After 13 years, Texas and New Mexico settle Rio Grande case, and well users face cuts

After nearly 13 years, Texas and New Mexico have reached a settlement in a Supreme Court fight over Rio Grande water and groundwater pumping.

For farmers, towns, and other users in southern New Mexico, however, this may only be the beginning. In communities already stretched thin, that delay adds another burden as a hotter, drier Southwest forces a wider reckoning with drought.

What happened?

The case stemmed from the 1938 Rio Grande Compact, which requires New Mexico to send a share of its river water to Texas. But 75 years later, in 2013, Texas sued, alleging that upstream groundwater pumping was reducing those deliveries, as reported by Inside Climate News.

Both the state of Colorado and the US government joined in on the lawsuit, accusing New Mexico of violating the 1938 compact with its pumping.

The outlet reported that the Supreme Court approved a settlement requiring New Mexico to lower pumping from connected wells by 18,200 acre-feet per year over the coming decade from between the Caballo Reservoir and Texas.

That amounts to roughly 6% to 7% of groundwater use in the basin each year. Ryan Serrano, Lower Rio Grande Basin bureau chief for New Mexico's Office of the State Engineer, described the deadline to ICN, saying, "We're on the clock now, May 2026. We have until May 2036 to get this done."

The settlement also further revises the formula used to calculate New Mexico's deliveries to Texas and starts measuring Rio Grande flow at the border. Meeting those requirements is now expected to cost New Mexico at least $150 million, with the total potentially rising if voluntary efforts do not achieve the needed cuts, per ICN.

Why does it matter?

Inside Climate News reported that snowmelt runoff, which supplies much of New Mexico's Rio Grande water, has dropped 17% since 2000. At the same time, the state expects significantly less water in the decades ahead as temperatures continue to rise.

In places like Hatch, Las Cruces, and Anthony, many residents and farmers rely on wells when river deliveries come up short, especially in bad years. Because those wells are central to the settlement's required reductions, farming communities there now face hard choices.

The economic effects could extend far beyond individual farms, too. Agriculture supports countless jobs and helps shape local identity throughout the region, and reduced irrigation could mean more fallowed land, lower farm income, and growing pressure on businesses that rely on growers.

For communities that already have little room to spare, those changes could be especially difficult.

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