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 Vik Jolly.
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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.
Deep in the Piedmont Hills, Gregg Semler and Casey Leblanc are
checking up on what could be described as the Bay Area’s newest
and smallest hydroelectric power plant. … The team installed
the miniaturized turbine in a pipeline connecting part of the
East Bay Municipal Utility District’s water distribution
system. It takes the place of the normal water pressure
regulator, housed in a small building next door. But instead of
just controlling the flow, they say it harnesses it to produce
electricity, spinning the turbine-driven generator.
California’s wet season started with a bang, or at least a
drizzle, as rain pitter-pattered on the Bay Area last
week. But the state’s water experts say at this time of
year, they still have to prepare for floods, drought or even
both. Oct. 1 officially began the rainy season in California,
and with this seasonal shift, they sealed their record of
annual rain and snow and started a fresh tally.
… Forecasters reported a 71% chance of La Niña beginning
this fall. The seasonal climate pattern can signal parched
conditions in Southern California but leaves precipitation in
the northern part of the state mostly a mystery.
As negotiators for the seven Colorado River Basin states
rapidly approach Reclamation’s November deadline for providing
a framework for a seven-state agreement for the Post-2026
Operating Guidelines for Lakes Powell and Mead, a larger threat
looms. … Reclamation’s latest analysis predicts that
storage at Lake Powell would fall below the 3500-ft elevation
as early August 2026 and might continue to be below this
critical elevation until March 2028. … In the face of this
imminent possibility, Basin States and the Federal Government
must commit to an enforceable agreement to reduce their total
consumptive Colorado River uses with an equitable sharing of
the burden sufficient to justify a waiver of claims under the
Compact for the duration of the agreement.
As groundwater agencies limit pumping, sometimes in different
amounts and ways, farmers with land across boundaries are
trying to figure how to operate. Lakeside Irrigation
District Board member and farmer Ralph Alcala brought up a
hypothetical at the district’s Oct. 1 meeting: How will
groundwater agencies stop farmers from transferring water
between parcels, potentially out of one groundwater region and
into another?
The federal agencies responsible for managing the
ever-shrinking Colorado River have two new leaders at the helm.
Scott Cameron, who previously served as acting assistant
Interior secretary for water and science, will lead the Bureau
of Reclamation as acting commissioner. Interior Secretary Doug
Burgum appointed him Wednesday through a secretarial
order. … The post Cameron was filling will go
permanently to Andrea Travnicek, who has experience leading the
North Dakota Department of Water Resources and served in the
first Trump administration’s Interior Department in various
roles.
Only a few seats are left on the bus for our Northern
California Tour on Oct. 22-24. This 3-day,
2-night excursion travels across the Sacramento Valley and
follows the river north from Sacramento through Oroville to
Redding and Shasta Lake. Tour participants will also get an
up-close view of Oroville Dam’s repaired main spillway
that suffered major damage during a power 2017 storm. Claim
your seat now!
The Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board,
represented by the California Attorney General’s Office, filed
suit against Sable Offshore Corp., alleging repeated violations
tied to the repair and restart of the Santa Ynez Unit oil and
gas operation. … It alleges that Sable repeatedly discharged
or threatened to discharge waste to waters of the state without
authorization, despite being notified by the Central Coast
Water Board that permits were required for the activities. The
complaint also contends that Sable activities resulted in the
discharge of sediment and vegetative debris to various bodies
of water inland and near the Gaviota Coast.
On a bright afternoon in August, the shore on the North Arm of
the Great Salt Lake looks like something out of a science
fiction film set in a scorching alien world. … This
otherworldly scene is the test site for a company called Lilac
Solutions, which is developing a technology it says will shake
up the United States’ efforts to pry control over the global
supply of lithium, the so-called “white gold” needed for
electric vehicles and batteries, away from China.
… Lilac is not the only company in the US pushing for
DLE. In California’s Salton Sea, developers such as
EnergySource Minerals are looking to build a geothermal power
plant to power a DLE facility pulling lithium from the inland
desert lake.
… Earlier this year, the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of
Land Management approved a plan to round up and
remove hundreds of wild horses roaming beyond the roughly
200,000 acres designated for them along the California and
Nevada border. … Environmentalists say the horses are
degrading the otherworldly landscape at Mono Lake, including
bird habitat and its famed tufa. … Local tribes and
nonprofits have partnered to fight the roundup plan, arguing
that the Indigenous community should be tapped to manage the
animals that roam their ancestral lands. A separate group of
plaintiffs has sued the government, claiming it’s reneging on
its duty to protect the horses.
Each fall, one of Lake Tahoe’s most unique wildlife spectacles
comes alive at Taylor Creek. The Kokanee salmon are preparing
to begin their upstream journey, turning the waters of this
South Lake Tahoe stream into a vibrant scene of red and silver.
While the native Lahontan cutthroat trout spawn in the spring,
the Kokanee—a landlocked cousin of the Sockeye salmon—take
center stage in October and November. Their timing depends on
environmental factors like colder water and higher stream
flows, which are managed in part by the Fallen Leaf Lake Dam.
Without these carefully balanced flows, Taylor Creek could run
too low or even dry up in the fall.
Three years after the federal government listed a tiny Nevada
toad on the endangered species list, a geothermal company
seeking to develop a project near the toad’s only known habitat
in Northern Nevada is suing the government over the listing.
Ormat Technologies, headquartered in Reno, is suing the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and U.S. Department of the
Interior, saying that the Dixie Valley toad was placed on the
endangered species list “without any evidence” that its
population is declining. … One of the concerns is that
geothermal pumping in the area could affect the quality,
temperature, or quantity of water in the wetlands where the
toad lives.
… [A]s sea levels continue to rise and extreme weather events
become more frequent, the need for more effective response
strategies is greater than ever. The San Francisco Bay is one
such region experiencing this exact trajectory, making it a
focal point for scientists like Patrick Barnard, research
director for the Center for Coastal Climate Resilience at the
University of California, Santa Cruz. Barnard co-authored a
paper recently published in the Journal of Waterway, Port,
Coastal, and Ocean Engineering that explores coastal flooding
patterns and mitigation strategies throughout the bay region.
The El Dorado Water Agency (EDWA) has announced that its
General Manager, Rebecca Guo, has been elected to the
Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) Board to
represent Region 3 for the 2026-27 term. Officials from EDWA
are celebrating this development, as Guo will be in a position
to advocate for El Dorado County’s water resource needs,
including investments in watershed management, water
reliability and drought preparedness.
For more than two decades, small-scale farmers and community
gardeners have grown fresh fruits and vegetables, native
plants, flowers and other produce at the Tijuana
River Valley Community Garden, a 20-acre complex of
publicly owned farmland adjacent to the Tijuana River.
… All of that came to a halt last week when
representatives from the Resource Conservation District of
Greater San Diego County, which manages the garden, issued mass
eviction notices to all 217 community gardeners and
farmers. One reason for the sudden eviction, the
district’s executive director said, was a series of pollution
warning signs erected six weeks ago at several locations
throughout the river valley, including at the garden itself.
Voluntary cleanup agreements have been a staple of cleanups
under both state and federal cleanup programs for
decades. … California Health & Safety (“H&S”)
Code § 101480 et seq. (“Section 101480”) allows local agencies
to enter into voluntary cleanup agreements and recover their
oversight costs. Section 101480 provides no framework or
authorization for local agencies to adopt their own corrective
action requirements but requires that they oversee the
investigation and cleanup consistent with the Water
Code. Several local agencies in California – including
some of the most populous cities and counties – have used
Section 101480 as enabling legislation to establish site
cleanup programs (“SCP”), including San Francisco City and
County, Alameda County, and Orange County.
Scott Cameron will take over as acting head of the Bureau of
Reclamation, shifting titles at the Interior Department while
he maintains his role as the Trump administration’s lead
official in negotiations over the future of the Colorado River
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum tapped Cameron for the role on
Oct. 1, announcing the decision in a secretarial order that
also updated other leadership roles recently confirmed by the
Senate. The decision comes in the wake of President Donald
Trump’s decision on Sept. 30 to withdraw his nomination of Ted
Cooke, a former top official at the Central Arizona Project, to
be Reclamation commissioner.
Governor Gavin Newsom has signed SB 72 into law after the bill
passed unanimously through the California Legislature. The
legislation establishes clear statewide water supply targets
and sets in motion long-term strategies to secure reliable
water for residents, businesses, agriculture, and the
environment. … The bill requires state agencies, water
providers, and stakeholders to work together on durable supply
solutions that extend beyond any single administration.
The most cost-effective and quickest way to conserve the
Colorado River’s shrinking water supply amid persistent drought
and rapid population growth is changing how states handle the
largest use of water on the river: agriculture. … That’s
according to a comprehensive study examining 462 federally
funded Colorado River conservation and supply projects using
available spending data from the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation. … The water projects examined – ranging
from large-scale infrastructure such as reservoirs and
wastewater treatment plants to agricultural water use – totaled
about $1 billion in federal funding between 2004 and 2024.
The California Department of Water Resources is implementing
new safety measures after the discovery of invasive golden
mussels in Merced County. The California Department of Water
Resources (DWR), in collaboration with the California
Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) and California State
Parks, is implementing new measures to protect the state’s
water infrastructure and curb the spread of invasive golden
mussels. This follows the recent discovery of the species at
San Luis Reservoir in Merced County, with confirmed findings in
Fresno and Kings Counties.
… Long before humans began altering the climate with
greenhouse gases and other air pollutants, the Southwest was
subject to feast-or-famine weather featuring extreme dry
spells, raising the possibility that this current drought is
just part of that natural variability. What scientists are
exploring now is how the human touch is imprinted on the
drought due to our ongoing transformation of the climate,
atmosphere and oceans. Three recent scientific studies identify
human emissions as a key driver in the precipitation declines
that have helped cause the Southwest’s current drought, which
has been made much worse by rising temperatures due to climate
change.
