America’s hydropower challenge goes beyond the West

Drought is squeezing hydropower across the country, not just in the West. Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the reservoirs behind the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams, both hit record-low water levels this month after a dry winter and a warm spring melted what little snowpack the Rocky Mountains had. When full, the two reservoirs can produce more than 3 gigawatts of power, but current levels are far too low for that, and federal water managers say there's a small but real chance the dams could stop producing power entirely at some point next year.

The problem isn't limited to the Southwest. Quebec, which gets nearly all its electricity from hydropower, is in a multiyear drought of its own. That matters for the Northeast: two new transmission lines built this year to bring Canadian hydropower into New England and New York City have delivered far less electricity than planned, thanks to outages and the drought. That raises questions about how much homeowners in those regions can count on Canadian hydropower as a clean, reliable source of electricity going forward.

None of this changes anything you need to do at home right away, but it's a reminder that the power grid is leaning on water supplies that are under stress in multiple parts of the country at once. If you live in the West or Northeast, it's worth keeping an eye on how your local utility talks about supply and prices, since strained hydropower can ripple into both.