[sacred_numbers]

Reverse osmosis desalination does have some capital and operational costs, though, but you're not far off. 5 billion m^3 or 4 million acre-feet would still only be about 2.5 B per year. The problem is that if you fill up the Colorado River the farmers that own the water rights will just drain it down again because they don't pay based on the quantity they use. Or if they do pay based on quantity the price is much lower than the cost of desalination. Desalinating large quantities of water without fixing the water rights situation would be like minting pennies out of gold.

[someguydave]

sure, there would be capital costs but those could be financed, plenty of people would lend 30 year money for such an enterprise.

So to be clear you hate agriculture so much you are willing to end it with drought? I like agriculture personally. I would like more of it! There is plenty of desert in the west that could be made to bloom.