A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation Writer Matt Jenkins.
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Gov. Jared Polis on Thursday issued a statewide drought
emergency declaration, potentially freeing up additional state
funding for the state’s response to record-low snowpack
and prolonged warm temperatures across
Colorado. Colorado’s snowpack peaked in early March about
a month earlier than usual and at the lowest level since 1987.
Farmers, ranchers, fishing and rafting outfitters, and cities
and reservoir managers are already feeling the impacts of tight
water supplies this year on their wallets and water supply
budgets. Polis’ declaration follows recommendations Monday from
the Colorado Drought Task Force and the Water Conditions
Monitoring Committee.
When rain falls on California shopping centers and warehouses,
the water runs off parking lots carrying metal dust and
chemicals from vehicle tires and brake pads, oil and grease
from engines, and bacteria from trash. The gunk washes into
storm drains and pollutes creeks, rivers and beaches. Now
environmental advocates are pushing state regulators to
crack down by requiring stormwater permits.
… Groups that represent the businesses say they are
already paying property taxes that in L.A. County include a
special tax for cleaning up stormwater, and that imposing new
regulations in this way doesn’t make sense. But California
Coastkeeper Alliance and other nonprofit groups submitted
petitions to regional water officials across the state this
week demanding they begin regulating commercial propertiessuch
as big-box stores, auto dealers and industrial parks.
The top federal official on the Colorado River said his agency
is targeting the middle of this summer to formalize a new
water-sharing plan. Scott Cameron, the acting commissioner of
the Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency which manages the
nation’s largest reservoirs, addressed a crowd of water experts
in Boulder, Colorado. “I can’t give you exact dates,” he
said, “But I would expect mid to late summer, and as we get
closer, we’ll try to signal a bit more precision around that.”
… Federal water officials have urged the seven states
that use the Colorado River to agree on a plan for sharing its
water. If they don’t, Reclamation will likely
install its own, but risk getting sued by states that could
accuse the federal government of overstepping its
authority.
The environmental footprint of data centers already rivals some
of the world’s largest countries, according to a United Nations
University report, which also predicts their water and energy
use and pollution will double in just four years as use of
artificial intelligence grows. Last year, global data centers
used 448 trillion watt-hours of electricity, more than all but
10 countries of the world, said the report issued Wednesday.
That electricity use produced about 208 million tons of carbon
dioxide, about the same amount as Argentina, and
producing that much energy consumed about 1.2 trillion
gallons of water, according to the report on the
environmental consequences of AI’s energy use.
Mexico completed emergency repairs Thursday to a ruptured
sewage line in Tijuana that spilled tens of millions of gallons
of raw sewage into San Diego’s South Bay waterways over the
weekend, but residents may continue smelling lingering odors.
The Tijuana parallel gravity line break sent an estimated 40 to
50 million gallons of sewage into the Tijuana River, according
to Chris Helmer, Environmental and Natural Resources Director
for Imperial Beach. The massive spill caused hydrogen sulfide
levels to spike in communities near the Tijuana River Valley,
creating a strong rotten egg smell. … Helmer warned that
similar infrastructure failures will likely continue,
especially during storm events. With El Niño conditions
expected this winter, he anticipates more potential breaks in
Mexico’s aging sewage systems.
As Colorado continues to navigate recurring drought and growing
water demands, researchers and water experts are looking beyond
traditional conservation measures and finding innovative ways
to reuse water that would otherwise go down the drain. At the
center of that effort is Water TAP, a technology accelerator
located at CSU Spur in Denver, where new ideas are being tested
to help communities make the most of every gallon. … One
of the facility’s flagship projects is called GRETA, Colorado’s
first commercial and legal graywater collection and reuse
system. Water from showers and handwashing sinks on the
building’s second floor is collected, treated, and reused to
flush toilets throughout the facility.
The Klamath Fish Hatchery near Chiloquin, Oregon, is back in
business after a five-year rebuild that turned a devastating
fire into a fresh start. The Oregon Department of Fish and
Wildlife reopened the hatchery to visitors on June 1, marking
the end of a long recovery from the 2020 Two Four Two Fire that
destroyed the facility’s 100-year-old main building and killed
approximately 50,000 triploid brown trout. Volunteer
firefighters saved staff residences and outbuildings by using
the hatchery’s own water pumps to fight the blaze.
Reconstruction took far longer than expected. … The result is
a new concrete, noncombustible building that is slightly larger
than the original and includes expanded fish-rearing capacity.
Boaters will have enhanced access between the Sacramento River
and the central Delta this weekend. The U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation announced it will open the Delta Cross Channel
Gates “to improve recreational boating access in the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.” The gates are scheduled to
open at 10 a.m. Saturday (June 6), and will remain open through
10 a.m. Monday (June 8). … The Delta Cross Channel
facility is a gate-controlled diversion channel on the east
bank of the Sacramento River, about 30 miles downstream of
Sacramento. It facilitates the diversion of fresh water
from the Sacramento River into the interior Sacramento-San
Joaquin River Delta to the Central Valley Project and State
Water Project conveyance.
As California’s ocean salmon season returns, anglers now have a
new way to monitor catch progress and stay informed throughout
the season. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife
(CDFW) recently announced the launch of new digital tracking
tools designed to provide real-time visibility into both
recreational and commercial in-season ocean salmon harvests.
Available through CDFW’s Ocean Salmon Fishery Information
webpage, the new tools allow anglers to track the number of
salmon landed and monitor how much remains under each region’s
harvest guideline. The information is intended to help anglers
better plan trips while supporting in-season fishery management
and sustainable harvest goals.
Seeking to prevent the California State Water Resources Control
Board from stepping in to regulate groundwater in critically
overdrafted subbasins, local agencies are working to correct
deficiencies in their plans to protect groundwater. With
groundwater sustainability agencies formed and groundwater
sustainability plans evaluated, the state water board has moved
to implement the 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act,
or SGMA. … Under probation, groundwater extractors in
the Tulare Lake subbasin face annual fees of $300 per well and
$20 per acre-foot pumped, plus a late reporting fee of 25%.
SGMA also requires well owners to file annual groundwater
extraction reports.
Last year’s snow deluge in California, which quickly erased a
two decade long megadrought, was essentially a
once-in-a-lifetime rescue from above, a new study found. Don’t
get used to it because with climate change the 2023 California
snow bonanza —a record for snow on the ground on April 1 — will
be less likely in the future, said the study in Monday’s
journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
… UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain, who wasn’t part
of the study but specializes in weather in the U.S. West, said,
“I would not be surprised if 2023 was the coldest, snowiest
winter for the rest of my own lifetime in California.”
Six tribes in the Upper Colorado River Basin, including two in
Colorado, have gained long-awaited access to discussions about
the basin’s water issues — talks that were formerly
limited to states and the federal government. Under an
agreement finalized this month, the tribes will meet every two
months to discuss Colorado River issues with an interstate
water policy commission, the Upper Colorado River Commission,
or UCRC. It’s the first time in the commission’s 76-year
history that tribes have been formally included, and the timing
is key as negotiations about the river’s future intensify.
… Most immediately, the commission wants a key number:
How much water goes unused by tribes and flows down to the
Lower Basin?
A group of Western lawmakers pressed the Biden administration
Monday to ramp up water conservation, especially in national
forests that provide nearly half the region’s surface water.
“Reliable and sustainable water availability is absolutely
critical to any agricultural commodity production in the
American West,” wrote the lawmakers, including Sens.
Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), in a
letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. The 31
members of the Senate and House, all Democrats except for Sen.
Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), credited the administration for
several efforts related to water conservation, including
promoting irrigation efficiency as a climate-smart practice
eligible for certain USDA funding through the Inflation
Reduction Act.
A study led by NASA researchers provides new estimates of how
much water courses through Earth’s rivers, the rates at which
it’s flowing into the ocean, and how much both of those figures
have fluctuated over time—crucial information for understanding
the planet’s water cycle and managing its freshwater supplies.
The results also highlight regions depleted by heavy water use,
including the Colorado River basin in the United States, the
Amazon basin in South America, and the Orange River basin in
southern Africa.
State water management officials must work more closely with
local agencies to properly prepare California for the effects
of climate change, water scientists say. Golden State
officials said in the newly revised California Water
Plan that as the nation’s most populous state, California
is too diverse and complex for a singular approach to manage a
vast water network. On Monday, they recommended expanding the
work to better manage the state’s precious water resources —
including building better partnerships with communities most at
risk during extreme drought and floods and improving critical
infrastructure for water storage, treatment and distribution
among different regions and watersheds.
It’s the most frustrating part of conservation. To save water,
you rip out your lawn, shorten your shower time, collect
rainwater for the flowers and stop washing the car. Your water
use plummets. And for all that trouble, your water supplier
raises your rates. Why? Because everyone is using so much less
that the agency is losing money. That’s the dynamic in
play with Southern California’s massive wholesaler, the
Metropolitan Water District, despite full reservoirs after two
of history’s wettest winters. … Should water users be
happy about these increases? The answer is a counterintuitive
“yes.” Costs would be higher and water scarcer in the future
without modest hikes now.
A steady stream of water spilled from Lake Casitas Friday, a
few days after officials declared the Ojai Valley reservoir had
reached capacity for the first time in a quarter century. Just
two years earlier, the drought-stressed reservoir, which
provides drinking water for the Ojai
Valley and parts of Ventura, had dropped under 30%.
The Casitas Municipal Water District was looking at emergency
measures if conditions didn’t improve, board President Richard
Hajas said. Now, the lake is full, holding roughly 20 years of
water.
After nearly a century of people building dams on most of the
world’s major rivers, artificial reservoirs now represent an
immense freshwater footprint across the landscape. Yet, these
reservoirs are understudied and overlooked for their fisheries
production and management potential, indicates a study from the
University of California, Davis. The study, published
in the journal Scientific Reports, estimates that U.S.
reservoirs hold 3.5 billion kilograms (7.7 billion pounds) of
fish. Properly managed, these existing reservoir ecosystems
could play major roles in food security and fisheries
conservation.
California has unveiled an ambitious plan to help combat the
worsening climate crisis with one of its invaluable assets: its
land. Over the next 20 years, the state will work to transform
more than half of its 100 million acres into multi-benefit
landscapes that can absorb more carbon than they release,
officials announced Monday. … The plan also calls for
11.9 million acres of forestland to be managed for biodiversity
protection, carbon storage and water supply protection by 2045,
and 2.7 million acres of shrublands and chaparral to be managed
for carbon storage, resilience and habitat connectivity, among
other efforts.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife recommended
Alternative 3 – Salmon Closure during the final days of the
Pacific Fisheries Management Council (PFMC) meeting mirroring
the opinions of commercial and recreational charter boat
anglers. The department’s position is a significant change from
early March. The PFMC meetings are being held in Seattle from
April 6 to 11, and the final recommendations of the council
will be forwarded to the California Fish and Game Commission in
May.
