The Biden administration has proposed evenly cutting allotments of water from the Colorado River to avoid a water and power catastrophe across the western United States. Overuse and drought made worse by climate change have affected the river, causing the river’s flows to fall one-third below historical averages. However, the size of reductions the administration is proposing and the prospects of imposing them have never happened in American history. The river supplies drinking water to 40 million Americans, irrigates 5.5 million agricultural acres, and powers millions of homes and businesses with electricity generated through dams on its reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell. Levels of these reservoirs are so low that they may not provide enough water to turn turbines that generate electricity or reach the intake valves that direct the outflow of water. The Interior Department, which manages the river, has offered three options. The first alternative is taking no action, which would risk a dead pool. The other options include making reductions based on the most senior water rights or distributing cuts evenly across Arizona, California, and Nevada by reducing water deliveries by as much as 13 percent beyond what each state has already agreed to.