A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation News & Publications Director Vik Jolly.
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The headlines below are the original headlines used in the publication cited at the time they are posted here and do not reflect the stance of the Water Education Foundation, an impartial nonprofit that remains neutral.
Money raised from California’s cannabis industry is being
channelled into saving endangered Coho salmon in Santa Cruz
County. The state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) has
awarded more than $3.9 million from its Cannabis Restoration
Grant Program to the Monterey Bay Salmon and Trout Project
(MBSTP), supporting operations at the Kingfisher Flat
Conservation Hatchery. The programme, funded by cannabis tax
revenues and penalties from unlicensed cultivation, was created
to repair environmental damage linked to the industry. This is
the first time it has supported Coho salmon conservation south
of San Francisco Bay.
A pair of recent court decisions in San Diego—Patz v. City of
San Diego and Coziahr v. Otay Water District—have thrust
California’s Proposition 218 back into the spotlight. But what
is this proposition, and how does it affect our water bills and
the state’s water providers? As Californians grow increasingly
concerned about affordability, we asked Dave Owen, a professor
at UC Law San Francisco, to explain how Prop 218 and water
rates are connected. … [Dave Owen:] “Prop 218 matters for
water because it imposes limitations on fees.”
… Federal funding cuts have targeted the network of ocean
buoys that make up the Coastal Data Information Program
(CDIP), which has been run by UC San Diego’s Scripps
Institution of Oceanography for the past 50 years. The
buoys can be found along the West Coast, the Gulf Coast, the
East Coast and the Pacific Islands. (At present, 27 of them are
off the coast of California.)… Experts say that
eliminating the buoys may compromise the accuracy of weather
forecasts. … The loss of buoy data could also mean
fewer systems are in place to track toxins in the water
and aid in public safety during natural
disasters. Coastline monitoring helped protect
people from exposure to dangerous bacteria and viruses during
the 2017 Tijuana River sewage plume.
… California’s largest freshwater system, the State Water
Project, is threatened both by catastrophic collapse from
earthquakes in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, as well as
long-term decline from saltwater intrusion into existing pumps
from rising sea levels. … The Delta Conveyance Project —
which would connect existing aqueducts to a new, safer
freshwater diversion point farther upstream from the Bay via an
underground tunnel — has been studied for over 40 years at the
expense of hundreds of millions of dollars and is simply the
most cost-effective solution to this problem. –Written by Jim Wunderman, president and CEO of the Bay
Area Council.
Early this year, Steven Cook was a lawyer representing chemical
companies suing to block a new rule that would force them to
clean up pollution from “forever chemicals,” which are linked
to low birthrates and cancer. Now Mr. Cook is in a senior role
at the Environmental Protection Agency, where he has proposed
scrapping the same rule his former clients were challenging in
court. His effort could shift cleanup costs away from polluters
and onto taxpayers, according to internal E.P.A. documents
reviewed by The New York Times.
… The Sacramento region is in one of the nation’s most
flood-prone metropolitan areas, and its levee system is
vulnerable to “erosion, seepage and stability,” the U.S. Army
Corps said on its website. The Corps will raze trees to install
riprap, or rocks, along the lower American River, as well as
fortify the Natomas East Main Drainage Canal, Arcade Creek and
Magpie Creek. … But the Corps did not consider any other
methods other than riprap, according to the lawsuit filed
Thursday by the Save the American River Association, American
River Trees organization and the Center for Biological
Diversity in Eastern District of California.
As California water officials consider changes to the state’s
regulatory framework for nitrogen applications and discharges
by farms that irrigate, those representing growers who rely on
nitrogen fertilizers say more data and time are needed before
strict targets are imposed. … Composed of University of
California scientists and Cooperative Extension specialists,
the second statewide agricultural expert panel is tasked with
reassessing and updating the state’s regulatory approach to
reduce nitrates. The panel met twice this month to review
nitrogen reporting data collected as part of the state’s
Irrigated Lands Regulatory Program, or ILRP, which governs how
regional agricultural orders manage farm runoff.
Moisture-laden air spreading across the Southwest in recent
days has brought much-needed rain to drought-ridden areas,
while also unleashing thunderstorms, dust storms, strong winds
and flooding. This seasonal weather pattern, known as the
monsoon, has led to some spectacular — albeit disruptive and
even dangerous — weather. … In California, thunderstorms
brought rain to Yosemite National Park that recharged the famed
Yosemite Falls, which usually goes dry in late August.
… The chance for isolated storms across the Southwest
was expected to taper off by Thursday and Friday.
… Housing developers and farmers in increasingly urban areas
celebrated the signing of Arizona’s new “ag-to-urban” water
program, which Gov. Katie Hobbs called a “huge water policy
win.” … But some of the left-leaning lawmakers who voted
against the new law that paves the way for some agricultural
water to be used instead to boost housing developments,
environmental activists and farmers whose land is outside of
the limited areas that it impacts say it doesn’t go far enough
in protecting the state’s water future — or their
livelihoods. On the other hand, some far-right lawmakers
who voted against the proposal argued that it went too far in
protecting the state’s water future and the state would be
better off throwing open the doors to developers.
Two San Diego County supervisors on Wednesday praised a
decision to expand treatment capacity at the South Bay
International Wastewater Treatment Plant. In a statement,
Paloma Aguirre and Joel Anderson said a cease-and-desist order
will allow the plant to treat an additional 10 million gallons
per day, from 25 million gallons to 35 million gallons. The
California Regional Water Quality Control Board adopted the
order during its regular meeting Wednesday. Aguirre and
Anderson described that decision as “a major step toward
reducing untreated sewage flows through the Tijuana River
Valley.”
The Truckee Meadows Water Authority (TMWA) has issued an urgent
directive for all customers to immediately stop outdoor
watering due to high turbidity levels in the Truckee River.
This situation is expected to worsen following a mudslide near
the California-Nevada state line. To safeguard the
region’s water treatment plants from excessive sediment and
debris, TMWA will close some river intakes, significantly
reducing treatment capacity. Although the water supply remains
secure, TMWA will rely heavily on groundwater wells to meet
demand.
It was a gorgeous June Saturday on Lake Tahoe, but the day
turned stormy in minutes when a torrent of winds whipped up
choppy waters that terrified boaters. Eight people died. The
Times looked at videos, radar and satellite imagery, and
interviewed over 30 people, including meteorologists, local
officials and boaters who were on the lake that day. The
investigation revealed a rare set of circumstances that led to
the unexpectedly dangerous day.
TSMC Arizona has broken ground and begun construction this
month on a planned 15-acre Industrial Reclamation Water Plant
(IRWP). The IRWP is designed to achieve “Near Zero Liquid
Discharge” which means the company will have the ability to
reuse nearly every drop of water. At start-up, the IRWP will
reach 85% recycling rate with a plan to reach 90% or better.
… This plant will convert industrial wastewater back to
the “ultrapure” standard required in the chipmaking process.
As the United States passes a tipping point in water security,
new research reveals that millions of Americans now face a
growing crisis in accessing clean, affordable water. The
findings, published in PLOS Water and PLOS One, were produced
by a multi-university team co-led by Dr. Wendy Jepson,
professor of geography and director of Environmental Programs
at Texas A&M University. ”Our research shows water
insecurity in the U.S. is not just a problem of pipes and
infrastructure—it’s a human issue that affects health, daily
life and dignity,” Jepson said.
… [In 2016], torrential storms drenched the Santa Cruz
Mountains in California, flooding the area around San Jose’s
Coyote Creek. Local officials there didn’t send alerts over the
federal system, which can, among other things, sound a blaring
alarm with evacuation orders on cellphones in geotargeted
areas. … ProPublica identified at least 15 federally
declared major disasters since 2016 in which officials in the
most-harmed communities failed to send alerts over IPAWS — or
sent them only after people were already in the throes of
deadly flooding, wildfires or mudslides.
The Trump administration on Wednesday announced it is opening
an investigation into the California Environmental Protection
Agency, including the powerful California Air Resources Board,
over potentially discriminatory employment practices. In a
notice addressed to CalEPA Secretary Yana Garcia, the
Department of Justice said its investigation will determine
whether the state agency is “engaged in a pattern or practice
of discrimination based on race, color, sex, and national
origin” in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
Across a state with snow-capped peaks and crystal-clear
mountain creeks, a lot of Colorado cities take pride in their
drinking water. But only one can be crowned as the state’s
best-tasting. According to a panel of judges at the Rocky
Mountain Water Conference in Keystone, the City of Broomfield
has Colorado’s tastiest water. Second place went to the Copper
Mountain Consolidated Metropolitan District, and Pueblo took
home third.
Earlier this year, several environmental groups sent a petition
to the federal government with a seemingly simple message:
Ensure that water from the imperiled Colorado River is not
wasted and only being delivered for “reasonable” and
“beneficial” uses. The organizations urged the Bureau of
Reclamation to use its authority to curb water waste in the
Lower Basin states: California, Arizona and Nevada. … The
petitioning groups argue reducing water waste could help ensure
the river has a sustainable future. But others worry cuts could
bring hardship to farmers and consumers.
Blue Forest, in partnership with the Colfax–Todds Valley
Consolidated Tribe, the Koy’o Land Conservancy and the Shingle
Springs Band of Miwok Indians, announces the launch of the
Colfax I forest resilience bond: the first FRB led by a tribal
nation. … The Colfax project takes place within the ancestral
homelands of the Miwok, Maidu and Nisenan peoples — territory
that includes the headwaters of the Sacramento River,
most of the American River watershed and parts of the Bear and
Cosumnes rivers. Restoration treatments span tribal
trust lands, private holdings and Bureau of Land Management
lands across Placer and El Dorado counties.
… After ruling out the usual culprits for benzene
contamination, such as a gasoline spill or leaking underground
storage tanks, utility staff were left with a startling
realization: The wildfire [2017 Tubbs Fire] had contaminated
the water system. … Staff at Santa Rosa Water started
reaching out to experts with experience responding to chemical
spills, including a Purdue University engineering professor
named Andrew Whelton. … Since then, at least eight wildfires
have contaminated public drinking water systems across the
United States, and Whelton has become the de facto national
authority on response and recovery.
