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 Doug Beeman.
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The Biden administration said Tuesday it will consider adding
Chinook salmon in Oregon and Northern California to the
endangered or threatened species lists. “Based on information
provided by the petitioners, as well as information readily
available in our files, we find that hatcheries and climate
change may be posing threats to the continued existence of
SONCC Chinook salmon,” the notice from the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, part of the Department of Commerce,
said. … The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) will now conduct a longer review, expected to be
concluded in August of this year, before deciding whether or
not the species — the largest of the salmonids — is eligible
for protected status.
It wasn’t so long ago that California prayed for rain.
Something to quench the climate-change-fueled drought — the
worst in at least 1,200 years — that has caused farm fields to
wither and wells to run dry…. Now, the water that
Californians so desperately wanted is pummeling them like a
curse….The recent onslaught of atmospheric rivers has
underscored the perils of California’s climate paradox: Rising
global temperatures are making the region drier, hotter and
more fire-prone, but they also increase the likelihood of
sudden, severe rainfall. Experts say the state is not prepared
for periods of too much water, even as it struggles to make do
without enough.
Record drought in the American West contributes to a growing
number of billion-dollar weather and climate disasters across
the country, and the quickening pace of large-scale events
makes recovery slower and pricier, according to a new report
from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Drought covered 63% of the contiguous United States on Oct. 25,
the largest such footprint since the severe drought of 2012,
according to the report, released Tuesday at Denver’s national
convention for the American Meteorological Society. Forty
percent or more of the lower 48 states has been in drought for
the past 119 weeks, a record in more than 20 years of the U.S.
Drought Monitor reports. That’s approaching double the previous
record of 68 weeks begun in 2012’s drought.
The Wyoming State Legislature begins its lawmaking session this
week. One bill, called the “Colorado River Authority of Wyoming
Act,” would create a board and commissioner to manage Wyoming’s
water in the Colorado River Basin. The system drains about 17
percent of the Cowboy State’s land area and is critical for
agriculture, energy development and residential use in cities.
The entire Colorado River Basin is currently under stress due
to drought conditions and human development in the Southwest.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Albert Sommers (R-Pinedale) and
Sen. Larry Hicks (R-Baggs) is similar to those previously
passed in several other states that depend on the Colorado
River.
My umbrella was wide and sturdy, my rain slicker insulated and
as yellow as a Minion. I wore thick Dickies and my good pair of
Doc Martens. It didn’t matter. Just minutes after I stepped out
of my Yukon to walk around Parque de los Niños in Placentia’s
Atwood barrio last week, I was thoroughly soaked. A strong wind
made the rain whip at a 45-degree angle. Drops hit the baseball
diamond with such force that mud leaped into the air.
… Eighty-five years ago this March, this historic
Mexican American neighborhood took the brunt of the deadliest
flood in Southern California history. Five days of heavy storms
caused all of the region’s major rivers — the Los Angeles, the
San Gabriel and especially the Santa Ana — to overflow their
banks. -Written by Gustavo Arellano, columnist for the
Los Angeles Times.
The prevailing goal in Southern California has been to get
water that falls from the sky away from our roads and buildings
as quickly as possible. Much of the rain washes out to the
ocean — often carrying trash and other pollutants. The L.A.
Times reported up to 10 billion gallons poured into the Los
Angeles Basin in recent storms and only about 20% will be
captured. L.A. County has plans to double the amount
of rainwater currently captured every year and use it
to provide nearly two-thirds of the county’s drinking
water. Voters approved a new property tax in 2018
meant to raise up to $300 million a year to fund the capture
and treatment of stormwater.
California’s vulnerability to destructive flooding is anything
but a secret. Meteorologists and climatologists have been
warning of the enhanced risk for years, as climate change
drives the state through cycles of extreme drought and then
warms the winter air to produce violent downpours like the bomb
cyclone and atmospheric river events of the past few weeks. The
effects are felt up and down the map, including in key
agricultural areas and low-lying rural patches. But they are
not felt equally—another reality experts have been speaking
about for some time. The worst of California’s flood woes, both
this month and into the long future, will be visited upon the
state’s poorest residents.
Downpours from an atmospheric river storm triggered landslides
in the Santa Cruz Mountains Monday, burying highways in heaps
of mud and trapping residents in place. The damage is the
consequence of weeks of rain fueled by atmospheric rivers.
… Rain is one of the primary forces that trigger
landslides. As water trickles into the tiny gaps between soil
and rocks, it adds pressure, which makes soils more
unstable. … The New Year’s Eve storm produced
hundreds of landslides across the Bay Area, with a focus in the
East Bay, Collins said. This week in the Santa Cruz
Mountains, waterlogged soil from weeks of frequent rain is
breaking free from deeper layers of earth and slipping down
slopes onto roads.
The recent atmospheric river that brought record rainfall and
snow to parts of the west coast also boosted Colorado’s
mountain snowfall totals. Several rounds of heavy snowfall like
the mountains have recently seen is the dream of every skier
and snowboarder, and it’s also a big help to the state’s
drought conditions. This boost helped Steamboat Springs
become the first resort of the season to surpass the benchmark.
It now has 225 inches so far this season. Ski areas like
Silverton and Winter Park aren’t too far from hitting 200 with
about 167 inches so far. Places like Wolf Cree, Breckenridge,
and Keystone have also seen some impressive totals for this
point in the season.
On September 7, California’s State Water Resources Control
Board (SWRCB) approved initial requirements for testing
microplastics in drinking water, becoming the first government
in the world seeking to establish health-based guidelines for
acceptable levels of microplastics in drinking water. …
Microplastics are tiny plastic particles, less than five
millimeters in length, that occur in the environment because of
plastic production from a wide range of manufactured products.
… The SWRCB’s implementation of Senate Bill 1422, will now
require select public water systems to monitor for
microplastics over a four year period—a daunting task as there
is no EPA-approved method to identify the many types of
microplastics in drinking water, and no standardized water
treatment method for removing microplastics from the public
water supply.
Exposure to low levels of nitrate in drinking water may have
adverse reproductive effects. We reviewed evidence about the
association between nitrate in drinking water and adverse
reproductive outcomes published to November 2022.
… Nitrogen is very important for plant nutrition and
growth, being incorporated by plants into amino acid synthesis,
and is therefore commonly used in inorganic fertilizers.
However, because nitrate is highly water soluble, it leaches
through soils and into groundwater very easily, particularly
after heavy rainfall. … The increasing use of artificial
fertilizers, the disposal of wastes, particularly from animal
farming, and changes in land use have become significant
contributors to the progressive increase in nitrate levels in
groundwater supplies.
When we think about the Colorado River water shortage, it’s
natural to blame it on the burgeoning population in desert
cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas and Los Angeles. … And as
more people move to these cities, their overall water
consumption increases proportionally … This pattern
held true for eight decades after the 1922 signing of the
Colorado River Compact: The number of people relying on the
river’s waters shot up from less than 1 million to nearly 40
million, and overall water consumption climbed consistently as
well, peaking at just under 20 billion cubic meters in
2000. But then, according to a new study in
the Journal of Water Resources Planning and
Management by Brian Richter, the pattern was broken. Even
as the population of the region continued to shoot up,
consumption of Colorado River water actually dropped and then
plateaued.
As torrential rainfall continues to batter the West coast, you
may be wondering how all of this wet weather is affecting
California’s wildlife. In Australia at the end of last year,
heavy rain and floods caused snake sightings to soar across the
country—could the same thing happen in California? “Rapidly
rising flood water from heavy rain can displace wildlife,
including rattlesnakes,” Bryan Hughes, owner of Arizona-based
snake rescue service Rattlesnake Solutions, told Newsweek.
“This can mean that in some areas, there will be a temporary
increase of the likelihood of random encounters.”
While many areas of California are coping with the destructive
impact of relentless rainfall, the news is nothing but good
when it comes to the state’s snowpack. As of Monday,
California’s snow water equivalent was 199% of normal for the
date (January 9), according to the California Department of
Water Resources. … Water experts are reluctant to signal too
much optimism since last winter California also saw snow
accumulate to above-average levels through December, only to
see January, February and March become the driest on record.
A powerful winter storm barreled into Southern California on
Monday, forcing the mass evacuation of Montecito and other
communities exactly five years after mudslides in the same area
left 23 people dead. Pounding rain wreaked havoc throughout the
coastal counties north of Los Angeles, bringing flooding, road
closures and tragedy, including the death of a motorist who
entered a flooded roadway and the presumed death of a
5-year-old boy who was swept away by flood waters in San Luis
Obispo County. The storm, which was expected to move through
Los Angeles, Orange and other southern counties through
Tuesday, dumped more than 16 inches of rain in some mountain
areas Monday and prompted pleas for people to stay indoors.
Lake Mead will need more than just rainfall to replenish
itself, an expert has told Newsweek. Spread between Nevada and
Arizona—Lake Mead, the largest man-made reservoir in the
U.S.—is best known for its rapidly declining water levels due
to the ongoing megadrought gripping the western states. The
lake is integral to surrounding communities, as it is also
formed by the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River—which generates
electricity for thousands of people. If the water levels
continue to decline, the consequences could be catastrophic.
Water levels at the lake have risen slightly thanks to heavy
rainfall sweeping across the region.
California has gone from extreme drought to extreme flooding in
a matter of days. On Monday, 90% of the state’s population was
under a flood watch as another round of storms rolled through.
Yet it was just last week when several counties in the state
were experiencing the exact opposite – exceptional drought,
which the US Drought Monitor considers the most severe
category. … But the abrupt shift from drought warnings to
flood warnings highlights the dilemma California faces: How do
you manage an overwhelming amount of rain in a water-scarce
state? And is it possible to harness that water so it’s
available in the dry summer months? Part of the solution,
climate scientists told CNN, is drawing levees back to allow
rivers more room to flood safely into surrounding land.
With the arrival of a series of atmospheric rivers in recent
weeks, drought-weary Californians are now confronting the
weather whiplash that is a hallmark of our state’s climate.
Flooding, power outages, and downed trees are now dominating
the news. It’s a remarkable shift from the past few years,
which saw the driest three-year period in the state’s recorded
history. And while it’s tempting to think the drought is now
over, it’s not—and if anything, the recent shift in conditions
highlights just how much Californians need to prepare for
wetter wets and drier dries. The past year was very important
for California water. Water managers found ways to innovate and
adapt.
NOAA’s hurricane hunters might be just as busy now as they were
during hurricane season. However, it’s not hurricanes they are
flying through, but the atmospheric river systems plaguing
California since Christmas week. Atmospheric rivers may not
make headlines in the same way hurricanes do, but they can have
extreme consequences. “Atmospheric rivers can span the whole
Pacific. They are long and narrow, but they’re way larger than
hurricanes,” Atmospheric River Reconnaissance Coordinator Anna
Wilson said. They are crucial to the West Coast. Half the rain
and snow the West gets comes from atmospheric rivers, which are
plumes of moisture coming in from the Pacific Ocean. And they
cross an area with very few observation sites, making them
challenging to forecast.
California could get 22 trillion gallons of rain in the coming
days. But what does that mean for the state’s drought? In a
perennial problem that even when California does get rain, much
of it runs off into the ocean or is otherwise uncollected. But
there’s new storm water technology that could help change that,
scientists say, as the decades-old discipline shifts to help
water managers collect rainwater, purify it and store it for
times of drought. Much of the new technology is often
referred to as “green infrastructure,” … To learn
more, The Washington Post talked with Andrew Fisher, a
professor of hydrogeology at the University of California in
Santa Cruz, and David Feldman, the director of the University
of California Irvine’s water institute.
