If Lake Mead were to run out of water, the Hoover Dam would no longer be able to generate power or provide water to surrounding cities and farms. The Colorado River would essentially stop flowing, and the Southwest would be in a major water crisis.
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If the Hoover Dam shuts down, it will have a ripple effect in the states of Nevada, Arizona, and California. There will be less water to go around, power will have to come from less clean sources, and all industries will be impacted some way or another.
The Hoover Dam relies on a steady water supply from Lake Mead. Without enough water, the dam would not be able to generate power. This would have ripple effects on the power grid and the economy, as the dam provides power to several states in the southwest United States.
As mentioned, it's possible for the water level in Lake Mead to drop to the point where the dam cannot generate hydroelectric power. However, it's very unlikely that the lake would completely run out of water.
The Dam FutureWhile the dam is expected to last for centuries, engineers predict the structure could last for more than 10,000 years, surpassing most remnants of human civilization if humans were to disappear from the earth.
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.
The sale of electrical power generated by the dam paid back its construction cost, with interest, by 1987. Today the Hoover Dam controls the flooding of the Colorado River, irrigates to over 1,500,000 acres of land, and provides water to over 16,000,000 people.
With intervening flows between Lake Powell and Lake Mead of 1.32 maf in CY 2023, Lake Mead's physical elevation is projected to be 1,065.42 feet on December 31, 2023. The WY 2023 unregulated inflow into Lake Powell in the August Probable Maximum inflow scenario is 13.75 maf, or 143% of average.
About 60% of the area still is in drought. It would actually take six more years of heavy rainfall in a row to refill the Lake Mead reservoir completely. Time is ticking to solve the problem before future droughts dry up the lake completely.
There are many places to swim in the bright blue waters of Lake Mead and Lake Mohave. Be aware that there are no lifeguards in the park. Always wear a life jacket.
Rainfall doesn't immediately add inches to the nation's largest reservoir. Lake Mead is enormous, and even the storm that dumped 8-10 inches of rain at Mt. Charleston covered a much smaller area than the lake. “We saw Mead's water level tick up a couple tenths of an inch.
As much as we clearly wanted it to, Hurricane Hilary couldn't help with that. Its rain didn't reach into the Rockies to sate those soils. And while Hilary drenched areas near Lake Mead, it gained less than a foot of elevation in the days after the storm (it is a big lake, after all, which takes a lot of water to fill).
When the snow eventually begins to melt, gravity will take over. As the water flows down from higher elevations, it begins a long journey that does not end at Lake Mead. According to the Las Vegas Valley Water District (LVVWD) the water will slowly seep into the ground.