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.
Western Slope communities and water agencies want to be able to
use powerful Colorado River water rights tied to the Shoshone
Power Plant to help the environment. Over 170 members of the
public weighed in on the process — and all but one said
they liked the idea. The Colorado Water Conservation Board, a
state water agency, gathered the public comments in preparation
for a hearing about whether to incorporate the water rights
into the state’s Instream Flow Program. The program aims to
keep water in rivers to help aquatic and riparian ecosystems.
The proposed change is part of a larger plan on the Western
Slope to permanently maintain the historic flows around
Shoshone.
A California court just confirmed that groundwater rights pass
with the land in foreclosure, settling a major question for
commercial mortgage professionals statewide. … The
dispute began in 2017, when 4-S Ranch Partners, LLC secured a
$33 million loan from Sandton Credit Solutions. … However, by
2019, 4-S Ranch had defaulted on the loan. … Sandton
sought a court declaration that all rights to the groundwater
passed with the land at foreclosure. 4-S Ranch continued to
argue that the groundwater was personal property and should not
have transferred with the land. The trial court ruled in
Sandton’s favor. … On August 8, 2025, the Fifth District
Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s decision.
Pacific Gas & Electric has begun the lengthy federal process to
decommission and dismantle the century-old Potter Valley
Project — a two-dam hydroelectric system that has diverted
water from the Eel River to the Russian River for more than 100
years. Removing the Potter Valley Project’s dams would
release the Eel River, connecting crucial habitats for salmon
and steelhead and making it California’s longest free-flowing
river.
… A quiet revolution is unfolding across Bay Area suburbs. In
cities like Berkeley and San Jose, the meaning of a “nice yard”
is being redefined. With water bills rising each summer—by an
average of 6.5% in the East Bay and 5.5% in the South Bay,
according to East Bay Municipal Utility District and San Jose
Water—more residents are putting down the hose and embracing a
wilder approach to residential landscaping. These so-called
“feral lawns” take many forms. Some are carefully planned
native gardens filled with drought-tolerant California flora,
while others look like an HOA citation waiting to happen. But
one thing is clear: Those who stray from traditional lawn
culture often face pushback from nosy neighbors and city
officials for their decision to disrupt the suburban status
quo.
Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California’s Sierra
Nevada mountains are now home to more than three dozen
yellow-legged frogs recently released by staff from the Oakland
Zoo. During the first week of August, the zoo said 43 mountain
yellow-legged frogs were flown by helicopter to their release
site near Laurel Lake. The event marked the 1,000th
yellow-legged amphibian released by the zoo during conservation
efforts designed to save the species from disappearing
entirely. Biologists said the frogs are part of a broader
recovery program designed to pull the species back from the
brink of extinction. Scientists attribute much of the
population collapse to chytridiomycosis, a deadly fungal
disease that has impacted animal populations worldwide.
Residents of the Diablo Grande housing development in the
foothills west of Modesto hope a possible water sale could keep
water flowing to their own homes, but they need buy-in from the
Kern County Water Agency. For its part, KCWA hasn’t said yes.
But it hasn’t said no. In a July 29 letter to the attorney for
Western Hills Water District, which serves Diablo Grande
exclusively, KCWA states it is willing to work with the
district “…if an economically, logistically and regulatorily
feasible solution can be found.” Given the complexity of the
24-year deal that first brought KCWA and Western Hills
together, that could be tricky.
In a first, researchers have identified the nation’s roughly
8,700 cattle feeding operations, and the map shows California
has more of them than any other state. California also has the
most feedlot acreage: over 85,000 acres. … For decades,
such operations have been associated with degraded air and
water quality. … The lack of precise
location data has meant that local governments, academics and
nonprofit organizations have struggled to document the effects
of these facilities on the environment and community health. So
the researchers decided to build a database and map combining
existing data sets. … The study was published Tuesday in the
journal Communications Earth & Environment.
… This March, Colorado’s Energy and Carbon Management
Commission (ECMC), which regulates the oil and gas industry,
passed new rules requiring drillers to recycle more of their
wastewater—a caustic, brackish and chemically
laden byproduct of the drilling and fracking process known as
“produced water.” The new rules were set in motion by
HB23-1242, passed in 2023, which requires oil and gas
extraction companies to use more recycled water, but do not
address another key provision of the law: the increased
recycling of produced water cannot cause more oil and gas
emissions, which can contain CO2, methane, benzene, a known
carcinogen, and other volatile organic
compounds. Regulators across the state are trying to
figure out whether meeting one requirement of the new law
requires violating the other.
EPA is preparing to extend key deadlines set by the Biden
administration for reducing coal-fired power plants’ water
pollution, according to a court filing Monday. A proposal to
amend the Biden administration’s water pollution rule for coal
plants is undergoing review by the White House, per the filing
from the Trump administration and a notice Monday from the
Office of Management and Budget. EPA expects the new proposal,
focused on compliance deadlines for plant owners, to be issued
“shortly” and finalized before the end of the year, the filing
said. … Last spring, EPA strengthened pollution standards for
coal wastewater, requiring plant owners to install new
technologies to virtually eliminate heavy metals and other
harmful pollutants from three major waste streams.
Five dogs have died and more than 20 have fallen sick in
California as researchers suspect a toxic algae is to blame.
Los Angeles County health officials are warning residents to
keep their furry best friends away from the Venice Canals as
they work to figure out what’s behind the mysterious illnesses
of multiple neighborhood dogs. The county’s Department of
Public Health said in an alert last Friday that there have been
26 local dogs that have suddenly fallen severely ill, including
five that have died as a result. … California water
officials tested the canal water, algae and scum, finding the
presence of algal toxins. But a definitive link between the
toxins and the dog illnesses has yet to be confirmed.
The Yurok Tribe is inviting the community to celebrate the
Klamath River’s renewal at the 61st annual Klamath Salmon
Festival on Saturday, August 16. The tribe said this year’s
theme is “Celebrating the Spectacular Start of the Klamath
River’s Renewal,” highlighting the river’s remarkable recovery
following the removal of the last of four dams in August 2024.
… Despite the festival’s name, the tribe said no salmon
will be served this year due to a below-average fish forecast.
However, the tribe remains optimistic about the future of the
Klamath’s salmon runs, citing ongoing large-scale river
restoration projects throughout the basin.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power lifted a “boil
water” notice Tuesday afternoon for Granada Hills and Porter
Ranch, ending a weeklong episode that saw residents’ taps run
dry or slow to a trickle. The DWP urged residents to flush out
all water pipes and appliances before using the water. About
9,200 households in the west San Fernando Valley were affected
by a water service outage that started last week after DWP
workers discovered a faulty valve, according to the agency. The
valve, which was installed in 1967 and located 20 feet
underground, was stuck in a nearly closed position and could
not be opened, which impeded the flow of water. … The
agency said in a news release that those customers affected by
the “boil water” notice would receive a $20 credit.
… The Monterey Peninsula is a water island, disconnected from
the vast state and federal water delivery systems that serve
other parts of California. This isolation means our fate rests
entirely on limited local resources. The state’s order, 30
years ago, to reduce pumping from the river is not just a
regulatory hurdle; it’s a critical environmental mandate to
protect endangered species and restore the health of one of our
most important natural assets. Without a new, reliable source
of water, we cannot meet this mandate while also providing for
the needs of our community. The desalination project represents
the most comprehensive and shovel-ready answer to this
challenge. –Written by Adam Pinterits, the government and community
affairs director for the Monterey County Association of
Realtors.
A contractor working for the U.S. Coast Guard has finished
removing the oil-soaked hull of a wooden minesweeper from
Little Potato Slough, completing the last large vessel removal
of the cleanup for the wreck-ridden waterway near Stockton,
California. The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta has long been
a catch basin for derelict vessels, some larger than others.
For decades, the Suisun Bay area of the Sacramento River
was home to dozens of decaying government ships maintained by
MARAD, almost all of which have been towed off to the scrapyard
to resolve an environmental lawsuit. But many more private
vessels litter the narrow waterways upriver, and Little Potato
Slough – a meandering waterway on the outskirts of Stockton -
has become notorious for its wrecks.
… Kabul is running dry, withered by scarcer rainfalls and
snow melts and drained by unregulated wells. It has become so
dry that its six million people could be without water by 2030
— and are now fighting about it. Its water reserves are
emptying nearly twice as quickly as they are getting
replenished. The Taliban administration, short of cash, has so
far been unable to bring water from nearby dams and rivers to
the choking city. Now, Kabul risks becoming the first modern
capital to be depleted of underground water reserves, the
nonprofit Mercy Corps warned in a recent report.
Sinking ground in California’s Central Valley is causing
property values to sink, according to a new study by UC
Riverside. ”When we see droughts, we see larger
subsidence, we see more extraction of groundwater, we see
larger subsidence, and that’s a sign for many other problems,
like water availability, job availability and so on,” said
Mehdi Nemati, author and UC Riverside Enviro Economics and
Policy assistant professor. … To determine how this
sinking is impacting home values, researchers used
satellite-based radar data to measure ground-level changes. …
They estimated that losses totaled $1.87 billion across the
region from 2015 to 2021.
Here’s the plain‑English version of what’s about to happen —
and what it means if you grow grapes or buy fruit in Sonoma
County. … FERC just approved PG&E’s 2025 flow variance,
which prioritizes holding more water back on the Eel to protect
fish and manage dam‑safety risks. Practically, that means lower
(and more variable) Potter Valley/Russian River diversions this
year, with releases allowed to dip below 25 cfs when needed.
… Second, the long‑term geometry of our supply changes from
“year‑round trickle” to “catch it in the rain.” ERPA’s New
Eel‑Russian Facility (NERF) is a pump station that only runs
when the Eel is up — fall through spring — pushing water
through the existing tunnel to the East Branch and, ultimately,
Lake Mendocino. … [I]n plain terms: load up in winter, live
off storage in summer.
The last remaining piece of the HMCS Chaleur, a Cold War-era
Canadian Navy minesweeper, was lifted from Little Potato Slough
on Thursday morning, concluding a 25-day demolition effort by
the U.S. Coast Guard and partner contractors. The operation,
which began in mid-July, cleared more than 400 tons of
oil-saturated hull from the Delta waterway.
… Submerged since 2021, the Chaleur had become a
slow-moving environmental hazard in one of California’s
most ecologically fragile and economically important river
systems. Its deteriorating Guardstructure leaked oil
into a channel that supplies drinking water to Stockton and
irrigates vast tracts of farmland across San Joaquin
County.
… Updated modeling this spring found that Sites [Reservoir]
could have stored more than 550,000 acre-feet in just five
months of the current water year. … South of the Delta, the
proposed Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir … could store up to an
additional 82,000 acre-feet of new storage every year. …
[B]ut when the House debated an energy and natural resources
package earlier this year that included $2 billion dollars for
Central Valley water storage, I was the lone Democrat to vote
yes because reliable water is critical to my district and the
state. Most of the $1 billion that ended up in the final bill
is expected to support the enlargement of existing facilities,
such as Shasta Dam and San Luis Reservoir. This is a good
start, but many more projects are needed. –Written by Rep. Adam Gray, who represents California’s
13th Congressional District and serves on the House Natural
Resources Subcommittee on Water, Wildlife and Fisheries.
For millions of years, water flowing through the Colorado River
shaped the geography of the West, carving out features like the
Grand Canyon. Now, the Colorado River sustains the cities,
farms and industries of the southwestern U.S., providing 40
million people with water. … The Colorado River is remarkable
in and of itself, it lays the foundation for remarkable
habitats, and, apparently, can precipitate remarkable political
alliances. This month, all 10 of Colorado’s U.S. legislators,
from the most progressive representatives to MAGA Lauren
Boebert, sent a letter to President Donald Trump calling for
the release of funding for Colorado River water projects. –Written by Colorado Newsline columnist Sammy
Herdman.
