Does Las Vegas get all its water from Lake Mead?

Colorado River water and local groundwater are the two primary supplies used to meet our community's current water needs. Colorado River water is primarily withdrawn from Lake Mead, and groundwater is pumped from the Las Vegas Valley groundwater basin.



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Southern Nevada depends on Lake Mead for 90 percent of its water.

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Key Points. Lake Mead has dropped by 70% due to droughts in the West and it will take many years to refill again, naturally. The reservoir is vitally important to millions of people as a source of water, electricity, and recreation.

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Lake Mead's water level continues to fall to historic lows, bringing the reservoir less than 150 feet away from “dead pool” — so low that water cannot flow downstream from the dam. The loss of water entirely from this source would be catastrophic.

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Who uses the most water from Lake Mead? The primary users of water from Lake Mead are the states of California and Arizona. Both states have been working to reduce their water usage in order to preserve the lake, but it is estimated that California still uses about three times more water from the lake than Arizona.

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A nearly 16-acre estate in Spanish Trail with ties to the Sultan of Brunei has been the number one residential water user for years. It used 13,109,000 gallons in 2022. That is 97,000 more than the year before. And that's a hundred times more than the average single-family home!

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Most of our rainwater travels untreated through gutters, storm drains, channels, washes and eventually into the major source of our drinking water - Lake Mead. All storm drains lead to lake mead. Stormwater that falls in the Las Vegas Valley picks up pollutants and travels untreated to Lake Mead.

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Lake Mead has a maximum depth of more than 532 feet. This massive reservoir is the largest in the U.S., having a capacity of 28,945,000 acre-feet. The reservoir was part of the original construction of the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River between Nevada and Arizona.

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“It has some impact, but it's not very much. I don't think you would notice Lake Mead appreciably rising just from the results of big rainstorms,” Miller said. After years of mostly seeing its water levels fall, Lake Mead has steadily risen since April.

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Lake Mead sees 'significant improvement' in water levels after drought led to disturbing discoveries. In October 2022, the water levels at the reservoir were roughly 1,046 feet.

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Although Lake Mead gradually began filling again after Lake Powell reached the minimum pool required for power generation in that reservoir in 1965, full pool in Lake Mead was not reached again until 1983.

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Downriver towns and major cities would see the most damage, in the event of the dam's physical collapse. Water flows would engulf many towns and growing cities around Mohave county, including Laughlin, Nevada; Needles, California; Lake Havasu, Arizona; and even as far south as Yuma, Arizona, and San Luis Rey, Colorado.

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