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Leaders and Experts

Aquafornia news September 20, 2023 Politico

Ebbs and flows

The Natural Resources Defense Council is winding down its San Francisco Bay-Delta program and losing two key staff attorneys as it shifts resources to protecting wetlands. Kate Poole retired this summer, and Doug Obegi is expected to leave in October. After 20 and 15 years at NRDC, respectively, the hard-charging and respected duo will leave a void in the environmental advocacy on the Delta, where anglers, farmers and cities are duking it out over a limited but precious water source. The decision was taken in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling this spring that slashed federal protections under the Clean Water Act, Drew Caputo, NRDC’s chief program officer, said in a statement.
- Editor’s Note: Scroll to bottom of story for water-related content.

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Aquafornia news September 20, 2023 NASA

Blog: Water-watching satellite monitors warming ocean off California coast

Warm ocean waters from the developing El Niño are shifting north along coastlines in the eastern Pacific Ocean. Along the coast of California, these warm waters are interacting with a persistent marine heat wave that recently influenced the development of Hurricane Hilary. … In its September outlook, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecast a greater than 70% chance for a strong El Niño this coming winter. In addition to warmer water, El Niño is also associated with a weakening of the equatorial trade winds. The phenomenon can bring cooler, wetter conditions to the U.S. Southwest and drought to countries in the western Pacific, such as Indonesia and Australia.

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Aquafornia news September 20, 2023 The Sacramento Bee

Editorial: Can California Gov. Gavin Newsom show some guts on these 5 controversial bills?

Gov. Gavin Newsom has before him about a thousand bills approved by the California Legislature that now await his fate but some are far more explosive and politically consequential than others. These bills in Newsom’s pile could reveal how the governor is evolving as a leader, and now he has less than a month to review them. … Here is an obscure bill that will reveal a lot about how much Newsom listens to his inner circle or his own common sense. Two water districts in Southern California want to switch water suppliers and leave the San Diego County Water Authority, the long-time primary provider for the region. The county’s Local Agency Formation Commission said yes, including an exit fee intended to address impacts to the SDCWA budget. 

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Aquafornia news September 19, 2023 Nature Water

New study: Balancing-oriented hydropower operation makes the clean energy transition more affordable and simultaneously boosts water security

Reservoir hydropower offers a compelling combination of stability and flexibility services for modern water and power grids. However, its operating flexibility is poorly characterized in energy system planning, missing opportunities to cost-effectively uptake variable renewable energy (VRE) for a clean energy transition. In this study, we have developed a fully coupled reservoir operation and energy expansion model to quantify the economic and environmental benefits attained from adaptive hydropower operation in a high VRE future. Our case study of the China Southern Power Grid reveals that, in a 2050 net-zero grid, simply adapting hydropower operations to balance VRE can reduce 2018–2050 total system costs by 7% (that is, US$28.2 billion) and simultaneously save 123.8 km3 of water each year …

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Aquafornia news September 19, 2023 Arizona State University

News release: Water sustainability at center of new mixed-reality game

With no end in sight for Arizona’s megadrought, many researchers at Arizona State University are developing innovations to mitigate the drought’s effects on residents, agriculture and industry, and promote water resilience and security. Claire Lauer, a professor of technical communication in the School of Applied Professional Studies, part of the College of Integrative Sciences and Arts (CISA) at ASU’s Polytechnic campus, is applying her knowledge of user experience, or UX, and Arizona’s water landscape to educate the public about the intricacies of water usage because “there’s a lot of misinformation about water out there,” she said. “Educating the public on water management will help communities make informed decisions, which can have a huge effect on Arizona’s water policies and conservation efforts.”

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Aquafornia news September 19, 2023 Public Policy Institute of California

Report: Managing water and farmland transitions in the San Joaquin Valley

Successful implementation of the 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) is vital to the long-term health of the San Joaquin Valley’s communities, agriculture, environment, and economy. But the transition will be challenging. Even with robust efforts to augment water supplies through activities like groundwater recharge, significant land fallowing will be necessary. How the valley manages that fallowing will be paramount to protecting the region’s residents—including the growers and rural, low-income communities who will be most directly impacted by the changes. With coordinated planning and robust incentives, the valley can navigate the difficult water and land transitions coming its way and put itself on a path to a productive and sustainable future.

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Aquafornia news September 18, 2023 SJV Water

Tübatulabal tribe celebrates homecoming with return of a slice of its ancestral lands

Tribal members celebrated the return of more than 1,200 acres of their ancestral lands in the jagged hills above Weldon on Saturday in a ceremony marked with gratitude, emotion and prayer. Chairman Robert Gomez opened the event by thanking a large number of people who helped find, purchase and deed the land back to the Tübatulabal tribe, which has called the Kern River Valley home for more than 5,000 years. Western Rivers Conservancy was chief among those Gomez called out for their help in obtaining the land. Western Rivers, a non profit dedicated to restoring rivers, helped secure funding through the state Wildlife Conservation Board and Sierra Nevada Conservancy and facilitated the handover of the land to the tribe.

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Aquafornia news September 18, 2023 State Water Resources Control Board

News release: State Water Board delivers $3.3 billion to California communities to boost drought resilience and increase water supplies

Seizing a generational opportunity to leverage unprecedented state funding to combat drought and climate change, the State Water Resources Control Board provided an historic $3.3 billion in financial assistance during the past fiscal year (July 1, 2021 – June 30, 2022) to water systems and communities for projects that bolster water resilience, respond to drought emergencies and expand access to safe drinking water. The State Water Board’s funding to communities this past fiscal year doubled compared to 2020-21, and it is four times the amount of assistance provided just two years ago. 

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Aquafornia news September 18, 2023 Seattle Times

At beaver summit, role of hefty rodents praised in climate change fight

As the nation faces a future of increasing flooding, drought and wildfires, millions of 60-pound rodents stand by, ready to assist. Beavers can transform parched fields into verdant wetlands and widen rivers and streams in ways that not only slow surging floodwater, but store it for times of drought. … Emily Fairfax, an assistant professor of physical geography at the University of Minnesota at Twin Cities … who spoke earlier this week at the first-ever Midwest Beaver Summit, is part of a broader “beaver restoration” movement that has gained ground in recent years with ecologists in Colorado using simplified human-made beaver dams to encourage the animals to recolonize waterways, and California passing a new law encouraging nonlethal approaches to human-beaver conflicts.

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Aquafornia news September 18, 2023 SF Gate

A strong El Niño is likely this winter: What that means for California

El Niño — a weather pattern that can cause impacts around the world — developed in summer and is expected to persist through winter, long-term forecasters said Thursday. In its latest monthly forecast, the federal Climate Prediction Center said there’s a 95% chance El Niño will continue through winter, January to March, and it will most likely be strong, as opposed to weak or moderate. In California, El Niño has near-celebrity status, as the state has seen some epic wet winters when it has developed in the past, but meteorologists say that the state has also seen dry or normal precipitation in El Niño winters.

Related article: 

  • Los Angeles Times: Warmest summer on record spurs dire warnings
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Aquafornia news September 18, 2023 California WaterBlog

Blog: Future ancestors of freshwater fishes in California

We are living in the Anthropocene, an era being defined by global mass extinctions caused by humanity. While on-going and impending extinctions of birds and other terrestrial vertebrates gain the most attention, the situation with freshwater fishes (and other freshwater organisms) is as bad or worse, partly because many freshwater extinctions are nearly invisible events, hidden by murky waters (Moyle and Leidy 2023). The extinction threat is especially high for obligatory freshwater fishes including many species endemic to California (Moyle and Leidy 2023). The ultimate cause is competition between people and fish for clean water.

Related article: 

  • New York Times: Meet Methuselah, the World’s Oldest Living Aquarium Fish
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Aquafornia news September 15, 2023 Forbes

Opinion: Dams and flood controls ‘not ready’ for a more extreme climate

More than 11,000 people are now known to have died, with thousands still missing, after Mediterranean storm Daniel made landfall in Libya over the weekend. Inland areas were flooded, as seen in Sentinel 2 images released by the European Union’s space programme on Wednesday. Coastal settlements built near or over alluvial fans and deltas of ancient Wadi — the Arabic term traditionally referring to river valleys — were swept away. In Derna alone, the worst affected city, the flood destroyed two-thirds of all buildings and killed over 2,000 people. … A “grey swan” is what experts describe as a predictable, yet improbable, event with significant and wide-ranging long-term impacts. Modern dams, reservoirs and infrastructure to control floods are build to withstand meteorological conditions as experienced in the last 100 years.
-Written by David Bressan, a freelance geologist working mostly in the Eastern Alps.

Related article: 

  • KCRW – Los Angeles: Could intense storms push America’s failing dams to the brink? 
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Aquafornia news September 15, 2023 NASA

News release: NASA announces summer 2023 hottest on record

Summer of 2023 was Earth’s hottest since global records began in 1880, according to scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS) in New York. The months of June, July, and August combined were 0.41 degrees Fahrenheit (0.23 degrees Celsius) warmer than any other summer in NASA’s record, and 2.1 degrees F (1.2 C) warmer than the average summer between 1951 and 1980. August alone was 2.2 F (1.2 C) warmer than the average. June through August is considered meteorological summer in the Northern Hemisphere. This new record comes as exceptional heat swept across much of the world, exacerbating deadly wildfires in Canada and Hawaii, and searing heat waves in South America, Japan, Europe, and the U.S., while likely contributing to severe rainfall in Italy, Greece, and Central Europe.

Related articles: 

  • ABC 10 – Sacramento: Climate change making summer hotter despite mild season in California
  • Nature Climate Change: New study - Widespread deoxygenation in warming rivers
  • The Conversation: As climate change warms rivers, they are running out of breath – and so could the plants and animals they harbor
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Aquafornia news September 15, 2023 Monterey Herald

Monterey Peninsula Water Management District board of directors to consider takeover of Cal-Am water system

While the California American Water Co. has repeatedly said they have no plans to sell their water system that serves much of the Monterey Peninsula, the local water management district board of directors is considering using eminent domain to take over the system. The public will get a chance to weigh in on that possibility at 5:30 p.m. Oct. 10 in a hearing in the Irvine Auditorium at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, 499 Pierce St., Monterey. … The resolution of necessity would entail taking by eminent domain the Monterey water system, which is currently privately owned, operated and held by Cal Am. If approved, the water system would be converted to public ownership and controlled by the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District. 

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Aquafornia news September 15, 2023 Fresnoland

Advocates want water board diversity in California’s Central Valley

During three weeks in December and January, storms dumped 32 trillion gallons of rain and snow on California. With it came unwelcome floods for many communities of color. The winter and spring storms were a rare chance for drought-stricken communities to collect rainwater, rather than have their farms, homes and more overwhelmed by water. Much of the rain that fell instead overflowed in lakes and streams, leading to disaster in low-income Central Valley towns like Allensworth and Planada. In the aftermath of the damage, community leaders are reiterating a call to diversify water boards to give marginalized groups more power. The California State Water Resources Control Board, which oversees the distribution of water in the state, has acknowledged that its workforce does not reflect California’s racial composition.

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Aquafornia news September 14, 2023 Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District

News release: Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District general manager, Thaddeus Bettner, announces resignation after 17 years of service

Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District (GCID) General Manager Thaddeus L. Bettner announced his plans to resign from his position, effective September 22, 2023. The District is extremely appreciative of Bettner’s leadership, dedication, and outstanding service to the District and the Sacramento Valley, and extends to him best wishes going forward. Bettner has worked for the District since 2006 as its General Manager. He is a registered civil engineer and recognized expert on issues of water and the environment. He has guided the District through critical water policy changes while improving the District’s infrastructure and building and investing in partnerships. Bettner has used his 33 years of experience across California in the water resources field to bring innovative solutions to historically challenging problems.

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Aquafornia news September 14, 2023 Reuters

In San Francisco Bay, ecologists work to protect sevengill sharks

Meghan Holst studies the broadnose sevengill shark, so she was naturally concerned when record-setting rain this year altered the shark’s nursery grounds in San Francisco Bay. But the species appears to have withstood the challenge, based on initial observations from a recent outing on the water by Holst, a 31-year-old doctoral student in conservation ecology at the University of California, Davis. Next, perhaps, will come California Fish and Game Commission protections for the sharks in San Francisco Bay, which she considers a nursing and pupping ground for a species believed to be in decline. Research like hers can help support such a designation. San Francisco Bay is one of the world’s only known year-round nurseries for the species, Holst said, making the habitat critical to monitor.

Related article: 

  • SF Gate: Baby beaver seen in Bay Area creek for first time in over 160 years
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Aquafornia news September 14, 2023 Public Policy Institute Of California

Blog: How might small farms fare under SGMA?

Change is coming to the heavily agricultural San Joaquin Valley. We know that a combination of climate change, new environmental regulations, and especially the implementation of the 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) are leading to a decline in water available for irrigation. (By 2040, overall farm supplies in the valley could drop by as much as 20%—and irrigated cropland by nearly 900,000 acres.) But what we haven’t known is how these changes could impact farms of different sizes in the valley—and there is understandable concern about how the shift will play out, particularly for smaller farms that have fewer resources and capacity to adapt.

Related articles: 

  • Science: Widespread aquifer depressurization after a century of intensive groundwater use in USA
  • The Californian: Salinas Valley agency gets $10.3M grant to fight against future California droughts
     
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Aquafornia news September 13, 2023 KUNC - Greeley, Colo.

Researchers can now predict when drought will kill a forest

Researchers have found a way to predict whether or not a forest will survive based on drought conditions – information that can help forest managers deal with climate change. The researchers from the University of California Davis looked at a drought that caused the loss of tens of millions of trees in the Sierra Nevada forest from 2012 to 2015. In the early years, the trees were doing fine, despite drought conditions. But by 2015, 80% of them were essentially dead.

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Aquafornia news September 12, 2023 Office of Rep. Jared Huffman

News release: New grants given to Humboldt and Mendocino fish culvert projects

Today, U.S. Representative Jared Huffman (CA-02) announced new grants for his district from the FY22 National Culvert Removal, Replacement, and Restoration Grant Program (Culvert AOP Program). Last Wednesday, Huffman visited the site of one of these projects to examine how the award will be utilized and the local impacts. … The grants have been awarded as follows: $470,000 for the Wiyot Tribe Butte Creek Fish Barrier Replacement Design, Humboldt County … $5,000,000 for the Avenue of the Giants Fish Passage, Humboldt County … $15,000,000 for the State Route MEN-1 Fish Passage, Mendocino County…

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