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Water news you need to know

A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation News & Publications Director Chris Bowman.

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Please Note: Some of the sites we link to may limit the number of stories you can access without subscribing. Also, the headlines below are the original headlines used in the publication cited at the time they are posted here and do not reflect the stance of the Water Education Foundation, an impartial nonprofit that remains neutral.

Aquafornia news San Francisco Chronicle

SF allegedly dumps big amounts of sewage into creek during storms

When heavy rain overwhelms wastewater treatment plants in San Francisco, causing stormwater to overflow onto streets and into the bay, sewage is an unfortunate part of the mix.  After heavy rain, the largest recipient of the potent brew of stormwater and sewage in the city is Mission Creek — a channel to the bay that is home to houseboats, walking trails and a kayak launch. At Mission Creek, Islais Creek, another channel at India Basin, and a few locations in between, the city discharges 1.2 billion gallons of “combined sewer discharges” in a typical year, according to the environmental group S.F. Baykeeper, which has notified the city it intends to sue over how such discharges impact the environment. A large portion of the combined sewer overflows — which SFPUC said are composed of 94% treated stormwater and 6% treated wastewater — is making its way without basic treatment into the bay during storms, according to S.F. Baykeeper. 

Aquafornia news Fox 40 - Sacramento

Remains of destructive dam failure to be cleared from the American River after 60 years

After nearly 60 years of being submerged in the clear waters of the American River, chunks of concrete and steel will be removed from the river in the Auburn State Recreation Area, but how did they get there? Before the current State Route 49 bridge straddled the American River, a similarly placed bridge provided the vital connection between Auburn and the communities of northwest El Dorado County. That bridge, named the Georgetown Bridge, was built in 1948 and ended its time of providing safe passage for motorists on Dec. 23, 1964. According to the Association of State Dam Safety Officials (ASDSO), Hell Hole Dam breached, releasing 30,000 acre-feet of water down the Rubicon River, into the Middle Fork of the American River and down to the confluence with the North Fork of the American River near Auburn.

Aquafornia news AP News

Interior Department will give tribal nations $120 million to fight climate-related threats

The Biden administration will be allocating more than $120 million to tribal governments to fight the impacts of climate change, the Department of the Interior announced Thursday. The funding is designed to help tribal nations adapt to climate threats, including relocating infrastructure. Indigenous peoples in the U.S. are among the communities most affected by severe climate-related environmental threats, which have already negatively impacted water resources, ecosystems and traditional food sources in Native communities in every corner of the U.S. “As these communities face the increasing threat of rising seas, coastal erosion, storm surges, raging wildfires and devastation from other extreme weather events, our focus must be on bolstering climate resilience …” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, a member of the Pueblo of Laguna, said in a Wednesday press briefing.

Aquafornia news Bloomberg

Regulation of PFAS chemicals in water supply strains city budgets

Hastings, Minnesota, is staring down a $69 million price tag for three new treatment plants to remove PFAS chemicals from its water supply, ahead of new US federal regulations limiting the amount of so-called forever chemicals in public drinking water — which could come as early as this month. … [T]he project amounts to a “budget buster,” says city administrator Dan Wietecha. Operation and maintenance costs for the new plants could add as much as $1 million to the tab each year … Cities across the US are bracing for costly upgrades to their water systems as the Environmental Protection Agency moves to finalize the first-ever enforceable national drinking water standards for PFAS — or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances — a large group of man-made chemicals used for decades in manufacturing and in consumer products.

Aquafornia news Capitol Weekly

Opinion: Newsom’s stealthy divide and conquer Delta tunnel campaign

Gavin Newsom’s stealthy divide and conquer tactics are pushing marginalized communities against each other in a war over water. Newsom, his administration and State Water Contractors are appropriating environmental justice language to sway public opinion in Southern California about the Delta Conveyance Project – also referred to as the Delta tunnel. They argue that the Delta tunnel is essential for Southern California’s disadvantaged communities, yet misrepresent the harm the project continues to have on the tribal communities along California’s major rivers and on communities in the Delta watershed. Pitting disadvantaged communities from different regions of the state against each other is a cynical strategy, and is all the more egregious when considering it’s done in the interest of serving only one sector of California’s economy that these players have deemed all-important – special interests in Southern California and portions of Silicon Valley.
-Written by Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of Restore the Delta.  

Aquafornia news Los Angeles Times

Opinion: Ours is the most wasteful civilization in history. Here’s how to stop that

What if the looming calamities of climate change, plastic pollution, the energy crisis and our whole environmental doom-scroll are symptoms of just one malady and it’s something we actually can fix? That’s right, the planet is fighting a single archvillain: Waste. Americans live in the most wasteful civilization in history. … Waste is so deeply embedded in our economy, products and daily lives that it’s hard to see clearly, or to see at all. … How is it “normal” that 40% of what our industrial farm and food system produces ends up as garbage? … The average American throws out three times more trash today than in 1960. Pin much of that garbage growth on plastic waste, so pervasive now that tiny bits of it are in food, water, beer and even human hearts, lungs and newborn babies’ poop.
-Written by Edward Humes, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. His latest book, “Total Garbage: How We Can Fix Our Waste and Heal Our World,” will be published in April.

Aquafornia news Monterey County Weekly

Farmers file lawsuits against County of Monterey, Caltrans and others over 2023 Pajaro flood-related damages.

Following a lawsuit filed by hundreds of Pajaro Valley residents and business owners, farmers and agricultural landowners and tenants have filed two lawsuits against local, regional and state agencies they claim are liable for damages connected to the 2023 Pajaro levee breach and subsequent flooding. One suit is filed by about a dozen business entities (and roughly 50 people who are trustees); another by Willoughby Farms. Each case, filed on March 4 in Monterey County Superior Court, names a long list of defendants: the counties of Monterey and Santa Cruz; the Monterey County Water Resources Agency; Santa Cruz County Flood Control and Water Conservation District; Pajaro Regional Flood Management Agency; State of California; and Caltrans. (The Willoughby Farms suit also names the City of Watsonville and others.) 

Aquafornia news USA Today

Concern after dog-killing flatworm found in California for first time – in Colorado River

A dog-killing parasite that was believed to only exist in Texas and other Gulf Coast states has been discovered as far west as California for the first time, scientists have warned. Experts at the University of California Riverside found the Heterobilharzia americana parasite, a flatworm commonly known as a liver fluke, in spots along the Colorado River where it runs through Southern California. According to the university, the flatworm has never before been seen outside of Texas and surrounding areas, and other studies have found most infections occur in Texas and Louisiana, though some have occurred in North Carolina, Texas, and Kansas.

Related article: 

Aquafornia news San Francisco Chronicle

Thursday Top of the Scroll: New study – California’s farm belt sees thirstier crops, pressure on water supply

Climate change is driving up the thirst of crops significantly in California’s San Joaquin Valley, new research shows, adding to the critical water challenges faced by one of the world’s leading agricultural regions. The total water demand of orchards, vineyards and row crops in the area is up 4.4% over the past decade compared with the prior 30 years because of hotter, drier conditions, and it’s likely to continue growing, according to a federally funded study published this week. In 2021, the water demand of crops was up an astonishing 12.3%, the study shows. While the warming atmosphere has long been known to dry out plants and soil, the new research identifies the impact specific to the San Joaquin Valley.

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Aquafornia news The Vacaville Reporter

State recommends huge cut to Solano water allocation

A new recommendation from the California State Water Quality Control Board in its Bay-Delta Water Quality Control Plan (Bay-Delta Plan) for the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Estuary could see Solano County forced to adapt to a fraction of the water it is currently allocated from Lake Berryessa. The implications for Solano County cities could be enormous, leaving Solano County with about 25 percent of its current allocation. Spanning hundreds of miles from north of Lake Shasta to Fresno, the tributaries of the Sacramento and Sac Joaquin rivers that feed into the San Francisco Bay reach well into the Sierra Nevadas and Central Valley. The State Water Quality Control Board has noted that diminished river flows in these areas are harming fish habitats and are detrimental to the water system as a whole ecologically.

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Aquafornia news KUNC - Greeley, Colo

Gila River Indian Community says it doesn’t support latest Colorado River sharing proposals

The Gila River Indian Community says it does not support a three-state proposal for managing the Colorado River’s shrinking supply in the future. The community, which is located in Arizona, is instead working with the federal government to develop its own proposal for water sharing. The tribe is among the most prominent of the 30 federally-recognized tribes that use the Colorado River. In recent years, it has signed high-profile deals with the federal government to receive big payments in exchange for water conservation. Those deals were celebrated by Arizona’s top water officials. But now, it is diverging from states in the river’s Lower Basin — Arizona, California and Nevada. Stephen Roe Lewis, The Gila River Indian Community’s Governor, announced his tribe’s disapproval of the Lower Basin proposal at a water conference in Tucson, Ariz., while speaking to a room of policy experts and water scientists.

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Aquafornia news SJV Water

Allensworth residents feel abandoned by company that makes water out of thin air

Allensworth is one of the testing grounds for a hydropanel that creates drinking water out of thin air. But two years into the program, community members say the hydropanel company has left them high and dry while many of the hydropanels have broken down. Allensworth has struggled with arsenic-laced groundwater for decades. In 2021, Source Global, the company behind the hydropanels, installed two in Allensworth to test out the technology. Each panel generates about a gallon of drinking water per day by condensing water vapor in the air into liquid form.  In 2022, a philanthropic organization bought 1,000 hydropanels to be installed throughout the Central Valley. Allensworth now has about 42 panels, according to Source Global.

Related article: 

Aquafornia news Los Angeles Times

Commentary: Water is life. It’s also energy — whether you like dams or hate them

The rain and snow that have drenched California and much of the American West over the last few months — at least relative to some of the hellishly dry years we’ve gotten recently — are a blessing not just for water supplies, but for energy. Or maybe they’re a curse (for energy, not for water). It depends on whom you ask. Much of the electricity powering our lights and refrigerators and cellphones comes from rivers, their once free-flowing waters backing up behind dams and trickling through hydropower turbines.

Aquafornia news New Times San Luis Obispo

LA Superior Court rules on Cuyama Valley Groundwater Basin boundaries

A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge confirmed that the Cuyama Valley Groundwater Basin is one connected basin—not separate subbasins—allowing for the groundwater adjudication to move forward following a year and a half of delays and litigation. … The Cuyama Valley Groundwater Basin is one of California’s 21 critically overdrafted basins that was required under the 2014 California Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) to create a groundwater sustainability agency (GSA) and corresponding groundwater sustainability plan.

Related articles: 

Aquafornia news Sacramento Bee

Sacramento catches a break on water conservation in new rules

Sacramento and cities across California caught a break from the state’s water regulator this week after the agency faced criticism that its water conservation rules were too complicated and costly to meet. Regulators at the State Water Resources Control Board proposed new conservation rules Tuesday that would ease water savings requirements for urban water suppliers and will ultimately lead to less long-term water savings than initially planned. Under the new rules, the city of Sacramento would have to cut its overall water use by 9% by 2035 and 14% by 2040, far less than an initial proposal that would have required it to cut back water use by 13% by 2030 and 18% by 2035.

Aquafornia news Ag Net West

Additional $205 million in funding for Sites Reservoir

Congress has given the green light for a significant boost to the Sites Reservoir Project, based on a recommendation from the Bureau of Reclamation. A total of $205.6 million in federal funds is being allocated. The money comes from the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act, which helps enhance water systems across the country. It marks the largest single award in the history of the WIIN Act for a storage project. … The Sites Reservoir aims to bolster water supplies across California while also supporting native wildlife during droughts. This project will add 1.5 million acre-feet of storage, significantly enhancing the state’s water flexibility and reliability during dry years. Last summer, the project received $30 million from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, making the total federal contribution to date $439.3 million.

Aquafornia news Audubon Magazine

A California wetland program’s flood of new funding lifts hopes for shorebirds

… For millennia seasonal wetlands dotted California’s Central Valley … But as farms and towns have taken over the landscape, nearly all those shallow, ephemeral water bodies have disappeared, leaving avian migrants with scant options for pit stops. With shorebirds rapidly declining along the Pacific Flyway, conservationists and landowners have joined forces to help turn the tide. Launched in 2014, BirdReturns runs via reverse auctions … Since its inception, the program—jointly run by Audubon California, The Nature Conservancy, and Point Blue Conservation Science—has paid more than 100 farmers a total of $2 million to flood 60,000 acres throughout the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. Buoyed by a recent $15 million grant from the state, the program is poised to greatly expand its reach.

Aquafornia news The Washington Post

New study: How the Flint water crisis set schoolchildren back

School-age children affected by the water crisis in Flint, Mich., nearly a decade ago suffered significant and lasting academic setbacks, according to a new study released Wednesday, showing the disaster’s profound impact on a generation of children. The study, published in Science Advances, found that after the crisis, students faced a substantial decline in math scores, losing the equivalent of five months of learning progress that hadn’t recovered by 2019, according to Brian Jacob, one of the study’s authors. The learning gap was especially prevalent among younger students in third through fifth grades and those of lower socioeconomic status. There was also an 8 percent increase in the number of students with special needs, especially among school-age boys. 

Aquafornia news Harvard Law School

Blog: Supreme Court tackles water rights in the West in Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado

Can Texas, New Mexico, and Colorado agree to a new apportionment of the Rio Grande’s waters without the U.S. government’s approval? The Supreme Court of the United States is set to hear a case next week that may affect access to water for millions of Americans — and set a precedent that could impact millions more, as increased usage and climate change further strain supply of the precious resource. On March 20, the Court will consider Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado, a tangled case involving water rights to the Rio Grande, a 1,896-mile river that begins at the base of the San Juan Mountains and runs into the Gulf of Mexico. The case, which has been in litigation for more than a decade, centers around a 1939 compact between the three states over how to apportion the river’s waters.

Aquafornia news Reuters

After destructive floods, EU sues Greece for failing to revise risk plans

The European Commission said on Wednesday it was taking Greece to the EU’s top court for failing to revise its flood risk management plans, a key tool for EU countries to prepare themselves against floods. The action comes five months after the worst rains in Greece flooded its fertile Thessaly plain, devastating crops and livestock and raising questions about the Mediterranean country’s ability to deal with an increasingly erratic climate. Under EU rules, countries need to update once in six years their flood management plans, a set of measures aimed to help them mitigate the risks of floods on human lives, the environment and economic activities. Greece was formally notified by the Commission last year that it should finalise its management plans but the country has so far failed to review, adopt or report its flood risk management plans, the Commission said in a statement.