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.
Calling all future water leaders! Are you an emerging leader
passionate about shaping the future of water in California
or across the Colorado River Basin?
The Water Education Foundation will
be hosting two dynamic water leadership programs in 2026 – one
focused on California water
issues and the other on the Colorado River
Basin. These competitive programs are designed for
rising stars from diverse sectors who are ready to deepen their
water knowledge, strengthen their leadership skills and
collaborate on real-world water challenges.
Are you an
up-and-coming leader in the water world? The application
window is now open for our 2026 California Water
Leaders cohort, and submissions are due no later than Dec.
3, 2025.
If interested in applying, start by checking out the
program
requirementsand look at the
frequently asked questions and mandatory
dates on
the application page. Make sure you have the time to
commit to the program next year and approval from your
organization to apply.
Then sign
up here to join a virtual Q&A
session on Nov. 5 at noon with Jenn Bowles,
our executive director, and other Foundation team members to get
an overview of the program and advice on applying.
… Perhaps no region stands to take larger hits to its
Colorado River water than central Arizona, owing to the low
priority of its water rights. … Unless Arizona’s farmers
and tribes can strike deals to bail out the state’s growing
cities, Arizona’s largest population centers will bear the
brunt of these cuts. Cities like Phoenix, Scottsdale and Tucson
could lose more than 20% of their Colorado River water,
triggering public debates in council chambers and municipal
offices over how to respond, what to sacrifice and what to
prioritize.
California often swings between climate extremes — from
powerful storms to punishing droughts. As climate change drives
more intense and frequent dry and wet cycles, pressure on
California’s water supplies grows. A new University of
California, Davis, economic study finds that drought in
California pushes the price of water from rivers, lakes and
reservoirs up by $487 per acre-foot, more than triple the cost
during an average wet year. The research appears in Nature
Sustainability.
The October floods in southwestern Colorado damaged homes and
upended people’s lives, but there was one silver lining: A lot
of the water also helped replenish reservoirs
in the state. The deluge, caused by tropical storms and
hurricanes in the Pacific Ocean, dumped more than 480 billion
gallons of water on five counties in southwestern Colorado.
… But the water also bumped parts of the region out of
severe and extreme drought. The amount of water stored in
Colorado reservoirs surged or even doubled.
Other weather and water supply news across the West:
State water officials have taken the first formal step toward
regulating groundwater pumping in the Ranegras Plain
Groundwater Basin, marking a major shift for La Paz County
residents who have long warned that unregulated water use is
threatening their communities. The Arizona Department of Water
Resources announced it will begin procedures to consider
creating a new Active Management Area, or AMA, in the western
Arizona basin. The move follows years of local concern about
land subsidence, dried wells, and groundwater depletion linked
to corporate water use in rural parts of the county.
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.
