Drought lifts plan to drain Powell

Some people say Richard Ingebretsen is nuts.

The Utah man wants the federal government to decommission Glen Canyon Dam and drain Lake Powell.

The movement to get rid of the dam and drain the popular lake — it's visited by about 2.5 million people each year — has been around for years but now is getting more attention as the drought continues to inch down the lake's water level, now down about 89 feet. Last spring, the level dipped to its lowest since 1973, and the Bureau of Reclamation expects the water to continue dropping this summer.

The dropping water level has revealed treasures that have been hidden by the lake for decades.

Recently, Ingebretsen took a visitor to what is known as the Cathedral in the Deseret — cool canyon walls, a windy stream, sediment-filled puddles and delicate sunlight peeking through slots in the cliffs. For 25 years, it's been under water, and to Ingebretsen, its beauty is proof Lake Powell can return to its past, before Glen Canyon Dam stopped the flow of the mighty Colorado River.

And it is splendid, this breathtaking glimpse of yesterday, hidden in a cove of the lake, like a secret.

The drought that has gripped the West for four years has sucked so much water out of Lake Powell that it is only a little more than half full.

A white bathtub ring stains the canyon rocks, a reminder of just how low the water is.

Ingebretsen, 47, relishes the ring and considers it a motive to just go ahead and drain the lake and get rid of the dam.

He believes it would restore the river to its natural state. He says the dam isn't needed anyway.

But try telling that to the 6,800 residents of Page, Ariz., a tourist-dependent city that officials say would cease to exist if there were no lake. The folks there, and other lake supporters, say Ingebretsen is nuts.

Shared by Utah and Arizona, Lake Powell is the country's second-largest manmade lake at more than 186 miles long.

Its millions of visitors come to fish, boat, sunbathe and explore canyons and alcoves. In the process, they pump $400 million into Utah and Arizona.

And it's those visitors who keep Page running. Page began as a town to house workers for Glen Canyon Dam. The dam, authorized by Congress in 1956 and storing water by 1963, is the dividing point of the Upper Basin and Lower Basin of the Colorado River.