Citing numerous studies indicating the breadth of environmental
damage caused by single-use plastics – common in restaurant
take-out products – the Monterey County Supervisors Tuesday
afternoon will consider banning their use. If passed, an
ordinance banning the use of single-use plastic will join a
groundswell of restrictions by cities, counties and the state.
The state has enacted Senate Bill 1046 set to take effect Jan.
1, 2025 that will ban all single-use plastic bags provided
prior to checkout at food stores. The most common of these are
the plastic bags used in produce sections. Los Angeles County
has already banned single-use plastics anywhere in the
unincorporated area of the county.
Last week, the U.N. hosted a summit on sustainable development,
including access to clean water. I have previously written
about declining water levels in the western U.S. and the use of
desalination to transform seawater into freshwater. Although
over 17,000 desalination plants are operating worldwide, there
are only about 325 in the U.S., with 45% in Florida, 14% in
California, and 9% in Texas. The reason they have not been more
widely adopted is traditionally, they are expensive to build
and use a lot of energy. Most of the desalination plants
operating today heat the salt water and pump it through
specialized membranes that separate the water from the
salts.
A nonprofit in Peru is gaining attention for its work in
developing a simple system that gathers moisture from fog and
channels it to storage containers for use in areas where water
is in short supply. The systems are dropping in price and
increasing in efficiency, experts say. The “fog catchers” have
been installed in several countries and were even considered
for possible use in the San Francisco area. … “It’s a
very intriguing idea,” says Jay Lund, a professor of civil and
environmental engineering and director of the Center for
Watershed Sciences at the University of California-Davis.
… Lund explored the idea of demisting
fogs over San Francisco in the aftermath of the droughts
in the Bay Area between 2012 and 2016, but concluded it would
likely not be economically viable.
Loma Linda University (LLU) researchers found microbial
contamination in common sources of drinking water in the
Eastern Coachella Valley, including soda fountains at fast-food
restaurants. Their findings revealed that 41% of the water
samples researchers collected from these soda fountains
contained total coliforms, an indicator of water contamination.
Molecular analysis of the water samples revealed traces of
genetic material found in bacteria, including Salmonella spp
(Salmonella), Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Escherichia coli (E.
coli). Given these findings, study authors advise soda fountain
owners to regularly clean and flush the dispensers as a way to
prevent water contamination.
The infusion of federal money for infrastructure projects is a
welcome first step toward fixing deep problems with water
systems on tribal lands, but it’s only a first step, an Arizona
official testified Wednesday [Sept. 25]. Brian Bennon, director
of the tribal water department at the Inter Tribal Council of
Arizona, said tribes need to make sure they have funding for
operation and maintenance of the systems to keep them
going … Bennon was joined by Ken Norton, director
of the Hoopa Valley Tribal Environmental Protection Agency, and
Jola WallowingBull, director of the Northern Arapaho Tribal
Engineering Department, to testify on the problems that come
with underfunding of Native water systems.
In her groundbreaking book Water Always Wins: Thriving in an
Age of Drought and Deluge, environmental journalist and
National Geographic Explorer Erica Gies observes, “If water
were a category in a game of rock, paper, scissors, water would
beat them all every time.” At a time when drought, fire
and flood threaten countless lives, Gies talks to water experts
who are using cutting-edge science and traditional knowledge to
show how our relationship to water must change if we want to
survive. She takes the reader inside water projects ranging
from the marshlands of Iraq to the highlands of Peru, as well
as nearer to home in B.C. and California, uncovering a
breathtaking complexity we ignore at our peril. The result is a
riveting and engaging book that does for water what Suzanne
Simard has done for trees.
… Recent floods left more than a third of California’s table
grapes rotting on the vine. Too much sunlight is burning apple
crops. Pests that farmers never used to worry about are
marching through lettuce fields. Breeding new crops that can
thrive under these assaults is a long game. Solutions are
likely to come from an array of research fronts that stretch
from molecular gene-editing technology to mining the vast
global collections of seeds that have been conserved for
centuries. … Here’s a quick look at some of the most
promising.
How did the nascent bottled water industry make a market for a
product that for much of the past century was largely viewed as
an unnecessary or wasteful luxury good? In just four decades,
this commodity has transformed into a ubiquitous consumer
object that is now the primary, and sometimes sole, source of
drinking water for billions of people globally. The story of
bottled water’s resurgence in places with abundant, clean tap
water revolves around the question of why people have
increasingly come to distrust their tap water, and how the
expanding bottled water industry has fueled and taken advantage
of this phenomenon.
Sept. 24 is World Rivers Day, first celebrated in 2005
following a declaration by the U.N. General Assembly that
2005-2015 would be the “Water for Life” decade. … Concern
about abuse and neglect of rivers has led to an international
movement to recognize rivers as living entities with
fundamental rights, entitled to legal guardians. … The
ability of America’s public health system to detect the
emergence and spread of diseases, or to mount timely responses
to them, is hampered by the lack of a national data system.
Post-pandemic, it’s one of the major priorities of public
health officials to change this.
… To better prepare and plan for a future with climate
extremes, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR)
has released the Public Review Draft of California Water Plan
Update 2023. … [The plan] focuses on three intersecting
themes: addressing the urgency of climate change, strengthening
watershed resilience, and achieving equity in water management.
… public comments can be made through Oct. 19,
2023.
The 2023 California legislative session concluded on September
14, 2023. This article highlights new bills pertaining to water
rights, the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), and
emissions on the consumer and industry levels, as well as bills
that are being held over. … AB 1337: State Water
Resources Control Board: water diversion curtailment.
… AB 460: State Water Resources Control Board: water
rights and usage: interim relief: procedures. … SB 389:
State Water Resources Control Board: investigation of water
right.
NASA scientists are testing a technology that could more
accurately measure water stored in snow as seen from a
satellite in orbit. Melting snow provides much of the
water that the western United States depend on for agriculture
and power. But warming winters due to climate
change led to decreased seasonal snowpacks high up in the
Rockies and Sierra Nevada mountains. That in turn affects the
volume of water that travels downriver to irrigate crops and
turn hydroelectric turbines.
Decades of drought in the West has made water quality and
quantity a major issue requiring government funding and
innovation to fix, members of a U.S. Senate panel said
Wednesday. Demand for water in growing municipalities is
stretching agricultural and tribal communities, while shrinking
availability is leading to higher water prices, witnesses told
the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s Water and
Power Subcommittee. … Kyle Jones, the policy and legal
director at the advocacy group Community Water Center, told the
panel about a woman whose California well ran dry as her
husband recovered from open-heart surgery. A new well would
have required a $30,000 loan, he said.
In appreciation of the critical role the Sacramento-San Joaquin
River Delta plays in California’s economy and environment,
Senator Bill Dodd, D-Napa, is recognizing the last week of
September as Delta Week. “The Delta is a cherished watershed
and the very lifeblood of California’s water system,” Dodd said
in a news release. … Dodd’s Senate Concurrent Resolution 119
established Delta Week, which this year kicks off Sunday. As
part of the annual tradition, it will be preceded on Saturday
by Coastal Cleanup Day, which offers Californians a chance to
participate in local waterway cleanup events.
Hollywood icon Leonardo DiCaprio urged his fans to sign a
petition asking Utah’s political leaders to protect and restore
the Great Salt Lake. In an Instagram post on Monday, DiCaprio
posted a photo of a receding Great Salt Lake shoreline, sharing
with his over 61 million followers the dangers a disappearing
lake poses. … DiCaprio shared his support for the group
of conservation organizations that filed a lawsuit against
the State of Utah over alleged “failures” to protect the
lake. The lawsuit claims Utah’s diversion of water upstream is
preventing necessary water from reaching the lake, depleting
water levels.
A state bill on the verge of becoming law would ban the use of
drinking water to irrigate decorative grass, a mandate endorsed
by Marin leaders who are already largely prepared for it.
Assembly Bill 1572, which has made its way to Gov. Gavin
Newsom’s desk, would involve the kind of grassy areas in street
medians, business parks and city sidewalks. Decorative grass
could still be irrigated with recycled water. The restrictions
proposed under were first implemented by the state as temporary
provisions during the recent three-year drought. The rules are
set to expire in June. The bill would make these rules a
permanent way of life in California. Violations would carry
fines of $500.
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.
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.
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.
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 …
