COLORADO RIVER BASIN — Mina Guli is running 2,000 miles along the Colorado River in 100 days to campaign for action on the water crisis. The CEO of the nonprofit Thirst Foundation stated that fragmentation between the Upper and Lower basins is the biggest obstacle to action in the Colorado River Basin.

Guli runs at night to avoid higher-than-average temperatures in the U.S. Southwest. Earlier this summer, she rerouted part of her run to avoid the Babylon and Snyder wildfires burning in Utah and Colorado. The Babylon Fire is burning in southeastern Utah, a situation PureSource News previously reported as reaching 54 percent containment near Monticello, Utah.

"We would lie in our tents at night and look out across the landscape and see the Babylon Fire burning in the distance," Guli said. "It’s hard to describe if you haven’t seen how big it is. It looked like a nuclear mushroom cloud." Five firefighters died in wildfires this year, including four who died after being burned by one of the fires Guli navigated around in Colorado, according to previous reports from PureSource News.

The physical state of the river reflects the urgency of the campaign. "The river that should have been flowing fast and deep was so low that we could literally wade down the course of the river," Guli said. The Bureau of Reclamation predicts that by August, water levels at Lake Powell will fall within a foot of "minimum power pool," below which Glen Canyon Dam can no longer generate electricity.

Guli identified historical policy decisions as a root cause of current challenges. The Colorado Compact overallocated the river’s water in 1922. "Reducing fragmentation, not just in the geography of how we look at the river, but also the sectors is pretty key," she said.

"It’s not a government problem, a community problem or a company problem. It’s an all of us problem."

The campaign is sponsored by the Water Resilience Coalition, an initiative of the U.N. Global Compact composed of the CEOs of major multinational corporations. The Thirst Foundation partnered with Danish pump manufacturer Grundfos to fund and promote the effort. Grundfos is a member of the coalition, which states that a company’s membership indicates a commitment to making improvements rather than coalition endorsement of its environmental policies.

"Delivering the needed impact requires engagement with high water footprint companies," a Water Resilience Coalition spokesperson said. "All stakeholders have a role to play in addressing the dire challenges of the Colorado River Basin." Cargill sits on the coalition’s six-member advisory board and owns meat-processing facilities for cattle raised in the Colorado River Basin. A Cargill spokesperson said the collective work complements the company's own business actions and that it works to reduce water use and improve efficiency in its operations.

Crops raised as cattle feed like alfalfa and hay account for 55 percent of water consumption basin-wide. In the Upper Basin states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming, these crops account for 90 percent of agricultural irrigation water. DuPont also participates in the coalition, despite manufacturing PFAS and other dangerous water pollutants. A DuPont spokesperson said the participation reflects a commitment demonstrated for decades as a global water technology leader.

Guli’s route will bring her to the U.S.-Mexico border before she runs nearly 300 more miles to the Santa Monica pier outside Los Angeles. The first summit of the campaign was held in Denver and emphasized solutions for water conservation in the Upper Basin. Water from the Colorado River Water Trust project at times accounted for half of the water in a 15-mile stretch east of Grand Junction recognized as critical habitat for the Colorado Pikeminnow, Razorback Sucker, Humpback Chub, and Bonytail Chub.