Current use of the water in the Colorado river is unsustainable and climate change could mean a crisis situation is reached within the decade according to Scripps Institute Researchers.  Even using conservative assumptions to make their estimate, the report concludes that there is a 50% chance that Lake Mead will dry up by 2021 and a similar chance that the Hoover Dam will no longer have enough water behind it to generate electricity by 2017.  This spells disaster for the entire region as cities from Las Vegas to Los Angeles depend on that water supply.

The report concludes, “Today, we are at or beyond the sustainable limit of the Colorado system. The alternative to reasoned solutions to this coming water crisis is a major societal and economic disruption in the desert southwest; something that will affect each of us living in the region”

http://scrippsnews.ucsd.edu/Releases/?releaseID=876