. Two competing instincts. Pro: she embraces innovation and new funding sources, and a private-capital buildout that also funds water addresses her chronic problem (NM/Upper Basin lack money for conservation and infrastructure). She defended hydropower revenue, so she understands the energy-water linkage. Con: she is a careful public-interest lawyer who will scrutinize a hyperscaler-financed deal for who controls the water, whether it privatizes a public resource, tribal/community equity, and whether solar+storage siting and water demand are net-positive for the basin. Frame it as a public-benefit financing mechanism with strong governance and community/tribal benefit and she can be won; frame it as a data-center water grab and she opposes.

On reuse/desal. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE. This is her demonstrated track record. As Interior AS she personally announced BIL desalination (~$250M) and Title XVI reuse (~$550M) funding and publicly celebrated El Paso's direct-potable-reuse facility as pioneering. Large-scale reuse/desal fits her 'new and innovative solutions' framing and eases pressure on the river she has to negotiate over. Expect enthusiasm, tempered by realism on cost, energy intensity, brine disposal, and (for inland NM) the practicality of desal vs. reuse. Reuse she will back readily; desal she supports in principle but will want the economics and energy/water tradeoffs to pencil.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 Colorado River framework that (a) protects New Mexico's Upper Basin allocation and San Juan Basin supply, (b) does not force Upper Basin states to absorb Lower Basin structural overuse, (c) brings new, verified, well-funded conservation and supply-augmentation (reuse, and financing that doesn't come out of NM's thin budget), and (d) preserves hydropower revenue and program funding. Politically, a win is Trujillo being seen as the negotiator who broke the eleventh-hour impasse through collaboration and 'thinking differently,' delivering NM a defensible deal and vindicating the Governor's bet on her. Any proposal that helps her tell that story, with airtight verification and public-benefit governance, converts her from persuadable to active ally.

Public record. As Assistant Secretary for Water and Science, she was instrumental in deploying funds from the Inflation Reduction Act for system conservation and advancing binational water management agreements.

Position. Taylor Farms de México is the Mexican arm of Taylor Farms (Taylor Fresh Foods), a privately held Salinas, California produce giant estimated at roughly $7B in revenue and the leading North American producer of salads and fresh-cut leafy greens. In the Mexicali Valley it operates a fresh-salad processing/growing operation in the Benito Juárez agricultural zone (a ~24,000 m2 facility that opened January 2019), plus a Taylor Farms Baja California grower entity around Ciudad Morelos/Cuervos in Mexicali. It grows and sources local leafy greens (lettuce, spinach, kale, arugula, cabbage, etc.), much of it for U.S. export, alongside product cultivated in California. The company has taken essentially NO public stance on the Colorado River crisis itself. It positions publicly around jobs, foreign-exchange generation for Baja California, food safety (Western Growers / California Leafy Green Marketing Agreement) and organic/USDA-NOP compliance, not water politics. Where a clear, longstanding CORPORATE position does exist is on resource use: since 2012 the parent has invested over $100M in on-site renewable/alternative energy (solar, wind, storage, Bloom Energy fuel cells, cogeneration, microgrids such as San Juan Bautista) and pushes water-efficiency instrumentation (flow meters on 95%+ of irrigation wells, soil-moisture probes). So the revealed corporate identity is a self-provisioning, efficiency-and-energy-independence buyer, not a river-allocation combatant. Its Mexicali greens sit inside Irrigation District 014, the same district whose farmers have driven Colorado River conservation via fallowing under Minutes 323/2017 and 330/2024, and where growers are currently protesting that Mexico has paid only about half of what was promised (U.S. has disbursed ~$41M of a committed $96.5M). Taylor Farms is a water USER/processor in that system rather than a named party to those minutes.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-neutral, conditional on reliability. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive IF it means their growers actually get paid reliably (the current fallowing program's failure is that Mexico underpaid District 014 farmers). Taylor benefits from a market that stabilizes grower income and keeps land in a predictable state, and its metering/soil-probe infrastructure makes it credible on measured, verified use. Risk they'll flag: a market that pays growers to fallow the exact acreage supplying Taylor's lines could pull volume away from them, so they'll want conservation structured around efficiency and lower-value crops (alfalfa/wheat) rather than their high-value greens. Persuadable, with design conditions.

On solar+water. Most natural fit and likely the strongest positive. Taylor already runs the private-microgrid, solar+storage+fuel-cell playbook (>$100M invested since 2012, San Juan Bautista microgrid). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto their existing strategy and de-risks both their energy cost (processing, refrigeration, cold chain) and their water supply. They would engage readily as an anchor offtaker or co-siting partner, especially near their Mexicali facility. Main caution: cross-border project structuring and ensuring the water benefit reaches District 014, not just the datacenter.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously favorable but cost-sensitive. Large-scale reuse/desalination that firms up Mexicali/Baja water supply reduces their single biggest structural risk and supports a clean water-stewardship story for U.S. retail buyers. They'd support it in principle. Concerns: reuse/desal water is expensive and its cost could land on growers/processors, and desal (e.g., Sea of Cortez / Rosarito concepts) is slow and politically fraught. They'd want assurance that new supply is affordable for irrigated greens and doesn't just backfill municipal/industrial demand. Persuadable if someone else (hyperscaler/public funds) carries the capital cost.

A win for them. A win is secure, predictable, export-quality leafy-green supply out of Mexicali at stable cost, with its grower base kept financially whole (paid reliably, not stuck in the unpaid-fallowing limbo) so acreage and food-safety compliance stay intact. Bonus wins: cheaper/cleaner on-site energy and cold-chain power (fits their microgrid strategy), a defensible sustainability/water-stewardship story for U.S. retail customers, and reduced exposure to abrupt river-allocation cuts. Essentially, anything that converts Colorado River uncertainty into a managed, budgetable line item.

Public record. The parent company, Taylor Farms, has invested over $100 million in on-site renewable energy, including 12 solar installations, and the Taylor Farms de México facility has retooled its wash lines to improve water and energy efficiency.

Position. Coalition of ten federally recognized tribes with Colorado River / tributary reserved (Winters) water rights, formed 1992. Five Upper Basin members (Ute Mountain Ute, Southern Ute, Ute Indian Tribe, Jicarilla Apache Nation, Navajo Nation) and five Lower Basin members (Fort Mojave, Colorado River Indian Tribes, Chemehuevi, Quechan, Cocopah). Longstanding public positions: (1) Tribes hold reserved rights (incl. unresolved claims) to divert nearly 2.8 million acre-feet/year, generally the MOST SENIOR and shortage-protected rights in the basin, and this seniority must be respected. (2) They were excluded from the 1922 Compact and every major apportionment/quantification process since (the Navajo were barred from a seminal quantification case), and they now demand a formal, sovereign seat at the post-2026 negotiation table, not just consultation. (3) Core demand is the ability to settle/quantify unresolved rights AND to maximize on-reservation use PLUS the legal flexibility to lease, bank, market and forbear water OFF-reservation. The Partnership's 2018 Tribal Water Study (with Reclamation) first quantified tribal current/future use and became the leverage base. (4) The Partnership has formally proposed two water banks (one Upper, one Lower Basin) drawing on unused Winters entitlements plus fallowing/conservation, with banked water marketed to non-Indians, expressly VOLUNTARY (no mandated transfers from any member) and subject to approval by the basin states, the Partnership, and the Secretary. Framing is stewardship-first: 'The Colorado River is sacred, water is life, the peoples are the keepers.' Current live grievance (2025-2026): the Northeastern Arizona Indian Water Rights Settlement (Navajo/Hopi/San Juan Southern Paiute, ~$5B) is being stalled in Congress by the four Upper Basin states (CO, NM, UT, WY) specifically because it would let tribes lease water off-reservation, which the Partnership and allies frame as states obstructing legitimate tribal sovereignty.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE with conditions, and a natural fit. A verified consumptive-use conservation market monetizes exactly what the Partnership has advocated for 30+ years: voluntary tribal forbearance/fallowing converted into paid, verified conservation. Precedent already exists (Upper Basin tribal water can be leased for 'system conservation' benefiting the whole river; tribes have paid-forbearance experience). Conditions they will insist on: (1) participation strictly voluntary and tribe-by-tribe, never mandated; (2) their senior priority is not eroded or 'used up' by conserving (no penalty for non-use of a right); (3) tribal sovereignty over the decision and the price; (4) proceeds flow to tribes, not intermediaries; (5) verification/measurement done with tribal cooperation, not imposed. If a market's rules would strand unquantified rights or let states capture the value, they turn skeptical fast.

On solar+water. Likely CAUTIOUSLY PERSUADABLE, mixed. Attractive elements: tribal lands hold major solar/storage potential and tribes actively seek economic development, jobs, and capital for water infrastructure their federal appropriations don't fully cover; a buildout that also funds water delivery hits their top unmet need (piped water, pipelines). Real friction: sovereignty and consent are paramount, so any project must be on-reservation, tribally owned or revenue-sharing, and free of the extractive/imposed-infrastructure pattern tribes distrust from past federal water and energy projects (dams, diversions built without them). Data-center water demand framed as competing with tribal claims would provoke opposition. Verdict: persuadable IF the tribe is the owner/partner and water benefit is real and on-reservation; opposed if it is a hyperscaler extracting siting and water while tribes get token payments.

On reuse/desal. Likely NEUTRAL-to-SUPPORTIVE but low-priority, with a strategic caveat. Tribes generally favor augmentation (reuse, desal, recycling) that adds new supply because it relieves pressure on the shared river and can reduce competition over their senior rights. Caveat the Partnership and tribal advocates raise: augmentation must not become a pretext for states to avoid honoring/settling tribal rights ('we'll just make more water instead of giving tribes theirs'), and tribes want a share of any federally funded augmentation benefit. No strong public Ten-Tribes-specific position on desalination was found (mark partial-unknown); the read is inferred from general basin-tribe augmentation stances plus their consistent 'more supply is fine, but settle our rights first' logic.

A win for them. A win: (1) their reserved rights fully quantified and settled with federal funding, so 'paper water' becomes real, deliverable, bankable water; (2) explicit, durable legal authority to voluntarily lease/bank/market water off-reservation at prices they set, with proceeds funding tribal water and energy infrastructure; (3) a permanent, sovereign seat in post-2026 and future basin governance so they are never again allocated around; (4) any conservation/energy/augmentation program built WITH them and generating tribal jobs, revenue, and on-reservation drinking water, without eroding seniority. In short: sovereignty recognized, rights monetized on their terms, and their people finally getting piped water.

Public record. The Partnership has explicitly proposed water banking and marketing of their conserved water and has engaged in system conservation agreements to leave water in Lake Mead, positioning them as key partners in paid conservation and infrastructure solutions.

Position. Wilhelmsen is a career technical water regulator (27+ years at the Division of Water Rights; assistant state engineer, regional engineer, adjudication program manager) rather than a political actor. First appointed State Engineer in 2020 by Gov. Herbert (Utah's first woman in the role), unanimously confirmed for a second four-year term in Feb 2024. She is Director of the Division of Water Rights and, by gubernatorial appointment, an Alternate Commissioner for the Upper Colorado River Commission and a Utah member of the Western States Water Council; she also sits on the Bear River Commission. LONGSTANDING POSITION: her office administers Utah's State Water Policy premise of developing Utah's remaining Colorado River allocation coupled with conservation to meet in-state growth. She protects Utah's Upper Basin apportionment (~23% of Upper Basin consumptive use) and interstate compact compliance. NOTABLE DECISION: in Nov 2020 she rejected the Water Horse / Green River proposal to divert 55,000 acre-feet of the Green River out of Utah to Colorado's Front Range, signaling she guards water staying under Utah control and resists speculative out-of-state export. She frames the job as 'stewardship' and emphasizes collaboration with agricultural producers, tribes (leading Utah's Navajo Water Rights settlement team), lawmakers, and environmental stakeholders (spoke at Friends of Great Salt Lake). Utah under her tenure is piloting an Upper Basin demand-management / conservation program, and she is a regulator, not a policy advocate, so her public statements stay measured and legalistic.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable but demanding on verification. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with Utah's own demand-management pilot and with her need to 'put teeth' on Upper Basin conservation commitments. As the technical regulator she would insist the market measure actual consumptive-use (ET-based) savings, not just diversion reductions, and route through her change-application/adjudication process so saved water is legally protected from re-appropriation and does not injure other rights or violate the compact. Verification is exactly her language and mandate, so a rigorous, auditable market is a fit. She would resist any structure that looks like speculation, out-of-state export of the conserved water, or an end-run around her office's authority.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-skeptical, gated by process. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive as new capital for conservation without raiding existing rights, but a large data-center load is itself a major new water and power demand in a scarce basin. She would evaluate it strictly on water-right mechanics: where does the project's own water come from, is any 'funded' conservation real and quantified, and does it injure senior rights or Utah's compact position. She is not the deciding political authority on economic development (that sits with the Governor, legislature, and the Colorado River Authority of Utah / Gene Shawcroft), so she would defer on the deal's desirability and hold firm on the technical/legal water-accounting conditions.

On reuse/desal. Generally supportive in principle, rigorous in permitting. Reuse and (for Utah, more plausibly) advanced treatment/reuse fit the 'conservation + develop our allocation' policy and stretch existing supplies without new depletions, so she is inclined to favor them. Desalination is less relevant for landlocked Utah (no ocean; brackish groundwater desal is niche) so she would treat large-scale desal as marginal to her basin. For reuse she would focus on return-flow accounting: reused water that would otherwise have returned to the system can affect downstream rights and compact deliveries, so she would require careful quantification. Supportive where the accounting is clean, cautious where reuse reduces return flows relied on by other users.

A win for them. A win is a legally durable, verifiable mechanism that (1) produces real, quantified consumptive-use savings her office can defend against challenge, (2) keeps conserved water under Utah control and inside Utah's Colorado River allocation, (3) strengthens the Upper Basin's demonstrated conservation to reduce curtailment pressure and protect Lake Powell, and (4) runs cleanly through her administrative process without injuring existing rights or violating interstate compacts. She wins when Utah can show it is 'putting teeth' on conservation commitments while still developing its allocation, and when her rulings survive the inevitable litigation.

Public record. As Utah's State Engineer, she oversees water rights and would be involved in implementing any state-level or Upper Basin-wide compensated conservation programs, which Utah has piloted.

Position. Coca-Cola has a longstanding, publicly documented water-stewardship posture that maps directly onto the Colorado River. In 2015 it became the first Fortune 500 company to claim 100% global replenishment of the water in its finished beverages, five years ahead of schedule, and repeats that claim annually. Its 2030 Water Security Strategy commits to: 100% regenerative/circular water use across 175 'leadership' facilities in water-stressed areas by 2030; improving the health of 60 priority watersheds critical to operations and its ag supply chain; and returning a cumulative 2 trillion liters to nature and communities from 2021-2030. On the Colorado River specifically the company is an active, on-the-ground funder, not just a rhetorical participant: (1) a December 2020 coalition with the Colorado Water Trust and Molson Coors' Coors Seltzer, funded through Business for Water Stewardship (a Bonneville Environmental Foundation program), backing a 10-year commitment to add flows to the drought-stressed '15-Mile Reach' near Grand Junction that supports endangered fish, irrigators and a small federal hydro plant; (2) an instream-flow partnership in Grand County with the Colorado Water Trust, Denver Water and irrigators, pledging ~$24,000/year to sustain flows in the Fraser River near Winter Park; (3) a National Forest Foundation-led beaver-dam-analog wetland restoration on Trail Creek (a Gunnison/Colorado tributary) since 2021; and (4) participation in the multi-company Verde River (AZ) restoration effort alongside Google, REI and Boeing. Its posture is consistently pro-restoration, pro-collaboration, and framed around nature-based solutions and voluntary corporate funding rather than regulatory or allocation-cutting advocacy. It has not taken public positions on the harder political questions (Lower Basin cuts, priority curtailment, Compact renegotiation, mandatory ag fallowing). Real reputational baggage exists globally (India Kaladera/Kerala groundwater conflicts, Mexico/San Cristobal) that makes it sensitive to any 'Coke drains scarce water' framing.

On conservation. Likely supportive to enthusiastic, provided the market produces verified, additive, permanent-or-durable consumptive-use reductions it can claim as replenishment. This aligns perfectly with its existing model of paying into instream-flow and water-trust deals (the 15-Mile Reach and Fraser River pledges are essentially small versions of this). A rigorously verified consumptive-use market is more defensible than the volumetric 'replenishment' accounting it has been criticized for, so it strengthens their claims. Main hesitation: cost per verified acre-foot and whether credits are recognized by the standards/registries they report against. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific instrument.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable but not their core lane. Coca-Cola already co-invests in basin restoration alongside hyperscalers (Google on the Verde River), so a datacenter-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water restoration is a familiar, comfortable coalition shape and lets them ride a larger balance sheet for water outcomes. They would care about the water-funding mechanism being credible and about co-branding optics, not the energy economics. Low downside for them, moderate upside; supportive if the water dollars are real and verified, neutral otherwise.

On reuse/desal. Mixed and more conditional. Reuse and circular/recycled water fit their stated 2030 'regenerative water use' and 'reduce, reuse, recycle' language and their new-plant design (water recovery systems), so plant-level reuse is a natural yes and something they can showcase. Large-scale desalination is outside their footprint (they operate inland bottling, not coastal supply) and carries energy-cost, brine-disposal and 'industrial megaproject' optics they typically avoid; they are unlikely to fund or champion desal directly, though they would welcome any basin-scale new-supply that relieves pressure on the shared watersheds they depend on. Net: pro-reuse, neutral/hands-off on desal.

A win for them. A win is verified, auditable 'water returned to nature' in a Colorado River priority watershed that they can count toward the 2030 goals (2 trillion liters, 60 watersheds, 100% regenerative use), branded as collaborative and nature-based, that simultaneously buys down the social-license and permitting risk around the new Colorado Springs bottling plant. In short: cheap, credible, third-party-validated replenishment credit plus local political cover, without being drawn into contentious allocation politics.

Public record. The company and its foundation have provided millions in funding for water conservation and watershed restoration projects in the Colorado River Basin, including paying for conservation and supporting solar-powered water initiatives.

Position. The Bradley Foundation is not a Colorado River water stakeholder in any operational sense: it is a Milwaukee-based conservative philanthropic grantmaker (~$1.2B in assets in 2024, ~$1.3B disbursed since 1985) with no water rights, diversions, or basin operations. Its relevance to the river is purely ideological and financial-upstream. Its grantmaking is organized around four stated principles including Free Markets, and for decades it has been described as the single largest funder of conservative policymaking in America (Heritage Foundation, State Policy Network, and a national network of state think tanks). On water and the environment specifically, the Foundation has a longstanding, explicit market-and-property-rights worldview rather than a river-specific position. Through 2016 it gave the Goldwater Institute roughly $815,000, including $250,000 in 2015 to build a state-based litigation alliance created 'at Bradley's behest'; the Goldwater Institute is an active Arizona water litigant (e.g., suing over the City of Tombstone's water lines). It gave the Pacific Legal Foundation roughly $327,000 (1986-1992), an organization whose property-rights practice regularly litigates against water and land-use regulation. Separately, it seeded the Bradley Fund for the Environment (administered via Sand County Foundation, phased out end of 2014), which funded 241 organizations across 37 states around market-oriented conservation, including the 'Water As A Crop' program that reframes water as a tradable asset with standalone value and grants to quantify carbon storage for carbon markets. Net: the Foundation's revealed position is that water problems are best solved by private property rights, voluntary markets, and litigation against regulatory overreach, not by federal mandates or centralized allocation.

On conservation. Most favorable of the three, and closest to Bradley's actual worldview. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is a near-perfect fit for the 'Water As A Crop' thesis its own environmental fund promoted and for the voluntary-market, property-rights framing its grantees champion: it prices water, rewards rights-holders for conserving, and moves water without a federal mandate. Bradley-funded organizations would likely view a credible, verified, voluntary market as a validation of their long-standing argument that markets beat regulation. The caveats are ideological, not operational: the Foundation's orbit will scrutinize whether the market is genuinely voluntary and privately enforceable versus a federally administered scheme in market clothing, whether it strengthens rather than erodes private water-right ownership, and whether verification/measurement becomes a new regulatory lever. Framed as private rights-holders voluntarily trading measured, additional water, it aligns; framed as a government program, it draws suspicion.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-mildly-favorable, but off Bradley's core axis. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is fundamentally a private-capital-solves-a-public-problem story, which the Foundation's free-market principle broadly endorses: private companies deploying their own capital to secure energy and water, with no federal mandate, is congenial. However, the specific ingredients (renewables, corporate ESG-style water funding, climate framing) sit outside Bradley's expressed priorities and can trigger skepticism in its base if presented as a climate or subsidy play. Reaction hinges entirely on framing and structure: a genuinely private, market-driven, subsidy-light deal where a hyperscaler voluntarily pays for firm power and new water reads as free enterprise and would draw little objection; a deal leaning on federal climate subsidies, mandates, or regulatory preferences reads as crony/green-industrial policy and would draw ideological resistance from grantees. Bradley itself is unlikely to fund or oppose such a project directly; its influence would surface through whether its policy grantees frame it as market success or subsidized overreach.

On reuse/desal. Broadly indifferent-to-supportive in principle, with the least ideological hook of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination are engineering/augmentation plays that create new supply; the Foundation has no doctrinal objection to new water and would welcome it insofar as private capital and market mechanisms drive it rather than federal megaproject spending. Its funded voices would likely favor privately financed, market-priced augmentation and be wary of multi-billion-dollar publicly funded desal megaprojects, expanded federal water bureaucracy, or new entitlement programs. This is the option most distant from Bradley's core free-market/property-rights message, so expect low salience: unlikely to be a priority to fund or fight unless a specific project becomes a symbol of either private-sector ingenuity (favorable) or federal boondoggle/regulatory overreach (unfavorable).

A win for them. A win for Bradley is ideological, not hydrological: outcomes on the Colorado River that validate free markets and private property rights over federal command-and-control. Concretely, that means water reallocated through voluntary, compensated, market transactions among rights-holders rather than mandatory federal cuts; strong, enforceable, tradable water rights (the 'Water As A Crop' thesis proven at scale); private capital and private actors solving scarcity where government is seen to have failed; and any expansion of federal regulatory authority over western water blocked or narrowed, ideally with a litigation precedent its grantees can claim. A conservation market or private-capital water buildout that demonstrably works WITHOUT growing the federal footprint is the cleanest 'win' the Foundation's worldview can bank.

Public record. The Bradley Foundation's grantmaking consistently supports organizations that advocate for free-market environmentalism and are skeptical of large-scale, government-led clean energy and conservation initiatives.

Position. Metropolitan (MWD) is the largest municipal water wholesaler in the U.S., delivering to 26 member agencies serving ~19 million people across six counties. Longstanding position: it treats the Colorado River as a critical but shrinking pillar of a deliberately diversified portfolio (Colorado River Aqueduct, State Water Project, Central Valley storage/transfers, local supply, in-region storage). The CRA supplies roughly half of MWD's imported water and averages ~800,000 AF/yr; MWD's firm base right within California's 4.4 MAF apportionment is ~550,000 AF plus junior/fifth-priority and surplus rights. Recent public positions (2023-2025): MWD explicitly acknowledges it, like all users, must reduce its Colorado River use, and has helped anchor California's Lower Basin conservation posture. It backed California's Dec 2025 framework in which the state offered ~440,000 AF/yr of additional cuts. MWD's consistent framing is consensus-first (all seven states + Mexico + tribes + ag), minimize the pain of cuts, and buy time by building local supply. It has been a heavy user of paid conservation/forbearance for decades: ~$2B in partnerships with Palo Verde and Imperial ag districts (fallowing, crop rotation, irrigation efficiency), and won ~$160M in Reclamation funding to add up to 269,000 AF to Lake Mead by 2031. It is simultaneously making its biggest-ever bet on reuse (Pure Water Southern California, ~$6.4B phase 1 / up to $8B, 150 MGD, with LA County Sanitation Districts). New GM Shivaji Deshmukh (from recycling-heavy Inland Empire Utilities Agency) started Jan 1 2026, reinforcing the reuse-and-diversify orientation.

On conservation. Strongly favorable and low-friction. MWD is already the archetype of a paid consumptive-use conservation buyer: it has spent ~$2B paying Palo Verde and Imperial farmers to fallow/conserve and route saved water to urban use, and it leans on Reclamation-funded system conservation to keep water in Lake Mead. A verified, MRV-backed consumptive-use market is squarely in its playbook and reduces the legal/political risk of paying for savings that don't materialize. Caveats it will press: (1) it wants credit and additive-ness rigor so it isn't paying for paper water; (2) it is sensitive to price escalation (ag water is currently cheap and analysts argue it is underpriced, so a real market could raise MWD's cost per AF); (3) it prefers deals that also give it flexibility and storage/exchange value, not just one-off fallowing. Net: a ready buyer and likely early adopter if verification is credible and it retains control over which savings it purchases.

On solar+water. Interested but skeptical, and it will scrutinize the water half hard. MWD has explored solar over the Colorado River Aqueduct at least three times since the 1990s and each time concluded ROI wouldn't arrive for ~20+ years, so it is unromantic about solar canopies as a standalone play. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive on two fronts: it could defray the CRA's heavy pumping-energy cost and provide outside capital toward the diversification/reuse program MWD is straining to finance amid falling sales. The persuadable angle is real because MWD needs capital and is energy-cost exposed. But MWD will resist anything that (a) adds new large consumptive water demand to a basin it is trying to shrink use in, (b) ties its supply obligations to a private data-center offtaker, or (c) commits it to long-horizon infrastructure with weak returns. The winning pitch funds water first and treats energy as the financing engine, not the other way around.

On reuse/desal. Split, and this is the clearest tell of where MWD is going. Reuse: enthusiastic and already all-in. Pure Water Southern California (~$6.4-8B, 150 MGD, target operation ~2032) is MWD's flagship local-supply bet explicitly framed as reducing Colorado River dependence, and the new GM comes from a recycling agency. Any program that accelerates or co-finances reuse is pushing on an open door. Large-scale ocean desalination: markedly cooler. MWD's institutional memory of Carlsbad is that it is ~200% costlier than imported water (~$2,725/AF), energy-intensive, and politically fraught (California Coastal Commission rejected the Huntington Beach plant in 2022), and Carlsbad was in part San Diego diversifying AWAY from MWD. MWD treats desal as a last-resort, high-cost, high-energy option well behind reuse and conservation. So: back reuse strongly, tolerate brackish/inland desal at the margin, and be lukewarm-to-resistant on big new ocean desal unless someone else eats the cost and energy.

A win for them. A win for MWD is reliability and rate stability without a fight: outside capital that closes its diversification/reuse financing gap, a verified conservation market that lets it buy real, defensible savings at a controlled price (so it can show member agencies it isn't paying for paper water), and energy-cost relief on the CRA. Concretely, a win looks like more Lake Mead credit and system flexibility per dollar spent, accelerated Pure Water at lower ratepayer cost, reduced Colorado River dependence on its own diversification timeline, and cuts that are shared across all seven states and ag rather than falling disproportionately on Southern California urban users. Politically, a win is being seen as the constructive convener that made the post-2026 deal work while protecting its ratepayers.

Public record. MWD has a long-standing program paying farmers for water conservation, is a partner in a major water reuse project (Pure Water Southern California), and is investing in solar-plus-storage at its facilities.

Position. The Moore Charitable Foundation (MCF), founded by hedge-fund manager Louis Bacon in 1992, operates in Colorado through two affiliates, the Trinchera Blanca Foundation and the Tercio Foundation, covering the San Luis Valley and the Culebra Range. Their longstanding public position is agriculture-and-ecosystem-first water conservation: restoring resilient rivers/streams, riparian habitat (invasive-species removal, beaver reintroduction, native fisheries including Rio Grande cutthroat trout, sucker and chub), and protecting the region's oldest water rights. A signature program funds Colorado Open Lands' Acequia Initiative, conserving ~2,000 acres of culturally significant land and acequia water rights in the Culebra Watershed (acequias are Colorado's oldest, senior water rights, families since the mid-1800s). Bacon's own Trinchera Blanca Ranch (~172,000 acres, Colorado's largest private ranch) is protected by conservation easements with USFWS and Colorado Open Lands that permanently tie water rights to the land so they can never be severed and sold off. The through-line: keep water on the land, tied to agriculture and habitat, and out of export/speculation. Bacon also helped found the Waterkeeper Alliance. Their orientation is a de facto opposition to 'buy-and-dry' groundwater export (e.g., the Renewable Water Resources / Douglas County scheme that the near-unanimous SLV coalition fought off). Note: this is a Rio Grande Basin / SLV actor, not a Colorado River (Colorado Basin) mainstem player. Their exposure to the Colorado River crisis is indirect (shared arid-West drought, groundwater sustainability, interstate-compact pressure), so their public record speaks to Rio Grande / SLV water, and their Colorado-River-specific positions are unknown/unstated.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-favorable, with conditions. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market aligns with their core belief that water should stay tied to land and habitat rather than be speculatively exported. They would welcome rigorous measurement/verification (they already fund quantified habitat and fisheries restoration and easement-based rights protection) and would see a real, audited consumptive-use market as a defense against unmeasured 'paper water' and buy-and-dry. Their persuadable edge: they will scrutinize whether a 'market' becomes a vehicle for permanent buy-and-dry or severance of ag/acequia water from the land, which they oppose. Design it as temporary/reversible, land-linked, and additive to habitat and they are an ally; design it as a mechanism to move water off SLV/ag land permanently and they turn opponent.

On solar+water. Cautiously skeptical / conditional. As a conservation-and-habitat foundation with deep aesthetic and ecological attachment to the San Luis Valley and Culebra Range (dark skies, wildlife corridors, riparian systems, ranch character), they would scrutinize a large hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout for land-use, viewshed, wildlife, and induced-water-demand impacts. The 'also funds water' framing helps but is not sufficient: they will ask whether the funded water actually keeps ag/acequia water on the land and restores habitat, or simply offsets a new industrial water and land footprint. Data-center water consumption itself is a red flag for a group whose mission is protecting a stressed closed-basin aquifer. Persuadable if the buildout is sited off high-value habitat, is net-water-positive for the SLV aquifer, and dedicates funding to acequia/riparian/fishery restoration; opposed if it reads as industrializing the valley or increasing net regional water draw.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-favorable in principle, low direct engagement. Large-scale reuse/desalination that creates new supply and relieves pressure to export SLV/Rio Grande groundwater is philosophically consistent with their 'don't drain rural aquifers' stance, so they would likely view it as preferable to buy-and-dry. But it sits outside their hands-on program (habitat, fisheries, acequias, easements) and largely off their geography, so expect passive support rather than funding or advocacy. They would want assurance that any brine/energy/land footprint does not harm rivers and wildlife, consistent with the Waterkeeper ethos. Unknown whether they would actively champion it.

A win for them. A win is water permanently staying on the land and in the ecosystem: senior and acequia water rights protected and un-severable, SLV/Rio Grande aquifer stabilized and Compact compliance secured without buy-and-dry, and measurable gains in riparian habitat and native fisheries (Rio Grande cutthroat trout, sucker, chub). On the Colorado River side, a win is any mechanism that reduces pressure to export or speculate on rural water, is rigorously verified, and channels new funding into land-linked conservation and restoration they already champion, all achievable quietly and through their existing conservation partners without forcing them into a public political fight.

Public record. The foundation's Colorado affiliates are explicitly committed to land and water conservation, including advancing forest and riparian health and supporting watershed restoration.

Position. Gibson is a career California water lawyer and regulator, not a public firebrand on the Colorado River. His documented positions are institutional rather than personal. As DWR Director he holds an automatic ex officio seat on the Colorado River Board of California (his named designee is Senior Policy Advisor Nancy Vogel), the body that ensures 'the long term quantity and reliability of California's Colorado River water resources' and represents California in Basin States / Tribal / federal negotiations and under the 1944 U.S.-Mexico Treaty. Note: the CRB's public face and lead negotiator on post-2026 guidelines is Chair JB Hamby, not Gibson; Gibson's lane is statewide DWR (State Water Project operations, climate adaptation, conveyance, groundwater/SGMA, flood, and supply reliability). Longstanding orientation: he built his career inside the Newsom/Natural Resources Agency environmental-regulatory world (Deputy Secretary and Special Counsel for Water at CNRA; General Counsel and Assistant Chief Counsel at CA Dept. of Fish & Wildlife; partner at Best, Best & Krieger). That pedigree implies alignment with the administration's 'Water Supply Strategy' framing: adapt to a hotter/drier hydrology, diversify supply (recycling, storage, desalination where it pencils), invest in conservation and efficiency, and protect ecosystems alongside supply. In 2026 California's formal Lower Basin posture (via CRB) was to offer measurable cuts (roughly 440,000 acre-feet of its 4.4 MAF share in 2027 and 2028) to help stabilize the system through 2028 as current guidelines expire end of 2026; Gibson's DWR sits inside that consensus. He has not personally staked out contrarian or hardline priority-rights rhetoric in the public record I could find.

On conservation. Likely supportive but deferential. A verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with the administration's supply-diversification and efficiency agenda and with California's own strategy of paying for measurable, verified savings (the state's 2027-2028 cut offers are effectively that logic). DWR would welcome rigorous MRV (measurement, reporting, verification) because verification protects California from paying for phantom savings and gives cover for the cuts California is already committing to. Caveat: Gibson defers to the CRB Chair and the priority-rights holders on anything touching the actual Colorado River allocation, and DWR is protective of not setting precedents that erode California's senior-rights position. He would engage on the mechanics (verification standards, funding vehicles) more readily than on allocation politics.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, wants it structured cleanly. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water fits California's clean-energy + water-resilience narrative and brings private capital DWR does not have to appropriate. Gibson the lawyer will scrutinize governance: who controls the water benefit, whether it creates a new claim on the river, permitting/CEQA exposure, and whether the energy and water benefits are additional and verifiable rather than greenwashing. Framed as private capital funding verified conservation, reuse, or storage (not as a new consumptive claim), this is attractive and low-political-cost for him. Framed as a datacenter deal that increases regional water/energy demand, he cools quickly.

On reuse/desal. Most on-brand and most likely enthusiastic. Large-scale reuse and desalination are central to California's 'diversify supply / climate-adapt' playbook, and DWR funds and champions recycling, storage, and (where it pencils economically and environmentally) desal. This is the option where Gibson has the clearest institutional mandate to act and the least allocation-politics friction, because new-supply reduces pressure on the river rather than fighting over its shares. Expect support in principle with lawyerly conditions on cost, energy intensity, brine/environmental permitting, and equity of who pays. Desal specifically he will treat more skeptically than reuse (cost, coastal permitting, environmental review), consistent with California's cautious desal track record.

A win for them. A win is measurable, verifiable water for California that reduces reliance on a shrinking Colorado River without eroding California's senior priority rights, without new state General Fund exposure, and without legal/permitting blowback he has to own. Concretely: private capital funding verified conservation, reuse, or storage that lets California meet its post-2026 cut commitments while keeping supply reliable, framed as a clean win under the Governor's Water Supply Strategy that helps rather than complicates his Senate confirmation. He wants durable, defensible, precedent-safe supply reliability with the political credit flowing to the administration.

Public record. As a representative of California water agencies, he has been involved in institutional agreements exploring the role of desalination and water recycling as tools for managing Colorado River resources.

Position. The Tohono O'odham Nation is one of the largest federally recognized tribes in the U.S. (reservation ~2.8M acres in southern Arizona). Its Colorado River interests run through the Central Arizona Project (CAP), not a mainstem diversion. Longstanding position: water is existential and cultural, tied to the disappearance of the Santa Cruz River and groundwater overdraft by nearby mining, agriculture, and Tucson-area cities that collapsed farming on tribal land. The Nation sued in 1975; the 1982 Southern Arizona Water Rights Settlement Act (SAWRSA) and the 2004 Arizona Water Settlements Act (AWSA) settled its rights, delivering a large CAP-based allocation (settlement figures cited in reporting include ~66,000 AF for San Xavier/Schuk Toak under SAWRSA, ~50,000 AF/yr usable for farming, economic development, river restoration, aquifer recharge, OR lease/sale to Arizona cities, plus ~28,000-28,200 AF of former non-Indian agricultural (NIA) CAP water). Core recent posture (2022-2026): the Nation formally commented to Reclamation (Chairman Verlon M. Jose / Vice Chairwoman Carla L. Johnson) on the 2007 Interim Guidelines SEIS and near-term/post-2026 operations. It is one of eight Arizona tribes (16 basin tribes total) that signed a March 11, 2025 letter to Reclamation demanding the post-2026 plan reject any alternative that imposes involuntary or uncompensated cuts, and asking the federal government to REPLACE (find substitute supplies for) any CAP cuts made to tribes. A specific structural grievance: much of its CAP water is former NIA priority water that is cut FIRST and DEEPEST under shortage/DCP rules, so the Nation bears drought pain earlier than its senior-rights standing would imply. It also has a documented history of pushing back on the CAP district (CAWCD) favoring non-Indian development over tribal deliveries. It already leases CAP water to Tucson-area municipal providers, so it is comfortable monetizing water within its settlement framework.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to interested, IF verification, priority protection, and compensation are ironclad. The Nation already leases and monetizes CAP water and has signaled openness to conservation programs so long as eligibility and participation rules 'maximize the tribes' ability to take advantage of them without incurring onerous financial burdens.' A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive because it turns the Nation's allocation into a revenue-generating asset without permanently ceding priority. Two hard conditions: (1) participation must be strictly voluntary and compensated (the March 2025 tribal letter's red line is no involuntary/uncompensated cuts); (2) verification and accounting must not later be used to argue the Nation doesn't 'need' its full settlement water or to erode its priority date. Sovereignty over how conserved water is counted, and assurance that conservation credits don't convert into a permanent haircut, are prerequisites.

On solar+water. Most naturally aligned option, with sovereignty caveats. The Nation is already an active solar/energy player (TOUA solar subscriptions, San Xavier PV, DOE/NAU programs) and needs capital for water infrastructure that federal appropriations only partly cover. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure (recharge, drinking-water systems, delivery to unlock its stranded CAP allocation) maps directly onto its stated goals of using renewable resources on O'odham land to benefit the people 'economically and socially.' Likely positive IF: projects sit on or benefit tribal land with tribal ownership/equity and jobs (not just an easement), respect cultural and archaeological resources (a real sensitivity given sacred sites and past land conflicts), and the water funding flows to O'odham priorities rather than being a mechanism for a datacenter to claim tribal water. Biggest risk to acceptance is any structure that looks like a hyperscaler acquiring rights to tribal water in exchange for capital.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, low direct stake, watch for cost-shifting. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., augmentation that adds new supply to the system) is broadly good for the Nation because new water reduces the pressure to cut CAP deliveries, protecting its junior-priority NIA water from being curtailed first. It has no coastal or mainstem desal role itself, so its engagement is indirect. Concerns: (1) that augmentation costs get socialized onto CAP rates in ways that raise the Nation's delivery costs or the cost of its leases; (2) that 'new supply' rhetoric is used to justify NOT compensating tribes for cuts in the interim ('we'll fix it later with desal'). The Nation would want augmentation framed as additive to, not a substitute for, honoring settlement obligations.

A win for them. A win: their full settlement quantity and priority are protected and made physically usable (stranded/UXO-blocked and infrastructure-limited CAP water finally delivered, recharged, and revenue-producing); any water they forgo is voluntary, compensated at fair value, and reversible, never an involuntary or uncompensated cut that shifts drought pain onto them first; and they gain tribal-owned energy and water infrastructure with equity, jobs, and control on O'odham land. In short: turn a defensive, litigation-won CAP position into a durable, self-directed water-and-energy asset, without surrendering sovereignty or priority.

Public record. The Nation has actively developed multiple on-reservation solar projects to increase energy sovereignty and reduce costs, demonstrating a commitment to clean infrastructure.

Position. Buschatzke has run ADWR since 2015 and is Arizona's chief Colorado River negotiator across three governors (Ducey, Hobbs). Longstanding positions: (1) The system cannot be stabilized without agricultural reductions - 'Given the volume of water that is used by agriculture in the Colorado River system, you can't stabilize the system without reductions in agriculture' - but senior-rights ag users (Yuma, Imperial) can't be forced to cut without compensation, so paid/voluntary conservation is the realistic tool. (2) He was a principal architect of the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan (named AZ Republic 'Co-Arizonan of the Year' with Ted Cooke) and of the 2023 Lower Basin 3.0 MAF deal - i.e., his track record is cutting deals in which Arizona (junior CAP priority) absorbs outsized pain in exchange for stability and federal money. (3) In the post-2026 fight he has become sharply confrontational toward the Upper Basin: after the Feb 2026 collapse he blasted the Upper Basin for refusing any firm commitment to reduce use 'no matter how dire the conditions of the river may be,' and warned talks reach 'an impasse if Colorado won't face cuts.' He frames Arizona as unwilling 'to sacrifice its water security while receiving virtually nothing in return.' (4) On the Lower Basin's May 2026 proposal he committed Arizona to 760,000 AF of cuts in 2027-2028 (CA 440k, NV 50k) and secured a federal commitment of $450M+ (over an earlier $450M he cited) to fund compensated conservation, explicitly requiring Lower Basin cost-sharing. (5) On augmentation, he is a measured supporter: he backed WIFA's Nov 2025 approval of four augmentation projects (including a San Diego desal 'water swap' where SDCWA takes desal water and leaves Colorado River supply for CAP) but consistently flags cost - desal at ~$3,500/AF vs ~$365/AF for CAP delivery - as the central obstacle. He is a pragmatist and dealmaker, not an ideologue.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE / champion, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially the mechanism he has already been building and defending: he argues you cannot force senior-rights holders and must pay them, he negotiated the $450M+ federal compensated-conservation package requiring Lower Basin cost-share, and he pointed to Reclamation's $400/AF offer to Lower Basin farmers. A market that rigorously verifies real, additional consumptive-use reductions (not paper/return-flow accounting) directly answers his stability-plus-defensibility problem and reduces litigation risk from senior users. Caveats he will press: verification integrity (he needs cuts that actually add wet water to Lake Mead), who pays (he wants federal + basin cost-share, not Arizona alone), and equity vs the Upper Basin - he will resist any market that lets the Upper Basin avoid its own reductions.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY PERSUADABLE, with skepticism on the water math. Buschatzke's world already ties power to water: Arizona's data-center boom is projected to sharply raise both direct cooling demand and indirect power-plant water use (power-plant water could quadruple toward ~14.5B gal/yr). Anything that decouples new load from thermoelectric (water-cooled gas/nuclear) generation and simultaneously funds river conservation aligns with his need to keep 'essential industry' watered without deepening the shortage - and with Hobbs's instinct to make data centers pay into conservation. He will be receptive if the offer is concrete: firm acre-feet of verified conservation funded, dry-cooling/low-water commitments, and money routed through the compensated-conservation channels he already runs. He will be skeptical of vague ESG framing, of claims that ignore indirect/power-plant water, and of anything that reads as buying a bigger Colorado River allocation for data centers while other users cut. Frame it as new supply + funded conservation, not as a claim on the river.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE, gated on cost and financing. He personally advanced the WIFA augmentation slate (desal + the SDCWA 'water swap' that frees Colorado River water for CAP) and calls such swaps the 'innovation needed to help stabilize the system long term.' Arizona's WIFA has committed ~$1B to hunt new supply, and reuse/advanced treatment fits Arizona's long groundwater-management tradition he embodies. His hard constraint is affordability - he repeatedly contrasts desal (~$3,500/AF Carlsbad) against CAP (~$365/AF) and warns ratepayers. So he welcomes reuse/desal that comes with a credible financing/cost-share structure (federal dollars, third-party capital, or a swap that avoids new AZ-borne desal cost) and is cool to proposals that hand Arizona a 10x cost with no funding plan.

A win for them. A durable post-2026 operating framework that (a) protects Arizona's CAP municipal, tribal, and 'essential industry' (chips/data-center) supplies from catastrophic junior-priority cuts, (b) is funded largely by federal and basin-wide cost-share rather than Arizona alone, (c) forces the Upper Basin to accept enforceable reductions so Arizona isn't sacrificing 'while receiving virtually nothing in return,' and (d) adds verifiable new supply/conservation (compensated ag conservation, reuse, desal swaps, energy-water decoupling) that stabilizes Lake Mead. Personally, the win is closing another historic deal on the scale of the 2019 DCP - reinforcing his legacy as the negotiator who kept Arizona whole through the crisis.

Public record. As Arizona's lead negotiator, he has been a key architect of multi-state agreements to pay for water conservation and has publicly championed binational desalination and water reuse to augment the state's supplies.

Position. The Tonto Apache Tribe governs the smallest land-base reservation in Arizona (originally 85 acres near Payson in northwestern Gila County, expanded to ~375+ acres after a Forest Service land transfer; enrolled membership ~110, on-reservation population ~140). Its central water-policy posture is not classic Colorado River basin advocacy but a decades-long fight for a federally recognized Indian water rights settlement. Chairman Calvin Johnson's uncle began the effort in 1985; formal settlement negotiations have run since at least 2014 and remain UNRESOLVED as of 2025. The Tribe's stated goals: secure a permanent quantified water right, plant orchards for a farming business, build more housing for a growing population, and reduce dependence on the Town of Payson for municipal water. Its water counsel Jay Weiner has publicly criticized Arizona's approach to tribal settlements as a 'zero-sum game,' and older members express doubt a deal will happen in their lifetime. The Tribe's claims sit inside the ~50-year Gila River General Stream Adjudication (Gila/Verde watershed), separate from but politically entangled with lower Colorado River allocation. It is not on record with a distinct public position on Colorado River shortage-sharing, Lake Mead cuts, or the post-2026 operating guidelines; its lens is local supply security and settlement leverage.

On conservation. Cautiously interested but wary. A verified consumptive-use conservation market offers a way to monetize a future settled right, but the Tribe has little consumptive use TODAY (tiny land base, buys water from Payson), so it has little to sell now and would first need its settlement to create a marketable, wet right. It would likely support a market only if participation is voluntary, if leasing/selling never erodes the paper priority date or leverage in the Gila River Adjudication, and if Arizona's 'zero-sum' settlement posture does not use market availability as an excuse to shrink its settlement. Weiner-style counsel would insist any market recognize unexercised tribal rights at full value, not just historic use. Net: persuadable-to-supportive if the market is settlement-additive, opposed if it is used to pressure a cheap deal.

On solar+water. Most likely the strongest positive of the three. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps directly onto the Tribe's needs: it has capital-hungry economic-development land (Apache Corners, 75 acres straddling SR-87), a growing population needing housing and power, and an unmet demand for its OWN funded water infrastructure to escape Payson dependence. Tribal land can host generation and a data-center/energy offtake, generating lease revenue and jobs, while the paired water funding could finance storage/treatment or accelerate settlement infrastructure. Risks they will test: sovereignty and land control, water the data center itself consumes (net water impact must be positive for them), and whether the deal locks them into terms before their settlement quantifies their right. Persuadable-to-ally if structured as tribal-owned or strong-revenue-share and net-water-positive.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but low salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination expands total basin supply and could ease Arizona's 'zero-sum' pressure, indirectly improving the Tribe's settlement odds by reducing competition for existing supplies. But desal/reuse plants are far from Payson's high-country location and would not directly deliver wet water to the reservation, so the Tribe has little direct stake and would not be a lead advocate. It would likely support such projects if they are framed as taking pressure off the tributary/Gila supplies its settlement depends on, and would be indifferent-to-skeptical if state funding for mega-supply projects crowds out the modest federal/state dollars needed for its own long-delayed settlement infrastructure.

A win for them. A signed, funded water rights settlement that quantifies a permanent tribal right, delivers wet-water infrastructure (storage, pipeline, treatment) so they stop depending on Payson, and unlocks the orchards, housing, and economic-development build-out (Apache Corners) their small land base and growing population need. A win means self-determined supply security plus federal/state capital they have been unable to extract in 40 years of negotiation, without surrendering leverage in the Gila River Adjudication.

Public record. The Tribe has repeatedly secured federal funding to deploy solar photovoltaic (PV) systems on its facilities to reduce energy costs and increase self-sustainability.

Position. Estes Park is a ~5,700-connection headwaters tourism town in the Big Thompson canyon, gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park. Its water is unusual: it sits physically at the eastern outlet of the Colorado-Big Thompson (C-BT) trans-basin diversion, where Upper Colorado River water stored in Grand Lake is piped 13 miles under the Continental Divide via the Alva B. Adams Tunnel into Marys Lake. The town draws from two treatment plants - Marys Lake (fed by C-BT / diverted Colorado River water) and Glacier Creek (a Big Thompson tributary inside RMNP). It is one of the six original Front Range members of the Northern Water Municipal Subdistrict (with Boulder, Fort Collins, Greeley, Longmont, Loveland) and a C-BT/Windy Gap allottee under Northern Water, whose Board sets an annual C-BT quota each April. The town's consistent public posture, voiced by Utilities Director Reuben Bergsten, is confidence: 'The Town of Estes Park has a diverse and robust water portfolio, and our supply is secure.' It frames itself around responsible stewardship and efficiency (Water Conservation Plan per Colorado statute; pipe replacement, low-flow bypass, system looping, smart/soil-moisture irrigation, night watering) rather than crisis rhetoric. Notably, in the record-dry 2026 winter it emphasized that its C-BT Western Slope reservoirs were running above average, so it publicly downplayed near-term drought risk. It has NOT taken loud positions in the interstate Colorado River / Lake Powell-Lake Mead allocation fight; its public voice is local and infrastructure-focused, not basin-diplomacy focused.

On conservation. Cautiously receptive but a small player. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is more relevant to Estes Park as a values-aligned idea than as a direct revenue lever - it uses relatively little water and much municipal use is non-consumptive-return. As a headwaters/RMNP-gateway town that already brands itself on efficiency and stewardship, it would be philosophically supportive and could be an early demonstration/endorsement partner, but it has little surplus consumptive use to sell. It would want assurances that participation doesn't jeopardize its C-BT reliability or Northern Water standing. Likely posture: supportive in principle, modest as a transactor.

On solar+water. Potentially the most interesting hook. Estes Park runs its own electric utility (Town of Estes Park Utilities is combined power + water) and faces a $100M+ water capital gap it cannot easily fund from a small ratepayer base. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps directly onto its two biggest needs: energy resilience (wildfire/outage hardening, it already cites power outages as a design constraint) and a way to pay for treatment-plant redundancy and pipe replacement. Constraints: it is a small, scenic, tourism/national-park-gateway community with tight land, viewshed sensitivity, and limited large-load demand, so a big datacenter siting is a poor fit locally - but as a FUNDING/energy-resilience partner (community solar + storage tied to grants) it could be quite receptive. Frame it as capital for their master plan, not as hosting a hyperscaler.

On reuse/desal. Low direct relevance / lukewarm. Desalination is geographically irrelevant to an inland 7,500-ft mountain town. Reuse is more plausible but limited: wastewater in the valley is handled largely by the separate Upper Thompson Sanitation District (which just landed ~$96M in upgrades), and Estes Park's small scale plus its already-secure C-BT portfolio give it little pressure to build costly potable reuse. It would view basin-scale reuse/desal favorably if it eases pressure on the Colorado River system it draws from (indirect benefit), but would not be an early adopter or funder. Neutral-to-mildly-positive on others doing it; unlikely to invest itself.

A win for them. A win is keeping safe, reliable, disaster-resilient water flowing to residents and millions of RMNP visitors WITHOUT crushing their small ratepayer base - i.e., outside capital (grants, hyperscaler/energy financing, federal dollars) that funds the new redundant treatment plant, pipe-replacement program, and power/wildfire resilience in the $100M master plan, while preserving their secure C-BT portfolio, their local control, and their scenic/tourism brand. Bonus win: burnishing their identity as a model of responsible mountain-town water stewardship.

Public record. The town actively promotes water conservation, has a renewable energy purchase program, and is a partner in a utility-level goal of a 100% non-carbon energy mix by 2030.

Position. Gilbert is a fast-growing SE Phoenix-metro town (~275k residents) that is one of the most Colorado-River-exposed municipalities in the Salt River Valley. Its potable portfolio is ~41% Colorado River (via CAP), ~40% Salt/Verde (SRP), ~15% reclaimed, ~4% groundwater; groundwater is held as a long-term reserve rather than a working supply. Longstanding public position: 'renewable-first' - stated goal of 90% of supply from renewable surface sources (Colorado, Salt, Verde) while protecting groundwater, and using recharge/banking as the shock absorber. Gilbert holds a state Designation of Assured Water Supply (100-year supply) and has recharged ~200 billion gallons (2nd-largest stored-credit balance in the Phoenix AMA), which it is now drawing down to offset shortage cuts. On the crisis specifically, Gilbert is an active, cooperating participant, not a holdout: it signed System Conservation Implementation Agreements with the Bureau of Reclamation, committed 8,500 acre-feet to Lake Mead over 10 years (~3% of its CR allocation), and took ~$17M in Phase 2 Lower Colorado River Basin Conservation & Efficiency Program funding (incl. ~$3M for 27,000+ AMI smart meters for leak detection). It has activated its Stage 2 drought response (SRP storage below 60% trigger + CAP cuts) and publicly told residents to expect ~9% CAP reductions in 2026 as 2019 DCP mitigation supplies expire. Since 1986 it has reused 100% of its reclaimed water. Mayor Scott Anderson frames the message as 'conservation is the key' and 'it's going to cost more all the time.'

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE / early adopter of a verified consumptive-use conservation market. Gilbert already sells conservation to Reclamation: it signed SCIAs, committed 8,500 AF to Lake Mead, and monetized federal conservation funding (~$17M). It has real, meter-verified conservation infrastructure coming online (27,000+ AMI meters) that would let it document consumptive-use savings credibly. A market that pays for verified reductions fits its 'conservation is key' messaging and its enterprise-fund need for revenue to offset a 73% CAP cost spike. Caveat: Gilbert is supply-short and growing, so it will guard its stored-credit balance and DAWS obligations - it will sell conservation it genuinely has (efficiency, reclaimed offsets, temporary fallowing of turf/recharge headroom), not core supply it needs to serve buildout. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific lever.

On solar+water. Likely INTERESTED but cautious. Gilbert has data-center and industrial growth in the East Valley and an enterprise-fund model straining under rate hikes, so outside capital that funds water infrastructure (NWTP-scale capex, advanced treatment, recharge) while adding firm clean energy is attractive on paper. But Gilbert's dominant water anxiety is that new large loads (including data centers) compete for the same scarce renewable supply. A hyperscaler package will land well ONLY if it is explicitly net-water-positive or net-neutral for the town - i.e., the water funding materially exceeds the project's own consumption and helps Gilbert firm supply/lower rates. Framed as 'we bring you funded water + power and we don't draw down your CAP/credits,' it is persuadable-to-ally; framed as another thirsty load, it is a hard sell.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE on reuse, NEUTRAL/uncertain on desal. Reuse is core Gilbert identity: 100% reclaimed reuse since 1986, four recharge facilities, ~3 billion gallons/yr recharged. The obvious next step - advanced water purification / potable reuse - aligns perfectly with its renewable-first, reduce-groundwater-reliance strategy and its huge treatment-capex posture (NWTP). Expect Gilbert to be an ally for reuse-scaling and for regional advanced-purification partnerships (peers like Scottsdale already do AWP). Large-scale desalination (e.g., a Sea of Cortez / regional import project or brackish groundwater desal) is geographically remote for an inland town; Gilbert would likely support it as a basin-firming supply that protects its CAP allocation, but sees it as a state/CAP/regional play it buys into rather than builds - and will be sensitive to the cost pass-through given its rate fatigue.

A win for them. A win is firming Gilbert's renewable-first portfolio and its DAWS while relieving rate pressure on residents. Concretely: new verified, non-CAP supply or paid conservation that offsets the shrinking Colorado River slice; outside capital that closes the NWTP/advanced-treatment financing gap without another double-digit rate hike; and revenue from monetizing conservation Gilbert genuinely has (efficiency, reclaimed, recharge headroom) - all structured so it protects, not spends, the stored credits and assured-supply status it needs to keep serving a growing town.

Public record. The town offers numerous water conservation rebates, including for grass removal, and has invested in large-scale solar energy to power its municipal operations.

Position. The Town of Parker is a small municipality (~3,100 residents) that serves as the county seat of La Paz County, Arizona, sitting directly on the Colorado River on the 16-mile 'Parker Strip' between Parker Dam and Headgate Rock Dam. It has NO significant public record of formal positions on the basin-scale Colorado River crisis (Post-2026 Guidelines, Lower Basin cuts, DCP negotiations) -- those are handled at the state (ADWR), tribal (CRIT), and large-user (CAP, MWD) level, not by a town this size. What IS on the public record: (1) The town's municipal drinking water comes from THREE GROUNDWATER WELLS, not a direct Colorado River surface diversion -- so its potable supply is insulated from river-level shortage declarations in a way most Lower Basin towns are not. (2) The town's economy is overwhelmingly tourism-, retail-, and recreation-based, built on the Colorado River 'Parker Strip' (boating, water-skiing, fishing, ~500,000 seasonal visitors to the broader area March-September). River flows and reservoir/pool levels between the dams are the town's true economic lifeblood. (3) Parker is institutionally interlocked with the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT): the two co-organized the Colorado River Sewage System Joint Venture (CRSSJV) on Dec 23, 1969 to jointly build and run sewage disposal for the Tribes and the Town. CRIT holds senior water rights to ~719,248 acre-feet (nearly one-third of Arizona's entire Colorado River allocation) and its headquarters is in Parker. CRIT's posture -- the 2024 CRIT Water Resiliency Act (signed near Parker with Sec. Haaland and Gov. Hobbs, enabling leasing/storage/exchange of tribal water) and its 2025 vote to grant the river legal personhood under tribal law -- shapes the political and water context the town operates inside far more than the town's own voice does. Net: the town is a low-profile, river-adjacent, tourism-dependent municipality whose stated public stance on the crisis is essentially unarticulated (mark position on basin-scale allocation policy as UNKNOWN), but whose material interests are clear and river-recreation-centric.

On conservation. Likely NEUTRAL-to-CAUTIOUSLY-FAVORABLE, but this is inference, not stated position (town has no public record on consumptive-use markets). Because the town's own potable supply is groundwater and it is not a large consumptive Colorado River diverter, it has little direct water to sell into a consumptive-use conservation market -- the real market participant in this area is CRIT, whose 2024 Water Resiliency Act was designed precisely to enable leasing/storing/exchanging its senior tribal water. The town would care mainly that any such market NOT drop the river pool/flows through the Parker Strip in a way that harms the recreation economy (in-stream flow between the two dams is largely dam-regulated, which softens this risk but does not eliminate the town's sensitivity). Expect the town to be supportive if conservation dollars flow into the local economy and CRIT is the beneficiary/partner, and wary if a market is perceived to pull water past/away from the recreation reach. Verified/measured consumptive-use accounting would reassure them. Overall: persuadable, contingent on protecting recreation-grade flows and on CRIT alignment.

On solar+water. Likely INTERESTED but risk-sensitive; no public record, so inferred. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive to a small, tourism-dependent town and to La Paz County (which has abundant sun, cheap land, and has historically courted energy/industrial development) IF it brings tax base, jobs, and water funding without threatening the river-recreation economy or straining the local aquifer the town's wells draw from. Key concerns the town would raise: land-use and viewshed near the recreation corridor, groundwater draw for any cooling/data-center load, and ensuring benefits land locally rather than exporting power/water value out of the county. The deal is far stronger if structured WITH CRIT (large landholder and senior water-rights holder) and La Paz County. Persuadable-to-favorable if the 'also funds water' component is real, local, and pairs with recreation-flow protection; skeptical if it reads as an outside data-center project extracting local water/land for someone else's benefit.

On reuse/desal. Likely SUPPORTIVE-in-principle but low-priority for the town itself; inferred, not stated. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., augmentation that adds 'new' water to the system) is generally attractive to Lower Basin interests because it relieves pressure on the shared river, which indirectly protects the flows the Parker economy depends on. But Parker is not a major municipal water provider (groundwater wells, small population), so it would not itself finance or host a big desal/reuse plant, and coastal desal is geographically remote. The town benefits mainly as a downstream free-rider on any augmentation that stabilizes the river. It already operates a joint sewage system with CRIT, so localized water-reuse concepts (e.g., reclaimed water for irrigation/recreation greenspace) could have modest direct appeal and lower capital scale. Expect passive support for basin-scale reuse/desal and mild interest in local reuse, with cost and who-pays being the deciding factors.

A win for them. A win for the Town of Parker is a stable, predictable river pool and flow regime through the tourism season (protecting the Parker Strip recreation economy), plus new outside dollars that shore up town/county finances without a new burden on ratepayers -- ideally something that also benefits CRIT (their sewage-JV partner and the region's water power) so the town isn't caught between the Tribes and larger players. Concretely: guaranteed recreation-grade water levels between the dams, tourism revenue protection or diversification, cost-sharing help on shared infrastructure (the CRSSJV sewage system), and a seat at the table when regional water/energy deals are struck so the town isn't merely acted upon.

Public record. The town operates a wastewater treatment facility returning treated water to the Colorado River and sits within La Paz County, which participates in conservation and endangered species programs.

Position. Formed in 1957 as a political subdivision of Colorado to advance participating projects under the Colorado River Storage Project Act. Serves ~1,400 sq mi across Delta, Montrose, and Ouray counties on the Uncompahgre River (a Gunnison/Colorado tributary in the Upper Basin), operating Ridgway Dam and the 84,230 acre-foot Ridgway Reservoir (Dallas Creek Project, completed 1987) and delivering domestic water to ~7,500 residential/commercial taps via ~615 miles of pipeline, 21 tanks, and 42 pump stations. Its board is judicially appointed (five members per county). Longstanding, publicly stated posture is supply-security and reliability oriented rather than crisis-activist. Strategic Plan commitments: 'Develop ways to manage the effects of drought on water rights, water supplies, and water management'; 'Protect existing, develop new, and maintain conditional water rights'; 'Continue discussions on efficient and effective Ag-to-Municipal water rights conversion to ensure sustainability'; 'Initiate a legitimate and effective regional water conservation program' and establish a water conservation office. Participates in the Gunnison Basin Roundtable, Aspinall Unit operations, the Upper Colorado River Endangered Species Recovery Program, and the Colorado River Water Users Association. Signed a historic no-call agreement (with Ouray County Water Users Association, the Colorado River Water Conservation District, and UVWUA) tied to delivering ~3,000 AF of irrigation water into Ridgway Reservoir (Ram's Horn/Cow Creek Pipeline project up to 13,750 AF) to relieve the Uncompahgre Basin during drought. As an Upper Basin tributary district, its interest is developing and firming its own supply and hydropower, not curtailing exports to the Lower Basin.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable if structured as voluntary and compensated. The district explicitly wants a 'legitimate and effective regional water conservation program' and is already discussing Ag-to-Municipal conversion, so a verified consumptive-use market that pays willing irrigators and lets the district firm municipal supply aligns with stated goals. Concerns: it will resist any market design that enables senior-rights calls, mandatory curtailment, or out-of-basin transfers that move water away from the Uncompahgre Valley. Wants Upper Basin / tributary equity, robust measurement, and protection of its CRSP and conditional water rights. Persuadable-to-ally on a clean, voluntary, verified structure.

On solar+water. Interested but scrutinizing. The district already sells power and RECs and has direct hydropower revenue exposure, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could be attractive as a capital source for the Cow Creek Pipeline, treatment plant, and debt reduction. It would weigh grid-interconnection realities (it works with Tri-State) and whether new solar undercuts its own hydropower/REC revenue. Likely welcomes datacenter-financed water capital if it stays in-basin and does not obligate the district to deliver water to a large industrial load that competes with its 7,500 taps and irrigators. Persuadable, contingent on who controls the water and the money.

On reuse/desal. Low direct relevance and lukewarm. As an inland Upper Basin district ~800+ miles from the coast, ocean desalination is not actionable for it, though it may support Lower Basin desal/reuse in principle because such 'new water' relieves pressure on the shared Colorado River and reduces the odds of Compact-driven curtailment reaching Upper Basin tributaries. Water reuse within its own service area (e.g., municipal effluent reuse) is more plausible and consistent with its reliability/redundancy goals, but at 7,500 taps the scale is small. Neutral-to-mildly-supportive; unlikely to fund or lead.

A win for them. A win is durable, drought-resilient supply for their 7,500 taps and irrigation contracts plus stable hydropower/REC revenue, achieved with outside capital rather than local rate hikes. Concretely: permanent satisfaction of the UVWUA no-call agreement (funded Cow Creek Pipeline / Ram's Horn storage replacing the temporary Reclamation lease), a built Ridgway water-treatment plant for redundant domestic service, protection and development of their conditional water rights, and a voluntary compensated conservation/Ag-to-Municipal mechanism that pays their basin instead of taking water out of it. Any deal that hands them capital and reliability while keeping water and control in the Uncompahgre Valley is a win.

Public record. The district's strategic plan supports public education on water conservation and exploring efficient ag-to-municipal water transfers, but its primary mission is the reliable delivery of water to its existing customers.

Position. Tri-State is a wholesale generation-and-transmission cooperative serving ~40+ member co-ops across CO, NE, NM and WY. On the Colorado River its footprint runs through the Yampa (a major CO River tributary): its coal-fired Craig Station uses ~8.4 million gallons/day of Yampa water, and Tri-State + Xcel together divert ~44 cfs. Tri-State's dominant public position is retaining its industrial water rights as it exits coal. It backed Colorado SB24-197, which protects those rights from abandonment through Dec 2050. Senior water/natural-resources policy advisor Jackie Brown: 'Tri-State prefers to hold on to those water rights as we transition to other generation technologies that also use water,' and the bill provides 'certainty that our water resources remain intact and available for future dispatchable, carbon-free generation.' Tri-State frames unused water staying in-stream (benefiting downstream farmers, ranchers, communities) as a conservation win, and worked with Conservation Colorado, The Nature Conservancy and Western Resource Advocates to get the bill passed. It is simultaneously executing an aggressive clean-energy transition: closing Nucla and Craig (last Craig unit ~Sept 2028) and Springerville Unit 3 (2031), adding ~1,250-1,850 MW of renewables + storage by ~2031 (incl. 920 MW solar, 1,374 MW wind, 310 MW storage w/ 100-hr iron-air), targeting ~89% CO GHG reduction by 2030 vs 2005. It is NOT a water-crisis advocate; its engagement is instrumental (protect the asset, keep options open for future dispatchable generation that also consumes water).

On conservation. Cautiously supportive to neutral. Tri-State already accepts the idea of its unused water staying in-stream during transition and touts that as conservation, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market is philosophically compatible. BUT its core stance is asset retention, not permanent forbearance: SB24-197 was explicitly framed as temporary and about keeping the water 'intact and available for future dispatchable, carbon-free generation.' It would likely engage a market only on terms that (a) are voluntary and reversible, (b) do NOT count as abandonment or erode the seniority/quantification of its rights, and (c) pay it for water it is not yet using. It would resist any market design that pressures it to permanently retire the rights. A well-structured market that pays Tri-State to keep Yampa water in-stream during the 2028-2050 window, without prejudicing its right, is a plausible near-term revenue source for a cash-strained co-op. Verdict: persuadable, price- and reversibility-sensitive.

On solar+water. Most likely of the three to excite them. Tri-State is a generation/transmission entity actively building solar+storage and actively seeking new load and revenue after losing ~20-25% of members; it has publicly offered to sell excess power amid declining membership. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly serves its two biggest needs: new large-load offtake and capital for renewables. Datacenter load in its service territory (CO/NM/WY) would help refill the revenue hole and justify its transition capex. The water-funding component is a bonus that aligns with its 'transition responsibly, keep water in-stream' messaging. Main frictions: exit/rate disputes and FERC dynamics, member-governance approval, and ensuring new large loads don't strand its legacy assets. Verdict: likely ally on this specific option.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-uninterested, low salience. Large-scale reuse/desalination is not Tri-State's business and is upstream/Upper-Basin-remote from its Yampa position. It could be a power OFFTAKER (desal and advanced reuse are energy-intensive), which is mildly positive for a G&T hunting load. But it would not champion or fund desal, and would view it as someone else's supply-augmentation project. If a desal/reuse buildout created new firm electricity demand it could sell into, mild positive; otherwise indifferent. Verdict: not an opponent, not a driver; engage only as a potential power supplier.

A win for them. A win is: (1) new large-load offtake (datacenters) that replaces the ~20-25% revenue lost to departing members and improves its downgraded credit posture; (2) capital/federal support that lowers the cost of its ~1,250-1,850 MW renewables+storage buildout; and (3) monetizing or safely parking its Yampa water rights during 2028-2050 WITHOUT abandonment risk and without giving up the option to use that water for future dispatchable carbon-free generation. If a Colorado River solution delivers paying load plus keeps its water intact, Tri-State treats it as a financial and strategic win, not a concession.

Public record. Tri-State's 2023 Electric Resource Plan, supported by federal IRA funding, accelerates its transition to clean energy by adding 1,250 MW of renewables and storage while retiring coal plants.

Position. USACE is NOT the water master of the Colorado River. Under the Law of the River, the Bureau of Reclamation (Interior) allocates and delivers Colorado River water and operates the mainstem reservoirs (Hoover/Lake Mead, Glen Canyon/Lake Powell). The Corps' role is narrower and mostly non-allocative: (1) FLOOD CONTROL. It owns and operates flood-control dams in the basin's tributary systems, notably Alamo Dam (Bill Williams River) and Painted Rock and Whitlow dams (Gila River), and under Section 7 of the Flood Control Act of 1944 it prescribes flood-control operating regulations for storage at certain non-Corps (including some Reclamation) reservoirs. Its Sacramento District (SPK) Water Management mission is explicitly flood control in Corps-owned and Section 7 reservoirs in CA, CO and UT. (2) NAVIGATION and Clean Water Act Section 404 dredge-and-fill permitting over waters of the U.S. (3) DATA/MODELING: it runs public water-control data systems and the Corps Water Management System (CWMS: HEC-ResSim, HEC-RAS, HEC-HMS, HEC-FIA) used across the basin. Its most river-relevant strategic move is on the SUPPLY-CREATION side: since 2023 the Corps' Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC-CERL) is the federal funder of a three-phase, roughly $38M water-reuse and desalination R&D program, with a ~$12.3M Phase 1 cooperative agreement anchoring the USC ReWater Center plus University of Nevada-Reno (pilot test bed) and University of Arizona. So the Corps has no public 'position' on cuts/allocations (that's Reclamation's fight) but is materially invested in reuse/desal technology as a national security and water-resilience mission. In May 2026 the Corps also proposed deauthorizing hundreds of dormant, never-funded water projects nationwide (including CA/AZ/NV/CO/NM water-reclamation and flood items), signaling a cull of stale authorizations rather than new build.

On conservation. Largely neutral / indirect; not the Corps' arena. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates on Colorado River ENTITLEMENTS, which the Corps does not hold or administer; that market lives with Reclamation, the states, tribes and users. So the Corps has no institutional stake to defend or oppose and would not take a public position. Where it could touch the Corps at all: (a) as a modeling/measurement service provider, since credible verification needs hydrologic and remote-sensing/accounting rigor and the Corps runs sophisticated water-management modeling (CWMS/HEC tools) it could in principle support; (b) at the margin, large-scale fallowing that changes tributary runoff or return flows could intersect its flood-control operating assumptions. Expect cooperative-but-hands-off: willing to lend technical/data capability if asked, indifferent to the market's existence otherwise. Mark most of this as low-confidence inference because the Corps has issued no public statement on consumptive-use markets.

On solar+water. Cautiously favorable where it intersects the Corps' engineering and permitting role, otherwise neutral. The Corps is not a power buyer or grid actor, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout is not something it champions or blocks on energy grounds. Its touchpoints are regulatory and infrastructural: (1) Clean Water Act Section 404 / Rivers and Harbors Act permitting if the build disturbs waters of the U.S. (washes, arroyos, conveyance crossings, desal intake/outfall) - here the Corps is a gatekeeper that will want clean, well-engineered permit applications, and a sophisticated applicant who pre-engages will find it workable. (2) If the 'also funds water' component channels private capital into reuse/desal R&D or pilots, that DIRECTLY complements ERDC's program and is a genuine positive for the Corps (leverages federal dollars, advances the tech, national-security/resilience framing). (3) Real-estate/easements on Corps-managed lands or near Corps dams would need coordination. Net: persuadable-to-supportive as an enabling engineer and permitting authority, provided flood-risk and environmental-compliance boxes are checked. Low direct energy stake means the Corps' enthusiasm tracks whether water/resilience R&D is funded, not the megawatts.

On reuse/desal. Most aligned of the three; this is where the Corps is already leaning in. Through ERDC-CERL the Corps is the federal funder of a ~$38M, three-phase water-reuse and desalination technology program (USC ReWater Center, UNR industrial-scale test bed, U-Arizona), explicitly aimed at membrane processes, contaminant/pathogen removal, resource recovery, and desalination ENERGY-COST reduction for the drought-stressed inland Southwest where ocean desal is impractical. A large-scale reuse/desalination push is therefore squarely on-mission: the Corps would welcome it as validation and deployment of its research, a resilience/national-security win, and a way to show its R&D dollars produce fielded systems. It can add value as technology partner, modeler, and (for coastal or binational desal, tributary conveyance, or waters-of-the-US crossings) as Section 404 permitting authority and civil-works engineer. Watch-outs are technical and fiscal, not political: the Corps will be rigorous on energy intensity, cost per acre-foot, brine/concentrate disposal, and benefit-cost, and its own May 2026 deauthorization sweep shows it will not back projects lacking funding or a viable purpose. Engage ERDC and the consortium to convert a private project into a Corps-validated pilot.

A win for them. A win is mission delivery, not water won. Concretely: (a) their ERDC reuse/desal research produces a fielded, validated technology at industrial scale (the whole point of the UNR test bed and the three-phase program), giving them a demonstrable resilience/national-security payoff and justification for continued appropriations; (b) flood-risk-reduction and public-safety performance at their dams is maintained or improved, ideally while squeezing more water-supply or reliability benefit out of existing federal infrastructure via re-operation studies (a benefit-cost-positive, congressionally supportable story); (c) they retire dead-weight dormant authorizations and focus scarce civil-works dollars on viable projects; and (d) any private capital (hyperscaler, market) that de-risks or co-funds a Corps-adjacent pilot or a permittable build lets the Corps show leverage of federal R&D dollars without new appropriations. The Corps wins by being the enabling engineer and technology pro;-provider, not the policy protagonist.

Public record. USACE's role is primarily regulatory and operational, issuing permits for infrastructure projects in waterways under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act and managing civil works projects for missions like ecosystem restoration.

Position. USDA/NRCS is the federal agency that funds on-farm water conservation across Colorado River Basin agricultural lands, primarily through EQIP (Environmental Quality Incentives Program), its EQIP WaterSMART Initiative co-run with the Bureau of Reclamation, the Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Program, and CREP. Longstanding position: fund voluntary, incentive-based irrigation-efficiency and soil-health practices that keep working lands in production while nominally 'saving water.' It frames conservation around producer viability, not around cuts. Under the Biden administration NRCS leaned into drought: the IRA directed ~$19.5B for climate-smart agriculture nationally (with ~$4B specifically for Colorado River Basin water via Reclamation), NRCS provided $2.3B in FY2023 Western conservation investments (a $213M/~9.7% IRA boost), and published the 'Western Water and Working Lands Framework' (17 states, 13 strategies). USDA Secretary Vilsack convened basin-state ag leaders in March 2023 to coordinate a drought response, and USDA/FSA launched the $400M Water-Saving Commodities (WSC) program in 2024 to pay producers for voluntary consumptive-use reductions (fallowing, deficit irrigation, crop switching) while maintaining production, targeting ~50,000 acre-feet across 250,000 irrigated acres. CRITICAL TENSION documented publicly: EWG (2024) found USDA paid $521.7M through EQIP in the basin for irrigation upgrades (e.g., ditch-to-pipe) that, under 'use-it-or-lose-it' water rights, do NOT reliably reduce consumptive use, i.e., billions for 'business as usual.' Independent experts and journalists (Aspen Journalism, Colorado Sun) stress agriculture is ~75% of basin diversions / ~half of consumptive use (alfalfa alone ~26% basin-wide) and must make PERMANENT cuts, which is politically hard for an agency whose mandate is keeping farmers in business. As of Feb 2026 the $400M WSC program is frozen/unpaid under the Trump administration, FSA lost ~24% of its workforce in early 2026, and USDA has gone silent on the program.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable to actively supportive IF the market is voluntary, keeps producers made-whole, and lets NRCS/FSA be a channel or verifier. USDA has already built the prototype: the $400M Water-Saving Commodities program pays for voluntary consumptive-use reductions (fallowing/deficit irrigation) and Colorado's SCPP-style programs paid ~$509/acre-foot. A verified consumptive-use market directly answers the EWG critique that its efficiency spending doesn't cut real water, so it offers the agency a credibility upgrade. Risk it will resist: anything mandatory, anything that permanently retires water rights or farmland (its mandate is keeping working lands working), and anything that bypasses its programs. NRCS would want the measurement tied to its own Framework and technical-assistance role. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific lever.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-cautiously-open, but outside its core lane. NRCS's mandate is on-farm natural-resource conservation, not power procurement, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout is not its instrument. It would engage constructively if the water-funding component flows to producers/irrigation districts for verified consumptive-use reductions (i.e., private capital doing what the frozen $400M WSC program was meant to do), and if agrivoltaics or solar-on-fallowed-farmland keeps landowners economically whole. It would be wary of large-scale farmland conversion to energy, dry-lot displacement of ag communities, and anything that reads as taking prime ag land out of production permanently. Persuadable if framed as producer income + water savings, indifferent/absent if framed purely as an energy deal.

On reuse/desal. Largely indifferent / out of jurisdiction. Municipal and industrial reuse and desalination are Reclamation, EPA, state, and utility domains, not NRCS. USDA would neither champion nor oppose these, though it would quietly welcome any supply that reduces pressure to force permanent agricultural cuts, since urban/industrial new supply is the alternative to shrinking the farm sector it serves. Marginal, mostly neutral stance; treat as low-priority for engaging this stakeholder.

A win for them. A win is producers getting paid to voluntarily and verifiably reduce consumptive use while staying economically viable and keeping working lands in the community, with NRCS/FSA as the trusted channel and verifier. Concretely: the credibility problem is solved (efficiency dollars replaced or complemented by measured real water savings that survive the EWG critique), a private-capital vehicle backfills the frozen federal WSC money and de-risks the agency politically, irrigation districts and tribes see cash flow restored, and USDA can point to real acre-feet returned to the system without being blamed for gutting the farm economy. Reputationally: USDA becomes the agency that made basin agriculture part of the solution voluntarily, rather than the agency that spent billions on 'business as usual.'

Public record. The NRCS is the primary federal agency funding on-farm water conservation in the basin through programs like EQIP and the WaterSMART Initiative, directly implementing the agenda of paying users to conserve water.

Position. DOE's direct footprint on the Colorado River is the Western Area Power Administration (WAPA), the federal Power Marketing Administration that markets and transmits the hydropower generated at Bureau of Reclamation dams (Glen Canyon, Hoover, and the smaller CRSP units: Flaming Gorge, Blue Mesa, Morrow Point, Crystal, Fontenelle). Note the split: Interior/Reclamation owns and operates the dams and controls water releases; DOE/WAPA only markets the resulting power. So DOE is a downstream taker of water-policy decisions, not a water manager, and it has historically stayed out of the allocation fight. Its consistent, longstanding public position is narrow and operational: keep the reservoirs above minimum power pool so the turbines keep spinning (Powell minimum power pool ~3,490 ft; Mead loses ~70% of Hoover output below elev. 1,035 ft), and keep firm-power commitments and rates stable for its ~5,300 GWh of preference customers (municipalities, rural co-ops, tribes, irrigation districts). WAPA has publicly acknowledged it is 'rethinking power sales for an uncertain era' and moved from firm marketing to a Declining Supply Approach (DSA) that caps sales to projected generation and limits expensive market-rate replacement-power purchases. Glen Canyon alone produces 75-80% of the power WAPA markets on CRSP, and CRSP sales fell ~37% during the drought. DOE's newer, adjacent position (2026 National Transmission Needs Study, Office of Electricity; DOE direction to FERC to speed data-center interconnection) is pro-buildout of transmission, solar, and storage to meet Western load growth , which is where the river crisis, hydropower loss, and hyperscaler demand intersect for DOE.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that keeps more water in the reservoirs is directly aligned with WAPA's core interest , higher elevations mean more generation, more firm power, and a healthier Basin Fund. WAPA would not lead or fund such a market (that is Reclamation/Basin-State/tribal turf), but it benefits when reservoir levels rise. The nuance: WAPA's own revenue mechanism has historically depended on releasing water THROUGH the turbines, so a conservation scheme that holds water back purely for storage without generation is a mixed bag near-term; the sweet spot is conservation that lifts and stabilizes elevations above power pool over the medium term. Verification and MMRV would appeal to their engineering culture. Expect quiet support, not advocacy.

On solar+water. Most favorable of the three, and the clearest fit with DOE's current national priorities. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits two DOE goals at once: it adds dispatchable/renewable capacity to replace the firm hydropower the drought is taking away (protecting WAPA customers and rates), and it aligns with DOE's 2026 push (National Transmission Needs Study, direction to FERC to accelerate data-center interconnection) to meet Western load growth. If it is sited on or interconnects to WAPA's transmission footprint and the water-funding component backfills the Basin Fund or supports reservoir levels, DOE/WAPA are natural partners. Watch-outs: interconnection queue realities, transmission constraints WAPA itself has flagged, and whether new hyperscaler load competes with preference customers for scarce firm capacity. Overall: strongly persuadable-to-ally on this option.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-favorable but the most peripheral to DOE's mandate. Large-scale reuse and desalination reduce demand on the river, which indirectly helps reservoir levels and thus hydropower , a plus for WAPA. But desalination is extremely energy-intensive, so DOE's interest flips toward the ENERGY side of the equation: powering desal plants becomes new load that needs generation and transmission, which DOE cares about, while the water outcome itself is Interior/Reclamation/state business. DOE has R&D equities here (energy-water nexus, desalination cost-reduction research via its national labs and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy) but no operational role on the river. Expect engagement as a technology/energy-supply partner for the power to run reuse/desal, not as a water-policy champion. Persuadable on the energy dimension, largely indifferent on the water dimension.

A win for them. A win: reservoirs held above minimum power pool so Glen Canyon and Hoover keep generating and WAPA avoids the 'financial cliff' of buying market-rate replacement power (which drove the first CRSP rate hike in nine years and, if Powell drops below minimum power pool, could roughly triple hydropower rates). Equally, a durable replacement revenue stream for the Upper Colorado River Basin Fund, which historically funded salinity control, the Glen Canyon Adaptive Management Program, and endangered-fish recovery (which drew ~65% of its funding from hydropower sales) out of power revenue that is now collapsing. And on the DOE-wide side: new solar+storage and transmission built on WAPA's footprint that meets Western load growth and data-center demand without stranding their assets.

Public record. WAPA's Transmission Infrastructure Program is responsible for developing projects to deliver renewable energy, and its broader parent agency (DOE) created and funds the Lower Colorado River Basin System Conservation and Efficiency Program.

Position. EPA's role in the Colorado River is narrower and more indirect than Reclamation's or Interior's. Its authority is water-quality, not water-quantity/allocation. Longstanding position: under Clean Water Act Section 303(c), EPA reviews and approves the salinity water-quality standards for the Colorado River System that the seven Basin states set through the Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Forum. Those standards require flow-weighted annual average TDS held at or below 1972 levels at three lower-mainstem stations: 723 mg/L below Hoover Dam, 747 mg/L below Parker Dam, 879 mg/L at Imperial Dam (2023 triennial Review, adopted Oct 24, 2023, EPA-approvable). EPA also administers Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds and grants (e.g., a $121M clean-watersheds/drinking-water award to Colorado), publishes water-reuse guidance and the national Water Reuse Action Plan, and sets drinking-water standards that govern any potable-reuse or desalination product water. EPA has NOT been a lead actor in the flow/allocation crisis or the post-2026 operations negotiations, which sit with Reclamation/Interior and the states. Salinity remains its most concrete Basin equity: cumulative program control of roughly 1.3M+ tons of salt/year, with damages estimated at $500M-$1.5B/yr if uncontrolled. Under the current administration (Zeldin EPA), posture has shifted toward deregulation and streamlining: proposed FY2026 budget cuts EPA ~54% and guts the SRFs (from ~$2.76B toward ~$305M for combined clean/drinking water), and EPA proposed narrowing CWA Section 401 to speed infrastructure/energy permitting. This makes EPA less of a funder and enforcer in the near term and more permissive toward build-it projects.

On conservation. Mildly supportive but not a driver. A verified consumptive-use conservation market reduces the volume of water diverted, which generally reduces the salt load mobilized by irrigation return flows and out-of-basin export, aligning with EPA's salinity-standards mission and the existing Salinity Control Program logic (irrigation efficiency = less salt transport). EPA would not lead or fund such a market under current budget posture, but it would view salinity co-benefits favorably and is unlikely to obstruct. Caveat EPA would flag: aggressive consumptive-use reduction can CONCENTRATE remaining TDS if flows drop faster than salt loads, so it would want the market's water-quality effect modeled at the three compliance stations, not assumed positive.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-supportive, low direct involvement. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is largely outside EPA's core Basin authority, but the current EPA's deregulatory, 'unleash energy/infrastructure' framing (Section 401 streamlining, permitting acceleration) makes it a facilitator rather than a blocker. EPA touchpoints: any water treatment/reuse funded by the deal must meet SDWA/CWA standards; discharges and any brine need NPDES coverage; EPA could offer reuse-guidance and technical assistance. EPA would not fund it and would not be the decision-maker, but it is a permissive-to-favorable actor if the water component is structured to improve quality.

On reuse/desal. Most directly relevant lever, and EPA is supportive in principle. Large-scale reuse and desalination sit squarely in EPA's wheelhouse: it runs the national Water Reuse Action Plan, publishes potable-reuse guidance, sets the drinking-water standards the product water must meet, and administers SRF financing that has historically backed reuse/desal. The June 2026 Reclamation MOU on desalinated/recycled interstate water swaps (San Diego, MWD, SNWA, Arizona, CAP, SRP) shows the Basin moving this direction, though EPA was not named a party. EPA's real leverage and concern is on the back end: brine/concentrate disposal (CWA/NPDES, deep-well injection under UIC), energy/GHG footprint, and ensuring potable-reuse public-health safeguards. Under current posture EPA leans toward enabling these projects, but reduced SRF funding weakens its ability to bankroll them, so its contribution is more regulatory-clearance and guidance than dollars.

A win for them. A win for EPA is Basin water that stays compliant with the salinity standards and safe under drinking-water rules while big new supply/efficiency projects proceed without EPA becoming the bottleneck. Specifically: conservation and reuse/desal that demonstrably hold or reduce TDS at the three compliance stations and add to the salt-control ledger; potable-reuse and desalination projects that meet SDWA/CWA standards with clean brine-disposal solutions; and being able to show streamlined permitting (Section 401, NPDES) that let infrastructure move fast, consistent with the administration's 'Great American Comeback' framing. Politically, EPA wins by being seen as the agency that protected water quality and public health while enabling, not obstructing, the projects that ease the crisis, and by leveraging limited SRF/reuse dollars for maximum visible drinking-water and watershed benefit.

Public record. The EPA actively promotes water reuse through its national Water Reuse Action Plan (WRAP 2.0) and encourages solar development on underutilized lands through its RE-Powering America's Land initiative.

Position. USFWS is not a water user or allocator; it is the federal regulator of species survival on the river, and that role defines every position it takes. Its longstanding mission on the Colorado is to recover four endangered big-river fish endemic to the basin (humpback chub, bonytail, Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker) while, in its own framing, allowing water development to proceed 'in accordance with federal and state laws and interstate compacts.' It has held that dual mandate since co-founding, with the Bureau of Reclamation, the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program (1988) and the San Juan River Basin Recovery Implementation Program. That partnership model is the Service's signature public position: recover fish WITHOUT stopping water projects, by substituting Program actions (flow provision, stocking, habitat, nonnative-fish control, fish passage) for project-by-project ESA jeopardy findings. Its hardest regulatory leverage is ESA Section 7: it writes the biological opinions that govern Glen Canyon Dam and, in the post-2026 operating-guidelines EIS, it is a cooperating/consulting agency whose jeopardy analysis can constrain how Reclamation runs Lakes Powell and Mead. As reservoirs fall, the Service's recent public posture has sharpened around one concrete threat: once Lake Powell drops below ~3,530 ft, invasive smallmouth bass pass through Glen Canyon Dam into humpback chub habitat, so the Service now ties dam operations and cold-water releases directly to endangered-species outcomes. It also operates as a water-dependent landowner: seven national wildlife refuges along the lower river (Cibola, Imperial, Havasu, Bill Williams and others) hold Colorado River water rights and wetland habitat that shrink as the river drops.

On conservation. Favorable, provided the conserved water can be legally and physically directed to species benefit and habitat, not merely retired on paper. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is attractive to USFWS because reliable flow is its scarcest recovery input and the Recovery Program already depends on partners releasing water for fish during dry years. The Service would engage as a beneficiary and technical partner IF (a) verification is credible enough to guarantee wet water reaches critical reaches (the 15-Mile Reach, San Juan, Grand Canyon) at biologically useful times, not just any time; (b) the market includes a mechanism to dedicate some conserved water to environmental flows rather than freeing it entirely for reallocation to other users; and (c) it does not undercut ESA obligations by letting Reclamation or states claim conservation as a substitute for required species protections. Watch-out: a market that only moves water between human users, with no environmental-flow set-aside, does little for the Service and could even be used to argue that jeopardy is being managed without funding recovery actions. The Service will push for a 'water for the river' tranche and for protected instream delivery, which is legally hard in several basin states.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested, with real regulatory friction. The energy angle matters less to USFWS than to water/power agencies, but two things pull it in. First, if hyperscaler funding channels real money into environmental flows, nonnative-fish control, and fish-passage capital, that directly relieves the Service's chronic underfunding, which is its single biggest constraint. Second, cheaper firm power for pumping could keep refuge water systems and Program facilities running. Against that, the Service is the ESA consultation authority for the buildout itself: large solar+storage and transmission trigger Section 7 review for desert species (desert tortoise, migratory birds, listed plants) and refuge/critical-habitat impacts, so the Service becomes a gatekeeper, not just a recipient. It will react well to a project that (a) sites and designs to avoid listed-species and refuge harm, bringing the Service in early as a cooperating agency, and (b) earmarks a defined, durable funding stream for species recovery and instream flows. It will react poorly to a package that treats 'funds water' as a PR line with no enforceable environmental-flow or recovery commitment, or that routes new load and infrastructure through sensitive habitat. Net: persuadable and potentially a strong ally if the environmental funding is real and siting is clean, but its own permitting role makes it a hurdle the project must clear regardless.

On reuse/desal. Mixed and issue-specific. USFWS supports augmentation in principle because new supply reduces the pressure that drains flows away from fish and refuges, and reuse inside urban systems is low-friction for it. But large-scale desalination raises direct Service equities it will scrutinize hard: intake entrainment and impingement of fish and larvae, brine-discharge harm to marine and estuarine species (a live concern for any Sea of Cortez / Gulf of California project, where listed species and the vaquita make the Service and its marine counterparts extremely cautious), energy footprint, and the ESA Section 7 consultation the project will require. It will also weigh whether desal actually returns water to the environment or simply enables more depletion elsewhere. The Service reacts most favorably to reuse and to desal configured to add supply while relieving stress on critical habitat and refuges, with enforceable mitigation for intake and brine impacts and an environmental-flow benefit. It reacts skeptically to mega-desal pitched purely as human-supply augmentation with the ecological costs treated as an afterthought, and it can slow such projects through consultation if brought in late.

A win for them. A win is durable, legally reliable flows and habitat for the four endangered fish plus funding for the two levers it cannot fully finance today: nonnative predator control and fish-passage/barrier infrastructure. Concretely: firm environmental water into critical reaches (the 15-Mile Reach and the lower San Juan) that does not depend on scarce annual discretionary appropriations; capital for smallmouth-bass suppression and Glen Canyon Dam barrier/cold-water measures before Powell breaches 3,530 ft; and a river-management regime that lets the Service continue downlisting rather than re-listing species (it downlisted the humpback chub from endangered to threatened in 2021 and found razorback-sucker extinction risk now low, and it wants to protect those gains). A further win is any structure that keeps refuge wetlands (Cibola, Imperial, Havasu) supplied when low river stages otherwise strand their pumps. Politically, the biggest win is a deal that lets the Service demonstrate recovery is compatible with continued water use, validating its 40-year partnership model, without having to invoke jeopardy and become the agency that 'stopped the water.'

Public record. The USFWS's primary role is species survival, which requires it to balance the ecological impacts of water conservation projects and large-scale solar development against the environmental benefits of both.

Position. The Forest Service is the basin's dominant land manager, not a water user: roughly 90% of Colorado River Basin flow originates as snow/precipitation in forests, ~40% of the water comes from the highest ~20% of land (mostly national forest), and USFS manages 14.5M+ acres of national forest in Colorado alone with ~90% in public-water-supply watersheds. Its longstanding public position frames forests as the basin's 'largest natural reservoirs' and centers source-water protection. Recent posture is built around the 10-Year Wildfire Crisis Strategy (2022-), which explicitly targets 1,800 municipal watersheds and named landscapes in the Colorado headwaters (Colorado Front Range, 3.6M acres/155 watersheds; Archuleta County watersheds feeding Santa Fe/Albuquerque). It treated a record 803,633 acres in FY2024 across 21 crisis landscapes and has invested ~$1.73B (IIJA+IRA) in wildfire-risk reduction as of Dec 2024. Operationally it partners on payment-for-watershed-services models (Denver Water 'From Forests to Faucets': ~$96M invested since 2010, 120,000+ acres treated). On water rights, USFS's public/legal stance is constrained: courts and statute (NFMA does not authorize bypass-flow or water-right-transfer mandates) mean it must respect and protect non-federal water rights and generally cannot use permitting to force consumptive-use changes. It is NOT a party to the Law of the River allocation fights and takes no public position on interstate apportionment. Its role in solar/wind is as a land regulator under 36 CFR 251 Subpart B special-use authorizations, with full authority over surface-disturbing energy projects on NFS lands. CRITICAL CAVEAT: as of 2025-2026 the agency is being gutted (proposed budget cuts up to ~75%, non-fire staff cut by a third to a half, ~5,900-5,800 staff already lost, R&D and regional offices eliminated, shift to a 15-state-director model, HQ to Salt Lake City). This reorganization degrades exactly the watershed-restoration and permitting capacity that makes USFS relevant here.

On conservation. Largely neutral-to-mildly-favorable but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates on the water-rights/demand side, where USFS is not a player and legally cannot compel participation. It would not oppose it. It could be a modest indirect ally if the market's verification framework credits forest/watershed restoration that improves runoff timing and reliability (the same logic underpinning payment-for-watershed-services deals it already partners on). Persuadable to endorse if conservation accounting recognizes source-water forest health as a supply lever. Unlikely to lead or fund it.

On solar+water. Cautiously conditional, and the one lever where USFS has direct authority. If any solar+storage is proposed on National Forest System land, USFS is the permitting gatekeeper under 36 CFR 251 Subpart B and controls surface-disturbing approvals, so it becomes a decisive stakeholder. Its instinct will be to steer utility-scale solar toward already-disturbed/non-forest land and to scrutinize watershed, habitat, and fire-risk impacts; large ground-mount solar in productive headwater forest would draw resistance. The water-funding hook is attractive to it IF dollars flow to forest/watershed restoration (it is comfortable with utilities paying for watershed services). Net: persuadable-to-supportive when projects avoid sensitive forest, ride existing corridors, and channel funds into source-water restoration; obstructive when they don't. Degraded 2026 staffing may slow any permitting either way.

On reuse/desal. Neutral / largely out of scope. Reuse and desalination are downstream, urban/coastal, engineered-infrastructure plays with essentially no nexus to national forest land or headwater management. USFS would take no institutional position unless a specific pipeline, intake, or facility crossed NFS land (triggering a special-use review) or a desal energy build was sited on forest. Mark low-salience; no meaningful support or opposition expected.

A win for them. A win is durable, additional funding and partners for headwater forest and watershed restoration that protects the source water for the entire basin, delivered through the mechanisms it already trusts (Wildfire Crisis Strategy landscapes and payment-for-watershed-services partnerships), while it retains its permitting authority and stays out of the water-allocation fight. Concretely: a new co-funding stream (utility/hyperscaler/market-derived) that treats more high-priority acres in Colorado headwater watersheds, reduces catastrophic-fire and post-fire sedimentation risk, and offsets the capacity it is losing to 2026 budget cuts, with any energy siting routed onto already-disturbed land so it never has to trade forest health for megawatts.

Public record. The Forest Service's mandate includes managing lands for multiple uses, which includes permitting renewable energy projects and supporting watershed health, but it does not have a direct role in paying water users for conservation.

Position. The USGS is the science and monitoring bureau of the Department of the Interior, not an allocator or policymaker for the Colorado River. Its longstanding public posture is to provide 'unbiased, actionable science' to Interior decision-makers (Reclamation, tribes, Basin states) rather than to advocate for any allocation outcome. Concretely in the basin: (1) It runs the streamgage network and Next Generation Water Observing System (NGWOS) in the Upper Colorado, generating real-time water quantity/quality/use data used for water-availability forecasts. (2) It completed a multi-year Colorado River Basin Focus Area Study under the National Water Census, quantifying water use and groundwater discharge to streams. (3) Its Upper Colorado River Basin Integrated Water Science initiative (Phase 1 2021-2025 on snowpack/snowmelt and salinity; Phase 2 2026-2030 on broader water availability) is its flagship basin science effort. (4) Its Southwest Biological Science Center supplies science on flow effects and species (e.g., Grand Canyon, endangered fish) to inform Post-2026 operations. (5) It maintains a National Brackish Groundwater Assessment (via WaterSMART) framing brackish water as a supplemental resource and providing the scientific basis for desalination policy. Its consistent institutional message is that better data, modeling, and monitoring are prerequisites for sound management. In 2024-2025 USGS science infrastructure came under acute budget threat: the FY2026 request cut the Water Resources mission area ~22% (from ~$288.8M to ~$223.8M) and terminated leases on 16+ of 25 Water Science Centers, with field-travel restrictions degrading gage maintenance, even as the request claimed streamgages would be 'maintained.' This makes funding stability, not allocation policy, the USGS's central live concern.

On conservation. Favorable on scientific merit, conditional on measurement rigor. A verified consumptive-use conservation market depends entirely on quantifying actual consumptive use (ET), which is squarely USGS's domain: remote-sensing ET (with Reclamation/EROS work on Lower Colorado irrigated-agriculture consumptive use), gaging, and the Focus Area Study water-use accounting. USGS would neither endorse nor oppose the market as policy, but would want to supply/validate the verification methodology and would flag uncertainty in field-scale ET estimates as the make-or-break issue. Funding USGS to build the measurement layer turns them into a strong technical ally for a credible market; skipping rigorous MRV invites their scientists to publicly note the verification gap.

On solar+water. Neutral-to-cautiously-interested, focused on hydrologic and water-quality effects rather than the financing. USGS has no institutional stake in who funds energy but would care about the water side: source-water accounting, groundwater impacts of large solar+storage sites, evaporation/consumptive-use implications, and whether the 'also funds water' component is directed at monitoring or new supply. Likely response is to offer baseline characterization and effects monitoring. If hyperscaler money is offered to fund basin gaging and water-availability science, USGS would welcome it as budget relief consistent with its mission; it would resist any framing that positions its science as endorsing a private buildout.

On reuse/desal. Most directly aligned with existing USGS science, and the intervention where it is closest to a natural ally. USGS built the National Brackish Groundwater Assessment specifically to 'provide a scientific basis for policy decisions' on expanding brackish/desalination use, and documents brackish volumes at ~35x annual fresh-groundwater use and industry/utility uptake via reverse osmosis. For large-scale reuse/desalination USGS would offer resource characterization (where brackish water is and its chemistry), monitoring of aquifer drawdown and brine/salinity impacts, and could be funded to extend the assessment to the Colorado River Basin. It would caution on salinity loading (a live basin issue it already studies) and disposal/environmental effects, but the underlying research posture treats these supplies as legitimate and worth quantifying.

A win for them. A win is that their data and models become the authoritative, funded backbone of whatever intervention proceeds, and that the basin's monitoring network is strengthened rather than left to erode. Specifically: durable funding for streamgages, remote-sensing consumptive-use estimation, and groundwater/brackish assessment; their measurements accepted as the verification standard; and their science visibly 'used' by decision-makers (the SBSC/Water Resources mandate). Any market, buildout, or new-supply project that pays for high-fidelity measurement and cites USGS as the system of record advances their mission and partially offsets the FY2026 cuts.

Public record. As a non-policy federal science agency, the USGS's public role is to monitor, assess, and deliver impartial data on water resources to support management decisions, not to take a position on them.

Position. The Uintah Water Conservancy District (UWCD, Vernal UT) is a supply-side, development-oriented Upper Basin district in the Uinta Basin (a Colorado River Basin sub-basin). It is the sponsoring repayment and operating entity for the Vernal and Jensen Units of the Central Utah Project (CUP), operating Steinaker and Red Fleet Reservoirs. Its longstanding public posture is developmental, not conservation-first: it exists to put Utah's still-undeveloped Colorado River apportionment to beneficial use for irrigation and municipal/industrial (M&I) supply in Uintah County. Vernal Unit delivers ~17,900 AF supplemental irrigation + 1,600 AF M&I annually; Jensen Unit delivers ~4,600 AF irrigation + up to 18,000 AF M&I. Since 1996 the Utah Board of Water Resources awarded tens of thousands of AF of unused CUP water to UWCD and peer districts, so UWCD sits on paper rights it intends to develop. This aligns it with the Utah/Upper Basin state position (Colorado River Authority of Utah, Commissioner Gene Shawcroft) that the Upper Basin uses less than its full compact share (~360,000 AF of Utah's ~1.369 MAF entitlement is undeveloped) and should not bear mandatory cuts. As of Feb 2026 the basin states remained deadlocked on post-2026 operations. No prominent standalone UWCD statement on the crisis was found in public search; its stance is inferred from its mission, CUP role, and alignment with Utah state Upper Basin messaging. Mark: specific UWCD crisis statements = unknown/low public profile.

On conservation. Cautiously open but wary (persuadable). A verified consumptive-use conservation market lets UWCD monetize water it holds but has not yet developed, and could bankroll infrastructure without local ratepayer burden. But it cuts against the district's core identity of developing new supply, and Upper Basin districts fear that paying to conserve implicitly concedes their water is 'surplus' others can claim, and that any System Conservation/demand-management program could become permanent uncompensated cuts. Reaction depends on: (1) ironclad protection that conserved water does not erode their compact standing or future development rights, (2) genuinely voluntary, compensated, temporary terms, and (3) verification they trust. Absent those, expect resistance framed as protecting Utah's right to grow into its apportionment.

On solar+water. Likely the most attractive option to UWCD (net positive). Uinta Basin has land, energy-industry infrastructure, and a supply-oriented district hungry for capital. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure fits their develop-more-supply mission, brings outside money into a small rural budget, and could pair with M&I demand growth (data centers as new industrial water/power customers). Risks they will probe: water footprint of the data center itself, whether the funded water is new supply vs. reallocated agricultural water (politically sensitive with irrigators/canal companies), and long-term obligations. Expect enthusiasm if it is framed as development capital and new industrial load, skepticism if it looks like it competes with local irrigation or ratepayers.

On reuse/desal. Mixed to pragmatically interested. Large-scale reuse and desalination are less central to an inland Upper Basin district than to coastal/Lower Basin players, but the Uinta Basin has an acute, unusual angle: massive volumes of saline oil-and-gas produced water (millions of barrels/month) that are currently a disposal liability. Produced-water treatment/reuse to offset freshwater demand for industrial use could be genuinely appealing if economics work and it frees fresh CUP water for higher-value M&I. Municipal wastewater reuse in small towns is marginal at their scale. Brackish/produced-water desalination pilots funded externally would likely be welcomed as new supply; UWCD would not fund heavy desal from its own small budget. Net: persuadable-positive on produced-water reuse, low-priority on seawater-style desal.

A win for them. A win is outside capital that lets them develop and firm up Uintah County water supply for M&I and industrial (including energy/data-center) growth without raising local assessments, while preserving Utah's claim to its undeveloped Colorado River apportionment and protecting Ashley Valley irrigators. Concretely: new or upgraded storage/delivery infrastructure funded by third parties, a monetization path for undeveloped rights that carries explicit compact/legal protection, a solution to the saline produced-water liability that also yields usable industrial supply, and being treated as a growth partner rather than a district asked to shrink.

Public record. While the district's history is rooted in developing Utah's allocation of the Colorado River via the Central Utah Project, its 2025 Water Conservation Plan acknowledges conservation as a key element in its long-term master plan to serve customers.

Position. Unit B is a small (~3,400 acre) Yuma-area irrigation district, also known as the Yuma Auxiliary Project, on the Yuma Mesa near Somerton, AZ. It diverts Colorado River water at Imperial Dam and delivers it via the Gila Project system, receiving roughly 25,000-30,000 acre-feet of federal project water per year (a high per-acre duty of ~8-10 AF/ac reflecting sandy Mesa soils and permanent/citrus crops). It holds senior standing within the Yuma-area priority structure (Priority 3 / present-perfected-rights class under the Law of the River, contracts predating 1968; its delivery contract with the U.S. dates to 1952). LONGSTANDING POSTURE (inferred from peer alignment, not its own public statements): like the broader Yuma agricultural bloc it represents its interests through the Yuma County Agriculture Water Coalition (coordinated by attorney Wade Noble), whose consistent public positions are (1) defend present perfected / senior priority rights as legally protected, (2) accept conservation only if it is voluntary and fully compensated, (3) oppose mid-growing-season or abrupt federal operational changes as devastating to Yuma ag (~two-thirds of the local economy), and (4) push large federal compensation packages (Noble floated a lower-basin ag plan costing $4-8B to leave ~2 MAF in the river across ~925,000 acres). RECENT ACTIVITY: Unit B itself is efficiency-oriented, having pursued Bureau of Reclamation WaterSMART / SWEP grants for pipeline consolidation (replacing dual 18-inch lines with a single 30-inch PVC line) and canal/ditch modernization to raise delivery efficiency. No independent public advocacy or press statements from the district itself were found; it is a small, thinly-staffed operations-and-maintenance entity that follows the Yuma coalition line rather than setting policy.

On conservation. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE if the market verifies and pays well. Yuma-area districts have already participated in compensated conservation (System Conservation / fallowing programs at roughly $400/AF federal, with neighboring districts pushing for more), so paid, voluntary, verified consumptive-use conservation is culturally acceptable and revenue-positive for a cash-thin district. Two conditions gate their support: (1) it must be strictly voluntary and must NOT erode or set precedent against their present perfected / senior priority (they will resist any structure that looks like permanent forfeiture of the right), and (2) compensation must reflect the high cost of idling permanent citrus, so they will want prices well above the $400/AF floor and multi-year certainty. A robust MRV consumptive-use market that pays per verified AF actually saved is attractive to them because senior high-duty water is exactly what such a market values most.

On solar+water. OPEN but not a natural first mover. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water offers two things Unit B lacks: capital and non-assessment revenue. Leasing marginal or fallowed Mesa acreage for solar (with the freed consumptive use monetized) could pencil well, and datacenter/energy money to underwrite canal lining and automation directly serves its efficiency track record. Frictions: the district is small and land is fragmented among individual landowners (Unit B does not own the farmland), so deals must be assembled parcel by parcel; and leadership will be wary of anything that permanently converts irrigated ag or is framed as giving up water. Best framed as 'keep your water right, get paid to save some, and get your infrastructure rebuilt.' Persuadable-to-favorable with the right structure.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL / LOW-PRIORITY, mildly supportive. Large-scale reuse and desalination that adds new supply to the lower basin reduces pressure on senior users and is therefore welcome in principle - it lets Yuma ag keep its water. But Unit B has no operational role, no coastline, and no capacity to co-invest, so it is a spectator. It would support desal/reuse politically as an 'augment supply instead of cutting us' argument, and it sits near the Yuma Desalting Plant precedent, but it will not lead, fund, or stake its future on these long-horizon projects. Indifference tinged with support.

A win for them. A win preserves their senior water right intact while turning water they can spare into cash and their aging 1920s-1930s delivery system into modern, low-loss infrastructure - all without permanent loss of irrigated ag or their priority standing. Concretely: multi-year, voluntary, verified conservation payments meaningfully above $400/AF; outside (hyperscaler/federal) capital that rebuilds canals, pipelines, and SCADA at little cost to their thin assessment base; new lease/energy revenue on marginal Mesa acreage; and explicit legal assurance that participation does not diminish their present perfected rights. In short: get paid, get modernized, keep the right.

Public record. The district has a history of participating in federally-supported water conservation and system modernization projects, indicating openness to conservation incentives.

Position. UpTerra is a privately held Sausalito, CA farm-performance technology startup (founded 2020, CEO Steve Birch) selling TerraFlow, a retrofit device that clamps onto existing irrigation lines and claims to 'structure' or 'enhance' water via vortexing plus proprietary 'bio-frequency imprinting' so groundwater 'behaves like rainwater.' Marketing claims include ~30% water reduction while maintaining yield, higher yields (e.g., +23% corn silage, +$70.90/acre cotton revenue), and 35M gallons saved for almond growers. Deployment is ~40,000 acres across ~300-350 farms in ~18 states, with concentrations in Texas (13,000+ acres) and Kansas (K-State trials); almond references imply some California Central Valley presence. CRITICAL EVIDENCE FLAG: the core mechanism ('structured water,' frequency/memory imprinting, biomimicry frequencies) is textbook pseudoscience with no peer-reviewed support and a long record of being debunked (chem1.com, Grander water rulings); UpTerra has published no independent, controlled field data. On the Colorado River crisis itself, UpTerra takes NO public position. Its site, press releases, and the December 2025 seed round say nothing about the Colorado River, drought policy, water markets, system conservation programs, or interstate allocation. Its posture is purely commercial water-use-efficiency marketing, not policy advocacy. Longstanding stance: sell efficiency-at-the-farm as a private good; stay out of allocation politics.

On conservation. AMBIVALENT, leaning opportunistic-then-exposed. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is the single most consequential program for UpTerra. Upside: if farmers can monetize saved consumptive use, UpTerra will aggressively market TerraFlow as the cheapest path to generate sellable savings and try to position itself as an enabling technology / MRV partner. Expect enthusiastic rhetorical support and attempts to get listed as an approved conservation practice. Downside and likely blocker: a CREDIBLE market measures actual consumptive use (ET-based, satellite/flux, metered depletion), not applied water or vendor self-reports. Under real MRV, 'structured water' devices have historically failed to show reproducible depletion reductions. So a rigorous market would likely EXPOSE the lack of effect and exclude the product, while a loose, self-reported market would let UpTerra sell savings that may not be real. Net: they will lobby to participate but resist independent ET-based verification of their specific device.

On solar+water. LARGELY INDIFFERENT / MILDLY POSITIVE. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is orthogonal to UpTerra's hardware business; they neither generate power nor hold water rights. They would welcome it only insofar as new money flowing to ag water efficiency creates a buyer for TerraFlow (e.g., a datacenter-financed program that pays growers to cut use could subsidize device purchases). No ideological stake and no obvious opposition. They might try to attach TerraFlow to such a program as a 'funded efficiency measure,' but they are a peripheral, not central, actor here. Low salience.

On reuse/desal. INDIFFERENT to MILDLY WARY. Large-scale reuse/desalination is a supply-augmentation strategy that competes for the same public and philanthropic dollars UpTerra wants directed at farm-level efficiency, and it does nothing for UpTerra's product. They are unlikely to oppose it publicly (no constituency, no water rights), but it is not their lane and diverts attention from demand-side device sales. Neutral overall; slight resource-competition friction, not opposition.

A win for them. A win for UpTerra is a large, well-funded farm-water-efficiency demand signal in which TerraFlow is recognized as an approved conservation technology that growers can buy to generate sellable/creditable water savings, ideally with measurement standards loose enough (applied-water or self-reported rather than independently metered consumptive use) that their device qualifies without falsifiable ET verification. Secondary win: a validating third-party trial that finally gives their claims real evidence, plus access to program dollars (public, philanthropic, or hyperscaler) that subsidize device adoption at scale. The cleanest durable win is if independent verification actually confirms a depletion benefit, converting them from a marketing-claim vendor into a legitimately credited efficiency provider.

Public record. The company's entire business is selling technology that directly enables on-farm water conservation, claiming significant water savings for its customers.

Position. The UCRC is the interstate administrative agency created by the 1948 Upper Colorado River Basin Compact (and ratified by Congress), comprising one gubernatorial commissioner each from Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming plus a presidentially-appointed federal commissioner. Its statutory job is apportioning water among the four Upper Division states and ensuring the delivery obligation to the Lower Basin and Mexico under the 1922 Compact. Longstanding and 2026 public positions: (1) SUPPLY-DRIVEN / 'NATURAL FLOW' MANAGEMENT. The Upper Division States Alternative in Reclamation's post-2026 DEIS proposes that Lake Powell releases be set as a percentage of a three-year rolling average of natural flow at Lee Ferry, so use tracks actual hydrology rather than Lake Mead's demand or fixed release targets. Colorado and Upper Basin entities pressed for 'durable, supply-driven' management in the 2026 federal comment period. (2) THE UPPER BASIN IS NOT THE CAUSE OF THE DEFICIT and should not bear uncompensated mandatory cuts; the deficit is structural Lower Basin overuse plus evaporation/system losses. Wyoming's state engineer stated Upper Basin reservoirs 'will not rescue the basin from an extended crisis' and are 'only a finite tool, not a solution.' The Upper Basin argues its users already take involuntary shortages every dry year because they live on the live flow of the river. (3) VOLUNTARY, TEMPORARY, COMPENSATED CONSERVATION ONLY. Through the UCRC the four states ran the System Conservation Pilot Program (SCPP) in 2023 and a narrowed 2024 version, funded via the Inflation Reduction Act and operated with Reclamation, paying agricultural/municipal/industrial users to temporarily reduce consumptive use. The UCRC is explicit that SCPP is NOT Demand Management; a formal Demand Management program remains only a contemplated framework under the Drought Contingency Plan Demand Management Storage Agreement and has never been implemented. Their 5-Point Plan leads with re-authorizing SCPP and ties Upper Basin conservation to 'commensurate' Lower Basin action. (4) DROA emergency releases from Flaming Gorge and Blue Mesa (500 kaf in 2022; 624 kaf recovered; a 660 kaf-1 maf transfer from Flaming Gorge approved April 2026) are framed as finite emergency tools, not a standing bailout. (5) TRIBAL RIGHTS: solutions cannot depend on Tribes' undeveloped federal reserved water rights. Overall the UCRC is defensive of state sovereignty over Upper Basin water and wary of anything that becomes a permanent, quantified, enforceable Upper Basin obligation.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, but strictly on their terms. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market is close to what the UCRC already built with SCPP, so the concept is familiar and legitimate to them. Their hard conditions: participation must be voluntary, temporary, and compensated; conserved water must NOT create a precedent for a permanent quantified Upper Basin obligation or be counted against them in a Compact-call analysis; robust measurement and verification of actual consumptive-use reduction (they already prioritize IIJA measurement funding, and 'shepherding' saved water past downstream diverters is a known technical worry); and Lower Basin must take 'commensurate' action so the Upper Basin is not conserving to subsidize Lower Basin overuse. Rigorous MRV that produces defensible, legally-clean consumptive-use accounting is a genuine selling point to them. They will resist any market that federalizes control of Upper Basin water or lets a downstream buyer claim a call on it.

On solar+water. Interested but not their center of gravity, and cautious. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation aligns with two Upper Basin goals: new revenue/economic development in rural four-state economies, and a private (non-federal, non-appropriations) funding source for compensated conservation that reduces reliance on fragile IRA/IIJA money. Positives for them: new demand for arid, sunny land; jobs; a checkbook to pay SCPP-style participants without a federal budget fight. Concerns: (a) large new data-center LOAD in the Upper Basin could add consumptive water demand (direct cooling and thermoelectric) unless it is genuinely water-light, which would cut against conservation; they will want net water accounting, not gross; (b) they guard against any arrangement that quietly transfers control of Upper Basin water to an out-of-basin corporate buyer or creates a de facto permanent depletion; (c) it must not undercut CRSP hydropower economics or the political standing of existing power customers. Net: persuadable and potentially enthusiastic if the water math is clearly additive-conservation and the state engineers keep administrative control.

On reuse/desal. Broadly supportive in principle, low direct stake. The UCRC's consistent framing is that the Lower Basin (and Mexico/coastal California) must fix its own structural overuse; large-scale reuse and desalination in the Lower Basin or on the coast are exactly the kind of Lower-Basin supply augmentation the Upper Basin has long said is the Lower Basin's responsibility. They would welcome anything that reduces Lower Basin call pressure on Lake Mead and therefore on Powell releases. Caveats: they will resist federal cost-sharing or river-wide funding mechanisms that tax Upper Basin water users to pay for Lower Basin/coastal desal; they want augmentation treated as new supply for the party that builds it, not as a basin-wide entitlement that resets allocations. In-basin reuse within the four Upper states (municipal effluent reuse) they view favorably as it stretches existing consumptive-use apportionment.

A win for them. A win is: durable, private, non-appropriations funding for voluntary/temporary/compensated conservation that (a) keeps administrative control with the state engineers and the Compact, (b) generates rigorously verified consumptive-use savings that are legally protected from being scored against the Upper Basin in any Compact-call litigation, (c) is matched by 'commensurate' Lower Basin cuts and augmentation (reuse/desal downstream) so the Upper Basin is not subsidizing Lower Basin overuse, and (d) brings rural economic development (energy jobs, land revenue) to their four states without adding net consumptive water demand. In short: money and technology that let them do more voluntary conservation and economic development while preserving supply-driven operations and never conceding a permanent, quantified Upper Basin delivery obligation.

Public record. The UCRC is investigating a voluntary, temporary, and compensated Demand Management Program, but its stated purpose is to store conserved water in the Upper Basin to ensure Compact compliance, not explicitly to send it to Lake Mead.

Position. The Utah Division of Water Rights (DWRi), housed in the Department of Natural Resources and headed by the State Engineer (Teresa Wilhelmsen, P.E.), is Utah's water-rights administrator, not its Colorado River policy voice. It is important to separate three Utah entities: DWRi (this stakeholder) administers, adjudicates, measures, and permits water rights; the Division of Water Resources plans/develops projects (e.g., Lake Powell Pipeline); and the Colorado River Authority of Utah (CRAU) sets interstate policy and negotiates the 2026 guidelines. DWRi's public 'positions' are institutional and legal, not advocacy: (1) It is the statutory gatekeeper of beneficial use and anti-speculation. Its highest-profile Colorado River act was Wilhelmsen's 2020 rejection of the Water Horse / Aaron Million proposal to divert 55,000 AF of the Green River to Colorado's Front Range, on the grounds that there was no Reclamation contract, no firm beneficial-use commitments, and the plan cut against Utah's interest in developing its own share and protecting endangered fish; the Utah Supreme Court upheld that denial in October 2025 (2025 UT 43). (2) It is the legal mechanism that makes any Upper Basin conservation market real: SB 144 (2023) amended Utah Code 73-3-30(4) to empower the State Engineer to authorize and distribute conserved water and to grant change applications that give conserved water a new beneficial use ('delivery of water to a reservoir') so participants are protected from forfeiture/abandonment. DWRi's approval of change applications (deadline March 1, 2026 for the current pilot cohort) is the on/off switch for Utah's Demand Management / System Conservation pilots. (3) It is the measurement and accounting authority: DWRi runs Utah's metering, telemetry, and distribution accounting, and Utah officials have publicly conceded Utah historically could not measure water accurately enough to prove savings 'saved to the system' , a gap DWRi is actively closing. Underlying all this is Utah's baseline stance (shared with CRAU/Commissioner Shawcroft) that the Upper Basin uses less than its entitlement, has a right to develop its ~23% Upper Basin share, and that the crisis is driven by 'hydrology,' with conservation done voluntarily and compensated, never as an imposed Upper Basin cut.

On conservation. Most favorable of the three, and the one DWRi is already operationally building. Utah's Demand Management Pilot Program and System Conservation Pilot Program run through DWRi's SB 144 / 73-3-30(4) authority: the State Engineer authorizes conserved water, approves the change applications (deadline March 1, 2026 for the 2025 pilot cohort to continue), and grants the anti-abandonment beneficial-use ('delivery of water to a reservoir'). A verified consumptive-use market is therefore squarely in DWRi's wheelhouse , provided verification is credible. DWRi's conditions will be exacting and technical: savings must be measured as consumptive-use (depletion) reductions, not just diversion changes; they must be provably 'saved to the system' and accountable to Lake Powell storage; and they must be non-speculative with firm, contracted use (the Water Horse lesson). It will resist anything that lets paper water masquerade as wet water or that creates forfeiture traps for participants. Pilots compensated at $390/AF (fallowing) and $150/AF (storage forbearance) show the model already exists; DWRi's ask is rigor and measurement, and funding to build it.

On solar+water. Largely neutral-to-supportive but outside DWRi's lane, so it reacts narrowly. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water does not touch DWRi's core functions unless the 'funds water' piece flows into conservation transactions or new appropriations , at which point DWRi re-enters as the permitting, beneficial-use, and measurement authority. Two things will draw its scrutiny: (1) any new data-center water demand becomes a new appropriation or change application DWRi must adjudicate for beneficial use and availability (Utah is arid and DWRi guards unappropriated water carefully); and (2) if hyperscaler money capitalizes conservation or measurement infrastructure, DWRi welcomes funding that closes its metering/accounting gap. It will not evaluate the energy economics ($/MWh, firming, PPAs) , that is not its mandate. Expect DWRi to be a technical reviewer that says 'the water side must clear appropriation, beneficial-use, and measurement rules,' not a champion or opponent of the energy structure itself. Mark the energy-economics dimension as low-relevance to this specific agency.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously supportive in principle, with DWRi's role concentrated on rights, beneficial use, and accounting rather than on financing or engineering. Large-scale reuse and desalination that create genuinely new supply are consistent with Utah's develop-your-share posture and reduce pressure to fight over the existing river, which DWRi's parent policy apparatus favors. DWRi's specific concerns: reuse of already-appropriated water raises classic Utah return-flow and change-application questions (downstream users may hold rights to return flows, so reuse can require change applications DWRi must adjudicate); new-source desal (e.g., brackish groundwater or imported supply) must clear appropriation and beneficial-use review; and any project claiming to add water to the Colorado River system must be measurable and accountable for interstate credit. DWRi will be hard-nosed that the water is real, legally sourced, and correctly accounted, and neutral on cost and energy intensity, which fall to Water Resources, CRAU, and project sponsors. Reuse inside a service area with clean rights is lower-friction for DWRi than a mega-project with contested return-flow or interstate-accounting implications.

A win for them. A win for DWRi is a conservation or augmentation mechanism that is legally clean, accurately measurable, non-speculative, and administrable without eroding Utah's water-rights system or its claim to develop its full Upper Basin share. Concretely: a verified consumptive-use market whose savings DWRi can meter and defend as real 'wet' water saved to the system; change-application and beneficial-use structures that protect participants from forfeiture (the SB 144 promise) while withstanding legal challenge; funding that upgrades Utah's measurement/telemetry/accounting backbone (the capability gap it has publicly flagged); and firm, contracted beneficial use rather than paper water. The deepest win is credibility: a system where Utah can prove to the other basin states and Reclamation exactly how much it conserved, strengthening the Upper Basin's negotiating hand that conservation is voluntary, compensated, and verifiable , not a mandated cut.

Public record. The office is running a Demand Management Pilot Program to test paying agricultural users to conserve water and has been involved in delays in its implementation.

Position. The Northern Ute Tribe holds one of the largest paper water rights in the Upper Basin but has been unable to develop most of it, and its central grievance is that the federal government has broken its promises. Under the 2016 Ute Indian Water Compact (ratified by Utah), the Tribe is apportioned 248,943 acre-feet/year of depletive use from all sources (diversion requirement ~471,035 AFY), including a 10,000 AFY Green River M&I depletion right with an 1861 priority date. Much of this is undeveloped 'paper water' because the storage and delivery infrastructure was never built. The Tribe repeatedly points to the 1965 Deferral Agreement, under which it deferred its water development so downstream Utah projects could proceed, in exchange for federal construction of the Upalco and Uintah storage units 'by January 1, 2005' plus other units. Those units were never built, and the Uintah Indian Irrigation Project (a federal trust project run by BIA) suffers chronic underfunding and decades of deferred maintenance with no storage to regulate natural flows. In comments on Colorado River near-term/post-2026 operations, the Tribe accused Interior of 'failing tribes legally, practically, and morally' and objected to being kept 'invisible to the Federal Government' while Reclamation decides 'who will get to use the diminishing water supply.' Longstanding position: tribal reserved rights are senior and must be quantified, funded, and made wet (not just paper) before basin conservation burdens are allocated; tribes must have a real seat at the post-2026 negotiating table, not just consultation. The Tribe has litigated aggressively (2018 D.C. federal suit and a Court of Federal Claims breach-of-trust case; in 2024 the Federal Circuit affirmed dismissal of the breach-of-trust claims, and the Tribe has pursued appeals), signaling it will use courts, not just negotiation, to force performance.

On conservation. Cautiously interested but wary (persuadable). A verified consumptive-use conservation market pays for water actually used, and the Tribe uses only a fraction of its 248,943 AFY entitlement, so a naive market rewards existing users and offers the Tribe little unless its undeveloped senior rights are explicitly monetizable. The Tribe would likely support a market ONLY if (a) it is paid for its senior priority and the ability to develop, not just current depletions, (b) participation is voluntary, revocable, and does not cap or extinguish undeveloped rights, and (c) it retains control of proceeds. It will strongly oppose any design that lets downstream/non-tribal users buy security on the back of tribes whose rights were never made wet. Framed as 'get paid for water you were promised but could never use, without giving up the right to build,' it becomes an ally-making tool; framed as 'sell your allocation,' it is a trust-breach flashpoint.

On solar+water. Most promising path and likely the strongest positive reaction (persuadable leaning ally if structured right). A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water directly addresses two tribal priorities at once: it diversifies revenue away from >90% oil-and-gas dependence and brings outside capital to the water infrastructure the federal government never built. The Tribe controls ~1.3M acres of trust land and sizable energy assets and has existing energy enterprises (Ute Energy, Ute Tribal Enterprises), so it is set up to host generation and capture lease/royalty/equity revenue. Keys to a yes: tribal ownership or equity (not just a land lease), local jobs, and an explicit, ring-fenced tranche funding on-reservation storage/UIIP rehab and M&I supply. Risk: any water 'funding' that is really a mechanism to move tribal water off-reservation to data centers will be rejected as another extraction of promised-but-undelivered water.

On reuse/desal. Low direct relevance and modest interest (unknown-to-neutral). Large-scale reuse and desalination are downstream/Lower-Basin-flavored supply augmentation; the Tribe sits in the Upper Basin headwaters of the Green River with no coastal or major reuse nexus, so these do little for its core need (on-reservation storage and delivery). The Tribe would view basin-scale augmentation favorably ONLY to the extent it relieves pressure on the shared system and is explicitly paired with making tribal rights wet, and it would be skeptical of any augmentation narrative used to justify continued non-performance on its 1965/settlement infrastructure promises ('we found new water, so we still don't owe you the storage'). Expect neutral-to-supportive in principle, indifferent in practice unless tribal-benefit strings are attached.

A win for them. A win is turning paper water into wet water and cash the Tribe controls: federally or privately funded on-reservation storage and delivery (the long-promised Upalco/Uintah-type units and UIIP rehabilitation), a firm municipal/industrial supply for reservation communities, protection (not extinguishment) of their senior undeveloped rights, an enforceable seat in post-2026 governance, and a durable new revenue stream that reduces reliance on volatile oil-and-gas royalties. Any conservation or funding it participates in must leave it better developed and better funded than before, and must be structured so it never forecloses future development of its full compact allocation.

Public record. The Tribe is actively pursuing its water rights and has stated a desire for compensation for its undeveloped water, while also developing its own solar energy projects.

Position. Tribal Nation (Towaoc, CO; White Mesa, UT; reservation extends into NM). Holds quantified, settled Colorado River basin water rights under the 1986/1988 Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights Final Settlement (amended 2000): ~25,100 acre-feet/yr from McPhee Reservoir (Dolores Project), plus an entitlement of ~16,000 acre-feet held in Lake Nighthorse (Animas-La Plata Project), and rights to 27,000+ acre-feet from rivers near/through the reservation. Longstanding grievance: in the settlement the tribe SUBORDINATED senior water rights (an 1868/Mancos senior right) in exchange for junior 1940s-priority project water plus infrastructure funding. As drought deepened, that junior priority produced catastrophic delivery cuts (as little as 8-14% of full allocation in 2026; ~10% in prior drought years). The tribe cannot physically access its Lake Nighthorse water (Towaoc is ~60 miles from the reservoir with no delivery infrastructure). Colorado water rights are adjudicated; NM and UT rights remain UNRESOLVED (settlement deadline pressure around 2026). Core recent public position, voiced by General Counsel Peter Ortego and Chairman Manuel Heart and echoed by tribal members (e.g., Donald Whyte at 2026 conferences): FAIRNESS/JUSTICE. Downstream Lower Basin users get paid federal money to forgo using water that is effectively unused tribal water flowing past the reservation, yet the tribe is NOT compensated for its own settled-but-unused water. The tribe sought Inflation Reduction Act 'Bucket 2' conservation funding for a compensated forbearance program; Reclamation ruled it ineligible (Sept 2024) because non-use of settled rights is not a 'new, verifiable contribution,' and the tribe then asked Interior for a standalone tribal forbearance funding program. Dec 2024: finalized a Lake Nighthorse repayment contract with Reclamation that removes prohibitive O&M charges and confirms drought-response/forbearance compensation does NOT count as disqualifying 'first use' -- a deliberate move to make future paid conservation participation possible. Also an active clean-energy developer: tribally owned 1-MW Towaoc community solar (2017, 3,648 panels), plus DOE-funded White Mesa and Towaoc housing solar; explicit vision of reducing fossil-fuel dependence and building energy self-determination/sovereignty.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE, provided the market pays tribes for forbearance of SETTLED rights on equal terms with non-tribal users. This is essentially the exact remedy the tribe has publicly demanded for years ('a matter of fairness and justice' -- Peter Ortego). A verified consumptive-use conservation market that compensates the tribe for water it is already involuntarily not using would convert a pure loss (fallowed fields, layoffs) into revenue and reward. Two hard conditions/risks: (1) the verification/additionality rule must NOT disqualify tribal non-use the way Reclamation's Bucket 2 'new, verifiable contribution' test did in 2024 -- if the market treats forced tribal fallowing as non-additional, the tribe will see it as the same injustice repackaged and oppose it. (2) The tribe will insist forbearance payments not be construed as forfeiture, non-use abandonment, or a cap on future development of its rights (the Dec 2024 contract's 'not first use' language shows how carefully they guard this). Design it right and they are a flagship ally; design it carelessly and it reads as another mechanism that pays everyone downstream but not them.

On solar+water. FAVORABLE and among the most receptive stakeholders to this model, with sovereignty guardrails. The tribe is already a committed solar developer explicitly pursuing energy self-determination and revenue diversification away from fossil fuels, and it holds large, sunny, low-population land near Four Corners transmission and load. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure hits two of its top needs at once: new non-agricultural revenue/jobs to offset farm losses, and capital for the delivery infrastructure (e.g., moving Lake Nighthorse water, on-reservation systems) it cannot self-finance. Conditions that determine yes/no: tribal ownership or meaningful equity and control (not a lease that extracts value), consultation and consent on siting/cultural resources, local hiring, and assurance the project does not consume scarce water for cooling in a way that competes with tribal supply. If water funding is tied to the tribe's own priorities and the energy deal respects sovereignty, expect active partnership; a pure land-lease/off-take model with a distant data center and no tribal upside would draw skepticism.

On reuse/desal. NEUTRAL-TO-LUKEWARM; largely off-thesis for this tribe. Reuse and desalination are Lower Basin / coastal supply-augmentation strategies; the Ute Mountain Ute problem is Upper Basin priority, delivery infrastructure, and compensation, not raw new supply near their land. They are unlikely to oppose basin-scale reuse/desal in principle -- anything that relieves Lower Basin demand pressure and reduces calls on the system indirectly helps Upper Basin juniors -- but they will be wary if such projects (a) are used to justify continued Lower Basin overuse and delay the compensation/settlement fixes they need, (b) draw federal dollars away from tribal infrastructure and forbearance funding, or (c) proceed without tribal consultation. Watch for equity framing: the tribe will ask why billions flow to desal while tribes still can't access or get paid for settled rights. Net: low salience, conditional acceptance, not a priority they will champion.

A win for them. A durable win: (1) Cash for conservation -- a verified market or federal program that PAYS the tribe for forbearing settled-but-unused water on equal footing with Lower Basin users, turning forced fallowing into revenue, without any implication of forfeiture or a cap on future development. (2) Delivery infrastructure funded -- capital to finally move their ~16,000 AF in Lake Nighthorse and other project water to the reservation and to the Farm & Ranch Enterprise, restoring jobs and stabilizing the Bow and Arrow business. (3) Resolution of unresolved NM and UT water rights on favorable terms. (4) Diversified, tribally owned energy revenue (solar+storage, ideally hyperscaler-financed) that hedges agricultural water risk and advances energy sovereignty. (5) A permanent seat and voice in post-2026 Colorado River governance so tribal water is never again the water everyone else gets paid to use for free. The ideal single deal bundles guaranteed forbearance compensation + water-delivery capital + a tribally owned energy project on their land.

Public record. The Tribe is actively seeking compensation for forbearing development of its water rights to conserve water in the Colorado River system and is developing large-scale solar projects on its lands.

Position. Ute Water is the largest domestic (municipal) water provider between Denver and Salt Lake City, serving ~85,000-90,000 people across Grand Junction, Fruita and Palisade in Colorado's Grand Valley (established 1956 under Colorado's Water Conservancy Act). Its longstanding public posture is that of a supply-security-first municipal utility, not a Compact-politics advocate. For 65 years it relied almost entirely on high-elevation Grand Mesa reservoir runoff (~11,000 ft) and deliberately avoided the Colorado River mainstem. That changed in June 2021 when drought forced it to begin blending ~7 cfs (~14 acre-feet/day) of Colorado River water into its system for the first time. Officials frame the crisis in terms of 'aridification' rather than one-off drought: external affairs manager Andrea Lopez said 'over time it just gets worse and worse.' In May 2026 the board voted to impose drought/emergency rates for the first time since 1977, citing sub-50% snowpack, stream flows ~40% of normal, depleted basin storage, and a shrunken Historic Users Pool (HUP) for Grand Valley irrigators. Their conservation stance is pragmatic and voluntary-first (voluntary conservation requests plus a drought pumping surcharge), reflecting a utility that manages demand through pricing and messaging rather than mandates or basin-scale policy advocacy. On the crisis itself they emphasize their own junior-rights vulnerability on the river and uncertainty over how long they can keep drawing before senior users curtail them.

On conservation. Likely cautiously supportive to neutral. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is designed around and mostly monetized by AGRICULTURAL water rights (the senior Grand Valley irrigation and HUP rights), not municipal domestic use. Ute Water benefits indirectly: agricultural conservation/fallowing that frees senior-priority water could relieve the calls that curtail Ute's junior river draws and could firm up basin storage. But as a municipal buyer of last resort, Ute would worry that a market prices water it may itself need to buy, and that monetizing senior ag rights could raise the cost or reduce the availability of any future supplemental supply. Expect it to support rigorous verification and additionality (it will not want to pay for paper water) and to want assurance the market does not disadvantage M&I users or municipal growth. Persuadable-positive if framed as buying down curtailment risk to its junior rights.

On solar+water. Likely interested but skeptical, and highly conditional. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could be attractive: Ute's constraints are treatment cost, redundancy, and securing future supply, all capital-hungry line items it currently funds from ratepayers. Outside capital that hardens the system (new storage, treatment redundancy, reuse) without a rate increase would land well with a full-cost-pricing utility. But western Colorado is wary of large data-center water/energy demand competing for the same scarce basin supply, so Ute would scrutinize whether the datacenter itself becomes a new consumptive load in or near its service territory. Reaction hinges entirely on structure: net water-positive and it funds THEIR infrastructure = warm; net new load on the Colorado system = cold. Persuadable, needs specifics.

On reuse/desal. Reuse: likely genuine interest. As a growth-constrained M&I provider facing a hard supply ceiling and rising treatment costs, potable/non-potable reuse is one of the few tools that adds firm, drought-proof supply within its own control rather than depending on junior river rights. Expect openness contingent on cost, regulatory path (Colorado reuse rules, return-flow obligations) and public acceptance. Desalination: largely not applicable at their inland Grand Valley location (no seawater; brackish groundwater desal would be niche and energy-intensive). Net: reuse is a plausible pillar of their long-term supply plan; large-scale desal is mostly irrelevant to them except as a basin-wide supply-augmentation concept that could reduce pressure on the river system overall.

A win for them. A win is firm, drought-proof supply for their 85,000-90,000 customers that does not depend on legally fragile junior Colorado River rights, achieved without forcing large ratepayer increases and without capping Grand Valley growth (which drives their tap-fee revenue). Concretely: new or hardened storage/treatment redundancy, a reuse supply stream they control, and/or reduced curtailment risk on their river draws, ideally funded partly by outside capital (conservation-market payments or hyperscaler infrastructure dollars) rather than entirely by their own ratepayers. Politically, a win also means being seen by their Grand Valley customers as having secured the water future while keeping bills manageable.

Public record. The District has financially supported efforts to keep senior water rights in the Colorado River for environmental flows, but its primary public focus is on securing reliable drinking water for its customers, which has included pumping from the Colorado River during drought.

Position. VVWD is a small municipal water district (est. 1993) serving ~22,000-23,000 residents of Mesquite and Bunkerville in the northeast corner of Clark County, NV, governed by a five-member elected board. Its defining public position is that it is NOT a Colorado River allocation holder: its supply comes entirely from groundwater in Basin 222 (Lower Virgin River basin) via nine deep wells (640-2,020 ft). On that basis its FAQ explicitly distances the district from SNWA/Colorado River drought mandates, states the aquifer 'has maintained constant levels over the past several decades,' claims a 'plentiful water supply,' and has 'no mandatory restrictions' -- preferring voluntary conservation via rate structure and education over 'draconian mandates,' while warning mandatory restrictions could come later if voluntary efforts fall short (source: vvwdnv.com/faqs). Longstanding posture is growth-and-supply-acquisition oriented: the district filed 45 water-rights applications seeking ~225,000 acre-feet in the Virgin River basin to underwrite Mesquite's growth, but a Jan 2010 Nevada Supreme Court ruling cost it priority and Lincoln County/Vidler Water beat it into the queue by ~36 hours (Las Vegas Review-Journal). More recently it has commissioned a groundwater flow model to justify additional future rights (management claims population could 'potentially be doubled') and touts a FY2025 clean audit. CAVEAT / contested: an independent local watchdog (Mesquite Water Alliance) argues the district pumps far above the basin's sustainable perennial yield (~8,684 AFY pumped in 2020 vs a cited ~3,600 AFY perennial yield) and projects Basin 222 hits a 'water wall' between ~2030-2035, with the district's own revised conservation plan reportedly ending Mesquite growth by 2035 -- so the 'plentiful/stable' framing is disputed and likely overstated.

On conservation. Likely cautiously receptive but with caveats -- lean persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays for measured reductions fits VVWD's stated preference for voluntary, incentive/rate-driven conservation over mandates, and could give it a revenue-neutral or revenue-positive way to defer the Basin 222 'water wall' and stretch existing rights. The catch: VVWD's supply is groundwater, not a Colorado River paper allocation, so it must be convinced a market can credit/monetize groundwater or Virgin River consumptive savings (e.g., leaving Virgin River flow to reach Lake Mead, analogous to SNWA's ICS mechanism). If the market only trades Colorado River mainstem/Lake Mead allocation, VVWD will see itself as out of scope. Frame it as monetizing verified in-basin savings and it becomes attractive.

On solar+water. Mixed-to-wary, and the most politically loaded of the three. VVWD sits next to a proposed gas+solar generation project (Lincoln County/Vidler) that is a direct competitor for the same Virgin River basin water it needs for growth, so large energy buildouts in its basin read first as a water-demand threat, not a benefit. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage package that ALSO funds water infrastructure (new supply, recharge, efficiency, or debt relief on its ~$27.4M liabilities) could flip that calculus -- it would offset the district's core constraints (capital and rate pressure) without adding consumptive water load. Reaction hinges entirely on the water-use footprint of the datacenter/energy load: if the compute is water-cooled and pulls from Basin 222, opposition; if it is dry-cooled/off-basin and the deal is net-positive on local water and capital, cautious interest.

On reuse/desal. Interested in reuse, cool on desalination for its own account. Mesquite has no seawater and no obvious brackish desal source at scale, so desal is only relevant to VVWD as a regional supply-swap concept (someone else desalinates, VVWD gains firmed supply or credits) rather than something it would build. Water reuse/recycling is far more actionable and directly addresses its perennial-yield overdraft and 2030-2035 wall by reducing net groundwater demand; expect genuine interest if capital is provided, since its constraint is money and rights, not willingness. Overall: engage on reuse first, treat desal as a longer-horizon regional-swap conversation.

A win for them. A win for VVWD is more firm, sustainable water for Mesquite/Bunkerville plus outside capital -- without a rate revolt and without conceding it is subject to Colorado River cutbacks. Concretely: (a) new or credited supply (reuse, recharge, monetized Virgin River savings, or a swap) that pushes the Basin 222 'water wall' well past 2035 and lets Mesquite keep growing; (b) third-party capital that funds water infrastructure and eases its ~$27.4M debt / rate pressure; (c) resolving or leapfrogging its lost water-rights priority against Lincoln County/Vidler; (d) doing all of this while preserving local control and voluntary-conservation framing. Any hyperscaler/energy or market deal that delivers net-positive local water plus capital, with a water-use footprint that does not draw down Basin 222, is a clear win they can sell to both the board and skeptical ratepayers.

Public record. As a small water district in a rapidly growing area of Nevada, its public record does not show a formal position on these broader basin infrastructure and conservation payment programs.

Position. WAVR is a Las Vegas atmospheric water harvesting (AWH) startup spun out of UNLV in May 2024 (founders H. Jeremy Cho, UNLV mechanical engineering professor, and CEO Rich Sloan). Its public framing on the Colorado River crisis is explicit and consistent: Las Vegas depends on the river for ~90% of its supply and flows could fall up to 30% by mid-century, so new water sources are needed. Its patent-pending frog-skin-inspired hydrogel membrane / liquid-desiccant system claims ~10,000 gal/day per unit and operation at humidity as low as 10%, marketed as 20x yield over conventional AWG. Crucially, the company does NOT position itself as a river replacement. CEO/co-founder framing (Cho): 'We're not trying to replace where all of our water comes from... We just want to draw a sustainable amount and make up the balance with atmospheric water harvesting,' and 'Clark County uses hundreds of millions of gallons of water every single day. You can find that amount of water in the first 30 feet of ambient air above the county.' It runs a UNLV pilot testing whether AWH can substitute Colorado River Basin water for campus irrigation. No public lobbying record, no stance on interstate allocation/DCP/post-2026 guidelines, and no stated position on conservation markets, hyperscaler solar deals, or desalination. It is a technology supplier, not an allocation-politics actor.

On conservation. Mildly favorable / neutral. A verified consumptive-use conservation market doesn't threaten WAVR and could help: it monetizes the scarcity narrative WAVR sells against, and if buyers must source or offset consumptive use, on-site AWH is a way to add 'new water' that reduces a facility's river draw (especially for data centers and beverage/industrial users who are its target customers). WAVR would likely welcome any framework where AWH-produced water counts toward compliance, offsets, or reduces a buyer's assessed consumptive use. Risk: if conservation credits are cheap and abundant, they undercut the willingness-to-pay for premium AWH water. Net: supportive as long as AWH is recognized as additive supply, indifferent to the market's allocation mechanics.

On solar+water. Most strategically important scenario for WAVR, and net positive with a caveat. Hyperscaler-funded solar+storage that also funds water aligns tightly with WAVR's #1 named market (data centers) and solves its biggest technical weakness: AWH is energy-intensive (desiccant regeneration), so cheap co-located renewable power dramatically improves its unit economics and carbon story. A hyperscaler willing to fund water infrastructure is a near-ideal customer/partner: it could co-fund AWH deployments to make data centers water-positive or reduce river dependence. Caveat: if the hyperscaler water funding instead flows to large centralized reuse/desal or conservation buyouts, WAVR competes for those dollars. Likely reaction: actively pursue as a partnership/BD target rather than oppose.

On reuse/desal. Ambivalent, leaning competitive. Large-scale reuse and desalination are the incumbent 'new water' answers WAVR's decentralized AWH pitch competes against on cost-per-gallon at scale. Las Vegas/SNWA already lead nationally on reuse (indirect potable reuse returns most indoor water to Lake Mead for return-flow credits), and desal (e.g., ocean-desal-for-Colorado-River-swap concepts) is the marquee big-infrastructure option. At municipal scale WAVR cannot compete on volume or cost with reuse/desal, so heavy public investment there could crowd out AWH mind-share and capital. However, WAVR would argue AWH serves the distributed / off-grid / point-of-use niche (remote sites, irrigation, arid low-humidity locations) that reuse and desal don't reach, and that it needs no brine disposal or river conveyance. Reaction: doesn't oppose publicly, positions AWH as complementary for edge cases, but treats mega reuse/desal as competition for the same scarcity dollars.

A win for them. A win is commercial validation and pull-through demand: paid pilots that convert to contracts (a data center, beverage/industrial, or municipal irrigation customer), closing the remaining ~$3M of the round, and a policy/procurement environment where AWH-produced water is formally recognized as additive supply that offsets a buyer's Colorado River consumptive use. The single biggest win is a hyperscaler or large industrial partner co-funding solar+storage-powered AWH so their water is cheap, low-carbon, and counted toward water-resilience or conservation obligations. Secondary win: being cited by public/utility actors as part of Nevada's supply-diversification portfolio, which de-risks fundraising and customer acquisition.

Public record. The company's entire business is creating a new, sustainable water supply via atmospheric water harvesting, a key clean infrastructure technology, to reduce demand on conventional sources.

Position. The Walton Family Foundation (WFF, endowed by Walmart's founding family) is the single largest private philanthropic force on the Colorado River, having given roughly $200M+ to river-focused nonprofits from 2011-2021 and roughly $25-35M/year to ~60+ Colorado River organizations (EDF, The Nature Conservancy, Western Resource Advocates, American Rivers, Trout Unlimited, Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership). LONGSTANDING POSITION: a strong, decade-plus advocate of market-based, voluntary, compensated water solutions. Its signature bet was 'demand management' / 'system conservation' - paying farmers and ranchers to temporarily fallow or reduce consumptive use and leave water in the river (co-funded the ~$8M, ~50,000 acre-foot Upper Basin System Conservation Pilot; the 2017 Grand Valley Conserved Consumptive Use Pilot fallowed 1,250 acres and returned ~3,200 AF to habitat). It explicitly favors 'flexible, market-based solutions' and leasing arrangements where farmers lease water without selling their rights. RECENT EVOLUTION (2022-2025): WFF has publicly 'pivoted away from water markets' as the headline frame toward watershed health, natural infrastructure, forest/floodplain restoration, beaver-dam analogs, reduced-till agriculture, and 'treating the needs of the river as equal to our own.' Its stated view is that cutting diversions is 'not nearly enough' and that supply/ecosystem resilience plus long-term funding are required. It frames corporate and state co-investment as essential ('philanthropy, along with corporations and state governments'). CRITICISM: environmental critics and former Reclamation chief Dan Beard argue WFF's concentrated funding captures the NGO ecosystem and drowns out non-market approaches; it has also funded Colorado River journalism (Aspen Journalism, KUNC, Politico), raising conflict-of-interest concerns.

On conservation. STRONGLY SUPPORTIVE - this is the closest thing to WFF's home turf. A verified, additive, measured consumptive-use conservation market operationalizes exactly what WFF pioneered and funded (System Conservation Pilot, Grand Valley CCU pilot, demand management to prop up Lake Powell). The key words 'verified' and 'consumptive-use' directly answer the technical objections (double-counting, return-flow accounting, non-additionality) that dogged earlier pilots, so a rigorous MRV-backed market is an upgrade of their own thesis. Expect enthusiastic engagement, likely willingness to fund verification infrastructure, pilots, and farmer-facing programs, and to mobilize grantees behind it. The one caution: WFF has been publicly distancing itself from the 'water market' label and stressing it does not want speculation or permanent ag dry-up, so framing matters - present it as voluntary, temporary, farmer-protective, and ecosystem-directed, not as a commodity-trading or Wall-Street water play (a framing critics have used against them, e.g. KUER's 'Agriculture and Wall Street profits' coverage).

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY PERSUADABLE, with conditions. WFF explicitly courts corporate co-investment ('companies that want to continue to work in the region' must back nature-based solutions) and has argued corporations have a critical role in funding basin resilience, so a hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation fits its 'corporate + philanthropy + state' funding model well. It would likely welcome new non-taxpayer capital for verified water outcomes. BUT WFF is acutely sensitive to the optics of large private/corporate actors gaining influence over the river (the same critique aimed at itself), so it will scrutinize whether the water funding produces real, additional, verified, community- and ecosystem-benefiting outcomes rather than greenwashing a datacenter's own consumptive footprint. Its enthusiasm scales with (a) transparency and third-party verification of the water benefit, (b) tribal and rural-community inclusion, and (c) assurance the deal does not entrench a private claim on public water. Frame the water funding as flowing into the same verified-conservation and watershed-health channels it already backs.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / LUKEWARM, tilting skeptical on desalination and warmer on reuse. WFF's public materials conspicuously omit desalination and large supply-augmentation from their endorsed strategies, and its core thesis is demand reduction + ecosystem resilience, not building new supply. It has argued that 'saving the river' is about more than the water taken from it but frames the 'more' as watershed/nature-based work, not engineered supply. Large-scale desalination (energy-intensive, capital-heavy, brine/coastal impacts, often positioned as a reason to avoid cutting diversions) cuts against WFF's 'live within the river's means' worldview and could be seen as a moral-hazard excuse to keep over-allocating. Water reuse/recycling is more palatable - it reduces fresh diversions and aligns with efficiency - and WFF would likely tolerate or modestly support it as a complement, not a substitute, for conservation. Overall: not an active champion of reuse/desal, will resist framing that treats new supply as an alternative to demand management, but will not necessarily oppose reuse if it is additive and paired with real conservation.

A win for them. A win for WFF is a durable, voluntary, verified conservation-plus-resilience solution that (1) validates their two-decade thesis that compensated, market-informed, nature-aligned approaches - not just top-down cuts - can stabilize the river; (2) leverages new private/corporate and state capital alongside their philanthropy so the burden does not fall on their endowment alone; (3) delivers measurable additional water to the river and its ecosystems with credible MRV; (4) protects farming communities and tribal nations rather than triggering permanent ag dry-up or speculation; and (5) lets them claim catalytic leadership and demonstrable outcomes while deflecting the 'capturing the river' narrative. In short: they win when their money is the catalyst that unlocks larger verified, community-safe, ecosystem-positive water outcomes funded substantially by others.

Public record. The foundation is a major philanthropic force on the river, explicitly funding programs that pay agricultural users for conservation and supporting market-based solutions to leave more water in the system.

Position. Longstanding (2016 Blueprint): six priority strategies for philanthropy in the West, explicitly including 'shape healthy water markets' (water banks, water trusts, flexible/voluntary transfers), 'develop new funding sources,' 'improve water governance,' 'drive decisions with data,' 'strengthen communications and build political will,' and 'accelerate innovation.' The Blueprint framed western water scarcity and unreliability as urgent and drew on ~140 experts/stakeholders. Colorado River Basin named a top-three priority geography. On agriculture, WFI framed farm water efficiency and voluntary ag-to-other transfers as a major lever (agriculture is ~70-80% of basin use), not as farmer opposition. Evolution / current posture (via member foundations and Water Table): the center of gravity has shifted. The dominant member, Walton Family Foundation, publicly pivoted AWAY from pure water-markets framing toward reducing total depletions, watershed/nature-based solutions (e.g. wetland and beaver-dam restoration), forest health, sustainable fisheries, tribal co-governance, and treating the river's own environmental needs as 'equal to our own.' Walton has separately funded and promoted 'demand management' (paying farmers to temporarily fallow/deficit-irrigate to add water to Lake Powell). Water Table's active work includes climate-smart agriculture learning groups, tribal-partnership funding, and basin collaborations. Net: WFI-world supports voluntary, compensated, market-adjacent conservation AND ecosystem/equity outcomes, and is wary of framings that read as commodification or as enabling speculative water grabs.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE, with conditions. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is squarely within WFI's original 'shape healthy water markets' + 'drive decisions with data' priorities, and aligns with Walton-funded demand-management work (paying farmers to reduce depletions). The 'verified consumptive-use' (as opposed to paper/diversion) accounting is a strong plus for this crowd because their explicit concern has been rigorous measurement and avoiding paper-water gaming (cf. daily-journal 'paper water markets' critique). Caveats that determine warmth vs. coolness: (1) verification must be real/remote-sensing-grade, not self-reported; (2) it must protect rural communities and avoid buy-and-dry / speculative concentration of rights (their reputational Achilles heel); (3) tribal water rights and environmental flows must be included, not externalized. Frame it as verified, voluntary, compensated depletion reduction with community and ecosystem guardrails and WFI-network funders are natural capital/credibility partners, not blockers.

On solar+water. Likely NEUTRAL-to-CAUTIOUSLY-INTERESTED, low prior engagement. WFI/Water Table's mandate is water, not energy siting; a hyperscaler-financed solar+storage buildout that ALSO funds water is off their core map but hits their 'develop new funding sources' and 'accelerate innovation' priorities. They would welcome new non-federal capital into basin water conservation (they have explicitly called for augmenting state/federal funding). Skepticism vectors: (1) additionality and greenwashing scrutiny (does the water funding actually reduce depletions or just offset a data center's own new demand?); (2) equity/host-community terms; (3) whether corporate money steers governance in ways that echo the 'capture' critique already leveled at Walton. This is a persuadable, evidence-driven audience: a transparent, independently verified water-benefit accounting and a governance structure that keeps public/tribal actors in control would move them from neutral to endorsing. Mark engagement history here as effectively unknown/thin.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / SELECTIVE. Reuse and recycling fit comfortably: they are demand-reducing, less politically radioactive, and consistent with the innovation/efficiency priorities and with member funders' urban-water work (Water Table's Urban Water Initiative). Expect support for potable reuse and stormwater capture. Large-scale desalination is the tougher sell for this network: it is energy- and capital-intensive, carries brine/ecological and coastal-siting concerns, and cuts against a nature-based, demand-reduction ethos that Walton and allies have moved toward. WFI-world is unlikely to fund desal directly and may fund analysis that questions its cost-effectiveness versus conservation and reuse, but is not a hard ideological opponent if desal is shown to be least-cost and least-harm for a specific supply gap. Net: lean in on reuse; treat desal as an area where they want rigorous comparative analysis before endorsing.

A win for them. A win is a demonstrated, independently verified reduction in Colorado River consumptive use that (a) is voluntary and fairly compensated, (b) protects rural and tribal communities rather than concentrating water in speculators or distant corporate buyers, (c) delivers measurable environmental flow / ecosystem benefit alongside supply reliability, and (d) attracts durable new non-federal capital that augments (not replaces) public funding. They want to point to a scalable, evidence-backed model that moves basin water balance and burnishes philanthropy's role as a credible, equity-conscious catalyst rather than a commodifier. A verified conservation market or a hyperscaler-funded water benefit that meets those guardrails, with WFI-network funders as the independent verification and community-protection backers, is exactly the kind of catalytic, de-risking win their theory of change is built to claim.

Public record. The Water Funder Initiative's 2016 blueprint explicitly lists 'shape healthy water markets' as a priority strategy to meet changing needs and reduce over-allocation.

Position. Water Technology Group is a regional water/wastewater equipment distributor and field-service firm founded in 1976, headquartered in Golden/Denver, Colorado with a second location in Casper, Wyoming. It is a partner company inside Cogent Companies, a 100% employee-owned network of ~12 partner firms serving water/wastewater, oil & gas, and petrochemical markets (Inc. 5000 seven years running; ~200 employees). Its business is the sale, rental, repair, and service of pumps, blowers, motors, instrumentation/controls, filters, mechanical seals, valves, mixers, and chemical-feed and treatment equipment, primarily to municipal water, wastewater, and stormwater customers across the Rocky Mountain region. It has NO public position on Colorado River allocation, the Lower/Upper Basin negotiations, drought-response policy, or interstate water politics. Its only scarcity-adjacent public messaging is commercial: it markets access to water recycle/reuse programs and Zero Liquid Discharge (ZLD) solutions framed around water recovery, resource recovery, sustainability, and regulatory compliance for municipal clients. Treat it as a vendor/service provider, not a policy actor. No longstanding advocacy record found (marked unknown where policy stances would be).

On conservation. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market does not directly help or hurt an equipment vendor. To the extent conservation is achieved through demand reduction and fallowing rather than infrastructure, it is marginally negative for equipment sales. To the extent conservation programs pair with metering, monitoring, controls, and efficiency retrofits (its instrumentation/controls line), it is a small opportunity. Unlikely to take any public stance; would engage only as a supplier if programs create equipment demand.

On solar+water. Positive if it creates municipal or industrial demand for pumping, treatment, and water-handling equipment near data-center loads (Colorado/Wyoming siting is plausible given its footprint). A hyperscaler-funded buildout that also funds water infrastructure (reuse, treatment, cooling water handling) directly expands its market and could be pursued as a sales channel. No ideological objection expected. Reaction is transactional: they follow the capital and the equipment specs.

On reuse/desal. Most positive of the three. Large-scale reuse and desalination are directly in its wheelhouse: it already markets water recycle/reuse and Zero Liquid Discharge solutions. Any basin-scale pivot toward reuse, recycling, advanced treatment, and desalination pretreatment/brine handling grows demand for exactly the pumps, filters, membranes-adjacent equipment, chemical-feed, and controls it distributes and services. Expect enthusiastic commercial engagement and a willingness to be named as a delivery partner, though not as a policy advocate.

A win for them. A win is expanded, funded infrastructure work in their Rocky Mountain footprint: municipal reuse/recycling and ZLD projects, advanced-treatment and pumping upgrades, and monitoring/controls retrofits that turn scarcity policy into equipment sales, rentals, and long-term O&M service contracts. Being positioned as a trusted regional implementation/service partner for reuse and desalination pretreatment/brine-handling buildouts, and for hyperscaler-adjacent water infrastructure, is the clearest value to them. Recognition as a sustainability-oriented supplier (reuse, resource recovery, compliance) also fits their existing marketing.

Public record. As a provider of water and wastewater treatment solutions to municipalities, their business interests align with infrastructure buildout, but they have no explicit public stance on these specific policies.

Position. Formed in 2015 as a coalition of conservation and river-advocacy groups (American Rivers, Audubon, Business for Water Stewardship, Conservation Colorado, Environmental Defense Fund, Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, The Nature Conservancy, Trout Unlimited, Western Resource Advocates; co-chaired by WRA and American Rivers). Longstanding mission: keep Colorado's rivers healthy and flowing while planning for climate change and deeper drought. Their first goal was shaping Colorado's first state Water Plan to put conservation and environment first. On the post-2026 river crisis, member specialists authored and submitted the 'Cooperative Conservation Alternative' to Reclamation (one of five formal alternatives in the Post-2026 EIS process). Core planks: (1) stabilize storage and stop crisis-to-crisis management via elevation triggers; (2) create a 'Conservation Reserve' (replacing Intentionally Created Surplus) that lets users store conserved water and use an operationally-neutral pool flexibly for environmental and infrastructure needs; (3) embed environmental mitigation/stewardship into operations, including Colorado River Delta flows and the Cienega de Santa Clara. On agriculture they favor voluntary, compensated, temporary tools (water loans that keep water in ag; the federally funded System Conservation Pilot Program that pays users to leave water in the river) and explicitly oppose permanent 'buy and dry.' Two coalition members sat on Colorado's 2023 Drought Task Force and they advocate legislation implementing its recommendations, including removing a match requirement so Tribes can access grant funds.

On conservation. Strongly supportive in principle , a verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to the tool they already champion (SCPP, water loans, the Conservation Reserve). Conditions: conservation must be genuinely additive and independently verified (they are wary of paper savings and of markets enabling speculation or permanent ag dry-up), a share of saved water must reach the environment/river rather than only backfilling depletions, and Tribal and rural-community equity must be built in. Meet those and they become an ally and validator; ignore verification/equity and they turn skeptical.

On solar+water. Cautiously persuadable, not a natural fit for their frame. Upside they would value: a new non-ratepayer, non-federal funding stream to close the water-funding gap and pay for conservation and environmental flows. Concerns: this is outside their core competency and vocabulary; they will scrutinize whether it induces new demand or greenwashes continued depletion, whether the water dollars are truly additive and durable, and whether a corporate funder gets undue influence over public-trust water. Frame it as funding for verified conservation and river health (not as buying a water supply for a datacenter) and pair it with their measurement/equity conditions to win support. Poorly framed, they stay neutral-to-wary.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-open but low-salience; no public coalition position found on reuse or desalination. Their members generally prefer demand-side conservation and healthy in-stream flows over large new supply-side infrastructure, and would weigh reuse/desal on cost, energy footprint, brine/ecological impacts, and whether it reduces pressure on rivers versus enabling continued growth in depletions. Municipal water reuse (they helped enable conservation-oriented development planning) is more palatable to them than large desalination, which is peripheral to Colorado's inland context. Expect measured engagement, not championing.

A win for them. A durable, well-funded mechanism that keeps rivers flowing and reservoirs stable without permanently drying up agriculture or enabling water speculation: voluntary and compensated conservation that is rigorously verified and additive, banked in a Conservation-Reserve-style pool, with a guaranteed slice of conserved water and new funding directed to environmental flows (Delta, Cienega, in-state streams) and to Tribal and rural-community equity. New non-ratepayer money that closes Colorado's water-funding gap without expanding depletions is a clear win.

Public record. The coalition advocates for state and federal funding for Colorado's Water Plan, which includes conservation, and supports policies like turf replacement programs to advance municipal water conservation.

Position. WaterStart is a Nevada 501(c)(6) public-private nonprofit accelerator founded in 2013 by GOED and the Desert Research Institute to commercialize water technology and use it as an economic-development engine. Its longstanding, demand-driven position is that the answer to Southwest scarcity is deploying innovative technology at scale for utilities and large consumers, not policy fights over allocations. Since 2013 it has screened 450+ technologies, funded ~51 pilots (~$4.6M invested), with a ~72-74% utility-adoption rate, and claims ~180 jobs and $33M+ Nevada economic impact. It is institutionally fused to Southern Nevada Water Authority (a founding member), so it tracks SNWA's Colorado River worldview: aggressive indoor water recycling (SNWA recycles ~99% of indoor water via return-flow credits, holding consumptive use to ~300,000 AF/yr), turf removal / outdoor-use conservation, and openness to paper water transfers and out-of-basin desalination swaps rather than desal for Las Vegas itself. Its most consequential public-policy footprint is authorship, through the SRI 'Building a Waterwise Economy' framework, of the recommendation to weigh water use before granting economic-development incentives, which fed directly into Nevada AB 594 (Board of Economic Development can deny/modify tax abatements on water-consumption grounds). Pilots include atmospheric water generation on a Bellagio cooling tower, Xylem network optimization with SNWA, KETOS water-quality monitoring, and the Klir permitting platform. No public position papers on a formal consumptive-use conservation market, on hyperscaler-funded solar+storage, or on large-scale desalination as a standalone stance; those must be inferred.

On conservation. Cautiously supportive but not a leader. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is primarily a policy/allocation instrument, which is outside WaterStart's core technology-pilot lane, so it would not champion it as a market. However, it would embrace the measurement-and-verification technology layer that such a market requires (metering, remote sensing, consumptive-use monitoring, MRV platforms) as exactly the kind of pilotable, utility-demanded technology it exists to accelerate. Its AB 594 heritage (price water use into economic decisions) is philosophically compatible with paying for verified conservation. Expect it to say yes to being the MRV-tech pilot host and workforce/commercialization partner, while staying neutral on the market's political design and deferring to SNWA on Colorado River allocation specifics. Persuadable-to-ally on the tech-enablement portion; neutral on the market mechanism itself.

On solar+water. Most likely a strong ally, because a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns almost perfectly with its model: it channels private capital from large consumers (data centers) into water technology pilots and Nevada economic development. WaterStart already works the data-center water-and-energy nexus that Nevada is actively debating (AB 594 was designed to make water-heavy projects like data centers earn their incentives), and it has piloted cooling-water recovery (atmospheric generation on a Bellagio cooling tower). A structure where hyperscalers pay for solar+storage and fund water reuse/efficiency gives WaterStart new members, new pilot demand, funding, and jobs numbers, all without allocation politics. The one caution: it will want the water contribution to be real and verifiable (not greenwashing), consistent with SNWA's conservation-first optics and the AB 594 water-accountability principle it helped write. Frame the water funding as accountable and measurable and it becomes an enthusiastic convener/host.

On reuse/desal. Supportive on reuse; qualified and SNWA-deferential on desalination. Large-scale reuse is directly in WaterStart's wheelhouse and in SNWA's identity (community-scale ~99% indoor recycling), so it would enthusiastically accelerate reuse, brine-management, and byproduct-reuse technologies (its Waterwise framework explicitly flagged industrial brine reuse and rural testbeds). On desalination, WaterStart would welcome desal-technology pilots and would not oppose desal as a concept, but on Colorado River strategy it will follow SNWA's line: desal is pursued as out-of-basin swaps (e.g. paying for California/Carlsbad or Mexico desal to leave water in Lake Mead) rather than building desal for Las Vegas. So expect ally-level enthusiasm for reuse and for desal-tech commercialization, but a hedged, SNWA-aligned posture on siting large desal as a Nevada supply solution.

A win for them. A win is a funded, high-visibility pilot pipeline that (a) validates new water technology with real utility/large-consumer adoption, (b) generates Nevada jobs, commercialization, and economic-impact numbers it can report to GOED and members, and (c) grows its budget and membership (including the data-center and industrial segment) without forcing it into allocation politics. Concretely: being named the pilot/vetting host for reuse, cooling-water-recovery, brine/byproduct, or monitoring technologies tied to a hyperscaler or conservation-market program; new GOED/philanthropic/impact-investment funding through CHANNELS; and Nevada cementing its 'global leader in water innovation' reputation. It wants to be the accelerator everyone routes water-tech through, with defensible adoption and jobs metrics.

Public record. WaterStart's core mission is to accelerate the adoption and commercialization of innovative water technologies by connecting technology companies with water agencies to solve challenges like drought.

Position. WMIDD is a Yuma-area (Arizona) irrigation and drainage district created by the Arizona Legislature in 1951 to repay and operate the federal Wellton-Mohawk Division; first Colorado River water reached its fields May 1, 1952. It holds an Arizona Third Priority mainstream Colorado River consumptive-use entitlement capped at 278,000 acre-feet/year (reduced via voluntary participation in the 1988 Salt River-Pima-Maricopa settlement). Longstanding position: it treats its water rights as senior and mostly pre-1968 present-perfected/perfected rights that Reclamation has a MANDATORY duty to satisfy before delivering to junior (post-1968) Arizona users, and it frames Yuma as the highest 'crop per drop' region in the basin (90% of U.S. winter leafy greens). It has a decades-long conservation track record: the Wellton-Mohawk Special Project Office (est. 1975) and USDA SCS on-farm work (1974-1986) drove on-farm efficiencies above 75% across ~48,000 acres under P.L. 93-320 to cut return flows. Recent posture (2022-2025): WMIDD is a core member of the Yuma-area irrigation district coalition (attorney/coordinator Wade Noble; board chair Robbie Woodhouse) that PROPOSED voluntarily forbearing ~1 acre-foot/acre across 925,000 acres in return for compensation of $1,500/acre-foot (~$1.387B/yr) to fund drip irrigation, crop switching, and cover economic loss. Noble: 'our voluntary forbearance ... will remain on the terms we put on the table.' Woodhouse: 'We do feel an obligation to do our part.' The district has executed/negotiated System Conservation and Efficiency Agreements (CAP sent letters of intent to WMIDD and Yuma Mesa) and maintains a formal fallowing program (full-year fallowing on district-owned land first-priority; seasonal Apr 15-Aug 15 fallowing), with per-acre compensation pegged to local land-rental rates. Federal pushback: Reclamation was 'less than enthusiastic' about $1,500/AF; comparable deals (e.g., IID) landed near $840/AF.

On conservation. STRONGLY FAVORABLE if the market pays enough and respects seniority. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is essentially WMIDD's own preferred model made durable: it already proposed voluntary consumptive-use forbearance at $1,500/AF and runs a formal fallowing/SCIA program. Verified, measured consumptive-use accounting is attractive because Yuma districts argue high on-farm efficiency and want credit for real wet-water savings, not paper cuts. Key conditions: (1) price must be high enough to fund drip/crop-switching and cover grower losses (they anchored at $1,500/AF; federal deals near $840/AF are viewed as low); (2) participation must stay VOLUNTARY and on their terms; (3) it must not erode or be used to leapfrog their senior priority. If those hold, WMIDD is a ready, sophisticated counterparty. Deal-breaker: any market structured as a backdoor to impose uncompensated or mandatory cuts, or that treats their water as junior.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN / TRANSACTIONAL, but not a natural fit. WMIDD's core need is water and grower income, not electricity, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout only interests them insofar as it also funds water (conservation payments, drip capital, canal/pumping energy cost offsets, or on-district lease revenue from siting panels on fallowed/marginal parcels). Positives: the district manages power under a WAPA Integrated Resource Plan and pays pumping/energy costs, so cheaper or offset power and lease income on fallowed land are tangible wins; solar on retired acreage plus a water-funding mechanism could pencil. Concerns: prime Yuma cropland is too valuable ('highest crop per drop') to convert to panels, so siting must be marginal/fallowed land only; growers will resist anything that permanently removes productive acreage or that a datacenter's own water demand competes with. Verdict: persuadable on a narrow, water-funding, marginal-land basis; indifferent-to-cool if it is just an energy project with no direct water benefit.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE IN PRINCIPLE as new 'augmentation' supply that relieves pressure on the river without touching their priority, but not a first mover and wary of who pays. Yuma-area districts generally back reuse/desalination and new water sources (the region hosts the Yuma Desalting Plant legacy and the districts' comments favor augmentation over cuts to senior users). They would welcome large-scale reuse/desal that adds supply to the system, protects Lake Mead/Powell levels, and keeps mandatory cuts away from senior agriculture. Concerns: cost allocation (they will resist paying for supply that benefits junior M&I users), water-quality/salinity issues (WMIDD's own history is defined by drainage-salinity problems), and any scheme that conditions new supply on ag giving up senior rights. Net: a useful pressure-relief valve they will endorse politically, provided the bill and the priority hit fall on the beneficiaries, not on Yuma ag.

A win for them. A durable, high-value, voluntary compensation stream that lets WMIDD monetize conservation ON THEIR TERMS while keeping their senior priority and their agricultural economy intact. Concretely: measured consumptive-use conservation paid near their $1,500/AF ask (or blended packages that reach comparable per-acre value), capital to convert to drip and higher-value/lower-water crops, revenue on fallowed/marginal land (leases, solar, water-funding deals), and formal recognition that their pre-1968 rights are protected first. A win preserves Yuma's winter-vegetable production, stabilizes district O&M/repayment finances, and positions WMIDD as the model 'efficient, willing partner' that gets paid to help the basin rather than being cut. A loss is any outcome that forces uncompensated or mandatory reductions on their senior water or converts prime cropland out of production.

Public record. The district has previously participated in programs to leave conserved water in Lake Mead and has amended its federal contract to allow for the transfer of saved agricultural water to municipal uses.

Position. West Divide Water Conservancy District (WDWCD), based in Rifle CO, was organized in 1964 to conserve and develop land and water resources across parts of Garfield, Pitkin, and Mesa Counties. Its longstanding institutional DNA was development-first: it was the local sponsor of the West Divide Project, a mid-century Bureau of Reclamation scheme (in the 1956 Colorado River Storage Project Act) to build up to five reservoirs and a trans-mountain tunnel, explicitly to supply irrigation and municipal/industrial water for a projected 150,000-barrel/day oil shale industry. Reclamation found the project 'not economically justified' by 1982 and it went dormant; WDWCD retains conditional water rights but is no longer a dam-builder. Its actual current mission is narrow and operational: it sells augmentation (replacement) water so out-of-priority junior users (individual/subdivision/commercial/industrial wells, irrigation, pond evaporation, direct river hauling) get a legal supply without injuring senior rights. It does this by releasing contracted storage from Ruedi, Green Mountain, and Wolford Mountain reservoirs, and delivers irrigation water from Alsbury Reservoir. It has taken no explicit public position on the broader Colorado River crisis, Lower Basin cuts, or interstate negotiations. Its revealed position is a West Slope water-security stance: keep local storage full and augmentation supplies reliable, protect senior/agricultural users, and treat drought as a supply-adequacy problem to be solved with more stored water. In 2024-2025, facing a warm winter, record-low snowpack, and a Green Mountain Historic Users Pool (66,000 AF) that failed to fill, WDWCD and neighboring Silt Water Conservancy District went to the Garfield County commissioners to lease the county's Ruedi shares (200 AF at ~$84.95/AF, with interest in another 185 AF) to keep augmenting ag and domestic wells through summer. President Samuel Potter's framing: 'Our devised augmentation plans have to protect all senior water users, or the plan does not work.' That is the district's guiding value.

On conservation. Cautiously interested, with guardrails. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is not a natural threat to WDWCD the way it is to a large senior diverter, because the district's business is augmentation, not primary consumptive use. Two angles: (a) As a potential participant/broker. If a market credibly measures and pays for real consumptive-use reductions, WDWCD could see a revenue and reliability tool: temporarily fallowing or reducing irrigation demand among its contractees in dry years reduces the augmentation obligation it must cover, and market payments could offset ag revenue. Its own framing ('protect all senior water users') maps onto a preference for verified, non-injurious transactions. (b) Deep skepticism about injury and West Slope water leaving. The district and its regional umbrella (River District) are historically wary of any mechanism that could become a back-door for transferring West Slope water to the Front Range or Lower Basin, or that stresses the local system (Green Mountain HUP, Ruedi) it depends on. It will demand that any market be strictly verified, additive, non-injurious to senior rights, reversible, and not a permanent 'buy-and-dry.' Likely reaction: engage and pilot if the accounting is airtight and West Slope agriculture keeps control; oppose loudly if it looks like a wholesale-water-export vehicle.

On solar+water. Warmest reception of the three, given the district's own history. WDWCD was literally founded to supply water for large energy/industrial development (oil shale), so an industrially-financed buildout that also funds water is culturally familiar and attractive rather than alien. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage project that pays into local water supply/augmentation could: (1) inject non-ratepayer capital into a cash-thin district (fund storage, replacement supplies, infrastructure, or augmentation subsidies for constituents); (2) fit its 'develop water and resources' charter; and (3) diversify a rural Garfield County economy that has ridden gas/oil-shale boom-bust cycles. Concerns it will raise: the water footprint of the data centers/industrial load themselves (net new consumptive demand on an already short system), whether the funding is durable or a one-time sweetener, senior-rights protection, and local siting/land-use control. Net: likely a persuadable-to-supportive stakeholder here IF the deal is structured as net-positive to local water supply (funds exceed any new demand) and keeps West Slope control. This is the strongest wedge to engage them.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-positive but largely indirect; low salience for their core operations. WDWCD is an inland Upper Basin augmentation district on the Colorado/Roaring Fork headwaters, far from the coast and not a large municipal potable provider, so ocean desalination and large municipal reuse are not things it would build or run. Its interest is second-order: anything that reduces Lower Basin demand on the system, keeps more water in Lake Powell/Mead, and relieves pressure that could translate into curtailment risk or compact-call anxiety on the Upper Basin is welcomed in principle. It would likely support Lower Basin / Front Range reuse and coastal desal as 'someone else augmenting their own supply so they stop reaching for our water.' It would be indifferent-to-skeptical about cost/feasibility and would resist any framing that positions West Slope water as the bridge supply while such projects are built. Low engagement priority relative to the energy-funded-water and conservation-market levers.

A win for them. A durable improvement in dry-year augmentation reliability without ceding West Slope control or injuring senior rights. Concretely, a win is: (1) new, non-ratepayer money or firm supply that guarantees they can meet augmentation obligations even when the Green Mountain HUP and Ruedi are short, ending the annual scramble to lease emergency shares; (2) protection or enhancement of local storage they depend on; (3) their contractees (well owners, irrigators, small industrial users) kept whole and, ideally, paid for any conservation they provide; (4) any market or funding mechanism that is verified, additive, non-injurious, reversible, and locally governed; and (5) recognition of the district as a legitimate West Slope partner rather than a source to be tapped. If an outside-funded arrangement lets them tell constituents 'your water is more secure and it cost you nothing, and West Slope water stayed on the West Slope,' that is the outcome they can say yes to and defend at the ballot box.

Public record. The district's public mission is focused on conserving and developing local water resources and providing augmentation water, with no stated opposition to broader conservation programs, making it potentially persuadable.

Position. WestWater Research (founded 2001, HQ Boise ID; five regional offices including California and a Rocky Mountain/Colorado office) is the leading US economic consulting firm for water-rights pricing, valuation, and transaction advisory. Longstanding public position: water markets and voluntary water sharing are the primary tool for reallocating scarce Western water. It runs Waterlitix (30,000+ verified deals, the largest water-transaction pricing database) and is the exclusive data provider for the Nasdaq-Veles California Water Index (NQH2O), which prices California water entitlements. On the Colorado River crisis specifically it frames unprecedented, uncertain Basin cuts as the defining risk (2023 Colorado forum recap: 'changes to water management in the Colorado River Basin may be coming at an unprecedented rate') and prescribes 'flexible policies, collaboration, and continued water sharing' to maintain a 'water secure future.' Staff (e.g., Brett Bovee, Adam Jokerst as Rocky Mountain Regional Director) provide expert analysis on System Conservation Program valuation and implementation. Its published market thesis aligns with the 2025 Nature Sustainability / UW-Stanford strategic-transactions research: strategically spending ~8% more than the cheapest conservation program can nearly triple ecological benefit, and a legally protected market is ~29% more cost-effective than an unprotected one. WestWater consistently argues 'not all water is equal' and that transaction pricing should be rigorous and market-based. It is not an advocacy org taking a normative stance on who should get cut; it is a valuation/market-infrastructure player that benefits from any mechanism that generates priced, tradable water transactions.

On conservation. Strong ally / enthusiastic. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is close to WestWater's ideal product. It creates exactly the priced, verified, tradable transactions that feed Waterlitix, generate valuation and advisory fees, support NQH2O-style benchmarking, and produce the 'underused water entitlement' deal flow the Aetos water fund targets. Its own published thesis (strategic, protected markets triple ecological benefit per dollar) is a direct endorsement of well-designed conservation markets. Likely to offer pricing methodology, MRV/verification standards, and a market-design role. Main caveat they will raise: verification rigor and legal flow-protection matter, and 'not all water is equal' so uniform per-acre-foot pricing is a design flaw.

On solar+water. Cautiously positive but lower-priority. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive as a new capital source that can be routed through water-rights transactions and infrastructure financing (their asset-management and transaction-advisory sweet spot). They would want the water funding structured as market transactions (leases, forbearance payments, entitlement purchases) rather than as off-market grants, because transactional structuring is where they earn and where their data improves. Neutral-to-skeptical on the energy engineering itself, which is outside their competency; their interest is purely the water-finance wrapper. Persuadable to champion it if it is designed as priced deal flow.

On reuse/desal. Most ambivalent / potential soft opposition. Large-scale reuse and desalination create NEW supply that substitutes for reallocated Colorado River water. That can depress water-rights valuations and reduce transaction volume, directly eroding the value of Waterlitix, NQH2O relevance, advisory fees, and the Aetos fund's entitlement-appreciation thesis. They will not oppose it publicly (it is politically popular and they advise all sides), but they have a structural financial reason to prefer market-mediated reallocation over supply augmentation. Expect them to reframe reuse/desal as complementary and to seek a role valuing the avoided-transaction or offset economics rather than championing it. Treat as the mechanism where their commercial interest and the public interest can diverge.

A win for them. A win is more priced, verified water transactions flowing through mechanisms they help design and value, cementing Waterlitix as the reference dataset and WestWater as the standard-setter for conservation-market pricing and MRV, plus advisory and asset-management mandates on the resulting deal flow, and appreciating or liquid water entitlements that benefit the Aetos-affiliated water fund. Concretely: a named methodology/valuation role in a Colorado River consumptive-use conservation market; recurring valuation and advisory contracts; and their data cited as the pricing authority. A loss for them is large non-transactional supply augmentation (reuse/desal) or blunt regulatory cuts that satisfy demand off-market and suppress water-rights prices and transaction volume.

Public record. As a leading economic consulting firm on water rights, they analyze and facilitate water markets, which can include conservation-for-payment deals, but their role is that of a market analyst and advisor, not a policy advocate.

Position. WAPA is the DOE power marketing administration (created by the DOE Organization Act of 1977) that markets and delivers cost-based federal hydropower from the Colorado River Storage Project (CRSP), including Glen Canyon Dam, to ~680+ preference customers (municipalities, rural electric co-ops, tribes, irrigation districts, state/federal agencies) across Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and Nebraska. CRSP sells roughly 5,300 GWh/year, ~78% of it from Glen Canyon. WAPA's core statutory mandate is to deliver reliable, low-cost, cost-based hydropower to preference customers and to collect revenues that repay the U.S. Treasury and fund the Upper Colorado River Basin Fund (which also underwrites salinity control and endangered-fish recovery). WAPA is NOT a water-policy decision-maker (Reclamation operates the dams; the seven Basin states negotiate allocation), so it engages as an affected federal utility, not a party to the river compact. Its consistent public posture through the megadrought: hydropower generation is falling and this may be 'the new permanent,' not a temporary drought. Power generation at Glen Canyon fell ~17% on average 2000-2023 vs. 1988-1999 baseline; SLCA/IP net generation in 2022 (~3.5 billion kWh) ran ~36% below average; 2024 was forecast near ~2.98 million MWh, the second-lowest on record. WAPA's Clayton Palmer has publicly framed the agency's role bluntly: 'all we have to deliver is bad news.' WAPA has institutionalized drought risk into its rates via the Drought Adder / Draft Sales Adjustment (DSA) methodology (Rate Orders WAPA-199 and WAPA-206), under which firm sales are limited to projected generation and WAPA makes 'firming' purchases up to a forecast level, passing volatile market power costs through to customers. WAPA's operational red line is minimum power pool at Lake Powell elevation 3,490 ft, below which Glen Canyon's turbines cannot generate; the dam risks dropping below that around July 2026 through ~March 2028 under some projections. WAPA is a data/technical participant in Reclamation's Post-2026 operations EIS process but has not staked out a public allocation position.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable / persuadable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that keeps more water in storage directly raises Lake Powell elevation, which is the single variable WAPA cares about most: higher pool means more head, more generation, fewer expensive firming purchases, more Basin Fund revenue, and margin above the 3,490 ft cliff. WAPA has no institutional objection to demand-side conservation and would welcome anything that stabilizes storage. Caveats it will raise: (1) it wants storage held at Powell specifically, not just conserved somewhere downstream, since only Powell drives its generation; a market that moves saved water to Mead or to consumptive users below Glen Canyon does little for WAPA. (2) It will insist conservation be genuinely additive and verified, because its DSA forecasting depends on reliable inflow/storage projections. (3) It will not pay for conservation itself (cost-based mandate, thin margins), but it is a natural beneficiary and credible technical validator of hydrologic accounting.

On solar+water. Most strategically interesting for WAPA and the clearest persuadable lever. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout maps onto two things WAPA already does: (1) it operates the transmission backbone new generation must interconnect to, and (2) it markets firm power and increasingly needs non-hydro capacity to firm a shrinking, less-reliable hydro fleet. Solar+storage that can be dispatched to backstop lost Glen Canyon output would reduce WAPA's exposure to $60-$200/MWh market firming purchases and could be integrated into its portfolio. If the same project also funds water (conservation, reuse, or offsets that keep water in Powell), it hits WAPA's storage-elevation interest too. Frictions: WAPA is cost-based and process-bound (federal procurement, rate cases, interconnection queues, NEPA), so it moves slowly and cannot simply sign a corporate PPA the way an IOU can; hyperscaler capital would more likely flow through WAPA's preference customers or through transmission/interconnection arrangements than directly onto WAPA's balance sheet. Still, WAPA is a logical convening/technical partner and a beneficiary, not an obstacle.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but indirect. Large-scale reuse or desalination that reduces new demand on the Colorado (e.g., coastal desal freeing Lower Basin allocations, or reuse cutting withdrawals) can indirectly support keeping water in the system and thus in Powell, which helps WAPA. But the linkage is weak and downstream: most reuse/desal benefits Lower Basin/Mead-side users and coastal metros, whereas WAPA's generation depends specifically on Powell head. Desal is also energy-intensive; WAPA could see new load (a customer-growth opportunity for its transmission and marketing) but also grid-management complexity. WAPA has no public position on desal/reuse and would treat it as a Reclamation/state/utility matter. Net: not opposed, sees modest indirect upside if it demonstrably raises or protects Upper Basin storage, largely indifferent otherwise. Mark the direct-benefit link as partly unknown.

A win for them. A win for WAPA is Lake Powell held reliably and durably above minimum power pool (3,490 ft) with enough head to sustain predictable CRSP generation, so it can (a) stop bleeding millions on $60-$200/MWh market firming purchases, (b) hold cost-based rates near the ~$30/MWh federal level and end the drought-driven rate increases hitting preference customers, (c) keep Basin Fund revenue flowing to Treasury repayment plus salinity and endangered-fish programs, and (d) avoid the catastrophic scenario of zero generation and unsafe bypass-tube operation. Secondarily, a win is a firming portfolio (dispatchable solar+storage plus transmission it operates) that insulates its customers from hydro volatility. The ideal outcome lets WAPA go from 'all we have to deliver is bad news' back to being a low-cost, reliable federal power supplier.

Public record. WAPA's mission is to market and deliver hydropower, and it is actively engaging with stakeholders to mitigate drought impacts on power generation, indicating an openness to solutions that sustain reservoir levels.

Position. WWA is a university-based applied climate/water science program housed at CU Boulder's CIRES, with nodes at the University of Utah's Global Change & Sustainability Center and the University of Wyoming's Haub School. It is one of NOAA's Climate Adaptation Partnerships (CAP), formerly Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments (RISA), teams, funded on 5-year NOAA cooperative agreements. Its self-described mission is to conduct research in partnership with decision-makers in the Rocky Mountain West so they make the best use of science to manage natural-hazard impacts. Longstanding public position on the river crisis: it is a science-synthesis and boundary-organization actor, NOT a policy advocate. Its flagship Colorado River product, 'Colorado River Basin Climate and Hydrology: State of the Science' (2020/2021, 531 pages, 17 authors led by Jeff Lukas and Elizabeth Payton, integrating ~800 peer-reviewed studies and agency reports), explicitly 'doesn't make recommendations' and instead characterizes uncertainty, model limitations, and research gaps. Its clearest substantive scientific finding, repeated publicly, is that warming temperature is now a 'very clear signal' materially reducing basin runoff and water supply (aridification / hot drought), on top of precipitation variability. This gives it credibility as a neutral referee of hydrologic claims across all seven states and the tribes. It supports water managers (a dozen-plus federal/state/local agencies advised the report) but takes no side on allocation cuts, markets, or infrastructure.

On conservation. Broadly supportive but as an evaluator, not a proponent. A verified consumptive-use conservation market depends on exactly WWA's competency: measuring and attributing actual consumptive use, distinguishing real, additional, permanent water savings from paper water or shifted use, and accounting for return flows and evapotranspiration. WWA's own science (warming-driven ET losses, vegetation drawing down snowpack-derived water, forecasting limits) directly bears on whether a claimed conserved acre-foot is real. Likely reaction: welcomes it as a use case for its research and an opportunity to fund/inform measurement, verification, and remote-sensing/ET methods, while publicly cautioning about verification uncertainty and additionality. It will not endorse a specific market design or price. Best engaged as the independent technical validator of the market's MRV (measurement-reporting-verification) layer. UNKNOWN: no public WWA statement specifically endorsing or opposing a consumptive-use market was found; inferred from its research portfolio.

On solar+water. Cautiously neutral-to-interested, with scientific scrutiny. WWA has no institutional stake in energy buildout and will not champion a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage+water package on its merits. It would likely engage on the water-accounting and climate questions: does the funded water actually augment basin supply or reduce consumptive use, how is it verified, and what are the hydrologic and demand implications. A large, well-capitalized private initiative that also funds water research/monitoring could be a diversification path away from sole federal dependence, which is attractive given FY2026 funding threats, but WWA will guard against any arrangement that compromises its perceived neutrality. Expect it to accept a role as independent science advisor or monitor rather than as a partner promoting the deal. UNKNOWN: no public WWA position on datacenter/hyperscaler water or energy financing found.

On reuse/desal. Interested as a subject of study, neutral on advocacy. Large-scale reuse and desalination are supply-augmentation strategies outside WWA's core hydrologic-science mandate, but they intersect its work on future supply-demand balance, climate scenarios, and the limits of the natural system. WWA would likely treat these as options to be characterized (energy intensity, cost, brine/environmental questions, and how much real basin relief they provide) rather than promoted. It is well-positioned to help quantify how much augmentation is needed under warming scenarios, which strengthens the case for reuse/desal generally without WWA taking a position on any specific project. UNKNOWN: no public WWA stance on desal/reuse projects found; inferred.

A win for them. A win for WWA is: (a) stable, diversified funding that reduces dependence on a single federal cooperative agreement now under budget threat, ideally through open, credibility-preserving research support; (b) their science actually used in decisions, e.g., their measurement/verification and warming-signal work becoming the accepted technical backbone of a conservation market or augmentation plan; (c) preserved reputation as the neutral, trusted science synthesizer for the whole basin; and (d) expanded research on the open questions their own reports flagged (forecasting under warming, consumptive-use/ET attribution, model uncertainty). If a market or buildout funds better monitoring and gets the accounting right, WWA both advances its mission and strengthens its institutional case for existence.

Public record. WWA is a university-based applied research program that provides policy-relevant science to decision-makers but does not take advocacy positions, aiming to help stakeholders make the best use of science.

Position. The White Mountain Apache Tribe (WMAT) is a headwaters and settlement-holder stakeholder rather than a large direct Colorado River diverter. Its ~1.67M-acre Fort Apache Reservation in east-central Arizona sits at the headwaters of the Salt River and the Black River (Gila/Lower Basin system) and drains partly to the Little Colorado, so the Tribe's water lands in Arizona's Colorado-system accounting via the Central Arizona Project (CAP). Its defining public position was set by the White Mountain Apache Tribe Water Rights Quantification Act of 2010 (part of the Claims Resolution Act of 2010, signed Dec 8, 2010, passed the Senate 99-0 / unanimous). In that settlement the Tribe relinquished a century-old claim of ~175,000 AF (including senior 1871-priority Salt River water SRP valued at roughly $150M/yr) in exchange for a firm quantified right of 52,000 AF/yr: 27,000 AF from the Salt and Little Colorado watersheds plus a 25,000 AF/yr CAP allocation, federal funding (~$126M+ authorized) for the Miner Flat Project / WMAT Rural Water System, and settlement/maintenance trust funds. Critically, the Tribe leases most of its CAP water to the Phoenix metro Valley cities rather than using it on-reservation: up to 22,500 AF on 100-year leases to Valley cities and 2,500 AF leased back to the Central Arizona Water Conservation District. So the Tribe's revealed position is pragmatic and monetization-friendly: it traded a huge paper claim for firm wet water at home plus a durable lease revenue stream. Its longstanding operational priority is not river-crisis politics but finishing its own drinking-water infrastructure. Its watershed health (forests, the 2002 Rodeo-Chediski megafire burned heavily on tribal land) directly conditions the Salt River flows that fill SRP's Phoenix reservoirs, making WMAT a source-water steward whose forest and fire management matters basin-wide.

On conservation. Cautiously favorable, and potentially an interested seller/participant, but only on tribal terms. WMAT already monetizes water it does not consume by leasing its CAP allocation, so a verified, additional, compensated consumptive-use conservation market is conceptually aligned with how the Tribe already turns firm water rights into revenue. It could welcome being paid to make part of its Colorado-system entitlement available as measured, additional conservation if the price is right and the deal is structured through the Tribe as sovereign. Watch-outs: (1) sovereignty and control, the Tribe will resist any structure that looks like federal or state pressure to give up quantified water or that reopens the 2010 settlement; (2) it will insist conserved water and payments be additional and not simply reclassify the leases it already holds; (3) tribes across the basin have been burned by having their water used to prop up the system without compensation or a seat at the table, so verification credibility and who-gets-the-credit will matter. Net: persuadable and possibly a willing counterparty, not a natural opponent.

On solar+water. Likely the most attractive of the three, if it delivers on-reservation benefit. WMAT is a rural, land-rich, capital-poor tribal economy with high-elevation forest land, an existing power/recreation footprint (Sunrise Park, Hon-Dah), and an unfinished water system starved for funding. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water hits several of the Tribe's needs at once: new revenue and jobs on tribal land, potential energy for the Miner Flat pumping/treatment plants, and a funding channel for the drinking-water system and watershed restoration that federal appropriations have repeatedly underdelivered. The Tribe would engage seriously if the structure keeps ownership/lease control and revenue on the reservation, respects cultural and forest-resource constraints (siting away from sensitive lands, fire-safe), and treats the 'funds water' piece as real dollars to their system, not a marketing line. Caveats: any large land-use or transmission project must clear tribal governance, cultural-resource review, and not compete with the forest/recreation economy or scarce local water for cooling.

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-mildly-positive but low-salience for this Tribe. Large-scale reuse and ocean/binational desalination are augmentation strategies that mainly help downstream urban Arizona and CAP; they do not directly solve WMAT's on-reservation drinking-water gap, which is a local dam-and-treatment problem, not a supply-augmentation problem. The Tribe would generally view basin augmentation favorably to the extent it firms the overall CAP system that underlies the value of its leases (more system water and augmentation reduce shortage risk to CAP supply, which indirectly protects lease revenue), and to the extent tribes are compensated and consulted rather than bypassed. It is unlikely to spend political capital for or against a desal megaproject unless (a) tribal water or lands are implicated, (b) the Tribe is offered a stake or firming benefit, or (c) costs are pushed onto tribal water users. Reuse within Arizona's urban service areas is essentially irrelevant to daily tribal operations. Expect polite engagement, not leadership, on this axis.

A win for them. A win is anything that (a) finishes durable, safe on-reservation drinking-water infrastructure (Miner Flat / Rural Water System) that federal funding shortfalls and dam-seepage costs have delayed; (b) protects or increases the cash value and security of their CAP lease revenue (the 22,500 AF leased to Valley cities and 2,500 AF to CAWCD), since that revenue funds tribal government with no on-reservation water cost; (c) respects and reinforces tribal water sovereignty and the finality of the 2010 settlement rather than reopening it; and (d) brings investment into the reservation economy (forestry/Fort Apache Timber, Sunrise Park ski resort, Hon-Dah casino, watershed and post-fire forest restoration) and into source-water/forest health at the Salt River headwaters. The strongest single win: new money that both accelerates their clean-water system AND makes their unused/leasable Colorado-system water more valuable, delivered with the Tribe in control.

Public record. The Tribe has settled its water rights and leases water to downstream users, indicating a willingness to engage in water marketing, and has explored biomass energy projects on its land.

Position. The Wyoming State Engineer's Office (SEO), led by State Engineer Brandon Gebhart, is the agency that administers water rights and represents Wyoming in interstate Colorado River (Green River sub-basin) matters via the Upper Colorado River Commission. Its longstanding and recent public positions: (1) Wyoming is an Upper Basin state that has stayed within or below its 1922 Compact allocation, and the crisis is driven by Lower Basin (AZ/CA/NV) structural overuse; Gebhart and Upper Basin peers publicly say the Lower Basin 'hogs water' and must fix its own overconsumption before demanding upstream cuts (Cowboy State Daily, 9/2025). (2) Gebhart frames the shortage as 'a problem that needs to be settled by hydrology,' calling 2026 'one of the worst, if not the worst, hydrologic year on record' and noting all of Wyoming is in drought (Cowboy State Daily, 6/2026). (3) The SEO strongly prefers VOLUNTARY, COMPENSATED conservation over mandatory/uncompensated curtailment or court-ordered compact call. It sponsored/championed Senate File 84 (2026), the Voluntary Water Conservation Program Act, which Gebhart said 'helps avoid mandatory and uncompensated water use reductions, whether by court order or curtailment, to satisfy compact obligations' and 'provides a tool for Wyoming to be part of a compromise.' (4) SF84 lets any Green River basin water-right holder apply to the SEO to reduce consumptive use, with conserved water storable in Fontenelle Reservoir (federal/Reclamation); the state appropriated ~$510K for SEO administration/staff, but grower COMPENSATION is expected to come from federal funds or 'junior water users or other interested parties,' not the state. (5) The SEO also runs voluntary reduction efforts descended from the System Conservation Pilot Program and held public-input meetings (June 2026), and it is backstopped by an 11-member Colorado River Advisory Committee (HB222) spanning ag, industry, municipalities, environmental, and conservation-district interests. Politically the SEO is caught between Green River ranchers (e.g., Pinedale/South Piney) who are 'tired of Wyoming giving up water' and a federal intervention threat, so it defends Wyoming's 'promised future' while trying to be an 'honest broker' toward a 7-state deal ahead of the end-of-2026 expiration of the 2007 interim guidelines.

On conservation. LIKELY SUPPORTIVE, and this is the closest fit to what the SEO is already building. A verified consumptive-use conservation market maps almost exactly onto SF84's design: voluntary, application-based consumptive-use reduction, verified/administered by the SEO, with conserved water parked in Fontenelle. The SEO's own stated gap is the money to compensate growers ('from federal funding or from junior water users or other interested parties'). A credible market that supplies verified demand and payment fills that hole. Two hard conditions the SEO will insist on: (a) rigorous VERIFICATION and measurement so conserved water is real, additional, and doesn't just get re-diverted downstream (the SEO's Diversion & Telemetry program signals it cares about measurement); and (b) protection of Wyoming's Compact entitlement and priority system, i.e., conservation must be genuinely voluntary/compensated and must NOT be used to establish a precedent that Wyoming owes uncompensated cuts. Frame it as avoiding curtailment and it lands well; frame it as Wyoming 'giving up water' and it dies with the ranchers.

On solar+water. CAUTIOUSLY OPEN but skeptical, and outside the SEO's core lane. Wyoming is energy-development-friendly and a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water conservation could supply the missing compensation dollars SF84 needs, which the SEO would welcome as a funding channel ('other interested parties'). But the SEO administers water rights, not power projects, so it will care narrowly about: does the deal put real, verified, paid consumptive-use savings into the system without impairing existing rights or Compact position? A data-center-driven NEW consumptive water demand in the basin would alarm the SEO (adds depletion in an over-stressed system). Net: persuadable if structured as 'private capital pays Green River users to reduce consumptive use, verified by the SEO, no new basin depletion.' Mark the SEO's direct stance on hyperscaler energy as largely unknown/unstated in public record.

On reuse/desal. LIKELY FAVORABLE BUT LOW-PRIORITY / OUT OF SCOPE for Wyoming specifically. Large-scale reuse and desalination are Lower Basin / coastal augmentation strategies that align with the SEO's core argument: the Lower Basin should reduce dependence on the river by developing its own supplies (reuse, desal) rather than demanding Upper Basin cuts. The SEO would rhetorically welcome anything that eases pressure on Wyoming's obligations. But desal/large reuse have little direct application in landlocked, headwaters Wyoming, so the SEO is unlikely to invest political capital or funding. Supportive-in-principle, not an active partner. No specific public SEO statement found on desal (mark that element unknown).

A win for them. A win is Wyoming being 'part of the compromise' on its own terms: a working, funded, voluntary conservation program in the Green River Basin that (1) demonstrably reduces consumptive use and helps meet Compact obligations, (2) is paid for by federal or private money (not Wyoming taxpayers or uncompensated ranchers), (3) is verified and stored (Fontenelle) so the savings are real and creditable to Wyoming, and (4) heads off the thing they fear most: mandatory, uncompensated curtailment imposed by court order, compact call, or federal fiat. Politically, the win also protects the State Engineer's standing with Green River ranchers by proving conservation can be voluntary and paid rather than forced.

Public record. The office supports voluntary, compensated conservation programs funded by the federal government to avoid mandatory cuts and protect its legal water rights under the Colorado River Compact.

Position. The Yavapai-Apache Nation is a federally recognized tribe in Arizona's Verde Valley (Camp Verde/Clarkdale/Middle Verde/Rimrock, near the Verde River, a major Colorado River tributary via the Salt/Gila system). Its defining recent public position is its Water Rights Settlement. On June 26, 2024, the Tribal Council unanimously approved the Yavapai-Apache Nation Water Rights Settlement Agreement after decades of negotiation with local communities, Salt River Project, the State of Arizona (ADWR), and the United States. The Settlement confirms rights to 4,610 acre-feet/year drawn from a mix of groundwater, Verde surface water, and Colorado River water via the Nation's 1980 Central Arizona Project (CAP) contract, and establishes an instream-flow right to protect Verde River flows for cultural, religious, and ecological purposes. In exchange, the Nation waives claims for water rights and injury against current Verde watershed users, explicitly 'preserving the status quo' for neighbors. The Nation frames the deal as resolving Arizona Indian water rights amid a third-decade drought and 'impending shortages on the Colorado River, both here in Arizona and across the entire Colorado River Basin.' Longstanding posture: it has fought for decades for a secured, quantified water supply and river protection, and it pairs settlement infrastructure with proactive water and clean-energy investment (WIFA-financed wastewater treatment plant replacing sewage lagoons; DOE-studied rooftop/facility solar). Ratifying/funding legislation is pending: H.R.6931 (reintroduced Dec 2025 by Rep. Crane) and S.3617 (Jan 2026 by Sens. Kelly & Gallego), authorizing $1.039 billion, including the Cragin-Verde Pipeline (from C.C. Cragin Reservoir on the Mogollon Rim) and a surface-water drinking plant. As of mid-2026 the Nation is publicly lobbying for congressional passage in the 2026 session; the money is NOT yet appropriated.

On conservation. Likely supportive-to-neutral, conditional on sovereignty and its own entitlement being untouched. The Settlement text itself 'promotes water conservation' and protects Verde flows, so a verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns with the Nation's stated conservation and river-protection values. A market could also let the Nation monetize a portion of its confirmed/CAP water (system-conservation payments) as non-federal revenue to co-fund infrastructure while the appropriation lags, which is attractive. Persuadable rather than automatic ally: tribes are wary of any mechanism that quantifies, prices, or moves 'their' water in ways that could later be used to cap entitlements or erode instream-flow protections. They will want tribal opt-in, control over whether and how much to participate, protection of the instream right, and assurance participation does not count against or waive settlement rights.

On solar+water. Most likely positive of the three, and a genuine engagement opening. The Nation already pursues clean energy (rooftop/facility solar, solar streetlights, DOE Tribal Energy proposals) and has unmet capital needs for water infrastructure the federal settlement has not yet funded. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water maps onto both its energy-development interest and its funding gap, and could accelerate or backstop the Cragin-Verde Pipeline / drinking plant. Persuadable, not guaranteed: the Nation will insist on sovereignty (project on or benefiting tribal terms, not siting that burdens the reservation), real tribal ownership/revenue rather than a land-lease-only deal, protection of the Verde and cultural sites, and water commitments that supplement rather than substitute for the federal settlement obligation. Framed as tribal-owned generation plus a dedicated water-infrastructure fund, this is the highest-probability 'yes.'

On reuse/desal. Neutral-to-cautiously-favorable but lowest salience. The Nation's own solution is surface water (Cragin pipeline + treatment) and it has already built modern wastewater treatment, so it understands and accepts reuse in principle. Large-scale reuse/desalination is mostly a Phoenix/CAP-system and Basin-scale supply-augmentation play that is geographically distant from the Verde Valley; the Nation would view it favorably to the extent it relieves pressure on the Colorado River and CAP (protecting the reliability of its CAP entitlement) and does not divert federal attention or dollars away from funding its pending settlement. Skepticism triggers: cost, if augmentation is used as a rationale to deny or delay tribal settlement funding, or any implication that tribes should shoulder augmentation costs. Persuadable, but this is not where they lead.

A win for them. A funded, permanent, sovereign water future for the Verde Valley reservation: enactment and full appropriation of the Water Rights Settlement with the Cragin-Verde Pipeline and surface-water drinking plant actually built, the 4,610 AFY entitlement (including the CAP/Colorado River share) secured and reliable through Basin shortages, and the Verde River instream flow protected for cultural and ecological continuity. A win also includes new non-federal capital and revenue (tribal-owned solar+storage, a dedicated water fund, or opt-in conservation payments) that de-risk the years-long wait for congressional money, expand tribal energy self-sufficiency, and strengthen rather than compromise the Nation's sovereignty and settlement rights.

Public record. The Nation's 2024 water rights settlement explicitly includes rights to reuse all of its effluent and it has actively pursued solar energy projects on its lands.

Position. YCWUA is a private non-profit corporation formed in 1903 that has operated and maintained the Valley Division of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Yuma Project since 1951. Its landowners hold a Priority One (present perfected) right to the Colorado River, the most senior agricultural entitlement in Arizona, junior only to the Colorado River Indian Tribes. GM Tom Davis (since Jan 2007) frames the right as crop-based beneficial use, not a fixed cap: 'whatever the requirement of the crop... that outlines or defines the amount of water that can be diverted.' Operationally it serves ~50,000 acres across ~300 parcels, delivers ~100 billion gallons/yr, and diverts ~350,000 acre-feet/yr, co-operating Imperial Dam, the All-American Canal, and delivery infrastructure to San Luis. Longstanding public posture: defend senior priority rights and Present Perfected Rights under the Law of the River; argue that Yuma's small footprint (~8% of basin irrigation water) produces outsized value (~18% of basin crop sales; the nation's winter vegetables), so equal or across-the-board cuts are the wrong frame. On the post-2026 federal plan, Yuma-area interests pushed back hard through counsel (attorney Ben Horwich for four Yuma irrigation districts) that 'the impacts of water reductions to Yuma would be especially severe' given ag is ~two-thirds of the local economy, and that federal proposals don't adequately weigh disruption. At the same time YCWUA has been an active, pragmatic conservation participant: it pursued WaterSMART Small-Scale Water Efficiency grants (e.g., the Larkin Lateral piping project cutting evaporation/seepage losses) and neighboring Yuma-basin districts have executed compensated System Conservation / fallowing agreements (YMIDD's 2023 SCIA created ~21,828 AF via fallowing). Return-flow geography at the delta complicates compensation: 'whatever water they divert is what they consume,' so upstream/central-Arizona users don't capture Yuma savings, which shapes how YCWUA evaluates any deal.

On conservation. Likely receptive but hard-bargaining, conditional on money, verification method, and no erosion of priority. YCWUA and adjacent Yuma districts have already shown willingness to fallow and pipe for compensation (WaterSMART grants; regional SCIA fallowing at ~\$1,500/AF-class economics). A verified consumptive-use market plays directly to their strongest card: extremely senior, reliable water that is genuinely 'wet' when conserved. Key conditions: (a) payments must reflect the value of senior water, not average-cost fallowing; (b) accounting must handle Yuma's delta return-flow reality so they get credit for real consumptive-use reductions and are not shortchanged by diversion-vs-consumption confusion; (c) participation must be voluntary, temporary, and explicitly non-precedential to their priority date. Persuadable-to-ally on this specific mechanism if those conditions hold.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not their core lever, so likely neutral-to-mildly-positive rather than a champion. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive as new outside capital that could pay for on-farm/canal efficiency (lining, piping, telemetry, tailwater recovery) or compensate fallowing without touching their priority. Yuma has abundant solar resource and marginal/retired ag land that could host generation. Concerns: they will resist anything that looks like permanently converting senior-water farmland to non-ag use (loss of the rights and the ag economy that is two-thirds of the county), and they will want water benefits delivered as verified, bankable AF rather than vague 'funds water' promises. Engageable if structured as capital-for-efficiency plus optional temporary fallowing, with land and rights staying in ag hands.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, low near-term relevance to them directly, but strategically useful. Large-scale reuse/desalination (including the long-discussed brackish/agricultural-drainage treatment and Sea of Cortez desal concepts near Yuma, echoing the Yuma Desalting Plant legacy) is welcomed by senior ag as 'new water' that reduces pressure to curtail existing rights. YCWUA would favor augmentation that lets the basin avoid cutting seniors and would point to Yuma's history as a natural host for drainage-treatment/desal infrastructure. Caveats: they will insist reuse/desal be additive and not used as a rationale to reallocate their entitlement, and they will scrutinize who pays and who gets the produced water. Ally on augmentation as a concept; watchful that it not become a bait-and-switch on rights.

A win for them. A win is durable, well-compensated participation that protects the priority right permanently while turning their senior, reliable water into a revenue stream. Concretely: new outside capital pays for canal/on-farm efficiency and telemetry (reducing losses without cutting production), verified consumptive-use savings are credited fairly under a Yuma-specific accounting method and paid at senior-water value, any fallowing is voluntary/temporary/non-precedential, and augmentation (reuse/desal, hyperscaler-funded supply) is additive so the basin stops threatening curtailment of seniors. The Yuma winter-vegetable ag economy and land values stay intact, the Association keeps its Priority One standing untouched, and it is recognized as a solution partner and food-security asset rather than a target for cuts.

Position. YFVA is a 60+ year grower/industry association for the Yuma, Arizona farming region, the self-described 'Winter Lettuce Capital of North America.' It is the promotional and advocacy voice for growers who irrigate roughly 175,000-210,000 acres (170,000+ in vegetables) with direct diversions from the Lower Colorado River. LONGSTANDING POSITIONS: (1) Seniority is sacred. YFVA's core message is that Yuma holds 'some of the most senior rights on the Colorado River' (Present Perfected Rights predating the 1922 Compact), and that 'with those rights, the Yuma area has always enjoyed water certainty.' The association exists in part to defend that legal seniority against reallocation. (2) Water = national food security. Its signature framing is 'Water in Yuma means food security for the Nation,' backed by the claim that Nov-Apr, ~90% of US and Canada leafy greens come from Yuma (~170M servings of lettuce/day). (3) 'We are already efficient / we are the conservation story.' YFVA and the affiliated Yuma-area coalition point to Yuma ag cutting water use ~15% since 1990 and ~18% since 1975 via laser-leveling, drip/sprinkler, tailwater recovery and cropping shifts, leaving 'tens of thousands of acre-feet in the river every year.' Yuma consumes ~8% of basin irrigation water but generates ~18% of basin crop sales and ~$3-4B/yr in sales, an efficiency/value argument used to say Yuma is the wrong place to cut. (4) 'A seat at the table, not all the water.' Yuma leadership (e.g., Mayor Doug Nicholls, growers like Matt McGuire) publicly say they are not demanding everything, but that solutions must include Yuma and must not let the federal government reallocate senior ag water to cities. On the post-2026 operating guidelines (DEIS process, current rules expire end of 2026), Yuma-district attorneys and growers have pushed back hard, warning ag is ~two-thirds of Yuma's economy and the federal proposal understates the harm of cuts. NOTE: YFVA itself is a promotion/education association; the hard legal advocacy is carried by allied bodies (Yuma-area irrigation districts, the Yuma County Agriculture Water Coalition, Western Growers). YFVA supplies the public narrative (food security, efficiency, seniority) those bodies litigate and lobby on.

On conservation. CAUTIOUSLY FAVORABLE, on strict terms, and only as a SELLER of last resort, not a systemic donor. Yuma growers already participate in compensated conservation adjacent programs (deficit irrigation, on-farm efficiency, system conservation payments in the $300-400/AF range in the region) and brand themselves as the efficiency leaders of the basin, so a verified, voluntary, well-priced consumptive-use market is not ideologically alien. They would engage IF: (a) participation is strictly voluntary and cannot be converted into a lever to erode Present Perfected Rights or set a precedent for mandatory ag-to-city reallocation; (b) verification credits THEIR baseline, i.e., recognizes efficiency gains already banked rather than treating Yuma as untapped fat to cut; (c) pricing reflects the very high value of the water to winter-veg production (their opportunity cost per AF is far above alfalfa growers', so lowball basin-wide prices will not move them); and (d) their seniority is legally ring-fenced so selling conserved water this year does not weaken their claim next year. WATCH-OUTS: deep skepticism that 'conservation markets' are a soft path to permanently redistributing senior ag water to Phoenix/Tucson/LA; strong resistance to fallowing high-value vegetable acreage (vs. forage); and insistence that food-security value be counted, not just acre-feet. They are persuadable suppliers, not enthusiastic ones.

On solar+water. PERSUADABLE, with the water-funding hook doing the work, not the energy. YFVA growers are not a large electric-pumping load the way CAP is (Yuma is largely gravity/direct-diversion irrigation), so a solar+storage buildout is not an obvious operational win for them the way it is for a pumped project. The interest is indirect: (1) a hyperscaler-funded structure that PAYS Yuma growers for verified conservation or on-farm efficiency upgrades (drip, tailwater recovery, automation) is attractive because it brings non-federal capital that lets them modernize and monetize water WITHOUT surrendering rights; (2) agrivoltaics or lease income on marginal parcels could diversify revenue. But there is real friction: Yuma sits in a booming solar/data-center corridor and growers are wary of losing prime farmland and water to non-ag uses, and of data centers competing for the same scarce water and grid. They will react negatively to any structure that reads as 'convert farmland/water to serve tech load,' and positively only to structures where growers keep farming, keep their rights, and the outside capital funds efficiency or pays for genuinely surplus conserved water. Net: engage them as recipients of capital and efficiency funding, not as a site for load.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE, and arguably their PREFERRED systemic solution. Large-scale reuse/desalination is the option most aligned with Yuma growers' core interest because it creates NEW supply and thereby relieves the political pressure to reallocate senior ag water to cities, which is the outcome they most fear. Yuma has direct historical relevance here (the Yuma Desalting Plant, built to treat drainage and meet the Mexico treaty obligation, sits in the area), so desal is a familiar concept, not a threat. Growers would welcome augmentation (coastal/Sea of Cortez desal, municipal reuse, brackish groundwater treatment) as the 'grow the pie' answer that lets cities meet demand without raiding Yuma. CAVEATS they will raise: it must be additive and city/industry-funded, not a cost passed to ag; it must not become a bargaining excuse to undervalue or reallocate their existing water; and it must actually get built (skepticism about $/AF and timelines on mega-desal). Reuse and desal that visibly reduce municipal demand on the river are the clearest 'win-win' YFVA can get behind.

A win for them. A win is durable water certainty for Yuma's high-value winter-vegetable economy WITHOUT surrendering their senior Present Perfected Rights. Concretely: (a) the post-2026 rules and any conservation market explicitly protect Yuma's seniority and treat their prior efficiency gains as banked, not as fat to cut; (b) any water they contribute is strictly voluntary, generously priced to winter-veg opportunity cost, funded by cities/industry/hyperscalers rather than by ag, and reversible so it never erodes their claim; (c) new supply from reuse/desalination relieves the pressure to reallocate ag water at all; (d) outside capital funds further on-farm efficiency so they keep producing more food with less water and get paid for the surplus; and (e) Yuma keeps its 'seat at the table' and its identity as America's winter salad bowl intact. The deepest win: proof that they can be part of the solution and be paid for it, while their legal position comes out stronger, not weaker.

Public record. The YFVA has stated that growers will consider giving up a portion of their water for high value compensation to leave water in Lake Mead, while also emphasizing their critical role in the nation's food supply.

Position. YMIDD is one of three districts in the Yuma Mesa Division of the Bureau of Reclamation's Gila Project (reauthorized 1947), delivering Colorado River water to roughly 25,000 acres of Yuma Mesa farmland (heavily citrus/lemon plus winter vegetables). Its defining public position is a paradox that makes it persuadable: it holds SENIOR present-perfected rights (the Yuma-area Valley Division carries a 1901 priority date; Yuma Project/Reservation Division rights are among the most senior on the river and are protected under the 1922 Compact and the Arizona v. California decree), yet it has been one of the most ACTIVE and willing paid-conservation participants on the Lower Basin. Longstanding position: defend the priority system and present-perfected rights absolutely, but voluntarily forbear/conserve water FOR COMPENSATION on terms the district sets. YMIDD signed a 2008 System Conservation Agreement with Reclamation, ran a voluntary Pilot Fallowing Program to prop up Lake Mead, and in the 2023-2025 round accepted roughly $400/acre-foot to leave ~72,477 acre-feet in Lake Mead (part of the $64M IRA-funded Arizona conservation package). Limoneira, a major Yuma Mesa citrus grower, monetized this by fallowing 581 of its ~1,300 acres for ~$1.32M/year through the district's program. The three Yuma Mesa Division districts have historically left ~75,000 AF/yr of shared entitlement in the river for others (mostly central Arizona). Politically, YMIDD sits inside the Yuma County Agriculture Water Coalition orbit (coordinator/attorney Wade Noble), whose stance is: we control the water, our forbearance is voluntary and priced, 'we're not going to negotiate with ourselves,' and cuts imposed without compensation or a seat at the table will be fought. On post-2026 operations, Yuma-area interests (echoed by the City of Yuma's March 2026 comments on the draft EIS) insist the priority system be preserved and that river-dependent communities not be disproportionately hit. National-food-security framing is a core rhetorical asset: Yuma produces most of the U.S. winter vegetables and, per WRRC framing, uses ~8% of basin irrigation water while generating ~18% of basin crop sales.

On conservation. Most receptive of the three interventions. YMIDD has already proven it will sell verified consumptive-use conservation at scale and repeatedly (2008 System Conservation Agreement, pilot fallowing, 2023-2025 at ~$400/AF for ~72,477 AF). A verified consumptive-use market is its preferred instrument BECAUSE it monetizes seniority without surrendering the underlying right. Expect enthusiastic engagement IF three conditions hold: (1) price is right and durable (the coalition's stated ask has run to ~$1,500/AF for permanent programs vs the ~$400/AF fallowing rate, so it will push hard on price), (2) the right of return is airtight (no permanent forfeiture of present-perfected rights, 'use it or lose it' waived), and (3) rigorous, trusted MRV that doesn't become a backdoor to mandatory cuts. Risk: for perennial citrus, consumptive-use reduction is harder than for annual vegetables (you can deficit-irrigate or remove blocks but not costlessly), so the district will want per-crop pricing and multi-year certainty. It will resent any market framed as a substitute for compensation of imposed cuts.

On solar+water. Cautiously interested but not natural constituency; treat as persuadable-to-neutral. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive as a NEW, non-federal, potentially permanent funding source to replace uncertain IRA money and to pay for on-farm efficiency (canal lining is largely done; next gains are drip/micro-irrigation, tailwater recovery, and land retirement). Yuma Mesa's abundant sun and available/fallowed acreage make co-location physically plausible, and citrus growers already understand leasing marginal land. Concerns the district will raise: (1) does the water funded by this deal come OFF its priority entitlement or is it additive/new supply, (2) who controls the conserved/freed water and does participation erode present-perfected rights, (3) will solar leases on prime farmland trigger local-economy and food-security backlash (Yuma's identity is winter-vegetable capital, not an energy park). It will prefer arrangements where energy money pays growers to keep water rights intact while reducing consumptive use, rather than schemes that convert farmland to permanent energy use. Likely supportive only if the water benefit is verifiable, the priority stack is untouched, and Yuma keeps agricultural primacy.

On reuse/desal. Institutionally supportive in principle, self-interested in practice, and geographically central to this debate. The Yuma Desalting Plant (YDP), built under Minute 242 to treat Wellton-Mohawk drainage and help meet the Mexico treaty delivery, sits in the district's backyard, so YMIDD is intimately familiar with desal/reuse economics and their historical cost/operational problems. Large-scale reuse and desalination (including CAP's stated interest in desal, reuse, and augmentation) are welcomed as SUPPLY AUGMENTATION that takes pressure off the priority fight and reduces the political appetite to cut senior ag. But YMIDD will insist augmentation is genuinely NEW water that relieves the system rather than a rationale to reallocate its senior entitlement, and it will be wary of paying for expensive new supply that benefits junior downstream/urban users while ag foots the bill. Neutral-to-positive: good if it grows the pie and protects priority; opposed if used as leverage to justify cutting Yuma ag.

A win for them. A durable, well-funded, voluntary program that (a) pays growers premium, multi-year, per-crop compensation to reduce consumptive use, (b) leaves their senior 1901-priority present-perfected rights legally intact with a guaranteed right of return and no 'use it or lose it' penalty, (c) replaces uncertain federal/IRA money with a stable non-federal funding source (hyperscaler energy revenue or a permanent conservation market) so the payments outlast one appropriations cycle, and (d) preserves Yuma's identity and economy as the nation's winter-vegetable/citrus capital rather than converting it to fallow or energy land. In short: get paid well and permanently for flexibility they already offer, while their seniority and community standing are formally protected and celebrated as a national-food-security asset.

Public record. YMIDD has participated in multiple paid pilot fallowing programs to voluntarily conserve Colorado River water and leave it in Lake Mead.

Position. Azusa Light & Water is the combined municipal electric-and-water utility for the City of Azusa in the San Gabriel Valley (LA County), CA. Its water supply is overwhelmingly LOCAL, not Colorado River: customers are served from the Main San Gabriel Basin (groundwater from wells adjacent to the spreading grounds) and San Gabriel River surface water treated at the Joseph F. Hsu Water Filtration Plant, with published mixes on the order of ~60% groundwater / ~40% local surface water and less than 1% from a Metropolitan Water District (MWD) treated-water connection. Azusa's groundwater pumping is governed by the Main San Gabriel Basin adjudication (1973 LA Superior Court judgment, administered by a nine-member Watermaster). The utility's only tie to Colorado River supply is INDIRECT and marginal: when its groundwater production exceeds its adjudicated water rights, imported water (State Water Project via the San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District's Devil Canyon-Azusa pipeline, plus MWD blend that can contain Colorado River water) is delivered to the basin as replenishment. So Azusa is a member of the broader MWD-served Southern California import system but is not a direct Colorado River contractor and does not depend on the river for its retail deliveries. On the water-crisis / drought front its public record is operational rather than political: it publishes a Drought Update page, activates a court-authorized drought commodity rate schedule (Rule No. 21) to offset conservation-driven revenue loss, runs even/odd-address outdoor watering restrictions, and offers the DRiP (Drought Resistant Landscape) rebate program (up to \$1,400/residential customer, \$15,000 for schools/businesses). I found no public statement by Azusa taking a position on Colorado River Basin allocation, the post-2026 interim guidelines, Lower Basin cuts, or interstate negotiations. On energy, Azusa is one of eleven members of the Southern California Public Power Authority (SCPPA) and already participates in large solar-plus-storage procurement (e.g., the SCPPA/EDF Renewables Bonanza Solar + Storage PPA in Clark County, NV, deliveries by end of 2028).

On conservation. Likely mildly positive / low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market operates on the Colorado River mainstem and Lower Basin allocations, where Azusa has no direct entitlement, so it is not a natural buyer or seller. Indirect upside: anything that firms up MWD's Colorado River position reduces the cost and improves the availability of the imported replenishment water Azusa leans on in dry years, which Azusa would welcome. But Azusa itself has little to trade (its savings live in a local adjudicated basin, not in river entitlements), so it would most likely defer to MWD, Upper District, and SGVMWD rather than engage directly. Net: supportive-in-principle, not an active participant. Confidence: moderate, inferred from supply structure rather than a stated position.

On solar+water. Potentially the most interesting fit, but as a partner/host rather than a Colorado River actor. Azusa is unusual in that it runs BOTH the electric and water utility for its city and already procures large solar+storage through SCPPA, so it understands renewables PPAs and municipal-utility economics. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could appeal if it (a) lowers Azusa's power-supply cost or adds local/regional clean generation it can access via SCPPA, and (b) channels water dollars into the things Azusa actually needs - basin replenishment, recycled-water recharge, treatment (the San Gabriel Basin has significant groundwater-contamination/treatment history), and drought resilience. Caution flags: a large new datacenter load inside or near Azusa's small electric system would strain capacity and could be politically sensitive; Azusa would want the deal structured so the water benefit is local (San Gabriel Basin) and not just a Colorado River offset that bypasses it. Net: persuadable-to-positive if the package includes tangible local power and water benefits; skeptical if it is a distant river deal with only nominal local value. Confidence: moderate, inferred.

On reuse/desal. Supportive in principle, especially reuse/recycled-water recharge; desalination less relevant. Azusa is inland with no coastal access, so ocean desal is not a direct play for it (brackish groundwater desal is conceivable but not evidenced). Water REUSE, however, aligns directly with how the Main San Gabriel Basin works: published basin management explicitly contemplates recycled water being used in place of imported water to supplement spreading-ground recharge. Anything that increases recycled-water recharge reduces Azusa's need for expensive imported SWP/MWD replenishment when it pumps above its rights, which is a clear operational and financial win. Constraint: Azusa is a small retailer and would participate through regional bodies (Watermaster, Upper District, SGVMWD, MWD's regional recycling programs) and via cost/permitting, not as a solo builder. Net: positive on reuse/recharge, neutral/low-relevance on desalination. Confidence: moderate-high on reuse alignment (grounded in basin docs), lower on desal.

A win for them. A win for Azusa is cheaper, more reliable water and power for its ratepayers with less exposure to imported-supply price spikes and drought rate shocks. Concretely: (1) new local recycled-water recharge that lets Azusa stay within its adjudicated basin rights without buying costly SWP/MWD replenishment in dry years; (2) funding or cost-offset for groundwater treatment/contamination and basin resilience in the Main San Gabriel Basin; (3) clean, firm, affordable power it can access through SCPPA without straining its small electric system or spiking rates; (4) reduced need to trigger its drought commodity rate schedule, protecting ratepayers and revenue stability. A hyperscaler energy+water package that routes real dollars into San Gabriel Valley reuse/recharge and treatment - while giving Azusa a share of low-cost solar+storage - is the version of these initiatives most likely to make Azusa an active partner rather than a bystander.

Public record. As a Southern California municipal utility, it is reliant on Colorado River water and its Urban Water Management Plan is focused on ensuring long-term supply reliability, making it open to conservation and new supply solutions.

Position. The City of Cody is a real municipal water utility in Park County, northwest Wyoming, serving roughly 10,000 residents. But it is NOT a Colorado River Basin stakeholder, and this appears to be a misclassification in the stakeholder list. Cody's water comes from the Shoshone River (North Fork and South Fork), which feeds Buffalo Bill Reservoir; the city buys treated water from the Shoshone Municipal Pipeline (SMP) and in 2022 purchased 543 million gallons, about 44.6% of SMP's total deliveries, making it SMP's largest customer. Hydrologically the Shoshone River drains northeast into the Bighorn River, then the Yellowstone, then the Missouri, then the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. This is the Missouri River Basin, with ZERO hydrologic connection to the Colorado River. Wyoming's Colorado River Basin water use is confined to five southwestern counties (Carbon, Lincoln, Sublette, Sweetwater, Uinta) in the Green River and Little Snake River drainages; Park County is not among them and Cody holds no Colorado River water rights or Compact allocation. On its OWN basin, Cody faces real drought stress: 2026 is one of the earliest, most severe water-regulation seasons in Wyoming Bighorn Basin history, with Buffalo Bill Reservoir May-July inflow forecast at 450,000 acre-feet (64% of the 30-year average of 705,000 af) and the reservoir about 68% full as of May 1, 2026. No public record found of Cody taking any position on the Colorado River crisis, which is consistent with it having no standing in that basin.

On conservation. Not applicable / unknown. A verified consumptive-use conservation market on the Colorado River (System Conservation-style paid forbearance among Compact-holding users) has no mechanism to touch Cody. Cody has no Colorado River consumptive use to enroll and would neither buy nor sell in such a market. If the intent is to engage Cody as a demand-management analog on ITS basin, that is a Bighorn/Missouri Basin conversation, not a Colorado River one.

On solar+water. Unknown / weakly applicable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could in principle interest any small Wyoming utility looking to offset capital costs (Cody buys wholesale water and runs ~102 miles of main). But the 'also funds water' hook is being sold as Colorado River relief; for Cody there is no Colorado River water to relieve. Interest, if any, would be purely local (Bighorn Basin resilience, rate relief), and there is no public evidence Cody is pursuing or opposing such a deal. Do not count Cody as a Colorado River lever here.

On reuse/desal. Unknown / not applicable to the Colorado River. Large-scale reuse or desalination is generally pitched as Lower Basin / coastal augmentation to free up Colorado River supply. Cody, an inland Missouri-Basin utility with a snowpack-fed surface supply, is not a candidate site, a beneficiary, or a decision-maker for Colorado River reuse/desal. Municipal reuse could theoretically matter to Cody as a local drought hedge, but that is unrelated to the Colorado River crisis.

A win for them. For Cody specifically, a 'win' has nothing to do with the Colorado River. It is secure, affordable Shoshone/Buffalo Bill supply through a drying Bighorn Basin: firm SMP wholesale deliveries, protected Buffalo Bill Reservoir storage, stable water rates for ~10,000 residents, and capital help for aging distribution mains. A Colorado River conservation market, hyperscaler water fund, or desal project delivers Cody none of that unless it is explicitly redirected to its actual basin.

Public record. The City of Cody is not located within the Colorado River Basin, and therefore has no public stance on these specific basin policies.

Position. No public positions on the Colorado River crisis were found, which is consistent with the stakeholder having no stake in that basin. Powell is a small public-power municipality (2020 pop. ~6,500; ~2026 est. ~6,589) that operates its own electric, water, sewer, and garbage utilities. Its electric utility serves ~3,300 meters and buys wholesale power through the Wyoming Municipal Power Agency (WMPA). Its water utility purchased ~319 million gallons in 2022 (about 26.2% of Shoshone Municipal Pipeline deliveries), sourced from Buffalo Bill Reservoir. The city's public water-policy engagement is with the Shoshone/Bighorn system (Shoshone Project, Willwood Dam sediment/watershed planning, Shoshone Irrigation District), not the Colorado River. No Colorado River compact, conservation, or drought-response positions are on record.

On conservation. N/A / unknown. A verified consumptive-use conservation market in the Colorado River basin would not affect Powell; it holds no Colorado River consumptive-use rights to sell or curtail. No reaction expected. (If the mechanism were extended to the Shoshone/Bighorn system, a separate analysis would be required, but that is outside the Colorado River scope.)

On solar+water. N/A / unknown for the Colorado River context. As a public-power town via WMPA with its own electric utility, Powell could in principle have generic interest in a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout for local power economics, but there is no Colorado River water-funding linkage for Powell because its water is not Colorado River water. Any such offer to Powell would be a standalone Bighorn-region energy proposition, not a Colorado River play.

On reuse/desal. N/A / unknown. Large-scale reuse/desalination framed as Colorado River basin augmentation has no bearing on Powell's supply. Powell is a surface-water (reservoir) system in a different basin; it is not a candidate beneficiary or funder of Colorado River augmentation. No reaction expected.

A win for them. Not applicable to the Colorado River crisis. There is no Colorado River outcome that constitutes a win or loss for the City of Powell because it has no interest in that basin. Local wins for Powell relate to the Shoshone Municipal Pipeline reliability, Buffalo Bill Reservoir management, affordable WMPA wholesale power, and infrastructure funding, all in the Bighorn/Missouri system.

Public record. The City of Powell is located in the Bighorn Basin, part of the Missouri River watershed, and has no public record of engagement on Colorado River issues, making it an opponent of spending resources on this agenda.

Position. Longstanding public position is LOCAL SUPPLY SELF-RELIANCE and reducing dependence on costly imported water. RPU consistently frames recycled water and local groundwater as ways to 'avoid costly imported water supplies' and 'increase water supply reliability.' The 2017 agreement with Western Municipal Water District is the flagship expression: instead of buying imported water, Riverside leverages surplus local groundwater rights, sells the surplus, and rents its conveyance system to WMWD. RPU has invested with regional partners in local recharge (e.g., the ~$55M Santa Ana River Enhanced Recharge Phase 1-B completed Feb 2025, roughly doubling local recharge capacity and capturing up to 80,000 AFY of stormwater with San Bernardino Valley MWD, WMWD, and the Conservation District) and in a recycled-water/'Riverside Resilient Water Initiative' program at the Regional Water Quality Control Plant (bioenergy expansion, tertiary recycled water for irrigation and groundwater replenishment). No evidence of RPU taking public positions on Colorado River Basin allocation politics, the post-2026 operating guidelines, Lower Basin cuts, or interstate negotiations. Those are handled at the MWD / state / basin-state level, not by a locally-supplied retail city. Treat any specific Colorado River policy stance as UNKNOWN / not publicly stated.

On conservation. LIKELY MILDLY SUPPORTIVE but LOW-PRIORITY / SELF-INTERESTED-NEUTRAL. A verified consumptive-use conservation market for Colorado River water primarily benefits direct Colorado contractors (agricultural districts, MWD, tribes, other basin users). RPU is not a Colorado consumptive user, so it neither buys nor sells in such a market directly. Indirectly, anything that stabilizes the Colorado and lowers regional imported-water price pressure is good for RPU's neighbors and for the regional system it sits inside, and RPU's own posture already values monetizing surplus water rights (it does exactly this locally with WMWD). So RPU would likely view a credible, well-verified conservation market favorably in principle and as philosophically aligned with its own 'sell surplus, avoid imports' model, but it is not a natural early adopter, funder, or vocal champion. Reaction: quiet approval, not active participation. Confidence: MODERATE (inference from documented behavior, no direct statement).

On solar+water. POTENTIALLY THE MOST INTERESTING ANGLE, because RPU is a combined ELECTRIC + water utility, not just water. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water touches both sides of RPU's business. On the electric side, RPU is a load-serving public power utility that already pursues renewable energy (renewable integration is part of its Resilient Water Initiative and broader mandate), so datacenter-anchored solar+storage that adds firm local generation and grid resilience is plausibly attractive IF it does not strand RPU assets, undercut its rate base, or hand load/generation control to an outside party. On the water side, RPU is water-secure locally, so it does not 'need' hyperscaler water money to survive, but capital for recharge, recycled-water expansion, and RWQCP upgrades would be welcome and consistent with its investment pattern. Key tensions: a large new datacenter load is a big water AND power draw in a basin RPU manages, so RPU would scrutinize the net water balance and would resist a deal that consumes local groundwater it currently monetizes. Reaction: PERSUADABLE-TO-INTERESTED where the deal brings capital + renewable generation and respects RPU's rate base and groundwater rights; SKEPTICAL where a hyperscaler wants to plant thirsty load on top of Riverside's aquifer. Confidence: MODERATE, and this is the segment most worth a direct conversation.

On reuse/desal. SUPPORTIVE OF REUSE, LUKEWARM ON DESAL. RPU already runs an active recycled-water program (tertiary recycled water for irrigation and groundwater replenishment) and a Regional Water Quality Control Plant it is actively upgrading, and it explicitly frames reuse as freeing potable supply and avoiding imported-water cost. Large-scale reuse expansion (including any move toward advanced treatment / potable reuse and more groundwater replenishment) is directly on-strategy and would likely be welcomed, especially if externally co-funded. Desalination is a weaker fit: Riverside is inland in the Santa Ana watershed and relies on brackish/groundwater desalting concepts (regional Chino/Arlington desalters exist in the area) rather than seawater desal, and it does not have the coastal-import dependence that drives cities toward ocean desalination. So RPU would view seawater desal as a regional MWD-scale project it benefits from indirectly (relieves imported system) but would not lead or heavily fund. Brackish-groundwater desalting that improves local basin usability is more aligned. Reaction: reuse = ally-leaning; desal = neutral-to-mildly-positive on regional relief, not a champion. Confidence: MODERATE-HIGH for reuse, MODERATE for desal.

A win for them. A win for RPU is: more secure, lower-cost LOCAL water supply and a stronger local generation/grid position, funded substantially by outside capital, without ceding control of their groundwater rights, their rate base, or their infrastructure to a third party. Concretely: (a) additional funded local recharge, recycled-water and potable-reuse capacity that lets them keep selling surplus groundwater and wheeling water for WMWD at favorable terms; (b) hyperscaler/renewable capital that adds firm solar+storage to their electric system and improves reliability for ratepayers while adding load they can serve profitably, with a net-neutral-or-better local water balance; (c) reduced regional exposure to Colorado River / imported-water price shocks that protects the economics of their local-supply strategy. The ideal outcome preserves and enhances their signature identity as the Southern California city that got off imported water and now profits from its water independence.

Public record. RPU's 2023 Integrated Resource Plan and public goals commit to 100% zero-carbon electricity by 2040, with significant investments in geothermal, solar, wind, and battery storage.

Position. No public positions on the Colorado River crisis, drought policy, or basin allocation could be found. Hydroscreen Inc. is a small, family-run manufacturer of water-powered and electric self-cleaning filtration/screening units for irrigation systems (removes trash and debris down to 1/8 inch; six standard models A/B/C and AE/BE/CE plus custom, 1,500-4,500 gpm). Founded 1961, hand-built in the USA. Public records place its headquarters in Eaton, COLORADO (not Utah, despite the dataset's state tag); Utah is one of seven Western states it sells into (also CO, ID, MT, OR, WA, WY). Reported annual revenue ~$3M (2026 estimate); president listed variously as Warren Milne with Justin and Shannon Lee as primary contacts. It is a commercial equipment vendor to farms, ditch companies, fish hatcheries, dairies, and fire ponds, not an advocacy organization, water district, or policy actor. It has no recorded testimony, rulemaking comments, coalition membership, or public statements on Lake Powell/Lake Mead operations, the post-2026 guidelines, or basin conservation. Its only implicit stake is that its entire market is Western agricultural irrigation water use.

On conservation. Likely neutral-to-mildly-negative but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market that pays irrigators to reduce diversions or fallow land would, at the margin, erode the very agricultural diversion activity Hydroscreen equips. If conservation is achieved by taking water/ditches out of service, replacement and new-unit demand softens. However, if conservation is pursued through efficiency and measurement (accurate diversion, reduced spillage, screened/piped systems that verify delivered vs. diverted volumes), the company could benefit, since fine screening supports cleaner measurement and piped conversions. Net: probably indifferent as an institution; no incentive to organize for or against. Persuadable only insofar as the market is framed around efficiency retrofits rather than pure retirement of irrigated acreage.

On solar+water. Likely indifferent. A hyperscaler-funded solar-plus-storage buildout that also funds water has no direct bearing on a ditch-screen manufacturer's product line. Secondary effects are minor: data-center and solar development that retires or dries up farmland reduces irrigation demand (slightly negative for the installed base), while new industrial/municipal raw-water intakes could create niche demand for coarse screening. No evidence the company operates in the industrial or municipal intake segment at scale (that is more the domain of the separate Colorado-based Hydroscreen Co. LLC, a distinct Coanda-screen engineering firm). Expect no organized reaction.

On reuse/desal. Likely indifferent to mildly positive but out-of-scope for its core business. Large-scale reuse and desalination shift supply toward engineered/municipal-industrial water and away from raw surface-water agricultural diversion, which is neutral-to-slightly-negative for irrigation-ditch screening demand. Pretreatment on reuse/desal intakes uses far finer, membrane-grade filtration than Hydroscreen's 1/8-inch debris screens, so the company is not positioned to capture that market with current products. No public statements suggest interest either way. Expect no engagement.

A win for them. A win is commercial, not political: sustained or growing demand for their screening hardware. That means Colorado River responses that keep irrigated agriculture operating and modernizing (efficiency retrofits, screened/piped conversions, fish-protection screening on diversions, infrastructure-modernization funding) rather than large-scale permanent fallowing or buy-and-dry that removes ditches from service. Any conservation program structured around upgrading and measuring diversions rather than retiring them is favorable to them; wholesale retirement of irrigated acreage is unfavorable.

Public record. No public positions on broad Colorado River policy were found, but as a manufacturer of water screening equipment, its business interests align with new water infrastructure investments.

Position. IWT is a small, privately held point-of-use water purification MANUFACTURER, not a Colorado River basin water-allocation or reuse/desalination policy actor. Its flagship products are the SunSpring Hybrid (solar/wind-powered, self-contained ultrafiltration/microbiological drinking-water unit producing 20,000+ liters/day for 10+ years off-grid) and the SunSpring Mini (portable UF unit for first responders and the US military). The company frames itself around off-grid, decentralized, renewable-powered clean drinking-water access. It has completed 1,500+ projects in 38 countries and its market is disaster relief, international humanitarian development, schools/hospitals/villages, and military/first-responder deployments. Its SunSpring Hybrid won the Colorado Chamber's 'Coolest Thing Made in Colorado' 2022 award. There is NO public evidence of any position on the Colorado River crisis specifically: no testimony, no compact/allocation advocacy, no involvement in Lower/Upper Basin conservation negotiations, no reuse/desal policy stance, and no public statements on Lake Mead/Lake Powell, cutbacks, or interstate exchanges. Its technology (household/community-scale microbiological purification) does not address the basin's core problem, which is CONSUMPTIVE-USE volume (agriculture ~70-80% of depletions), not drinking-water microbiological quality. Positions on the river crisis: UNKNOWN / not publicly stated.

On conservation. LIKELY NEUTRAL / MILDLY FAVORABLE but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market targets large agricultural and municipal water users and river depletions -- IWT is neither and sits in the Arkansas basin. It has no allocation to sell or protect, so a conservation market neither threatens nor directly rewards it. IWT's decentralized/off-grid ethos is philosophically aligned with 'use less, do more with less' framing, so leadership would likely voice generic support, but the company has no operational or financial stake and no public track record on such markets. Confidence LOW -- inferred from company identity, not from any stated position.

On solar+water. LIKELY MILDLY FAVORABLE, opportunistic. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water aligns with IWT's core identity (renewable-powered, off-grid water systems). IWT could see a datacenter/hyperscaler ecosystem as a potential customer or partner channel for decentralized purification at remote sites, worker camps, or community-benefit programs, and would welcome new capital flowing into 'energy + water' packages. But its product does not solve datacenter cooling-water demand or basin-scale supply, so any benefit is marketing/partnership-adjacent, not core. Confidence LOW.

On reuse/desal. MIXED / mostly NEUTRAL. Large-scale reuse and desalination are the supply-augmentation strategies most often paired with Colorado River shortfalls, but they are centralized, capital-intensive, membrane-RO/large-plant approaches -- a different technology class and scale from IWT's decentralized UF drinking-water units. IWT does not compete in seawater/brackish desal or municipal potable-reuse plant markets, so large reuse/desal buildouts are neither a direct opportunity nor a direct threat. Leadership might publicly favor decentralized alternatives over mega-projects (consistent with its brand), but no such position is documented. Confidence LOW.

A win for them. A win is commercial and reputational, not policy: new sales/deployment channels for SunSpring units (rural Colorado disadvantaged-community drinking water, tribal systems, disaster-resilience and military/first-responder contracts, remote-site or datacenter-adjacent community water programs), continued visibility as a Colorado clean-water innovation success story, and inclusion in any 'renewable energy + decentralized water access' funding or partnership package. They win when someone buys or funds hardware deployments and amplifies their Colorado-made, off-grid, humanitarian brand -- not when a compact or allocation fight is resolved one way or another.

Public record. IWT is a water purification technology manufacturer, not a direct policy actor in Colorado River allocations, and no public positions on the specified topics could be found.

Position. As State Engineer, Rein was Colorado's top water-law enforcer, responsible for administering water rights under the prior-appropriation doctrine and for Colorado's obligations under the 1922 Colorado River Compact to downstream states and Mexico. Key documented positions: (1) On curtailment terminology and philosophy - he deliberately rejected the phrase 'anticipatory mandatory curtailment' in favor of 'compact administration in the absence of a violation,' and explicitly declined to build a compliance buffer preemptively: 'If I'm concerned that in a few years, we might be out of compliance, that's a personal concern I may have, but I can't go out and do some administration to build a buffer.' (2) On how an actual compact call would be administered - he affirmed the priority system: 'If I found out today that our agency needs to administer a compact call tomorrow, then that's where we go, priority of administration.' (3) He preferred voluntary tools first, endorsing the state's 'voluntary, temporary and compensated' (VTC) demand-management framework and the drought management plan as 'the best effort' for now, and said any curtailment approach would be 'stakeholder-driven' with 'outreach, and a well-contemplated approach that complies with the law.' (4) On protecting Colorado's compact leverage - in November 2018 he directed all four Western Slope division engineers to exclude pre-compact (pre-June 25, 1929) water rights from the decennial abandonment list, reasoning: 'We need to allow for the fact that if those water rights are abandoned and taken off the tabulation, then that amount of water is no longer available to Colorado.' Pre-compact rights are exempt from involuntary cutbacks in a compact-call, so keeping them on the books preserves Colorado's consumptive-use tally and negotiating position. (5) He flagged Colorado's two big unresolved problems on exit: how the state would measure water statewide, and how it would curtail its OWN users to meet Lower Basin obligations - noting Colorado has no playbook for intra-state cuts. Consistent operating style (corroborated by colleagues and courtroom adversaries): listens to all sides, seeks 'win-win solutions' and middle ground, avoids 'my way or the highway,' proceduralist and law-first rather than advocacy-driven.

On conservation. Likely SUPPORTIVE but rigorous, given his documented endorsement of the 'voluntary, temporary and compensated' (VTC) demand-management model and his stated preference for voluntary tools before mandatory ones. A VERIFIED consumptive-use conservation market aligns squarely with the VTC framework he championed. His engineering-and-law lens means he would demand three things before backing it: (1) genuine verification of actual consumptive-use reduction (not paper savings or return-flow double-counting) - measurement was his signature unfinished priority; (2) protection of the priority system and third-party water rights so a conservation transaction cannot injure other appropriators; (3) certainty that conserved water counts toward Colorado's compact position and is not simply captured downstream. Skepticism, not opposition. Sell him on measurement rigor and legal defensibility, not on climate urgency or ROI.

On solar+water. UNKNOWN / likely cautious-neutral. No public record of Rein addressing datacenter, hyperscaler, or energy-water-nexus questions; this fell outside his administrative mandate. As a proceduralist he would neither champion nor reflexively oppose a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water. His probable frame: is the water piece structured as legally clean, verified consumptive-use conservation or new supply, or is it a marketing wrapper around water that still injures senior rights or the compact tally? He would treat the funding source as irrelevant and scrutinize the water accounting. A private-capital vehicle that finances VTC-style conservation or reuse infrastructure could earn his technical respect; a scheme that assumes new large industrial load has priority over existing appropriators would draw his skepticism. Mark reaction as low-confidence.

On reuse/desal. Likely PRAGMATICALLY FAVORABLE toward reuse; NEUTRAL-to-skeptical on desalination for Colorado specifically. Reuse and augmentation that create genuinely 'new' water (reducing demand on the natural stream and strengthening Colorado's consumptive-use accounting) fit his law-and-measurement worldview and his concern about preserving Colorado's compact position. He would insist reuse plans respect return-flow obligations and downstream senior rights - a core Colorado water-law constraint. Large-scale desalination is geographically marginal for landlocked Colorado (no coast; would be a Lower Basin / California-Arizona play or an interstate augmentation concept), so his engagement would be limited and he would evaluate it only insofar as it relieves pressure on the Compact system. He is unlikely to oppose desal on principle but would view it as someone else's tool, not Colorado's.

A win for them. For Rein, a 'win' is durable, legally sound Colorado water administration that survives a compact-call scenario without chaos or litigation: closing the two gaps he named - statewide measurement and a defensible playbook for intra-state curtailment - so Colorado can meet its Compact obligations while protecting the priority system and its consumptive-use tally. A conservation market or reuse program 'wins' with him if it demonstrably reduces real consumptive use, is verifiable and measurable, injures no other appropriators, and strengthens (never erodes) Colorado's negotiating position vs. the Lower Basin. He values middle-ground, stakeholder-driven, voluntary-first outcomes over coercive mandates. Legacy motive: being remembered for good, fair water administration ('it's very satisfying to say we're doing good water administration').

Public record. As State Engineer, he enforced existing water law and oversaw Colorado's 'hard pause' on paying for conservation, indicating a cautious, law-and-order stance rather than opposition to the agenda's goals.

Position. LAPLAWD is a small, young (formed 2008) quasi-municipal potable-water district covering ~400 sq mi of rural southeast La Plata County (and possibly SW Archuleta County), southwestern Colorado, excluding the towns of Bayfield and Ignacio. It sits in the Upper Basin, San Juan River sub-basin. Its mission is narrow and domestic: finance, build, operate a rural public water system delivering safe potable and fire-protection water, replacing failing wells and hauled water for scattered rural households. It has NO public position on the Colorado River basin crisis, shortage tiers, Lake Powell/Mead operations, or the post-2026 guidelines. The word 'Colorado River' does not appear in its FAQs; there is no board resolution, comment letter, or public statement on basin-scale policy found. Its supply portfolio is stored/settlement-based, not senior-diversion-based: it holds a contract to purchase Animas-La Plata Project (ALP) water from Lake Nighthorse (bought from CWCB at ~\$3,462/acre-foot plus O&M, e.g. a recent ~30 AF purchase for ~\$207,300), stored water from Vallecito Reservoir off the Pine River, and rights to direct diversions from the Animas, Pine, and/or Piedra Rivers; it uses no wells for supply. ALP/Lake Nighthorse is M&I-only (no ag, no leasing) and was built under the 1968 Colorado River Basin Project Act and the Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights Settlement, so LAPLAWD's supply is legally intertwined with tribal settlement water (Southern Ute holds ~35% of ALP). The district's public statements stress supply adequacy ('water rights are adequate, but more reliable stored water sources are also being secured') and its binding constraint is construction CAPITAL, not water availability: it explicitly says lower natural-gas prices cut its property-tax revenue and slowed pipeline construction.

On conservation. Largely irrelevant to them, mild indifference to slight wariness. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is built for large agricultural or M&I users with tradable, senior consumptive rights to fallow or forbear and sell. LAPLAWD is a small potable retailer whose ALP water is M&I-only and explicitly CANNOT be leased, and whose problem is delivering water it already owns, not having surplus consumptive use to monetize. It has little to sell and little to buy, so a conservation market neither threatens nor rewards it much. It might mildly favor basin-wide conservation that keeps San Juan/Animas storage healthy (protecting Vallecito and direct-diversion yields), and it would resist any market mechanism that tried to reclassify or claw back its M&I/settlement water. Net: low-salience, unlikely to engage unless the market touched San Juan sub-basin supplies it depends on.

On solar+water. Potentially the most relevant of the three, but only at small scale and with tribal/federal coordination. LAPLAWD runs pumping and treatment on a small ratepayer base and its build-out is capital-constrained, so a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that (a) lowered its pumping/treatment energy cost and (b) channeled funding into water infrastructure could directly relieve its two real pain points: energy O&M and construction capital. The hook is small dollars that move its needle, not grid-scale power. Big caveats: its service area overlaps or abuts the Southern Ute Reservation and its water flows through ALP/Reclamation and CWCB contracts, so any sited energy project must be led by the Tribe and federal partners, and the district would worry that large new data-center load could compete for the same regional water and grid. It would engage only if the structure clearly netted cheaper water delivery for its rural customers without new tax or rate burden, and it lacks the staff to run a complex deal alone.

On reuse/desal. Low relevance and likely low priority. Large-scale reuse and (especially) ocean/brackish desalination are supply-augmentation megaprojects aimed at big M&I systems and basin-scale balancing; they are far outside a 400-sq-mi rural district's scale, budget, and geography (inland San Juan headwaters, hundreds of miles from any coast). LAPLAWD already believes its rights are adequate and needs delivery capital, not new bulk supply. Small-scale local reuse could in theory stretch supply in dry years, but for a low-density rural potable system the capital and operating cost of reuse treatment per connection is hard to justify, and its water is M&I-only settlement/stored water rather than a scarcity-priced commodity. Expect little engagement unless a reuse project specifically lowered its cost of serving existing customers.

A win for them. A win is anything that gets safe, reliable water to more of its rural service area faster and cheaper without raising property taxes or rates on a small ratepayer base: outside capital (grants/low-cost loans/sponsored financing) for the next pipeline phases (e.g., Phase 2D along Hwy 172, the Fox Fire subdistrict), lower pumping/treatment energy and O&M cost, and a firmer, cheaper path to its Lake Nighthorse and Vallecito stored water. Secondarily, anything that stabilizes its capital pipeline against natural-gas-price swings in local property-tax revenue. It does not need a bigger water entitlement; it needs the money and infrastructure to deliver the water it already has rights to.

Public record. The district's 2014 Water Management and Conservation Plan states a goal to encourage reduced water use, but there is no recent, specific public record on the listed policy items.

Position. No public positions on the Colorado River basin crisis could be found. Menoken is a very small retail domestic water district (roughly $190K estimated annual revenue, ~5 staff, president Ryan Whitfield per third-party listings). It publishes only operational material: 2026 rates/budget, a Consumer Confidence Report, drought resources, and updates tied to Project 7's treatment plant. It has no independent river-policy voice, no water rights administration role of note, and no visible advocacy on Lake Powell/Lake Mead, the post-2026 Colorado River operating guidelines, upper-basin vs lower-basin allocation, or demand management. Its de facto position is inherited from Project 7 Water Authority, whose stated priority is supply resiliency: Project 7 relies on a single source (Gunnison River via the Gunnison Tunnel) and a single treatment plant serving ~50,000+ residents, and is pursuing a Regional Water Supply Program to add a second source, treatment, and distribution to be resilient to wildfire, drought, and Gunnison Tunnel transmission interruptions. Menoken's longstanding concern is therefore reliable, affordable delivery of treated municipal water, not basin-scale allocation politics. Everything beyond 'small municipal end-user dependent on Gunnison/Project 7 supply' is marked unknown for lack of public evidence.

On conservation. Likely neutral-to-mildly-supportive but low-salience. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is oriented to holders of large, senior consumptive water rights (agriculture, large municipalities). Menoken is a small treated-water retailer without meaningful marketable consumptive rights of its own, so it is neither a natural seller nor a natural buyer, and would have little direct stake. It might benefit indirectly if such a market kept more water in the Gunnison/Colorado system and eased pressure on Project 7's raw supply, and it is unlikely to oppose conservation on principle. But it lacks the water rights, staff, and financial capacity to participate meaningfully. Expect passive support, deference to Project 7 and the Uncompahgre Valley Water Users Association / Colorado River District, and no independent advocacy. Confidence low.

On solar+water. Likely cautiously receptive if it directly funds Project 7's Regional Water Supply Program (second source, treatment, distribution) or reduces Menoken's wholesale water costs, because the district's stated need is affordable supply resiliency it cannot self-finance. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure maps onto a real, acknowledged gap. But wariness is likely on two fronts: (1) a new large data-center/industrial load in a single-source, drought-exposed Gunnison supply area could be seen as competing for scarce water and grid capacity, and (2) a district this small has limited capacity to evaluate or negotiate such a deal and would defer to Project 7 and county/regional bodies. Net: persuadable-to-favorable only if the water funding is concrete and routed through the wholesale/regional structure, otherwise skeptical of new consumptive load. Confidence low.

On reuse/desal. Reuse is more relevant than desalination. Montrose is inland at high elevation with no seawater access, so large-scale ocean desalination is irrelevant to Menoken directly; brackish groundwater desalination is conceivable but not evidenced as a local priority. Municipal reuse/recycling could plausibly appeal as a way to stretch a single Gunnison source and improve resiliency, aligning with Project 7's diversification goals, but Menoken is a water (not wastewater) district and any reuse program would sit with wastewater/sanitation entities and Project 7, not Menoken alone. Expect mild, passive support for regional reuse if it lowers cost or shores up supply, indifference to desalination, and no independent leadership. Confidence low.

A win for them. A win is secure, affordable, resilient delivery of treated water to Montrose/Olathe customers: specifically, breaking the single-source Gunnison Tunnel dependency (a funded second source/treatment/distribution via Project 7's Regional Water Supply Program) without large rate increases on a small ratepayer base. Any proposal that lets Menoken tell its customers 'your water is reliable through drought and your bill stayed affordable' is a win. Basin-scale allocation victories matter to them only insofar as they keep Gunnison raw water flowing to Project 7.

Public record. No public record exists of the district's position on Colorado River policies, which is consistent with its small size and focus on local domestic water delivery.

Position. The S. D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation was a spend-down (limited-life) private family foundation that closed operations on December 31, 2020, having granted over $1 billion between its 2009 spend-down decision and its 2020 sunset. Its Environment Program made California water management one of its two 'big bets' (alongside K-8 STEM/education). Longstanding public positions, from its own program materials and third-party coverage: (1) California can meet the needs of both people and nature ONLY if surface water, groundwater, water quality, and flood protection are managed jointly ('integrated water management') rather than in silos; (2) heavy emphasis on data, science, and policy-relevant research as the foundation for water decisions; (3) leadership development and field-building to strengthen the water-management community; (4) a strong push on sustainable groundwater management (it was an active funder around California's 2014 SGMA). It was a founding/primary funder of the California Water Foundation and its successor, the independent Water Foundation (spun out of Resources Legacy Fund, standalone since Jan 2017, focused on the western U.S.), alongside Packard, Hewlett, Walton, Pisces, and others, and a participant in the Water Funder Initiative. The Foundation did NOT publicly articulate explicit positions specifically on Colorado River Basin allocation politics, consumptive-use water markets, potable reuse, or desalination in its published program materials; its Colorado River exposure was indirect, via a late (2020) watershed cohort touching the Colorado River Basin and via grantees/research (e.g., PPIC) it funded. Because the entity no longer exists, it holds no current position on the present (2023-2026) river crisis.

On conservation. N/A for the entity itself (defunct). Inference from its documented worldview: a verified consumptive-use conservation market aligns well with its stated preference for data-driven, science-based, market-and-policy-enabled integrated water management , it funded exactly the kind of measurement, research, and institutional capacity such a market requires. A living Bechtel Foundation would most plausibly have been a persuadable-to-supportive funder of the measurement/verification and governance scaffolding, while likely staying cautious about anything that harmed ecosystems or rural communities. Practically, this signal is only useful for identifying successor funders (Water Foundation, Walton, Packard, Pisces) who inherited its posture.

On solar+water. N/A (defunct). No public record of any position on energy-water nexus, data-center load, or hyperscaler-financed solar+storage. Its grantmaking was water-management-and-education focused, not energy-sector. Any inference here would be speculative; treat as unknown.

On reuse/desal. N/A (defunct). The Foundation never published an explicit position on large-scale reuse or desalination. Its general frame (integrated supply reliability plus healthy ecosystems, evidence-first) suggests a living version would have evaluated reuse/desal case-by-case on cost, energy, and ecological grounds rather than as ideological champion or opponent. Mark unknown.

A win for them. Not applicable in the present tense , a closed foundation cannot 'win.' The closest legacy analog: its founders explicitly chose to spend down fast to force durable, large-scale, systemic change in California water management within a fixed window. A 'win' consistent with that intent is that the institutions and evidence base it funded (integrated water management, groundwater sustainability under SGMA, the independent Water Foundation, credible water data/research) outlive it and drive better basin-scale decisions. For outreach purposes, the actionable 'win' belongs to its successors, not to this record.

Public record. The foundation's now-closed water program historically funded efforts to advance sustainable water management in the West, aligning with conservation and new infrastructure goals.

Position. No public evidence found. Six independent web searches (July 2026) turned up no Colorado-based philanthropic foundation named 'Speer Family Foundation' with any footprint in Colorado River basin water policy. The only entity in the public record actually named 'The Speer Family Foundation' is a small private foundation in Port Orange, Florida (see instrumentl.com/990-report/speer-family-foundation) with no water or river connection. Related 'Speer' philanthropic entities are also non-Colorado, non-water: the Speer Foundation (EIN 81-6922938, a Christian-based private foundation in Odessa/Port Orange FL tied to Roy M. Speer, founder of the Home Shopping Network), the Speer Charitable Trust (EIN 62-1338941), and the Elizabeth Ferry Speer Foundation. In Colorado, 'Speer' appears only as a place name (the Speer neighborhood and Speer Boulevard in Denver, named for former mayor Robert Speer), not as an active water-policy funder. No public statements, grants, ranch/water-rights holdings, or Colorado River positions could be attributed to any 'Speer Family Foundation.' This stakeholder appears to be misattributed to Colorado, a name collision, or an entity so small/private that it has no public record on the river crisis. Marked UNKNOWN accordingly.

On conservation. Unknown. With no established position, grant history, or water holdings, there is no evidence base to predict how a 'Speer Family Foundation' would react to a verified consumptive-use conservation market. Do not assume a stance.

On solar+water. Unknown. No evidence of energy, data-center, or water-funding activity that would indicate a reaction to a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water. Do not assume a stance.

On reuse/desal. Unknown. No evidence of positions on water infrastructure, reuse, or desalination. Do not assume a stance.

A win for them. Undefinable without a verified identity and mission. No credible 'win' can be articulated for an entity whose river-related interests, if any, are entirely unknown. Establish who this actually is before assigning objectives.

Public record. No public evidence found after multiple web searches for a Colorado-based philanthropic foundation named 'Speer Family Foundation' with any public position on Colorado River issues.

Position. The Town of Guernsey is a real municipality (public water system PWS #5600023C, 81 West Whalen, Guernsey, WY 82214) in Platte County, southeastern Wyoming, serving a small population of roughly 1,100 residents (1,130 at the 2020 census, ~1,097 in 2026). It is NOT a Colorado River Basin stakeholder, and this is a misclassification in the stakeholder list. Guernsey sits on the North Platte River, immediately downstream of Guernsey Dam and Reservoir (the last of the five major North Platte reservoirs in Wyoming, ~71,040 acre-feet, part of Reclamation's North Platte Project). Hydrologically the North Platte flows east into Nebraska, joins the South Platte to form the Platte, then the Missouri, then the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico , the Missouri River Basin, with ZERO hydrologic connection to the Colorado River. Wyoming's Colorado River Basin water use is confined to five southwestern counties (Carbon, Lincoln, Sublette, Sweetwater, Uinta) across the Green River and Little Snake River drainages, covering ~17,000 sq mi; Platte County is not among them, and Guernsey holds no Colorado River water rights or Compact allocation. The town's economy is anchored by ranching heritage, tourism (Guernsey State Park, Oregon Trail ruts, Register Cliff) and the adjacent Camp Guernsey (Wyoming National Guard training center). No public record found of Guernsey taking any position on the Colorado River crisis, consistent with it having no standing in that basin.

On conservation. Not applicable / unknown. A verified consumptive-use conservation market on the Colorado River (System Conservation-style paid forbearance among Compact-holding users) has no mechanism to touch Guernsey. It has no Colorado River consumptive use to enroll and would neither buy nor sell in such a market. If the intent is to engage Guernsey as a demand-management analog on ITS basin, that is a North Platte / Platte (Missouri Basin) conversation administered by the Wyoming State Engineer's Office and Reclamation's North Platte Project, not a Colorado River one.

On solar+water. Unknown / weakly applicable. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water infrastructure could in principle interest any small, capital-constrained Wyoming town , Guernsey is tiny (~1,100 people) and drought-stressed, so outside capital for water resilience would be welcome. But the 'also funds water' hook is being sold as Colorado River relief; for Guernsey there is no Colorado River water to relieve. Any interest would be purely local (North Platte drought hedge, rate relief for a small system, possible tie-in with Camp Guernsey energy needs), and there is no public evidence Guernsey is pursuing or opposing such a deal. Do not count Guernsey as a Colorado River lever here.

On reuse/desal. Unknown / not applicable to the Colorado River. Large-scale reuse or desalination is generally pitched as Lower Basin / coastal augmentation to free up Colorado River supply. Guernsey , a small inland Missouri-Basin town on a snowpack-fed surface river , is not a candidate site, a beneficiary, or a decision-maker for Colorado River reuse/desal. Municipal reuse could theoretically matter to Guernsey as a local drought hedge given 2026 North Platte shortages, but at its scale (~1,100 residents) even that is marginal, and it is unrelated to the Colorado River crisis.

A win for them. For Guernsey specifically, a 'win' has nothing to do with the Colorado River. It is secure, affordable municipal supply through a drying North Platte system: firm treated-water delivery for ~1,100 residents through a severe 2026 drought, protection against North Platte drought-administration curtailments that have already squeezed some Wyoming towns, stable rates on a very small ratepayer base, and capital help for a small-town water system. A Colorado River conservation market, hyperscaler water fund, or desal project delivers Guernsey none of that unless it is explicitly redirected to its actual basin (North Platte / Platte).

Position. No public Colorado River positions exist and none would be expected. Lingle has taken no stance on the Colorado River crisis, the 1922/1948 Compacts, Upper Basin curtailment, or the post-2026 operating guidelines, because it is outside the basin and has no water rights or obligations there. Its documented public concerns are strictly local and Missouri-basin: maintaining safe drinking water, wastewater/sewer system upgrades, and reliable municipal power for its residents, plus the perennial small-town Wyoming problem of too little staff and money to complete engineering studies needed to access state/federal infrastructure grants (WWDC loans/grants, SRF, ARPA). To the extent Lingle-area agriculture cares about water policy, it is North Platte Project / North Platte River administration (interstate apportionment with Nebraska, Modified North Platte Decree), which is a separate legal regime from the Colorado River.

On conservation. Not applicable / no reaction expected. A verified consumptive-use conservation market for the Colorado River does not touch Lingle. It holds no Colorado River consumptive use to sell or forgo, so there is no participation, no revenue, and no threat. Marked unknown/NA. (If the same market design were ported to the North Platte / Missouri basin, that would be a separate question and Lingle's small municipal footprint would still make it a marginal participant at most.)

On solar+water. Largely not applicable to the Colorado River framing, but weakly positive in the abstract. Lingle would have no view on a hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds Colorado River water, because the water benefit does not reach it. In principle a cash-strapped rural Wyoming town welcomes outside capital that funds local water/wastewater infrastructure or brings tax base and cheap power, so if a hyperscaler+solar project were sited near Goshen County and funded LOCAL utilities, Lingle would likely be receptive. But tied to Colorado River water specifically, it is irrelevant to them. Marked mostly NA, mild latent positive only if reframed to local infrastructure.

On reuse/desal. Not applicable. Large-scale reuse and desalination are Lower Basin / coastal and lower-Colorado supply-augmentation strategies. Lingle is an inland high-plains town on groundwater and North Platte surface water with no desal relevance and no need for advanced potable reuse at ~400 population. No reaction expected. Marked unknown/NA.

A win for them. A win for Lingle has nothing to do with the Colorado River. It looks like: fully drawing down its $1.4M sewer grant, funded engineering/technical assistance so its tiny staff can actually access WWDC/SRF/ARPA money, lower-cost and more reliable municipal water/wastewater/power, and protecting the North Platte Project irrigation deliveries that underpin the local Goshen County ag economy. Nothing in a Colorado River conservation, reuse, desalination, or hyperscaler-water program delivers value to Lingle, because its water does not come from that system.

Public record. The town's water source consists of local groundwater wells, it is not located in the Colorado River Basin, and has no public record of positions on basin policy.

Position. No public positions on the Colorado River crisis were found, and none would be expected. Lusk is a town of ~1,541 people (2020 census), the county seat of Niobrara County, the least-populated county in the least-populated US state. Its municipal water utility (Town Department of Public Works) is supplied by groundwater: roughly 3 wells, 80-480 ft deep, ~1,600 gpm total, drawing on the northern High Plains / Ogallala aquifer within the Lusk Underground Water District. The town's water-policy attention is on local groundwater levels (some ~30-ft, ~5% aquifer declines documented over pre-development baselines) and on aging street/water/sewer infrastructure (e.g. the Phase III Street and Utility Replacement Project), not on the Colorado River. The economy is cattle ranching. Nothing in the public record ties Lusk to Colorado River compacts, Lower/Upper Basin allocation debates, Lake Mead/Powell operations, or Colorado River conservation programs.

On conservation. Not applicable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market on the Colorado River does not touch Lusk. It holds no Colorado River consumptive-use rights to sell or buy, so it would be neither a participant nor an opponent. Expect indifference/non-response.

On solar+water. Not applicable to Colorado River water. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage-plus-water buildout would only matter to Lusk if such a project physically sited in Niobrara County and tapped or recharged the local Ogallala aquifer, which is outside the scope of a Colorado River intervention. Absent that, no reaction. (If a developer did bring solar+storage plus aquifer-recharge or well-field funding to Niobrara County, a cash-strapped small utility would likely be receptive, but that is a High Plains story, not a Colorado River one.)

On reuse/desal. Not applicable. Large-scale reuse or ocean/brackish desalination to augment Colorado River supply is geographically and economically irrelevant to an inland High Plains groundwater town. No stake, no reaction. (Small-scale local reuse for a 1,500-person town is not what these programs contemplate.)

A win for them. Not applicable to the Colorado River. What a 'win' looks like for Lusk in its real context: stable High Plains aquifer levels, affordable well and distribution-system replacement funded through Wyoming Water Development Commission grants/loans rather than local rate shock, and reliable water for the town and surrounding ranches. None of that is advanced or threatened by Colorado River policy.

Public record. No public record exists of the town taking any position on Colorado River issues, which is expected as it is not located within the basin and has no direct connection to its water supply.

Position. No public statements found on the Colorado River crisis specifically; as a small High Plains town it has no standing in Compact politics. Its longstanding, documented water posture is defensive protection of a declining Ogallala supply. Pine Bluffs is one of three named towns (with Albin and Carpenter) inside the 'Drawdown Area' of the Laramie County Control Area (LCCA), created by the WY State Engineer in 1981 and tightened by orders in 2012 and 2015 that closed the area to new large-capacity High Plains wells, imposed well-spacing rules, and required metering/annual reporting. Pumpage in the Pine Bluffs-Egbert area has been identified since ~1961 as a cause of declining Lodgepole Creek base flow. The town runs a full municipal utility (electric, water, sewer, garbage) and sells bulk water at ~$15/1000 gal. Revealed position: supply security and existing-water-rights protection over expansion; it operates under a state-imposed groundwater conservation regime already.

On conservation. Likely INDIFFERENT-to-mildly-negative on relevance grounds. A Colorado River consumptive-use conservation market pays holders of Colorado River (Green River basin) rights to forbear; Pine Bluffs holds no such rights, so it cannot participate and gains nothing directly. It might view a market model favorably in the abstract, since the town already lives under a state conservation/curtailment regime (LCCA) and understands paying to protect a shrinking resource. But absent Colorado River rights it is a non-participant. If the same market mechanism were ever extended to Ogallala/High Plains groundwater, the town would likely be cautious-to-supportive but wary of anything that could let outside money buy up regional water rights and stress its own supply.

On solar+water. Most RELEVANT lever and likely PERSUADABLE-to-positive, but locally, not via the Colorado River. Hyperscaler-scale solar+storage that also funds water maps directly onto what is already happening 40 miles west (Meta/Enbridge Cowboy Project 365 MW solar + Tesla BESS; Crusoe/Tallgrass Jade data center; Switch Grass Industrial Park). Pine Bluffs would welcome investment that funds municipal water infrastructure and brings tax base/jobs, and it already hosts energy pilots. Concern: a hyperscaler drawing on the SAME stressed High Plains aquifer for cooling is a direct threat, so support is conditional on the deal ADDING water supply (funding reuse, new sources, or efficiency) rather than competing for the aquifer. Frame it as 'data-center money pays for the town's water security,' and they lean yes.

On reuse/desal. Cautiously SUPPORTIVE where it fits, especially water REUSE; desalination less so. As a small full-service utility on a depleting aquifer with closed large-well permitting, reuse/recycling of municipal wastewater is a logical way to stretch supply and would likely be welcomed if grant-funded (WWDC-style cost share). Desalination is a weaker fit inland with limited brackish source and no ocean access, and high capex/energy cost is prohibitive for a ~1,100-person town without outside capital. Net: reuse yes if funded, desal only as part of a larger regionally- or hyperscaler-financed package. Colorado River basin desal/reuse framing is not directly relevant to them.

A win for them. A durable, affordable municipal water supply that survives Ogallala decline without new debt the town cannot carry: new or supplemental supply (efficiency, reuse, or an outside-funded source) that keeps rates low and existing water rights protected, plus capturing local economic benefit from the nearby data-center/energy boom rather than just bearing its water and grid costs. State (WWDC) cost-share or third-party (hyperscaler) capital that de-risks their utility is the shape of a win.

Public record. The town has no standing in Colorado River politics and has not issued public statements on the matter, making it persuadable by default due to a lack of any opposition.

Position. No public positions on the Colorado River crisis were found, consistent with the town being outside the basin. Wheatland's actual water politics are entirely North Platte / Laramie River: it is served by the Wheatland Irrigation District system (Laramie River direct-flow rights, Wheatland Reservoirs No. 1 and No. 2, plus ~135 cfs from Sybille Creek). The town's live water stressors are (a) North Platte drought-triggered 'priority administration' orders from the Wyoming State Engineer that shut off junior diverters, and (b) low levels at Glendo/Guernsey reservoirs, where the state holds contracted emergency storage that municipalities can lease. Its dominant industrial water context is Basin Electric's Laramie River Station coal plant (3x570 MWe), which draws Laramie River water. None of this touches Colorado River Compact, Lower Basin cuts, or Lake Mead/Powell operations.

On conservation. Not applicable to the Colorado River. A consumptive-use conservation market on the Colorado has no bearing on Wheatland; it holds no Colorado River rights to sell or buy. If asked in the abstract, a small SE-Wyoming municipal utility would likely view an out-of-basin market as irrelevant and would be wary of any precedent that reframes Wyoming's prior-appropriation rights as tradeable commodities. No evidence of a position. Mark unknown.

On solar+water. Not applicable to Colorado River water funding. Wheatland could in principle care about a hyperscaler solar+storage buildout as an economic-development and grid matter (it hosts Basin Electric coal generation and lies in a wind/solar-rich part of Wyoming), but any 'that also funds water' hook tied to the Colorado River would not reach its Laramie/North Platte supply. No public evidence of a position. Mark unknown.

On reuse/desal. Not applicable. Wheatland is an inland freshwater (Laramie River/Sybille Creek) system with no seawater or brackish-desal context and no Colorado River supply to augment. Large-scale reuse/desalination on the Colorado would not affect it. No public position found. Mark unknown.

A win for them. Irrelevant to the Colorado River crisis. Their real 'win' is reliable dry-year municipal supply on the Laramie/North Platte: senior-right protection, affordable access to state contracted storage in Glendo/Pathfinder during priority-administration years, and no cost or reliability shock from the Laramie River Station's water and any coal-transition timeline. None of these are Colorado River levers.

Public record. No public record exists of the town's position on Colorado River policies, which is consistent with its location outside the basin.

Position. Very small rural domestic water district (formed 1973, incorporated in California) serving the unincorporated community of Winterhaven in Imperial County, CA, on the Colorado River's California bank across from Yuma, AZ. Serves roughly 192 residents via about 107 residential connections, 22 commercial connections, and a 495-space RV park (plus ~300 seasonal winter visitors). This is a POTABLE/DOMESTIC water utility, not an irrigation district and not a river-policy actor. No public evidence found of the District taking any position on the Colorado River crisis, Lower Basin cuts, the post-2026 operating guidelines, DCP/500+ conservation plans, or basin-scale allocation debates. Its public record is entirely operational and local: it draws water from local wells (Well No. 3, ~350 gpm, currently the sole active source) tapping an aquifer recharged by the Colorado River and adjacent Yuma Main Canal. It lost its backup well (failed 2016), leaving it out of compliance with California Title 22's two-source requirement, and is pursuing a replacement well (CUP25-0009/IS25-0023, a ~500-ft, 10-inch, ~400 gpm well) plus treatment-plant upgrades for elevated manganese and total dissolved solids. It received $1.5M from USDA Rural Development (announced Dec 2023) for the new well and system/accessibility improvements, and ICCED secured a separate ~$550K CDBG grant (12-CDBG-8394) for tank recoating, hydrant replacement, and lift-station repair. Geographically it sits inside the Yuma Project Reservation Division / Bard Unit area, which is covered by among the HIGHEST-priority (present-perfected) Colorado River rights on the system: Yuma Project Reservation Division (PPR 28) and Fort Yuma Indian Reservation (PPR 23). The District itself relies on groundwater rather than a direct surface diversion contract, so its supply security is tied to Colorado River aquifer recharge and to the senior-priority hydrology of this reach, not to a junior allocation exposed to first cuts.

On conservation. Largely indifferent / not directly applicable. A verified consumptive-use conservation market is designed around large agricultural and municipal surface-water rights holders. Winterhaven is a small groundwater-based domestic utility with no meaningful surface entitlement to fallow or sell, so it has little to offer a market and little to fear from one. Second-order concern only: if a market drove large-scale fallowing of nearby senior irrigated lands (Bard/Reservation Division), reduced canal deliveries and field irrigation could lower local aquifer recharge that feeds its wells, which the District would view warily. Net: neutral-to-mildly-cautious, persuadable to neutral if recharge to its wellfield is protected.

On solar+water. Cautiously open if the water benefit reaches small rural systems like theirs; otherwise indifferent. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is attractive only to the extent it delivers capital they cannot raise from ratepayers, for exactly the things they already need (backup well, treatment, tanks, lift station). They would welcome grant-style, no-strings capital and be skeptical of anything that increases local water demand (a nearby data center or large facility competing for the same aquifer would alarm them). Persuadable-to-supportive IF framed as rural-water infrastructure funding with no new local consumptive draw; wary if the deal is really about siting large water-using loads near their wellfield.

On reuse/desal. Low direct relevance; mildly positive in principle, unlikely to participate. Large-scale reuse/desalination (e.g., ocean desal, Salton Sea/brackish projects, augmentation) operates at a scale far above a 130-connection district and would not change their day-to-day supply, which is local groundwater. They would generally favor any new basin supply that relieves pressure on the Colorado River and thus indirectly protects their aquifer recharge and the area's senior rights. But cost is the constraint: they cannot afford desal-priced water and have no distribution tie to such projects. Relevant sub-case: they already treat for manganese/TDS, so affordable small-scale treatment/reuse tech or brackish-groundwater treatment funding would interest them far more than mega-desal. Net: passively supportive, not an active stakeholder.

A win for them. A concrete local win: a reliable second (backup) water source that brings them into Title 22 compliance, funded treatment for manganese/TDS so the water meets standards, and money that does not stress a tiny ratepayer base of ~130 connections. More broadly, anything that protects Colorado River aquifer recharge in the Yuma reach (their supply depends on it) and preserves the senior present-perfected-rights status of this area, plus grant/subsidy dollars for small-system capital and O&M. A win is measured in wells, tanks, hydrants, and compliance letters, not in acre-feet traded or basin-scale policy outcomes.

Public record. No public record exists of the district's position on large-scale conservation funding, solar development, or water reuse, making its stance unknown and likely influenceable.

Position. WMPA is a not-for-profit joint powers agency formed under Wyoming's joint powers board authority (Joint Powers Agreement signed Feb 1, 1976), governed by one board representative from each of eight member municipalities: Cody, Fort Laramie, Guernsey, Lingle, Lusk, Pine Bluffs, Powell, and Wheatland. It serves ~24,000 Wyomingites and exists to secure safe, affordable electric power and transmission for its members. Associate members are Basin, Deaver, Gillette, and Torrington. CRITICAL FRAMING: WMPA is NOT a Colorado River WATER user or consumptive-use rights holder. Its only connection to the Colorado River is on the ELECTRICITY side. WMPA is a WAPA preference customer holding two federal hydro contracts, drawing power from the Loveland Area Project (LAP) and the Colorado River Storage Project (CRSP), both marketed by the Western Area Power Administration. However, WMPA states it purchases 81% of its power from Basin Electric Power Cooperative (BEPC), with only a modest slice coming from the federal CRSP/LAP hydro allocations. WMPA has NO public position on the Colorado River crisis, on consumptive-use conservation, on reuse/desal, or on basin allocation policy. No press statements, testimony, comment letters, or resolutions from WMPA on the river crisis were found. Its latent interest is aligned with the broader CRSP preference-power community (represented by the Colorado River Energy Distributors Association, CREDA, which buys ~80% of CRSP firm power): that interest is keeping Lake Powell above minimum power pool (elevation 3,490 ft at Glen Canyon Dam, which supplies 75-80% of CRSP generation) so federal hydropower keeps flowing at low cost. When Powell falls, CRSP output drops (Glen Canyon generation fell ~17% in 2000-2023 vs 1988-1999) and WAPA must buy replacement power on the market, raising rates to preference customers; below minimum power pool, hydro rates could roughly triple. WMPA's exposure to that dynamic is real but diluted because 81% of its supply is Basin Electric, not CRSP hydro.

On conservation. PROBABLE MILD SUPPORT / LOW SALIENCE. A verified consumptive-use conservation market keeps more water in Lake Powell, which protects CRSP hydropower head and generation and thus WMPA's federal-hydro rate. Higher Powell elevations directly reduce the risk of a minimum-power-pool rate spike that would raise WMPA's blended cost. So WMPA's structural interest leans favorable. But conservation markets are a WATER-side instrument WMPA does not participate in, has no rights to trade, and has never spoken to. Reaction is likely quiet, indirect approval channeled through CREDA/the CRSP preference-power bloc rather than any WMPA action. If a conservation market were framed or funded in a way that raised WAPA/CRSP costs (e.g., diverting hydropower revenue to fund water buybacks, as basin environmental programs already do), WMPA would object to any pass-through that raises member rates. Net: cautiously favorable on hydrology grounds, sensitive to who pays. Confidence LOW (no stated position).

On solar+water. LIKELY NEUTRAL-TO-WARY, with a rate-and-reliability lens, NOT a climate/water lens. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water is primarily a generation/load-growth story. WMPA would evaluate it as a small public-power buyer worried about (a) whether large new datacenter load on the shared grid/Basin Electric system tightens capacity and raises wholesale prices for small preference customers, and (b) whether new low-cost solar+storage could actually diversify and cheapen its supply. Wyoming's political posture is strongly pro-fossil/pro-baseload, and WMPA already buys 81% from Basin Electric (coal/gas-heavy), so it is unlikely to be an enthusiastic renewables champion. It has no water stake to be moved by the water-funding sweetener. Most likely reaction: transactional and cost-driven. Supportive only if it demonstrably lowers or stabilizes member power cost and does not crowd out its firm supply. Confidence LOW.

On reuse/desal. LIKELY INDIFFERENT / NOT APPLICABLE. Large-scale reuse and desalination are water-supply-augmentation strategies aimed at consumptive users and municipal water utilities. WMPA is an electric power agency with no water-supply role, so it has no direct stake. The only indirect angle: desalination is extremely energy-intensive, so a large basin desal program would ADD electric load and could tighten regional power markets (a mild negative for a small power buyer) while also potentially reducing pressure to drain reservoirs for consumptive use (a mild positive for hydropower head). These effects are second-order and speculative for an agency this size. Expect no engagement and no public position. Confidence LOW.

A win for them. A win for WMPA is stable, affordable, reliable power for its member towns: keeping CRSP/LAP federal hydropower flowing at low cost (Lake Powell held above minimum power pool so no rate spike), no cost pass-throughs that raise member rates, and no new large loads that tighten its Basin Electric supply or the regional grid. On the Colorado River specifically, the win is purely derivative: healthier reservoir levels that protect cheap federal hydropower, achieved WITHOUT any mechanism that shifts water-conservation or augmentation costs onto power ratepayers. Any proposal that protects Powell's hydropower head while insulating small preference customers from the bill is a win they would quietly welcome.

Public record. WMPA's mission statement mentions being 'good stewards,' but its power mix relies on coal, hydro, and natural gas, with no publicly available plans or projects indicating a move toward a conservation-and-clean-infrastructure agenda.

Position. Longstanding: The Yavapai-Prescott Indian Tribe fully and finally settled its water rights via the Yavapai-Prescott Indian Tribe Water Rights Settlement Act of 1994 (P.L. 103-434). The settlement quantified the Tribe's entitlement at roughly 1,550 acre-feet/year: 550 AF/yr of water service from the City of Prescott, 1,000 AF/yr of Granite Creek surface water, plus rights to pump groundwater within the ~1,413-acre reservation. Critically, the Tribe RELINQUISHED its Central Arizona Project (CAP) allocation as part of the deal; the Secretary acquired the Tribe's CAP contract and Prescott's subcontract, and Prescott later (1996) sold the associated CAP entitlement to the City of Scottsdale for ~$7M. Proceeds funded a Verde River Basin Water Fund for on-reservation water/effluent development, and the settlement was structured to be consistent with the Prescott Active Management Area goals and preservation of Verde River riparian habitat and flows. The Tribe is therefore only INDIRECTLY tied to the Colorado River (its former entitlement flowed through CAP); its live water supply today is a municipal service contract plus local surface and groundwater. No recent (post-2020) public statements by the Tribe specifically on the Colorado River crisis, the post-2026 guidelines, the Navajo/Hopi/San Juan Southern Paiute settlement, or basin-wide conservation were found in public sources. The Tribe has not been a visible participant in the ongoing Colorado River renegotiation or in tribal-coalition advocacy (e.g., the Ten Tribes Partnership or the stalled multi-tribe settlement). Current public posture on the river crisis: effectively UNKNOWN / not publicly articulated.

On conservation. Likely INDIFFERENT to mildly interested, not a natural participant. A verified consumptive-use conservation market rewards holders of large, currently-used-or-usable water entitlements who can fallow or forbear. The Yavapai-Prescott Tribe holds only ~1,550 AF/yr for municipal/commercial use with essentially no agricultural consumptive use to idle and no CAP allocation to leave in Lake Mead, so it has little to sell into such a market. It would not oppose one on principle and might mildly favor it as pro-tribal-sovereignty precedent, but it has minimal direct stake. Reaction is largely UNKNOWN and probably low-salience; do not count on them as an active supporter or opponent.

On solar+water. Potentially the MOST relevant of the three interventions to this Tribe, but as a host/economic-development counterparty rather than a water-rights seller. A hyperscaler-funded solar+storage buildout that also funds water could align with the Tribe's economic-development orientation (it actively courts developers to reservation land) and could fund exactly the kind of on-reservation water/effluent-reuse infrastructure the 1994 settlement anticipated. Interest would hinge on whether the ~1,413-acre reservation and its Highway 69/89 frontage can host generation or related facilities, on lease economics, and on tribal-sovereignty/land-control terms. Likely PERSUADABLE-to-favorable if structured as capital and infrastructure for the reservation. Reaction remains an inference, not a stated position, so mark as plausible but UNKNOWN.

On reuse/desal. Likely FAVORABLE in principle, again as a local-supply beneficiary rather than a basin player. Large-scale reuse/desalination that augments the regional (Prescott AMA / central Arizona) supply would relieve pressure on the groundwater and municipal system the Tribe depends on, and on-reservation effluent reuse is directly contemplated by the Tribe's settlement (Verde River Basin Water Fund for on-reservation water/effluent use). The Tribe would care about cost pass-through to its Prescott water-service contract and about protecting Verde/Granite Creek flows. Net: mildly supportive of supply augmentation that firms up local water, but low-profile and with no publicly stated position; treat as inference.

A win for them. A win is water-supply certainty for the reservation's commercial/economic base and protection of the local resources the 1994 settlement secured: a durable, adequately-priced Prescott municipal water-service contract; protection of Granite Creek surface flows and Verde River basin riparian health; and long-term groundwater sustainability in the over-allocated Prescott Active Management Area. Any deal that shores up regional (Prescott-area) water reliability, reduces groundwater-depletion risk near the reservation, or brings capital for on-reservation water/effluent-reuse infrastructure (the kind the Verde River Basin Water Fund was meant to seed) is a win. They do not need Colorado River paper water; they need their existing local supply protected and funded.

Public record. The Tribe has a settled water rights agreement and actively partners on local watershed restoration projects, indicating a focus on conservation and resource management for its own lands.