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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With Western states deadlocked in negotiations over how to cut
water use along the Colorado River, the Trump administration
has called in the governors of seven states to Washington to
try to hash out a consensus. The governors of at least four —
Utah, Arizona, Nevada and Wyoming — say
they’ll attend the meeting next week led by Interior Secretary
Doug Burgum, but California Gov. Gavin Newsom
won’t. Newsom is “unable to attend but plans to send
key representatives of his administration to attend in his
place,” spokesperson Anthony Martinez said in an email.
… As the negotiations remain at an impasse, the
possibility of the states suing one another is increasing.
Gov. Gavin Newsom is stepping into a labor dispute that could
threaten the timeline of one of his flagship water projects:
the planned Sites Reservoir north of Sacramento. Newsom
(D) wrote to the Sites Project Authority Board of Directors on
Friday expressing concern that the board’s choice to finalize a
contract with Barnard Construction Co. to build the roughly
$6.8 billion reservoir was alienating unions. “The
Construction Manager you select must ensure that the project’s
ambitious timetable is not disrupted by the potential for labor
unrest,” Newsom wrote. … Sites Reservoir would be the
first major new reservoir built in California in decades. The
project would divert water from the Sacramento River into an
offstream reservoir capable of holding up to 1.5 million
acre-feet of water.
Wyoming’s top water managers are warning that a significant
drawdown of Flaming Gorge Reservoir this spring is likely
imminent due to low snowpack and generally dry conditions
throughout the seven-state Colorado River
Basin region. Wyoming is a headwaters of the Colorado
River system, mostly via the Green River, which feeds Flaming
Gorge. As of Jan. 8, snow cover across the West was at its
lowest since 2001. … Flaming Gorge, which straddles the
Wyoming-Utah border, is one of the key reservoirs in the
Colorado River system that water managers turn to for extra
releases when there’s a projected shortage — primarily to
ensure operational water levels at Lake
Powell.
Nearly one million young salmon are being released this week
into flooded rice fields near the Yolo Bypass. The project is a
partnership with stakeholders from the Bridge Group and
the Coleman National Fish Hatchery. The juvenile fish,
called salmon fry, will spend several weeks growing in the
shallow fields. After that, they will swim into the Sacramento
River and begin their trip to the Pacific Ocean. The
effort is based on scientific research showing flooded rice
fields can help young Chinook salmon grow and survive.
The South Fork Kings Groundwater Sustainability Agency (GSA)
approved a pumping allocation during a Jan. 15 board meeting.
The policy will allow Lemoore-area pumpers to extract a base
amount of .86 acre feet per acre of land. “I think it’s a
necessary evil, but it scares me and it’s going to be real
expensive and I don’t know how long it’s going to last. I don’t
think it’s sustainable for the farmer. It might be sustainable
for the groundwater, but it’s not sustainable for the farmer,”
Board member Ceil Howe said before the vote. The pumping
allocation policy is just one piece of the puzzle to ensure
that the GSA complies with the Sustainable Groundwater
Management Act (SGMA), which aims to have local
entities bring aquifers into balance by 2040.
The State Water Resources Control Board unanimously adopted an
order extending its approval of the landmark Lower Yuba River
Accord for another 25 years. Specifically, the board approved
Yuba Water Agency’s petition for a long-term extension of the
points of diversion and places of use associated with
the Lower Yuba River Accord through 2050.
… Since the mid-2000s, the Yuba Accord has advanced a
broad suite of important benefits [including]:
… science-based minimum instream flows to protect
spring-run Chinook salmon and steelhead trout … a
reliable source of water available to improve statewide water
supplies … a reliable source of supply to ensure local
agricultural needs can be met, while also maintaining
hydropower production.
The Delta Science Program leads the development of the Delta
Science Plan, a shared framework that provides vision,
principles, and approaches for better coordinating science in
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and more effectively
communicating the outcomes of science activities and their
management implications to policymakers. … The due date for
public comments on the draft 2026 Delta Science
Plan has been extended until January 30,
2026, and we encourage community feedback to help
shape its final form.
San Diego County leaders announced Thursday they have a plan to
help reduce toxic sewage pollution in the Tijuana River Valley
and measure its impact on residents’ health. At a news
conference from the river valley, Supervisors Paloma Aguirre
and Terra Lawson-Remer said they want the county to use
reserves typically set aside for emergencies for two
initiatives they estimate would cost $4.75 million. The
proposal to use rainy-day funds for Tijuana River sewage
efforts is the latest Aguirre has made this week. On Tuesday,
she suggested using $19.25 million to buy more air purifiers
for residents and air monitors for the county to record
real-time data of hydrogen sulfide levels and to run a
treatment pilot program that would improve the river water’s
conditions.
The story of California begins with water. Without the mass
import of the wet stuff from parts north and east, much of
Southern and Central California would be barely inhabitable. No
one tells the story of water in California’s heartland in more
detail, or with more tenacity, than Lois
Henry. She’s a former Bakersfield Californian
columnist who six years ago launched
SJVWater.org. Mega-farmers, environmentalists
and everyday folk read her site to learn about arcane water
district policies, the effect of those policies on farmland and
fish and for insights on the political intrigue that powers the
San Joaquin Valley.
Water-related violence has almost doubled since 2022 and little
is being done to understand and address the trend and prevent
new and escalating risks, experts have said. There were 419
incidents of water-related violence recorded in 2024, up from
235 in 2022, according to the Pacific Institute. … [Pacific
Institute Co-Founder Peter] Gleick said: “The Colorado
River and the Rio Grande in the US have become
increasingly politically contentious in recent years. There are
treaties dating back to 1944 that govern both rivers, requiring
the US to deliver Colorado River water to Mexico and Mexico to
deliver Rio Grande water to the US. But as border politics
ramped up under the Trump administration, these issues became
more contentious. Several people were killed in Mexico during a
protest at a dam used to deliver water to the US, after farmers
objected to the releases.”
The No Desert Data Center Coalition filed a lawsuit last week
against Pima County in southern Arizona for approving a land
sale and rezoning request from a data center developer — just
the latest move in the battle over data centers amid
water concerns in Arizona. … Local
opposition to data centers in Tucson, a Democratic stronghold,
Marana, a conservative-leaning district, and Chandler, a
Republican suburb, suggests bipartisan consensus over concerns
of water scarcity and rising energy costs. … Beale
Infrastructure, the data center developer, said the data
centers will be air-cooled instead of using millions of gallons
of water to “wash” the heat away from servers. But the
trade-off in this case is a massive energy draw in an already
strained region.
Poway residents will be paying more for water after the City
Council’s Jan. 20 approval of a 9.9% rate increase this year,
with another 4% hike each year for the next four years.
Additionally, the cost of recycled water is increasing by 23%
this year and wastewater costs are scheduled to rise by 3% each
year from 2028 through 2030, according to a staff report.
… The increases are needed to fund the costs of imported
water, capital expenses, operational expenses and appropriate
reserve levels. … Also leading to the rising rates are
the wholesale costs associated with operating the Claude “Bud”
Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant and from the detachment of
the Rainbow and Fallbrook municipal water districts from the
County Water Authority.
Governor Spencer Cox said he and his fellow governors of states
along the Colorado River have been summoned to Washington D.C.
to try to negotiate an agreement. ”I will be going back to
D.C., I think towards the end of next week; all the governors
are going to be getting together with the Department of
Interior to have a discussion there,” Gov. Cox said.
… FOX 13 News reached out to the governors offices in
several states to see if they intended to participate in the
talks. Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon’s office confirmed he would
attend. So did Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo’s office.
… Utah’s governor also expressed support for an idea to
pay California to build more desalination plants along the
Pacific Coast in exchange for Colorado River water shares
upstream.
… Climate scientists have long warned that when storms
ride on top of high tides, bayside Marin County will flood and
cause chaos, especially in low-lying areas like San Rafael.
… Flooding experts predict that the changing climate
will turn today’s king tides into the everyday tides of the
future. They want Marin County to learn from the recent
disaster and to install better pumps, engineer new seawalls and
even pilot out-of-the-box ideas like floating homes.
… The city’s flatlands are shaped like a bowl, protected
by makeshift levees — some constructed with plywood, cement or
asphalt — and pumps that are already struggling.
Developers in Arizona are planning to build a $10 billion data
center next to Horseshoe Bend, an iconic viewpoint
along the Colorado River. The 500-acre parcel,
located a mile from Horseshoe Bend, was previously protected
for outdoor recreation. … A petition to stop the data
center’s construction has already netted over 1,800 signatures
as of this publication. The document cites concerns over water
consumption and contamination, pollution, and an “unsightly
blight that will detract from the scenic beauty.”
… These servers generate immense heat, and keeping them
cool requires a large amount of water, the bipartisan think
tank Environmental and Energy Study Institute writes.
Snowpack in Nevada is off to a grim start as high temperatures
have prevented snow packs from forming, despite high
precipitation. Snowpack in Nevada and the Eastern Sierra – a
major source of water for the Truckee River in northern Nevada
– are below normal at 74% of median for the time of year. While
precipitation in December was well above normal, warmer than
normal temperatures mean that has not translated to robust
snowpacks throughout much of the state. … The decrease
in snowpack across Nevada was largely a result of above normal
temperatures melting snowpack away, according to Nevada State
Climatologist Baker Perry.
Dozens of the world’s major rivers are so heavily tapped, they
often run dry before reaching the sea. More than half of all
large lakes are shrinking, and most of the world’s major
underground sources are declining irreversibly as agricultural
pumping drains water that took centuries or even thousands of
years to accumulate. In a report this week, U.N. scientists
warn that the world has entered a new era of “global water
bankruptcy.” … The report points to the Colorado
River and its depleted reservoirs, on which California
and other western states depend, as symbols of over-promised
water. … These problems are compounded by climate
change, which is upending the water cycle and bringing more
severe droughts and floods.
… Adding groundwater sustainability agencies (GSAs) under the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA)
has only multiplied the many cross connected lines, in some
cases creating conflicts. Joe Neves, who serves as a Kings
County Supervisor, as well as a director on both the Mid-Kings
River and South Fork Kings GSAs decided that was his case and
announced Jan. 15 he was offloading his position on the
Mid-Kings board. Serving on both boards was
“incompatible,” Neves said at South Fork’s Jan. 15 meeting. His
resignation came after Neves voted to approve a letter from
South Fork opposing Mid-Kings’ draft pumping allocation policy,
though he had approved the policy as a member of Mid-Kings’
board.
In a significant move to bolster California’s salmon
population, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife
(CDFW) has allocated over $10 million in grants to 16 projects
aimed at restoring, enhancing and protecting salmon and
steelhead habitats across the state. … Among the funded
projects, the Upper Klamath River Design and Planning Project
was awarded $739,196 to the Mid Klamath Watershed Council. The
project will develop a 100% level fisheries restoration design
on 7 miles of Beaver Creek. … The FRGP is now accepting
concept proposals for the 2026 grant solicitation.
We’ve been following the ongoing pollution crisis in the
Tijuana River Valley, and today, we’re zeroing in on a spot
that’s drawing a lot of attention: Trash piled up in Smuggler’s
Gulch, just feet from where stormwater flows straight into the
estuary. … During heavy rain, the creek bed turns into a
roaring river. When that happens, trash gets swept downstream
and straight into the Tijuana River Estuary and, eventually,
the ocean. … This part of the Tijuana River Valley is a
complex network of streams and creeks all feeding into the
estuary. County officials say trash booms can only do so much,
especially when flooding moves fast and carries heavy debris.
