# 1 Most Endangered River in U.S. "Colorado"

The Colorado is a winding resource of beauty and age. 

All reservoirs along the Colorado River might dry up by mid-century as the West warms, a new study finds. The probability of such a severe shortage by then runs as high as one-in-two, unless current water-management practices change, the researchers report. Even under the harshest drying caused by climate change, the large storage capacity of reservoirs on the Colorado might help sustain water supply for a few decades.The Colorado River system is enduring its 10th year of a drought. Fortunately, the river system entered the drought in 2000, with the reservoirs at approximately 95 percent of capacity. The reservoir system is currently at 59 percent of capacity. Roughly 30 million people depend on the Colorado River for drinking and irrigation water. To the right is one of the depleting areas. Between 2026 and 2057, the risks of fully depleting reservoir storage will increase seven-fold under the current management practices when compared with risks expected from population pressures alone. Implementing more aggressive management practices - in which downstream releases are reduced during periods of reservoir shortages - could lead to only a two-fold increase in risk of depleting all reservoir storage during this period, according to the study.

This is an actual  picture from part of the Colorado River

Is this the future of its entire environment?