Enhanced Coordination: Letting Powell and Mead Work Together
Combined-storage balancing between Powell and Mead. Solid third-place option.
Enhanced Coordination treats Powell and Mead as a combined system rather than two reservoirs with independent release rules. Releases from Powell are adjusted based on the combined storage percentage — when the total system is low, both reservoirs ease up; when it's fuller, releases ramp up. The goal is to keep the two reservoirs in a healthier balance so neither hits critical elevations while the other sits comfortably.
Projected Lake Powell elevation under the driest decade on record. Median line shows the most likely outcome; p10 line is the 10th-percentile worst case.
The scorecard
We ran this plan through our standard stress test: sampled inflows from the last ten years (the driest decade on record), 2,000 Monte Carlo iterations, 40 years forward. Same starting point as every other plan we evaluate. Same inflow sampling. Only the operating rule changes.
| Horizon | Median Ending | Worst-Case Floor | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 years | 3583.3 ft | 3458 ft | B |
| 20 years | 3582.2 ft | 3449.7 ft | B |
| 40 years | 3577.8 ft | 3442.3 ft | B |
Strengths
- Worst-case (p10) floor stays at 3,442 ft — well above dead pool (3,370 ft) even in the bottom 10% of bad-luck futures.
- Robust across all horizons. Earns a B at 10, 20, and 40 years — one of only two plans with consistent grades.
- Adaptive. The rule responds to current conditions rather than relying on fixed thresholds, so it handles unusual sequences of wet and dry years better than static rules.
- Preserves Upper-Basin vs Lower-Basin Compact obligations while allowing smart operational choices within that framework.
Weaknesses
- Requires genuine coordination between Upper and Lower Basin states. Political complexity is higher than Basic Coordination.
- Median ending elevation (3,579 ft) is slightly lower than Max Operational Flexibility (3,586 ft). Not much — but not the top of the pack.
- Requires both basins to agree on what "balance" means. If one side games the rule, the benefits diminish.
Verdict
Enhanced Coordination is our third-place recommendation. It sits behind Max Operational Flexibility and Supply Driven, both of which produce better outcomes. But if neither of those is politically achievable, Enhanced Coordination is a solid fallback — it earns B at every horizon and stays within the existing Compact framework.
See all plans compared in the head-to-head verdict, or read about why the real problem isn't drought — it's math.