Our California Water Map, recently updated, is one of our
most popular products. We also offer magazines, documentaries,
posters, layperson guides and more. Our catalog offers a wide
array of resources to help you understand the complex issues of
water in California and the Southwest.
Project WET is an award-winning, nonprofit water education
program and publisher. The program facilitates and promotes
awareness, appreciation, knowledge, and stewardship of water
resources.
Join the Water Education Foundation, an impartial
nonprofit, in its mission to create a better understanding
of water issues and help resolve water problems through
educational programs.
California’s groundwater is a great natural resource and has
contributed to the state becoming the nation’s top agricultural
producer and a leader in high-tech industries. Groundwater is an
asset that is increasingly relied upon by municipalities,
industry and agriculture and it will play an important role in
the future sustainability of California’s overall water supply.
Ranchers and conservationists in the
headwaters of the Colorado River decided that to get something
done to benefit the ranches, the fish and the river, they needed
to work together. Their partnership, which could serve as a
template for similar regions across the West, is the focus of
a new article in our flagship publication, Western
Water.
The article by the Foundation’s team of veteran journalists
explores what drove the need to act, how the partnership came
together and some of the projects undertaken to improve
irrigation for ranchers and habitat for fish.
The Santa Barbara region’s recovery
from drought often has lagged behind much of the rest of
California due to the nature of its watershed. But a variety of
efforts are underway to enhance the region’s limited local water
resources.
Our new Edge of Drought
Tour Aug. 27-29 explores the connection between the area’s
distinctive hydrology and the lurking threat of drought and
persistent water scarcity with an up-close look at water projects
and programs across the southern Central Coast.
The more than 1 million Californians without access to safe,
affordable drinking water may soon see money flowing for water
districts to regionalize, consolidate, install treatment, or
take other actions to improve water quality.
California regulators are negotiating an agreement with two
major oil companies that would allow them to keep injecting
millions of gallons of wastewater into potential drinking water
and irrigation supplies in the Central Valley for three years.
In a paper published Tuesday in the Journal of Applied Ecology,
scientists at the University of California, Santa Cruz and the
National Marine Fisheries Service used statistical modeling to
determine an optimal water management plan that would protect
both species and ensure other water users would benefit as
well.
While wildfires have gotten much of the attention in California
as consequences of climate change, it’s really rising sea
levels that will likely wreak the most damage. With more than
25 million people living near the coast, some $150 billion
worth of property is at risk.
Wetlands are among the most important ecosystems in the world.
They produce high levels of oxygen, filter toxic chemicals out of
water, reduce flooding and erosion, recharge groundwater and provide a diverse
range of recreational opportunities from fishing and hunting to
photography. They also serve as critical habitat for wildlife,
including a large percentage of plants and animals on
California’s endangered species
list.
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 drought occurs with much greater frequency in the
West than in any other regions of the country.
