After 12 years of drought, Casa de Piedra lake recovered its levels: The reservoir level rose about 8 meters and today it is 281.28 meters above sea level. According to the authorities, it was below 268 meters.
The lake is on the border of La Pampa and Río Negro. «If we take January 2023 to January 2024, the reservoir level increased by 8 meters. It happens that we have been coming from dry cycles for 12 years and we entered a wet cycle,” explained Javier Schlegel, president of Coirco (the committee made up of La Pampa, Mendoza, Neuquén, Río Negro and Buenos Aires, the five provinces with jurisdiction over the Colorado River).
He stressed that throughout 2023, there were two flood events due to precipitation. «Now in the summer, due to the snow melting, we have had a flood and a significant contribution of flow. “The levels of the Colorado River have recovered,” he added.
When the lake’s flow began to normalize over the last year, engineer Gustavo Campetella, head of the Casa de Piedra hydroelectric plant since 1991, had explained that “Until 2010, the Colorado was a river that showed large floods every 10 years and then it moved between forecasts of average flows, some dry, it returned to the average and its 10-year flood.” But from 2010 onwards, the river changed. “There came a succession of dry and extra-dry years. The floods disappeared and this one that hit now is something extraordinary,” he said.
Schlegel highlighted that during the 12 years of drought, the watershed committee, together with coordinated management of the five provinces, managed to sustain the activities of the basin. “The reservoir is used for human consumption, energy generation, recreational and primary production activities (agriculture and mining),” he noted.
He mentioned that every year “the basin organization establishes a plan for dispensing the dam’s flow. That plan has been conservative and agreed upon. “This year it allows us to spend a little more, reaching 125 cubic meters per second.”