How this year's 'no-pack' is rewriting what we know about Utah's water supply system

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Utah's snowpack peaked early at a record low, raising water supply concerns statewide.
• Record-high temperatures led to early snowmelt affecting water availability and tourism.
• Experts stress collaboration to manage water needs as Utah's hydrology becomes unpredictable.

Editor's note: This article is published through the Great Salt Lake Collaborative, a solutions journalism initiative that partners news, education and media organizations to help inform people about the plight of the Great Salt Lake.

SALT LAKE CITY — Laura Briefer insists she's an optimistic person, but thinking about this year's snowpack has often kept her up at night because of everything that could go wrong.

Utah's statewide snowpack peaked early and at a record low, raising many questions about water supply across the state. Unlike last year, where some regions fared better than others, no basin and essentially no state escaped snowpack concerns. It's left Briefer, director of Salt Lake City Public Utilities, and other Western water managers racing to figure out how to keep up with water demands while also managing reservoirs for future drought possibilities.

"We're no stranger to drought. We've gone through drought cycles, but this year feels a lot different in not only the snowpack ... available, but also the earlier runoff. (It was) about a month earlier than normal, which affects how much water we have available to meet demand," she said.

She's not alone in her concerns. Briefer spoke alongside experts in various water-related fields on a panel discussion about the various state impacts of this year's "no-pack," which the Great Salt Lake Alliance hosted on Monday.

Impacts of this year's 'no-pack'

The short story of Utah's situation is simple. Record-high temperatures led to more snow in areas accustomed to winter snow, leading to a historically low snowpack. The impacts of that are much more complicated and far-reaching.

"What happens in the mountains affects (people's) livelihood," said Bethany Neilson, director of Utah Water Research Laboratory at Utah State University.

Less snow meant fewer skier days, which has its own economic hit. Utah may only end up with about 5 million skier visits this year, based on preliminary estimates from the state's ski industry, said Hilary Arens, director of sustainability and water resources at Snowbird Resort.

That would be at least 20% below last year's total, which generated approximately $2.51 billion in spending. This year's snowpack resulted in fewer seasonal employees working fewer days, as well as fewer hotel stays by visitors and less tourism sales, among direct impacts.

Snowbird, Arens said, is among the resorts that donate a portion of sales to a forest conservation fund, and it donates money to various other nonprofits. A poor snow year means less money to donate to these organizations.

Most of the other impacts are now starting to be felt. About 95% of the state's water supply is tied to snowpack, which means a bad snowpack year chips away at available water.

In a normal situation, snowpack provides a "big slug of water" that goes toward the groundwater system or rivers that recharge water systems the people pull from, Neilson explains. Warmer storms, like the ones Utah has received for much of this water year, create more rain captured by vegetation or other barriers to the system.

March's record temperatures melted most of what was collected in the mountains, essentially burning off that slug of water as vegetation woke up early.

She doesn't know how this winter affected plants, but she knows it probably means less water for downstream communities because it advanced the snowmelt process by several weeks. Utah's creeks and rivers were likely to peak at less than 60% of normal, federal forecasters warned earlier this month.

"(The low snowpack) reduces groundwater in the mountainous areas, but also potentially groundwater recharge into our valley areas," Neilson told KSL after the event.

Some of the runoff conditions have been similar to numbers seen during Utah's last severe drought, during the 2021 and 2022 water years, she pointed out during the event. This includes basins that came off three straight good snowpacks, which she found surprising.

All of this has left water users scrambling for changes this year.

Handling a low snowpack

Experts say this year's snowpack will likely have multiple impacts.

• Salt Lake City enacted the second stage of its water contingency plan in March, and several other systems and cities have added cutbacks over the past month. Many shouldn't have a problem tapping from reservoirs this year, but there's no certainty that next year will help refill them, leading to more long-term concerns, Briefer said.
• It's part of a "triple-whammy" for farmers and ranchers, arriving at the same time as rising fuel and fertilizer prices tied to overseas conflicts, said Chris Robinson, CEO and co-owner of The Ensign Group, which manages more than 1 million acres of land across Utah and neighboring states.
• The Great Salt Lake remains close to 6 to 7 feet below its minimum healthy level, and it likely won't gain much more heading into the generally drier summer season.
• Utah reservoirs will likely be lower this year, possibly impacting water recreation options this summer.
• Recent storms have helped, but Utah faces a potentially active fire season once the vegetation dries, since snowpack generally helps prolong the start of the season.

Long-term impacts

Yet, it's still unclear what this year's snowpack means for Utah, Neilson says. She calls it "baffling" because it rewrote the types of temperatures Utah can receive during its snow collection season, how little snowpack it can build and how early it can melt, and did so just three years after Utah received its highest snowpack on record.

The uncharted territory is frustrating for hydrologists, who often rely on the past to project what to expect in any given season.

"We don't even know what this translates to because we haven't seen it really, at least recently. When you start to see new patterns that we've never seen before, it becomes extremely difficult to predict. ... You can't always rely on prior observations to help predict future conditions," she said. "There's still a lot we don't know."

She plans to track the situation to help inform future projections, should this type of year become a trend. Unfortunately, that might be the case, according to research from the Great Salt Lake Strike Team, which includes various research universities and state agencies. It released a report earlier this year projecting that warming temperatures would affect the lake's basin over the rest of this century, potentially affecting snowpack.

That's likely going to create a difficult water hurdle to overcome, but it doesn't mean that it's impossible.

That's where Briefer's optimism kicks in. Salt Lake City's population has jumped by about 20% over the past 25 years, but water demand has decreased by 25% in that time, showcasing the area's improved efficiency.

It'll likely require collaboration, ongoing funding and clearer solutions, but she and other panelists say they're still hopeful that Utah can figure out ways to manage growth and water needs — like refilling the Great Salt Lake — as the state's hydrology becomes harder to project.

"I do think that we can do this," Briefer said. "We've seen our community rally around this lake, (and) we've seen our community rally around droughts. ... There's a huge amount of desire to do this."

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

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Carter Williams

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Carter Williams is a reporter for KSL. He covers Salt Lake City, statewide transportation issues, outdoors, the environment and weather. He is a graduate of Southern Utah University.