Nevada has lots of water in a Lake Mead "bank." What happens if water levels keep dropping?

Much like a household puts money into a savings account, Southern Nevada has been setting aside part of its allocated Colorado River water in Lake Mead for the last two decades. At the end of 2025, the state had approximately 890,000 acre-feet of that water in the proverbial bank, according to the Bureau of Reclamation's annual water accounting report. Nevada's bank holds nearly three years' worth of the water the state can take from the river, which is capped at 300,000 acre-feet a year. To picture an acre-foot, imagine a football field covered in water about a foot deep, or roughly 326,000 gallons. That's enough to supply about two Southern Nevada homes for a year. The official name for these credits, Intentionally Created Surplus, makes them sound like a rainy-day fund. But under federal rules for the river, most of the water can't be taken out once Lake Mead drops below 1,000 feet above sea level. Water levels at the lake sat at 1,037 feet on Oct.

This excerpt comes from the named source. Read the original for the full reporting.