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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Please Note: 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.
State officials are putting farmers in south-central Arizona on
notice that the continuing drought means a “substantial cut” in
deliveries of Colorado River water is expected next year. A
joint statement issued Friday by the state Department of Water
Resources and the Central Arizona Project said an expected
shortage declaration “will result in a substantial cut to
Arizona’s share of the river, with reductions falling largely
to central Arizona agricultural users.” The Central Arizona
Project is an aqueduct system that delivers Colorado River
water to users in central Arizona and southern Arizona,
including farmers, cities and tribes.
The blizzard that dumped snow along the Front Range in March
helped Colorado nearly reach its average snowpack for the
winter, federal data shows. But last year’s historically dry
weather means that streams are likely to run lower than normal,
potentially restricting the amount of water some consumers can
use, experts said… Areas east of the Continental Divide
had above average snowpack, but the Colorado River Basin on the
west was below average….
Water covers 71% of the earth’s surface, but only about 3%
percent of it is fresh water, making it the planet’s most
precious resource. But what do you do when water is in danger
of going dry? California’s Central Valley is no stranger
to drought, and because of that, farmers and scientists are
joining forces to figure out how to get by with less.
Water releases designed to benefit the critical outmigration of
juvenile salmon on the Stanislaus River as well as assist farms
and communities along the west side of the San Joaquin Valley
already starting to suffer the effects of two consecutive dry
years is languishing in the federal bureaucracy. Up to
100,000 acre feet is proposed to be released that belongs to
the South San Joaquin and Oakdale irrigation districts that
would provide a critical impulse flow from April 15 to May
15. That water based on measurements at Vernalis south of
Manteca where the Stanislaus River joins the San Joaquin River
would significantly improve the survivability of the threatened
salmon.
Is there water available on the Kern River and, if so, how
much? Parties to the long-running river dispute will finally
get a hearing by the State Water Resources Control Board on
those questions, at least. The big question — who should get
the water? — will have to wait. Still, this is the first
significant public movement on the Kern River in the past 11
years.
Placing solar panels atop Central Valley canals could get the
state halfway to its goal for climate-friendly power by 2030, a
new study suggests. And the panels could reduce enough
evaporation from the canals to irrigate about 50,000 acres, the
researchers said. They are from the Merced and Santa Cruz
campuses of the University of California. The idea has
already drawn interest from the Turlock Irrigation District, as
one of several options for boosting the solar part of its
electricity supply.
Although most residents have safe drinking water, more than 250
water systems serving 900,000 people were out of compliance
with drinking water standards in 2020. This is a chronic issue
for some systems; more than 170 have been out of compliance for
three or more years. More than half of these noncompliant
systems are in the San Joaquin Valley—California’s largest
farming region and home to a third of the state’s low-income
communities. Some tribal water systems face similar challenges.
Data are lacking on water quality provided by roughly 1,500
very small, county-regulated water systems and more than
350,000 domestic wells, but some of these supplies may have
chronic issues as well.
In the wake of California’s worst-ever wildfire season,
researchers are exploring how mushrooms can help detoxify
polluted soil and water. Scientists and volunteers at
CoRenewal, a nonprofit dedicated to ecological restoration, are
conducting the experiment in burn zones along high-risk
waterways in Northern California. Burned and melted plastics,
metals, electronics, and building materials leave behind toxic
ash, which then washes into water systems. For instance, in the
months following the Tubbs Fire in 2017 and Camp Fire in 2018,
authorities found toxic levels of benzene—a cancer-causing
chemical—in local drinking water.
When Gov. Gavin Newsom voiced his support last year for a ban
on hydraulic fracturing by oil and gas companies, an effort
long fought by the industry and trade unions alike, he gave
Democrats a green light to send him legislation to achieve that
goal as they saw fit. But the crackdown on oil and gas
production under consideration by the California Legislature is
much wider in scope than the plan requested by the governor,
who may get more than he bargained for as he shoulders the
pressures of carrying out the state’s COVID-19 pandemic
response while battling a looming recall election. The
ambitious proposal would outlaw hydraulic fracturing, or
fracking, and a series of other oil extraction methods reviled
by environmental activists.
A $230,000 revision of the Pure Water Monterey expansion
project’s environmental review document will move forward after
the Monterey One Water board approved the work earlier this
week. At the same time, board members backing the study
revision made it clear they wouldn’t support approving the
recycled water expansion proposal itself until an outside
funding source is available. On Monday, the Monterey One Water
board voted 7-3 to approve the work needed to update a
supplemental environmental impact report for the expansion
proposal, including consultant contracts and a cost-sharing
agreement with the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District
whose board agreed last month to cover most of the revision’s
cost.
The California Department of Justice (DOJ) filed comments with
the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Army Corps) regarding Sunset
Exploration’s proposal to drill for natural gas in the Suisun
Marsh. Located in the San Francisco Bay-Delta, this 88,000-acre
wetland is home to a number of endangered and threatened
species, including California Ridgway’s rail, black rail, and
Chinook salmon – and is just a few short miles from
environmental justice communities in Solano County…. DOJ
urges the Army Corps to fully consider the proposal’s
significant environmental impacts, including harm to these
communities and protected species, as well as increased
greenhouse gas emissions, before deciding whether to grant the
requested permit.
If the mountain of proposed legislation is any indication,
lawmakers are increasingly primed to crack down on the plastic
waste that is littering roadsides, washing onto beaches and
into oceans, being digested by fish, and ending up in our own
bellies. In Sacramento, at least a dozen bills go after plastic
pollution from a variety of angles, including reducing the
amount of single-use plastics and refilling returnable beverage
bottles. And in Washington, D.,C., a sweeping federal proposal
co-authored by Rep. Alan Lowenthal, D-Long Beach, would place
much of the responsibility for plastic reduction and recycling
on companies that make and utilize single-use plastics.
A federal judge has thrown out a legal action from multiple
environmental organizations seeking to halt the expansion of a
key Denver Water storage facility, citing no legal authority to
address the challenge. … The expansion of Gross Reservoir in
Boulder County is intended to provide additional water storage
and safeguard against future shortfalls during droughts. The
utility currently serves customers in Denver, Jefferson,
Arapahoe, Douglas and Adams counties. In July 2020, the Federal
Energy Regulatory Commission gave its approval for
the design and construction of the reservoir’s expansion. The
project would add 77,000 acre-feet of water storage and 131
feet to the dam’s height for the utility’s “North System” of
water delivery.
In 2016—after two years of rigorous scientific study by
CalTrout and its partners in the Sierra Meadows Partnership—the
Sierra Meadows Strategy for restoring and protecting our
state’s Sierra Nevada meadows was officially released. A key
piece of CalTrout’s source-waters-to-sea approach to combatting
the effects of drought and climate change, this strategy
developed among a broad coalition of conservation partners aims
to restore and conserve meadows throughout the Sierra Nevada,
protecting a major source of our state’s water supply and
critical habitats to fish and other species.
The Bureau of Reclamation today released final technical
reports supporting the Water Reliability in the West – 2021
SECURE Water Act Report. Reclamation—s 2021 West-Wide
Climate and Hydrology Assessment and seven individual basin
reports provide detailed information on climate change
impacts and adaptation strategies to increase water supply
reliability in the West. A new 2021 SECURE Report Web Portal is
also available to provide a user-friendly, web-based format for
delivery of information in the reports.
With commercial salmon fishing in California likely headed
toward a shortened season starting in late June, fishermen out
of Half Moon Bay remain worried about what a short season means
during an already down year. … The shortened season will
be set based on an estimated low stock of chinook salmon
derived from statistical modeling. An ocean abundance forecast
of adult salmon estimated the Sacramento River in 2021 to have
around 271,000 salmon, while the Klamath River had around
181,500, both lower than their 10-year averages of 487,600 and
449,000, respectively, Morgenstern said.
Humboldt County authorities are warning people it is still too
early to swim in some rivers due to high and swift water. A
report of multiple swimmers in distress this week led to a
sheriff’s deputy rescuing three people stuck on a rock in
Willow Creek. The Sheriff’s Office says the three Arcata-area
residents had decided to swim due to good weather. The office
says people should check National Weather Service information
on river levels and flow information. The advice includes the
Trinity River. Warming spring weather causes snowmelt that
sends cold and fast-moving water down through California’s
rivers to lakes and reservoirs. Authorities say even the most
experienced swimmers can be in danger. California State
Parks on Thursday began a series of online programs to help
prevent drownings in waterways.
Barack Obama was seven months into his first term as President
of the United States, the World Health Organization had
declared a H1N1 flu pandemic, and the California State Water
Resources Control Board (State Board) adopted the current
Construction General Permit for Stormwater Discharges (Permit
or CGP). It was September 2009. Now, having
administratively extended the Permit since 2014 when, by its
terms, the Permit expired, the State Board may, under a
schedule released late last year, soon release a new draft CGP
for public comment, with a goal of adopting it late this
summer. As with the current permit, the proposed new CGP will
regulate the discharge of pollutants from construction sites in
California.
Drought is returning to California as a second, consecutive
parched winter draws to a close in the usually wet north,
leaving the state’s major reservoirs half empty. But this
latest period of prolonged dryness will probably play out very
differently across this vast state. In Northern
California, areas dependent on local supplies, such as Sonoma
County, could be the hardest-hit. Central Valley growers have
been told of steep cuts to upcoming water deliveries.
Environmentalists too are warning of grave harm to native
fish. Yet, hundreds of miles to the south, the
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California reports
record amounts of reserves — enough to carry the state’s most
populous region through this year and even next.
A groundwater market, which caps total pumping within one or
more basins, allocates portions of the total to individual
users and allows users to buy and sell groundwater under the
total cap, is a promising tool for basins implementing
California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act
(SGMA). … [G]roundwater markets can be a useful tool for
achieving basin sustainability, but they are not a good fit for
every basin or groundwater sustainability agency (GSA). … The
Fox Canyon groundwater market benefitted from the four enabling
conditions (water scarcity, fixed allocations, agricultural
stakeholder support, and capacity and funding) described below.
