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.
Are you an emerging leader ready to
make a greater impact on California water policy and management?
Applications are now being accepted for the Water Education
Foundation’s 2027
California Water Leaders cohort, with submissions
due Dec. 3.
Designed for rising professionals in California’s water
community, the program offers participants an unparalleled
opportunity to deepen their understanding of water issues, expand
their professional network and develop leadership skills
alongside a cohort of peers from across the state.
Visit the
application page, paying close attention
to frequently asked questions and mandatory
program dates to ensure you can fully
participate.
Confirm that you have your organization’s support and can
commit the time necessary to partipating in the program.
Interested in learning more? Join our exeuctive director, Jenn
Bowles, and other members of the Foundation team for
a virtual Q&A session at 12:30 p.m. on Nov.
10. We’ll provide an overview of the program and
share tips for submitting a strong application. Sign up here.
What role will desalination play in
the arid West? That topic is one of many engaging conversations
that will be explored at our Oct. 29 Water
Summit revolving around this year’s theme,
Stewarding a New Era in Western Water.
Led by Central Arizona Project’s General Manager Brenda Burman,
the panel will discuss all topics worth their
salt - from emerging desalination technologies to the
latest developments in innovative desalination programs to the
regulatory challenges and opportunities that face the region.
The panel of accomplished speakers will provide deep
insight on desalination’s implications for water management
in the West.
The Water Summit is the Foundation’s premier event of
the year and returns to Sacramento on Oct. 29
with leading policymakers and experts addressing critical water
issues in California and across the West. Capacity is
limited and registration closes soon, so grab your ticket
here while they’re still available!
A judge won’t back down — even temporarily — from his
ruling that state water officials acted illegally in changing
the rules for home builders. In a new order, Maricopa
County Superior Court Judge Scott Blaney rejected claims by Bo
Dul, an attorney for the Department of Water Resources, that
the ruling against a policy to prevent new home construction in
areas without a 100-year water supply was
likely to be overturned on appeal. … The new order
most immediately affects efforts by developers to build homes
in some communities on the edge of the Phoenix
area. But there are broader implications going
forward. The order reaffirms Blaney’s conclusion that
DWR is not free to make what he considered to be a significant
change in the rules about where residential development can
occur without going through the legal process, one that
requires public hearings and other input.
Although California lawmakers recently passed a suite of laws
intended to bring transparency to the development of new data
centers, local communities across the state are signaling that
disclosure isn’t enough. California currently ranks
third among U.S. states in overall data center
density, according to independent trackers like the US
Data Center Map, with the state home to 366 of such
facilities that are either fully operational, under
construction, or moving through the planning process.
Local elected officials are proposing data center moratoriums
to slow that momentum — if not stop it in its tracks.
… Opponents say these energy-hungry facilities strain
power grids, potentially deplete water
supplies and pollute the air, and contribute to
broader economic anxieties around AI-driven job
elimination.
… An area of cooler low pressure — an extratropical cyclone —
is spinning out off the coast of the Golden State. … For
Sacramento and Fresno, it will be the first good rain — not a
trace amount — since late spring. … As the cyclone moves
over land Thursday, showers that were moving out of the south
will flip and begin crashing in out of the north, this time
with less energy and moisture to keep rainfall sustained for
long. … Further up the mountains, several inches
of snow are expected to begin stacking up across the Sierra
above 8,000 feet, with the highest amounts between 3 to 6
inches. As temperatures continue to cool into the
coming months, setups similar to this will become increasingly
common as cool air from the north mixes with warm air from the
south.
… [Starvation Reservoir] was one of the first
reservoirs the Bureau of Reclamation built for the
Central Utah Project — an expansive system of
dams, diversions, tunnels and pipelines that takes water from
eastern Utah’s Colorado River Basin to western
Utah’s Wasatch Front. Starvation keeps water in the Uintah
Basin, though, compensating for water lost to the
state’s biggest cities. Most of that water goes to
irrigate fields and some fills taps across Duchesne County.
… The Central Utah Project and other transbasin
diversions have helped the Wasatch Front boom. But
Colorado River tributaries were left with less water,
harming habitat for fish. And while some farmers
benefit from Starvation Reservoir and other storage projects,
some promised reservoirs were never built,
leaving other areas of the Uintah Basin, including the Uintah
and Ouray Reservation, without adequate water storage, ongoing
bitterness and legal fights.
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.
