Watch our series of short videos on the importance of the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, how it works as a water hub for
California and the challenges it is facing.
When a person opens a spigot to draw a glass of water, he or she
may be tapping a source close to home or hundreds of miles away.
Water gets to taps via a complex web of aqueducts, canals and
groundwater.
Learn more about our team in the office and on the Board of
Directors and how you can support our nonprofit mission by
donating in someone’s honor or memory, or becoming a regular
contributor or supporting specific projects.
Unlike California’s majestic rivers and massive dams and
conveyance systems, groundwater is out of sight and underground,
though no less plentiful. The state’s enormous cache of
underground water is a great natural resource and has contributed
to the state becoming the nation’s top agricultural producer and
leader in high-tech industries.
A new era of groundwater management began in 2014 in California
with the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. The landmark law
turned 10 in 2024, with many challenges still ahead.
We are gearing up for an engaging Water Summit on Oct. 29 and
also prepping our 2027 California Water Leaders program. Join a
virtual Q&A on our Water Leaders program on Nov. 10. Details
below.
Water Summit | October 29
Our 42ⁿᵈ
annual Water Summit is the Foundation’s
premier event of the year and returns to Sacramento October 29
with leading policymakers and experts addressing critical water
issues in California and across the West. Capacity is
limited and filling up quickly, so register here while
seats are available!
Conversations during the Summit will revolve around this year’s
theme, Stewarding a New Era in Western
Water, with a focus on emerging topics related to
the challenges and opportunities facing water resource
management.
The mandate to identify 9 million acre-feet of
additional water supply in California by 2040
The need for clarity in the ongoing AI/data center
discourse related to water resources management
The latest developments in desalination
efforts and their implications for the arid West
Our 42ⁿᵈ annual Water
Summit, an engaging day of discussions addressing
critical water issues in California and across the West, will be
held on Thursday, Oct. 29, in Sacramento with the theme,
Stewarding a New Era in Western Water.
Speakers and conversations will highlight emerging topics related
to the challenges and opportunities facing management of the
West’s most precious natural resource.
Lively conversations will focus on topics such
as:
The mandate to identify 9 million acre-feet of additional
water supply in California by 2040
The need for clarity in the ongoing AI/data center discourse
related to water resources management
The latest developments in desalination efforts and their
implications for the arid West
A full agenda will be posted soon, and speakers
include:
Joel Metzger | Deputy Director, Statewide
Water Resources Planning, California Department of Water
Resources
Sandi Matsumoto | California Water Program
Director, The Nature Conservancy
Cannon Michael | President, Bowles
Farming
Craig Miller | General Manager, Western
Municipal Water District
Dave Pederson | General Manager, Las Virgenes
Municipal Water District
As previously announced,
the day will open with a keynote address from Tom
Gibson, the new director of California’s Department of
Water Resources. An attorney who has held several roles in
the state’s Natural Resources Agency and its various departments,
Gibson was appointed by Gov. Newsom on June 29 and sworn in on
July 6 to lead DWR and its nearly 4,000 employees.
The developers of a new, massive Northern California reservoir
say they’ll have enough water to pursue their $6 billion
venture, laying to rest their previous concerns that
the project 70 miles northwest of Sacramento might not be
viable. The proposed Sites Reservoir, billed
as a remedy for the state’s chronic water shortages, appeared
to be at risk earlier this year when state regulators outlined
how much water the facility could draw from the
Sacramento River, and when those draws could
occur. … But two weeks ago, after pushback from Gov. Gavin
Newsom and other advocates, the State Water Resources Control
Board relaxed the conditions laid out in the
reservoir’s proposed water right. … On Friday,
officials with the Sites Project Authority, the agency leading
the ambitious endeavor, reported that their analysis of
the revised water right showed the reservoir would have
adequate water to make the project cost-effective.
The Colorado River Indian Tribes and the Central Arizona Water
Conservation District reached an agreement on Colorado
River, CRIT officials announced. The CRIT and CAWCD
agreement will deliver more than 9,000 acre-feet of
CRIT Intentionally Created Surplus, or ICS, water to the
district. … CRIT officials said the agreement
with the CAWCD represents the last remaining water CRIT
made available as part of a Drought Contingency Plan that was
agreed to in 2019. The surplus water was
previously conserved between 2020 and 2022 after requests from
the federal government. CRIT leaders conserved water to
help stabilize Lake Mead. … Under the
agreement, the CAWC District will compensate the CRIT at
$590 per acre-foot, for a total of
$5.3 million in two payments.
As the 2026-27 El Niño flirts with record territory, scientists
are increasingly confident it will have an
outsize influence on California precipitation.
That’s because there is a significant similarity between this
event and two prior very strong El Niños that drenched
California, and a difference from two that didn’t. The
key is the exact location of warm water: El Niños in
the far east — with the most unusually warm water near South
America — correlate more strongly with California
precipitation than a central-Pacific based El Niño,
according to John O’Brien, a climate scientist and a program
officer for science at the Heising-Simons Foundation.
… Despite El Niño’s outsize influence,
scientists note there’s a chance California ends up
relatively dry. Nothing is guaranteed.
Karla Nemeth spent eight years atop California’s water
bureaucracy, trying to make the state’s vast, creaky system
work in a hotter, more volatile climate. Now she’s
continuing the fight from outside government. …
Newsom is winding down his term, and Nemeth left her position
in July. Earlier this month, she took over as executive
director of the Association of California Water
Agencies, the state’s largest water trade group.From
that perch, she’ll be pushing the next administration
and the Legislature to do more about water storage, flood
protection, affordability and the Colorado River. In
an interview with POLITICO, she reflected on her time in the
executive branch and the challenges ahead for California and
its next governor.
Operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the
Bay Model is a giant hydraulic replica of San Francisco
Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta. It is housed in a converted World II-era
warehouse in Sausalito near San Francisco.
Hundreds of gallons of water are pumped through the
three-dimensional, 1.5-acre model to simulate a tidal ebb
and flow lasting 14 minutes.
As part of the historic Colorado
River Delta, the Salton Sea regularly filled and dried for
thousands of years due to its elevation of 237 feet below
sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
Drought — an extended period of
limited or no precipitation — is a fact of life in California and
the West, with water resources following boom-and-bust patterns.
No portion of the West has been immune to drought during the last
century and it occurs with much greater frequency in the West
than in any other region of the country.
