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.
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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.
Time is running out to register for next Thursday’s Water
101 Workshop and go beyond the headlines to gain a
deeper understanding of how water is managed and moved across
California. Plus, only a handful of seats remain for the
opportunity to extend your ‘beyond the headlines’ water education
experience on the optional watershed tour the next day!
To replenish California’s
chronically depleted aquifers, the state’s Department of Water
Resources is taking a hard look at a new line of attack: Pairing
more sophisticated reservoir operations with groundwater
recharge. Water managers are aiming to make greater use of the
increased floodwater that’s expected to come with flashier, more
intense storms and earlier snowmelt.
Denver Water has enacted Stage 1 drought restrictions for all
customers across the service area, effective immediately. The
Denver Water board approved the plan Wednesday morning, aiming
to cut water use by 20% due to worsening drought. They warned
that this year’s low snowpack could impact supply.
… This is the first time a level of restriction
this high has been in place since 2013, according to
Denver Water. Other areas, such as Thornton, Erie, and the
mountain communities of Fairplay, Bailey, and Shawnee, are also
under restrictions. The move comes as drought conditions deepen
across Colorado.
Under pressure to strike a compromise on water cuts, and amid
talk of litigation, Wyoming and other upper Colorado
River Basin states are pointing to the climate-driven
disaster unfolding in the West to insist they can’t cut what
Mother Nature isn’t providing in the headwaters. While
some observers suspect that argument is cover for withholding
more cuts in water use, the upper-basin contingency insists it
has negotiated in good faith and still hopes to strike a deal
with its lower-basin counterparts despite missed deadlines.
They simply cannot commit to calculations that are beyond their
control. … Upper Colorado River Commission members [met]
Tuesday to discuss what they say are ongoing negotiations with
lower Colorado River Basin states Arizona, California
and Nevada, as well as 30 tribes and Mexico.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released more than 6.2
million juvenile Chinook salmon from the Coleman Hatchery into
the Sacramento River this week, even as the river faces unusual
March heat and low water flows. The announcement of the release
came during a spell of extreme heat throughout California,
prompting urgent calls from conservationists who warn the young
fall‑run Chinook could die in the river’s warm, low‑flow
conditions before making their way to the ocean, unless the
Bureau of Reclamation releases more water from Shasta
Dam.
As the Arizona Department of Water Resources works to regulate
groundwater pumping in western Arizona, a megafarm responsible
for more than 80% of all pumping in a 912-square-mile
groundwater basin seeks to stay a public nuisance lawsuit in
which it’s accused of excessive pumping. In a state courthouse
Wednesday, Fondomonte Arizona LLC argued the ongoing process to
designate the Ranegras Plain Basin as an active management area
would achieve the same groundwater regulation goals as the
lawsuit Attorney General Kris Mayes filed against it in 2024.
Rather than move forward with the litigation, Riley Snow of
Rose Law Group suggested the court allow the two-year process
to play out and address any remaining concerns later.
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.
During California’s 2012–2016 drought, much of the state
experienced severe drought conditions: significantly less
precipitation and snowpack, reduced streamflow and higher
temperatures. Those same conditions reappeared early in 2021
prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom in May to declare drought emergencies
in watersheds across 41 counties in California.
