Background

The Drought Management Strategy (Strategy) provides for a continuation of the drought management measures from the original Strategy adopted by the Albuquerque City Council in April 2003. When the Strategy was adopted, the utility was a part of the City of Albuquerque. The City established a task force to develop and finalize a drought management plan. This plan established four stages of drought and voluntary and mandatory drought response measures to protect and preserve the aquifer. The Water Authority utilized the recommended drought stages and corresponding drought response measures in 2006 and 2011 through resolution as a result of below average precipitation and/or above average temperatures from La Niña conditions. In 2008, the Water Authority began utilizing surface water in addition to ground water to provide its customers a safe and sustainable water supply. As a result, the Strategy needed to be updated as the original Strategy’s drought stages were structured exclusively on ground water use. In addition, lessons learned from the 2006 and 2011 droughts were used to design more appropriate drought stages and drought response measures.  Similar to the original Strategy, this updated Strategy was reviewed and recommended for approval by the Water Authority’s Customer Advisory Committee before being submitted by the Water Authority Board. The plan is to review and update the Strategy every five years. The Strategy was approved at the Water Authority Board Meeting on April 18, 2012.

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Purpose

The purpose of the Drought Management Strategy (Strategy) is to reduce water use during a drought consistent with the goals and objectives of the Water Resources Management Strategy. The water savings that are targeted during declaration of various stages of drought are intended to be short-term measures capable of producing water savings over time periods ranging from one month to one year, but no longer. Implementation of the Strategy should be considered separately from the Water Authority’s conservation program.  The water conservation program is intended to provide for long-term water savings as opposed to a single year or irrigation season. The public messages for the Strategy will certainly promote education about the long-term need to conserve.  However, the Water Authority will strive to achieve higher than average savings during a short period of time during a drought.

Declaring a Drought

Drought in the Water Authority’s service area relates to the supply of surface water and the amount of ground water pumped during dry, high-demand periods of drought. Because drought has its greatest impact in the summer and early fall (the highest water demand time of the year) drought mitigation focuses on this time period and reducing outdoor water use. When drought conditions exist or are anticipated to develop in our region, the Water Authority Board will be briefed on water usage and predicted drought conditions and will utilize this information to decide when to declare the drought stages.   The approval of a drought stage by the Water Authority Board, will authorize the Water Authority’s Executive Director to initiate all the measures associated with that drought stage.

Drought Stages and Corresponding Drought Response Measures

There are four levels of drought that can be declared and all but the Drought Advisory (a first stage early warning system that calls for increased education on drought and voluntary conservation) must be approved by the Water Authority Board. The four drought stages include:

• Drought Advisory
• Drought Watch (Stage 1)
• Drought Warning (Stage 2)
• Drought Emergency (Stage 3)

The three drought stages (Watch, Warning, and Emergency) can be declared along with an early alert system, the Drought Advisory. The drought advisory, does not require mandatory conservation, but rather calls for increased public education. If declaration of the Drought Advisory is ineffective at keeping water use consistent with the established goals, then further stages of drought may be adopted by the Board. Drought stages are linked to the annual groundwater pumping goal and the gallons per capita per day water usage goal as shown in the chart below.

Drought Stage Criteria Chart

For questions or comments on the Strategy, please contact Katherine Yuhas at 505-768-3633 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .