It's illegal to collect and store rainwater on your property in Colorado? (Greeley: transplants, 2009)

[tablemtn]

Are there any plans to modify these nutty laws?

Graywater Reuse and Rainwater Harvesting

Practically speaking, this means that in most river drainages, a person cannot divert rainwater and put it to a beneficial use without a plan for augmentation that replaces the stream depletions associated with that diversion. In most areas of Colorado, the only sure legal way to use rainwater is to direct roof gutter downspouts to drain to landscape areas you wish to water.

Wow.

[jazzlover]

Originally Posted by tablemtn

Are there any plans to modify these nutty laws?

Graywater Reuse and Rainwater Harvesting



Wow.

If you understand the history and basis of Colorado water law, it's not nutty at all. Go study up.

[tablemtn]

It's nutty because the amount of water that could be captured from devices like rainbarrels or collection devices is not that great compared to the overall rainfall onto any particular watershed. Most river water comes from meltoff and other uncapturable sources. Illegalizing rainwater collection is ignorant of the relevant science, in addition to being quite mockable.

[jazzlover]

Without going to a long discourse about Colorado water law, the reasoning is simple. Colorado is not a "riparian" water state--where water is considered the property of the landowner where the rain falls or where a river runs. Water is considered the property of the public until a person "perfects" a water right by putting unclaimed water to beneficial use, and adjudicating a right to it through the water court system. Since there is very little water that is "unappropriated" in Colorado, the rain falling on your property does not "belong" to you to capture, unless you have perfected a right to it. That raindrop falling on your property eventually joins other raindrops that form a rivulet, then a stream, then a creek, then a river--and somewhere along that course, it is almost certain that someone has perfected a right to use that water. If everyone captured the rain falling on their property, pretty soon those downstream water right holders would have no flowing water to use. That is why the water law is written the way it is. Nothing prevents a person from trying to perfect a water right to use unappropriated water that falls or rises through springs on one's property--but chances are pretty good that a downstream user with a perfected water right may object. The "doctrine of prior appropriation" or "first-in-use, first-in-right" still governs. Chances are that someone perfected a water right to the water rising on your property long before you ever built a house there.

Colorado's water law actually begins within the State Constitution--but this declaration in the Colorado Revised Statutes is pretty unambiguous (emphasis added by italics):

37-92-102. Legislative declaration - basic tenets of Colorado water law.
(1) (a) It is hereby declared to be the policy of the state of Colorado that all water in or tributary
to natural surface streams, not including nontributary ground water as that term is defined in
section 37-90-103, originating in or flowing into this state have always been and are hereby
declared to be the property of the public, dedicated to the use of the people of the state, subject
to appropriation and use in accordance with sections 5 and 6 of article XVI of the state
constitution and this article. As incident thereto, it is the policy of this state to integrate the
appropriation, use, and administration of underground water tributary to a stream with the use of
surface water in such a way as to maximize the beneficial use of all of the waters of this state.
(b) A stream system which arises as a natural surface stream and, as a natural or man-induced
phenomenon, terminates within the state of Colorado through naturally occurring evaporation
and transpiration of its waters, together with its underflow and tributary waters, is a natural
surface stream subject to appropriation as provided in paragraph (a) of this subsection (1).

Good information here:

Colorado Water Rights | The Water Information Program
Western States Water Laws - Colorado
http://www.westernwaterlaw.com/artic...WaterLaw_2.pdf

[tablemtn]

Water is considered the property of the public until a person "perfects" a water right by putting unclaimed water to beneficial use, and adjudicating a right to it through the water court system. Since there is very little water that is "unappropriated" in Colorado, the rain falling on your property does not "belong" to you to capture, unless you have perfected a right to it.

I'm aware of the rationale. I'm just saying it's conceptually ridiculous, and offensive to general notions of property rights and personal autonomy. It's like someone downwind has placed a lien on your air, because they purchased a "senior claim" on the airstream that passes through your property, and the law has abetted this absurdity by adopting the language of secured transactions.

[jazzlover]

Then move to a state where water is riparian. The relative scarcity of water in the arid West led to the doctrine of prior appropriation--and, though not without flaws, it has worked pretty well to allocate a scarce resource. And I wouldn't make that "it's conceptually ridiculous, and offensive to general notions of property rights and personal autonomy" comment face-to-face to a rancher or farmer with a senior water right--that's usually good to start a fistfight or to get an irrigating shovel wrapped around your neck. As the old saying goes, "You can mess with my wife, but don't mess with my water right."

[tablemtn]

Rainwater barrels on one's own property would not capture any more than a miniscule percentage of the water that eventually contributes to any given watershed.

If a rancher wants to invade a homeowner's property and overturn rainbarrels and get shot in the process for trespass, he is free to try.

[jazzlover]

Originally Posted by tablemtn

Rainwater barrels on one's own property would not capture any more than a miniscule percentage of the water that eventually contributes to any given watershed.

If a rancher wants to invade a homeowner's property and overturn rainbarrels and get shot in the process for trespass, he is free to try.

While I doubt that some rancher would come to tip over your rain barrel, Colorado law does protect the right of an owner of a water right to reasonably trespass on another's property to exercise that water right. That law has been litigated numerous times, with the right to trespass to exercise a water right upheld by the Colorado Supreme Court.

And, yes, most of the people who bellyache about it are transplants from states with riparian water rights. The people who grew up around Colorado's water scarcity and who have dealt with water issues here understand why Colorado water law is written the way it is.

Put bluntly, unless you have an adjudicated water right to the water falling upon or rising upon your land, THAT WATER DOES NOT BELONG TO YOU under Colorado law.

[treedonkey]

Looks like Jazzlover found someone to argue with.

He's right, though, it has to do with the ongoing statewide dryness here, and our non-riparian legislation.

But Tablemtn is right, too... it's ridiculous, and nutty. No need to study water laws to know that. Especially when it prohibits my having a tiny, self-circulating fish pond in my back yard.

AND I forgot to drain my sink last night... I think I hear sirens.

[sterlinggirl]

Originally Posted by treedonkey

AND I forgot to drain my sink last night... I think I hear sirens.

Don't worry....it's just the fire truck.

VIDEO: Flammable water fires up Fort Lupton homeowners | Greeley Tribune