California is taking the first steps in realizing an idea to save billions of gallons of water each year and produce enough clean energy to power a city the size of Los Angeles for nine months annually. The simple but brilliant concept? Cover as much of California’s roughly 4,000 miles of irrigation canals with solar canopies as possible. … Now, after almost a decade of careful study and planning, the highly anticipated Project Nexus, a private/public/academic partnership between the California Department of Water Resources, Turlock Irrigation District, and Solar Aquagrid — based on research by UC Merced and UC Santa Cruz — is online.