Light rain started falling Sunday evening in the Bay Area, as a
week of much-needed precipitation was forecast for the parched
Northern California landscape. One to 2 inches of rain is
expected to fall across the Bay Area over the next week, and
even more could fall across the North Bay as a series of storms
dives in from the northwest, said Rick Canepa, meteorologist
with the National Weather Service. To the east, parts of the
Sierra Nevada could see more than a half-foot of snow by Monday
morning.
The Northern Hemisphere looks ready to transition into a La
Niña winter in the next month, according to the latest outlook
from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s
Climate Prediction Center, KTLA sister station WUTR reported.
… Southern California, the southwestern states, Texas,
and the Gulf Coast states through to Florida … are plagued by
drought, and a La Niña year could make that worse. The
opposite is actually true for Northern California and the
Pacific Northwest, where La Nina winters tend to bring more
precipitation, not less.
The West’s historic, multi-year drought is threatening water
supply, food production and electricity generation. It has
drained reservoirs at incredible rates and fueled one of the
most extreme wildfire seasons the region has ever experienced.
In California, drought conditions this summer were the most
extreme in the entire 126-year record — a clear sign of the
role climate change plays in the perilous decline of the
state’s water resources. Data from the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration shows that drought months are
becoming the new normal, with rainy months becoming fewer and
farther between.
The question of whether private ownership of desalination
plants will be allowed in Monterey County remains unresolved,
but supervisors on Oct. 12 voted 4-1 to direct county staff to
prepare a study on overturning the 32-year prohibition on
private ownership. … The law has been thrust into
the spotlight as Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp., a
publicly traded, $11 billion Canada-based company, has
proposed construction of what could be a massive regional
desalination plant in Moss Landing. The project has the
potential to produce 32,000 acre-feet of drinking water when
built out.
We need a dramatic shift in our efforts to curb wildfires in
California. Instead of reacting to wildfires, we need to
utilize the knowledge of Indigenous people on managing the
land. When it comes to fire prevention, the wisdom of
Indigenous tribes like the Yurok, Karuk, Hoopa and Wintun is
unparalleled. … Thoughtful prescribed burns with
low-intensity fire were carried out on the land for thousands
of years to keep fire, food and water resources in
harmony. -Written by Chelsi Sparti, a member of the
Winnemem, Nomtipom and Nomsus bands of the Northern Wintu
People; and Chris Villarruel, a member of the Ajumawi band
of the Pit River Nation.
A recent study identifies Morro Bay Estuary as a priority
location for restoring the native Olympia oyster population
through conservation aquaculture. It’s a project that unites
shellfish lovers and conservationists on the Central
Coast. April Ridlon, a post-doctoral researcher at UC
Santa Barbara, said oysters are not as charismatic as other
marine organisms she has studied, but they are a foundation
species — meaning they create a habitat for other animals that
live on or near their shells.
Fog is a defining element of summer in Santa Cruz … Its
fingerprints are visible in the vast coastal forests, even when
it isn’t hanging in the air. The redwood trees towering in a
clear blue sky soak up moisture from the fog on gray days. It
is often their only source of water for months at a
time. Fog is essential for plants and animals, agriculture
and human health, not only in California but in coastal zones
around the world. But many scientists believe that fog is
declining, another casualty of global warming.
The nation’s firefighters spent a record 69 days this year at
their highest level of alert, the dreaded level 5, rushing from
one drought-driven wildfire to the next. Now they’re finally
getting at least somewhat of a break. Last week, federal fire
managers downgraded the National Preparedness Level to 3 after
a handful of September storms smacked the Pacific Northwest and
residual rain fell in California’s far north.
Farming has always been dependent on varying weather patterns.
With a water shortage and fear of wildfires, farming has become
an even riskier occupation. These circumstances are beyond
their control and small farmers are having an especially tough
time because they don’t have the many resources available to
them that larger farms do. As the drought continues to
worsen, many water-use limitations and regulations will be
enforced upon all California residents and businesses—including
mandatory water restrictions.
As dry times become a greater concern, taking full advantage of
wet times becomes a greater priority. This is the idea behind a
long – conceived $150 million tunnel project that would connect
two of [Monterey] county’s most important reservoirs [Lake
Nacimiento and Lake San Antonio], allowing the more common
superfluous flows in one to fill the other. However, as the
design moves toward a public unveiling, support for the massive
project is uncertain.
Almost five years after 56-percent of Monterey County voters
approved Measure Z, a 2016 county ballot initiative that sought
to ban fracking, wastewater injection and any new oil and gas
development in the county, attorneys once again faced off in
court, arguing whether or not counties in California have
jurisdiction to regulate oil and gas operation within their
borders.
California is in a second year of drought and for many North
Bay grape growers, the hot, dry conditions mean lost crops. In
2020 some growers lost 20% or more of their crops because of
dry conditions, fires, or smoke tainting the flavor of their
grapes. As the climate warms, winemakers and grape growers are
changing the direction they grow vines, picking earlier,
covering crops with shade cloth, and adapting in other ways.
… Some, like [winemaker John] Hamel, have shifted to dry
farming and are using a lot less water or none at all.
A new bill authored by state Sen. John Laird and Assemblymember
Robert Rivas will fund all of the state’s share of the design
and construction phase of the Pajaro River Flood Risk
Management Project, which will help move forward the
long-awaited work. SB 496 directs the Department of Water
Resources to pay 100% of the State’s cost-share for
reconstruction—a total of $140 million—of the Pajaro River
Flood Risk Management Project. Gov. Newsom signed the bill
on Sept. 24.
Researchers and environmental scientists from across the nation
kicked off the 2021 Humboldt Bay Symposium on Tuesday. … Tom
Suchanek, marine ecologist at the University of California,
Davis, … predicted that much of the West Coast would
experience nearly one foot of sea-level rise in the next 10
years and approximately two feet by 2050. By 2100, he predicted
California would see a five-foot rise.
If it seems like wildfires in California are getting larger,
they are. Nine of the state’s 10 largest wildfires since 1932,
when modern records began, have occurred in the past decade.
And amazingly, the eight largest have all burned since 2017.
Why? “It’s a combination of everything — climate change,
decades of fire suppression and drought,” said Craig Clements,
director of San Jose State University’s Fire Weather Lab. Some
fire experts call them “megafires,” blazes larger than 100,000
acres that once were rare but are becoming increasingly common.
The State Department of Water Resources will bolster funding
the long-anticipated Pajaro River levee system rebuild after
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 496 on Friday — a move
critical in protecting residents from frequent floods,
officials say. The levees — built in 1949 — haven’t stacked up
to heavy rainfall events. For Pajaro Valley residents and
farmers it’s been a decades-long saga of evacuations, property
damage, and safety risks. In 1995 the river flooded, killing
two people, and leaving more than $95 million in damages in its
wake.
The Monterey Peninsula’s water supply challenges require
partnership and collaboration to solve. After months of
negotiation, California American Water, Monterey One Water and
the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District have agreed to
terms that enable California American Water to purchase
recycled water from the Pure Water Monterey Expansion project.
This represents a critical step toward the development of a
reliable, long-term water supply for the local community. -Written by Rich Svindland, president of
California American Water
After months of handwringing over language in a contract
allowing California American Water Co. to purchase thousands of
acre-feet of water from a Monterey recycling project, some of
the heavy lifting now begins. With the Monterey Peninsula Water
Management District approving a contract last week and the
board of Monterey One Water approving the water purchase
agreement Monday night, the stage is now set for Cal Am to go
before the California Public Utilities Commission to finalize
the deal.
Santa Cruz native Sierra Ryan is taking the helm of the county
Water Resources Division as it’s new manager — a role critical
in protecting the region’s water quality, supply and
sustainability. … Ryan hails from Live Oak, a place she said
her family has had roots in since 1918. She left the Monterey
Bay area to pursue an environmental studies degree at UC Santa
Barbara, later earning a master’s in environmental
sustainability at the University of Edinburgh.
You won’t find a Beaver Creek in Sonoma County. Likewise,
there’s no Beaver Pond, Beaver Dam or Beaverton. No Beaver
Glade or Beaver Falls either. Wander north to the Mendocino
Coast and you will find Beaver Point jutting into the ocean. In
Humboldt, even though beavers prefer well-watered valleys,
there’s Beaver Ridge and Beaver Butte. Keep going and you’ll
eventually reach Oregon, whose nickname is “The Beaver State.”
Here in Sonoma, there’s a glaring, beaver-shaped gap in our
place names.
The extensive slough system that runs through the heart of the
Pajaro Valley has become a cornerstone for local recreation,
wildlife viewing, education and research. These wetlands
are home to various species of animals and plants, many rare
and endangered. They help replenish groundwater, buffer the
town from storm impacts and are popular spots for walkers,
birdwatchers and scientists.
Key staff from three water organizations along the Monterey
Peninsula have apparently reached an agreement on a deal that
will send hundreds of acre-feet of new water to California
American Water Co. for distribution up and down the Peninsula.
Monterey One Water, the Monterey Peninsula Water Management
District and Cal Am reached an agreement at a joint meeting
Wednesday whereby Cal Am agreed to purchase water from Monterey
One’s Pure Water Monterey expansion project.
Although the current outlook for our water supply is pretty
grim in California, Sebastopol filmmaker Emmett Brennan hopes
to inspire, not depress, audiences with his new documentary,
“Reflection: A Walk with Water,” premiering at the Mill Valley
Film Festival Oct. 14 and 15. Environmental devastation, from
desertification and overdevelopment, was Brennan’s initial
motivation to make the movie. But instead of focusing on the
damage, he captures the efforts of people working to restore
and promote healthy water systems, from Santa Rosa ranchers and
Ojai farmers to L.A. greywater ecologists and Sonoma soil
experts.
Francisco Diaz remembers when the water piped to his home in
the Central Valley community of Monterey Park Tract made
everything smell rotten, including himself.
… Unsurprisingly, the water was undrinkable.
Agricultural run-off, heavy in potentially toxic nitrates,
had contaminated both wells that supplied water to Monterey
Park Tract, nestled amid the crop fields and dairy farms of
Stanislaus County. The small community of some 200 people had
few options. And so about five years ago, it
started sourcing its water from the City of Ceres, a
suburb of Modesto about four miles away.
If there’s anything to take away from MacKenzie Elmer’s latest
story on the cost of water in drought-stricken Southern
California, it’s that it isn’t getting cheaper any time
soon. The San Diego County Water Authority, which
controls most of the region’s water resources from the
drought-stressed Colorado River, is forecasting hefty price
hikes as high as 10 percent beginning 2023. That’s partly
because the agency has a lot of debt to pay off. It doesn’t
want to take out more loans, so it’d like to raise cash over
the next decade instead — and that cash comes from ratepayers.
Water is a marquee issue in Monterey County. But when it comes
to private ownership of desalination plants, something
currently prohibited under local law, county lawmakers are
divided. For some, private ownership goes against the will of
voters and could trigger a future of lengthy legal battles. For
others, private ownership offers a chance for market
competition and an accelerated path toward solving the county’s
water shortages.
California Coastal Commission staff presented two important
items regarding sea level rise in coastal cities like Malibu at
the commission’s September meeting last week. The commission is
urging local communities to get proactive in planning how they
are going to deal with sea level rise and adapt to its effects
on infrastructure like roads, wastewater systems and stormwater
drainage. Some of these changes and the funding for them need
to be planned out years in advance.
Californians reduced their water use at home by a meager 1.8%
statewide in July compared to last year, even after Gov. Gavin
Newsom urged residents to conserve 15% and drought continues to
spread across the state. Officials today warned water
providers south of the Delta who rely on state water
allocations — already slashed to 5% this year — to brace for
the possibility of zero supply next year.
The federal government needs a new wildfire strategy,
particularly in the American West, and several members of
Congress are looking in the right direction with bills to
create a new Climate Conservation Corps (CCC). The proposed CCC
is modeled after the Civilian Conservation Corps that worked
effectively on soil conservation, water conservation, and
recreation projects from 1933 to 1942. The new CCC, drawing in
part on funding from the recent $1 trillion infrastructure
bill, could provide similarly effective work on public
lands. -Written by James R. Skillen, an associate professor of
environmental studies at Calvin University and director of the
Calvin University Ecosystem Preserve and Native Gardens.
A recent court ruling has turned away the city of Marina’s
insistence that it is the sole authority over a groundwater
basin underneath the old CEMEX plant where California American
Water Co. wants to construct wells to feed its proposed
desalination plant. Like any water issue along the Monterey
Peninsula, or countywide for that matter, the issues can be
convoluted and involved numerous parties. This court case was
no different.
[I]n June 2019, Monterey City Council voted 4-1 to rezone
commercial properties along the south side of Garden Road so
that they can be converted into multifamily residential units.
In so doing, the city would have a better chance of meeting the
state-mandated goal of adding 650 housing units by 2023. But
given the chronic water shortage on the Monterey Peninsula,
that plan has faced a challenge from the start.
I have been receiving numerous calls from worried residents of
Monterey County about the current Board of Supervisors’
proposed elimination of the health and safety protection
ordinance that requires public ownership of desalination
plants. This wrong-headed proposal to dismantle public
protections of our water supply will be discussed Tuesday by
the Board of Supervisors. -Written by Marc Del Piero, an attorney and
native of Monterey County.
While concerns over sea-level rise have typically focused on
the ocean washing over previously dry land, higher seas also
raise the coastal groundwater table — and that could expose far
more Californians and their property to climate-change effects
than overland flooding. Miami is already experiencing
such groundwater flooding. The Atlantic Ocean has risen enough
that it routinely pushes subterranean water levels …
The Bureau of Reclamation is collaborating with Natural
Resources Conservation Service to make federal funding
available to improve the efficiency of agricultural water use
throughout California. The projects funded through this
partnership will help communities build resilience to drought
through the modernization of water infrastructure and efficient
use of water resources.
The first Diablo winds of the season could arrive in the Bay
Area beginning Sunday night and into Monday morning — though
they’re unlikely to be as strong as in years past,
meteorologists said. The timeline for this year’s dry, offshore
winds has come about two weeks earlier than expected, said
Warren Blier, science officer for the National Weather Service.
The winds — which can spread fires and smoke in new directions
— typically start around the fall and come and go irregularly
through the spring.
The availability of potable water is not a reason to oppose
development in drought-threatened California. The view that
water should limit development is one of the false claims made
by Not-In-My-Back-Yard organizations that want to stop the
future. The NIMBY mantra that new development poses risks to
the environment, that we will run out of water, is wrong. Less
than 5 percent of annual water supply is used inside
residences. There are many NIMBY organizations making these
false claims, some with longstanding national stature. -Written by Jim Larimer, a resident
of Miramar.
Various climate models differ on whether our area will get
slightly wetter or drier with rising temperatures. But they
have one prediction in common: greater extremes. Dry
years will be drier. Rainfall could come all at once in a few
large storms rather than spread across a season. … With
this in mind, water managers are designing and implementing
projects to capture, store and access clean water. Some
irrigation for crops in the Pajaro Valley might soon come from
lake water rather than groundwater. A project in Soquel will
use recycled water to replenish a groundwater basin. Another
project in Santa Cruz will inject excess runoff from winter
storms into wells.
The California Legislature released the final budget language
late on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend. CalTrout remains
critical of the unnecessary delay in releasing critical budget
items like emergency drought funding, wildfire relief, and
climate resilience packages. As water curtailment orders go
live throughout the state, the legislature is still waiting to
officially approve these critical funding packages to combat
the effects of climate during this year’s especially dry
drought conditions.
Fog is a defining element of summer in Santa Cruz, obscuring
the view of day trippers descending the hills to the coast and
prompting kids to bundle up to hop on their bikes for summer
adventures. Its fingerprints are visible in the vast coastal
forests, even when it isn’t hanging in the air. The redwood
trees towering in a clear blue sky soak up moisture from the
fog on gray days. It is often their only source of water for
months at a time. … But many scientists believe that fog
is declining, another casualty of global warming.
President Biden visited California on Monday to tout his
efforts to better protect the state against the raging
wildfires that have burned more than two million acres,
displaced thousands and pushed responders to the brink of
exhaustion. “These fires are blinking code red for our
nation,” said Mr. Biden, who used the occasion to promote two
bills pending in Congress that would fund forest management and
more resilient infrastructure as well as combat global warming.
Officials say the City of San Luis Obispo is water-secure for
now, despite several years of drought conditions. The City of
San Luis Obispo relies on water from Santa Margarita Lake,
Whale Rock Reservoir and Nacimiento Reservoir. Mychal Boerman
is Deputy Director of Water for the city. He said Nacimiento’s
water capacity is at 13 percent, due to low rainfall years and
continuous use of the reservoir for Salinas Valley farming.
Drought. Wildfires. And, for the country as a whole,
temperatures worse than the Dust Bowl. In a further bit of
evidence of the reality of climate change, California has just
experienced its hottest summer on record, according to data
released this week by the federal government. The National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the average
temperature in California reached 77.3 degrees from June to
August. That topped the previous record of 76.5 degrees in
summer 2017.
California and several other Western states endured the hottest
summer on record, according to federal data released Thursday,
underscoring the ways rapid climate change is unleashing
unprecedented wildfires, deadly heat waves and drought
conditions. In addition to California, officials said Idaho,
Nevada, Oregon and Utah also set all-time heat records for the
meteorological summer, spanning June through August. Sixteen
other states also saw a top-five warmest summer on record,
according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, which issued its findings Thursday.
James Gilbert, an associate project scientist in the Institute
of Marine Sciences (IMS) at UC Santa Cruz, was recognized by
the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center (SWFSC) with its
Staff of the Quarter award for the third quarter of fiscal year
2021. … The award recognizes his work as part of the FCP’s
Central Valley Salmon project.
Since 1994, a 300-foot-long stretch of the West Trail, which
provides beach access to Pillar Point, has substantially eroded
and needed emergency repairs, according to a report from the
San Mateo County Harbor District. Now the Harbor District is
doing something about it. … The West Trail Shoreline
Protection project calls for the development of a “living
shoreline” along the beach. This strategy is meant to provide a
more natural ecological solution to erosion and flooding by
bringing in native vegetation that blends with the environment
and has minimal hard armoring.
For the past two weeks, a 375-foot dredge ship has been
cruising off the coast of San Francisco, ferrying thousands of
tons of sand from the seafloor to Ocean Beach and marking the
city’s latest effort to confront climate change. The ambitious
$7 million project is designed to anchor the city’s rapidly
eroding southern shoreline with a 3,000-foot-long, 30-foot-tall
sand berm. … Roads, underground infrastructure and
a major city wastewater treatment plant are at risk of being
swallowed by the sea.
State Sen. John Laird, the former Secretary of the California
Natural Resources Agency, has been appointed to a state agency
charged with protecting and improving natural coastal lands.
Laird will serve as one of six non-voting representatives of
the state legislature to the Coastal Conservancy, after his
appointment Wednesday by Senate Pro Tempore Toni Atkins. …
Looming threats to the environment such as climate
change-driven sea-level rise, an increasingly threatening
drought cycle and other coastal access issues mean “it is time
to get to work,” Laird is quoted in a release from his office.
California is again the center of the nation’s biggest and most
destructive wildfires. Over 2 million acres have burned, with
the enormous Dixie and Caldor fires (more than 917,000 and more
than 216,000 acres, respectively) accounting for more than half
of this acreage. More than 3,050 structures have been damaged
or destroyed, and over 14,000 firefighters are battling blazes
in the state. …The entirety of the state remains in drought,
with 88 percent in extreme to exceptional drought, the two
highest categories.
CalTrans plans to restore about four acres around the
Centennial Creek bed in Paso Robles. David Best with the Upper
Salinas-Las Tablas Resource Conservation district said he’s in
favor of the plans, and believes it a win-win for residents in
the area. … CalTrans is planning to provide around $1 million
in funding to improve the creekbed but is asking for public
comment on the proposal.
As Tropical Storm Ida cripples New York City and flooding takes
dozens of lives along the East Coast, California suffers from a
two-year drought that has curtailed water supplies and spawned
wildfires scorching nearly 1,000 square miles. One side of the
nation gets far too much water, the other side far too little,
The common element is climate change and it would be folly for
Californians to yearn — even with flames approaching Lake
Tahoe, the jewel of the Sierra — for a portion of the rain
falling 3,000 miles away.
Monterey County is the only county is California with a law
that prohibits private companies from operating new
desalination plants. That law, passed in 1989, will be up for a
potential repeal when the county’s supervisors meet on Sept.
21. The law has been thrust into the spotlight as
Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp., a publicly traded, $11
billion Canada-based company, has proposed construction of what
could be a massive regional desalination plant in Moss Landing.
The California red-legged frog is a threatened species that has
been found on the UC Santa Cruz Coastal Science Campus, but has
not been known to breed there successfully. That may soon
change with the construction of a small pond designed to
enhance an existing seasonal wetland and provide potential
breeding habitat for the native frog.
California grape growers in coastal areas can use less water
during times of drought and cut irrigation levels without
affecting crop yields or quality, according to a new study out
of the University of California, Davis. The findings, published
today (Sept. 1) in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science, show
that vineyards can use 50% of the irrigation water normally
used by grape crops without compromising flavor, color and
sugar content.
More than 90 small frogs were released back into the wild this
week after being recovered from an oil spill at Toro Canyon
Creek near Summerland. The frogs were rescued in August by the
California Department of Fish and Wildlife Oiled Wildlife Care
Network (OWCN) and Santa Barbara’s Wildlife Care Network
(SBWCN). Crews said the frogs were found coated in oil. They
were washed and rehabilitated back to prime health before being
prepared for release.
Nearly five years after Pacific Grove officials broke ground
with golden-hued shovels for construction of a wastewater
reclamation plant on Point Pinos in hopes of creating revenue
from the sale of recycled water and water credits, the city is
finding out the financial returns aren’t as golden as they had
hoped.
[A] new analysis by Redfin, a real estate brokerage,
reveals more Americans are moving into areas that face the
highest climate risks than ever before. … Counties with
homes facing the highest heat risk saw populations increase by
an average of 4.7% over the last five years. Counties with
homes facing high drought risk saw population growth of 3.5%,
fire risk counties grew by 3%, flood 1.9%, and storm 0.4% over
the last five years.
It’s been almost nine months since Wall Street turned on the
taps — with the launch of the Nasdaq Veles California Water
Index on December 7th, 2020, investors have been able to bet on
the price movement of water. The real-world droughts that
followed have made for an oasis of opportunity. … As droughts
and wildfires hammered the U.S. West Coast, California declared
a state of emergency in April, and last month asked residents
to cut their water use by 15%. As of July 31, California’s
major reservoirs held just 53% of their historical
averages.
The Santa Cruz Water Department has the responsibility for
providing clean safe water for all of its 96,000 customers
located both inside and outside of the city limits, and also
for planning ahead for future needs. Most readers will recall
that about 15 years ago, in the wake of earlier droughts and
water rationing, the City of Santa Cruz initiated an evaluation
of a joint desalination project with the Soquel Creek Water
District. -Written by Gary Griggs, Santa Cruz Sentinel
columnist.
It’s too early to say if Sonoma County and surrounding areas
will get enough rain this winter to revive the parched
landscape and replenish dwindling water supplies, but it
doesn’t look good. “The tilt is toward a drier than normal
winter,” said Brian Garcia of the National Weather Service. …
Don’t expect the kind of above-normal rainfall that would be
typical of an El Niño weather pattern. The opposite is
more likely: below normal rainfall common to La Niña conditions
…
Water wells in the Edna Valley used to be shallow: “You could
put a well to 30 or 40 feet. Well that’s just kind of
unrealistic [now],” Edna Valley Growers Mutual Company
President Bob Schiebelhut said. Some of those shallow wells
didn’t make it through the last drought, drying up and forcing
landowners to drill a little deeper. Now in a new drought, Edna
Valley farmers and residents are once again praying for rain,
Schiebelhut said. But they’re also moving forward with SLO
County and the city of SLO on a plan to make their groundwater
more drought resilient.
There are a number of ways to analyze the behavior of wildland
fires using data that is easily available. The amount of
moisture in the live and dead vegetation is a critical factor
in determining how readily it will burn, because it has to be
cooked off before the grass, brush, or woody vegetation will
vigorously combust. The amount of precipitation over days,
weeks, months, and years affects how wildfires burn. The map
above depicts precipitation during the 30-day period ending
August 23, 2021.
In less than a month, a new Pacific Grove ordinance will
prohibit any new water hookups despite having been granted
earlier water entitlements by the state. The ordinance is set
to take effect in mid-September. In 2017 Pacific Grove’s Local
Water Project came online. It processes wastewater to irrigate
the Pacific Grove Golf Links and the El Carmelo Cemetery. In
November 2015 the state water board approved $2.3 million in
grant funding and $5.4 million in low-interest loan financing
for the project.
You can usually find Trish and me walking our dog CoBe around
Los Osos in the evening. Our favorite walk is along the
shoreline that stretches from Baywood Park Beach off Pasadena
Drive to the Audubon overlook at the end of 4th Street. Over
the past year, we’ve noticed a gradual increase in the amount
of eelgrass washed up on the sand. In fact, on our last hike,
there were areas that you couldn’t see any sand below the wrack
of eelgrass that formed in different ribbons of colors by the
tides.
Welcome to the summer of climate change. No longer a
distant phenomenon — something to worry about in a few decades
— the consequence of a warming planet has arrived in a
resounding fashion. Most Californians probably didn’t need
to read the recent doomsday report by the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change to know that their lives are being
upended already by climate change. Now they must fret about
their electricity being shut off, their faucets running dry and
their houses catching fire.
According to the National Integrated Drought Information
System, all of San Luis Obispo County is currently experiencing
severe drought and 17% of San Luis Obispo County is
experiencing exceptional drought. In California, irrigation
systems are a common alternative to relying on rainfall for
agriculture. Since many crops require a certain amount of
water, farms simply can’t depend on rainwater alone in
California’s dry climate.
An agreement that would turn on the taps for recycled water for
Monterey Peninsula residents hit a speed bump Monday when water
officials balked at a clause that would require the Monterey
Peninsula Water Management District to support any California
American Water Co. project, including desalination, should the
recycled water fail to meet a promised amount. For Cal Am to
purchase water from Monterey One Water’s Pure Water Monterey
Expansion project, a water purchase agreement, or WPA, would
need to be signed by Cal Am, Monterey One Water and the water
district.
Extreme weather events in recent headlines, including
wildfires, heat waves and flooding, could offer a preview of
what to expect in forecasts of the near future, experts
suggest. … Already, historic heat waves have ravaged the
Pacific Northwest, wildfires blaze across California and Oregon
and agencies are recording some of the hottest months on
record. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
said last week that July was the hottest month ever
recorded.
It’s looking increasingly likely the U.S. will see La Niña
conditions this winter, something that could spell bad news for
an already parched Southern California. As of Thursday, NOAA’s
Climate Prediction Center says there’s a 70% chance that La
Niña returns for a second straight winter, this time between
the period of November 2021 and January 2022. As such, a La
Niña Watch has been issued by the agency. So what does that
mean for winter weather?
We are looking at back-to-back La Niña winters, and while
forecasters tried to keep us optimistic about the chances of
average rainfall last winter, we all know how that turned out.
So we should brace ourselves for another year of this drought.
Forecasters at the Climate Prediction Center issued an update
Thursday giving a 60% chance that another La Niña pattern will
form — and this same forecast was given last year, only to be
updated the second week of September to say, “Yep, La Niña is
here.”
Drought across the Western U.S. has forced California to
ration water to farms. Hydroelectric dams barely work. The
smallest spark — from a lawnmower or even a flat tire — can
explode into a wildfire. While this region has always
had dry summers, they’re supposed to follow a pattern that
leads to relief with the arrival of the annual rainy
season in November. But a break is no longer
guaranteed…. Here are three forces desiccating the
region.
[A]s we sit squarely in the middle of another drought, adding
more seawater desalination facilities has become a louder
discussion. Right now, California has 12 desalination
facilities in operation, but there are calls for more.
There are three in the Northern California area near Monterey
and San Francisco. As for proposed desalination facilities,
there are 15 in all, including seven in Northern California.
Construction is underway in nearby Antioch on a brackish water
desalination facility that’s the first of its kind in the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Moving to provide immediate support to communities facing water
supply challenges, the Department of Water Resources (DWR)
Wednesday announced the first round of funding commitments
for $200 million available through the Small Community Drought
Relief Program. DWR, in coordination with the State Water
Resources Control Board, is directing $25 million to 10 small
water systems in Tulare, Siskiyou, Shasta, Lake and Kern
Counties.
California just closed the books on its hottest July on record,
a whopping 5.3 degrees above normal. It was the latest in a
rash of record-setting months over the past year, as the state
saw its hottest July, June, October, September and August in
history, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration. NOAA data shows that the average monthly
temperature in July was 80 degrees, 5.3 degrees above normal,
or the average temperature from 1901 to 2000. June’s average
temperature was 75 degrees, 6.8 degrees above normal.
As the drought deepens, industries that rely on water are
facing a desperate situation and that includes the wine regions
of the Napa and Sonoma Valleys where one producer has literally
run dry. Chris Loxton, of Loxton Cellars, spends so much time
in his Glen Ellen vineyard that he can spot the slightest
changes in his grapevines and the news isn’t good. …
Vineyards across this famous wine-growing region are beginning
to show signs of stress from lack of water.
Coastal marshes are vulnerable to erosion caused by rising
seas, pounding waves, and tidal flows. In Elkhorn Slough, these
vulnerabilities are made worse by superabundant crabs found at
their highest densities along the estuary’s tidal creeks,
according to a new study published August 8 in Ecosphere.
6-PPD is a chemical widely used to protect car tires from
ozone. However, when rainwater washes it into freshwater, 6PPD
degrades into 6-PPD quinone, a contaminant that a recent study
has linked to the mass deaths of Coho salmon in the Pacific
Northwest of the US. Researchers from Northeastern University
and the University of Washington found that even small doses of
6PPDq were lethal for the salmon. … According to the
California Water Board, Coho populations today are
probably less than 6% of what they were in the 1940s, and there
has been ‘at least’ a 70% decline since the 1960s.
The overall pattern over California has been remarkably
consistent thus far this warm season: exceptional, unrelenting,
and record-breaking heat across interior and higher elevation
areas (especially in NorCal), but relatively unremarkable
temperatures along the immediate coast that have actually felt
pretty chilly at times. It has been a summer of incredible
contrasts between the beaches and…virtually everywhere else in
California.
When the sewage utility and the Peninsula’s water management
agency began negotiating in late April with California American
Water about buying water through the recently approved
recycled water project expansion, some local officials felt a
deal could be reached by May. Then June. Then July. Those close
to the negotiations are still singing a familiar refrain: a
deal is imminent. However, the two clauses that have stalled
negotiations – terms proposed by Cal Am – remain
unsettled.
When it comes to California’s worsening drought, Santa Clara
County residents are falling far short in conserving water. On
June 9, the Santa Clara Valley Water District, the county’s
main wholesale water provider, declared a drought emergency and
asked all 2 million county residents to cut water use by 15%
from 2019 levels as local reservoirs dropped alarmingly and
state and federal water agencies reduced water deliveries. But
new numbers out Friday show that instead of hitting the 15%
target, residents saved 0% in June — essentially using the
same amount of water as they did in June 2019.
Today, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) announced that he
secured over $71 million in federal funding for 20 projects
across California in the Senate’s Agriculture, Energy and
Water, and Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee
bills. The bills were approved by the Senate Appropriations
Committee this week and now await passage by the full
Senate.
Monterey Peninsula water officials are breathing a sigh of
relief after a monitoring well in the Seaside Basin picked up
increased salt levels, prompting concerns that an underground
reservoir of potable water was being infiltrated by seawater.
But it turned out the salts were from a failed well casing that
allowed saltier shallow water from the Dune Sands to enter into
the well and cross-contaminate the deeper body of water called
the Paso Robles Aquifer that is tapped for drinking
water.
If you live in Paso Robles or Atascadero, you may have seen a
strange sight this weekend: a helicopter with a large hoop on
it, flying 200 feet above the ground. The Department of Water
Resources held something called an airborne electromagnetic
survey of that area to collect data on the groundwater basin
there. During one of these surveys, the helicopter tows
electronic equipment — which looks like a large hoop — that
sends signals into the ground, which then bounce back. It’s
like taking an MRI of the ground’s subsurface — and it helps
the DWR know more about our groundwater basin.
A historic drought is spreading across California and much of
the American West. How bad is it? Which places are most
affected? What does it mean for our water supply and wildfire
risk? These 10 maps and charts tell the story.
Now, with the looming threat of sea level rise and a
state desperate for solutions, conservationists and a
growing movement of researchers say restoring these dunes could
provide a much-needed buffer from the water. These overlooked
features of the coast could help buy communities a bit more
time — before the ocean pushes inland and reclaims
the land. Most of these ideas remain untested in
California. Pilot projects like the one in Malibu are starting
with a concept so simple it seems radical: If these degraded
ecosystems were just given the space to regrow, could they come
back to life?
Even after the pandemic subsides, the San Lorenzo Valley Water
District (SLVWD) will not turn off customer’s water supply for
nonpayment. SLVWD Manager Rick Rogers in an interview said the
board has “a strong position that we should not be turning
people’s water off for nonpayment. It’s a fundamental right,
but we also have to pay our bills.” SLVWD, Rogers said, will no
longer issue a 48-hour tag for nonpayment. Instead, the
district will, once a year, move any outstanding bills onto
residents’ property tax bills.
The San Benito County Water District, which manages groundwater
around Hollister, has released for public review a draft plan
that will set out ways to ensure healthy, equitable supplies of
the local resource. District officials on July 29 made their
draft of the North San Benito Basin Groundwater Sustainability
Plan available for a 90-day public review as required by state
law. The periodically updated 357-page document assesses water
levels and land use conditions. It proposes ways the district
can manage water for long-term groundwater sustainability.
In Fort Bragg on the Mendocino Coast, city leaders are rushing
to install an emergency desalination system. In Healdsburg,
lawn watering is banned with fines of up to $1,000. In
Hornbrook, a small town in Siskiyou County, faucets have gone
completely dry, and the chairman of the water district is
driving 15 miles each way to take showers and wash
clothes. So far, California’s worsening drought has been
an inconvenience in big cities. But it’s already imperiling an
alarming number of communities, especially between the Bay Area
and the Oregon border, threatening the water supplies for more
than 130,000 people.
Advocates for public water systems on Tuesday jumped quickly on
a request by a Monterey County supervisor to consider amending
a law that currently allows only public ownership and operation
of desalination facilities. The request came in the form of a
board referral, an instrument allowing members of the Board of
Supervisors to make requests to the county’s chief
administrative officer for work by staff or additional
information on a specific topic.
As more communities impose water use restrictions because of
the drought, the California Coastal Commission is likely to
vote on a controversial proposal later this year that could
ease water worries for millions of Orange County residents.
After decades of debate, Poseidon Water just needs approval
from the commission to begin the construction of a desalination
facility in Huntington Beach that would produce 50 million
gallons of drinking water per day.
No other region in the country is warming faster than the
western United States when it comes to increasing daytime
highs, a trend that became apparent with the unprecedented and
record-shattering heat wave that took over the Pacific
Northwest earlier this summer. Heat has been building all
across the west this year. In June, Idaho, Utah, Arizona,
Nevada and California all had record heat statewide. Salt Lake
City had its warmest June in 74 years of records with an
average temperature of 80.2 F, which is 8.6 degrees Fahrenheit
above normal.
“Mussel Dogs” are making an appearance at Lake Nacimiento in an
effort to catch aquatic hitchhikers and protect local
ecosystems. During the weekends of the Mid-State Fair,
mussel-sniffing canines are helping public officials inspect
vessels in hopes of spotting invasive species known as quagga
or zebra mussels. The San Luis Obispo County Public Works
Department said zebra and quagga mussels typically “hitch”
rides on boats and travel to other lakes, causing damage to a
lake’s natural environment, boating and water equipment.
The House of Representatives approved a $715 billion
infrastructure plan, and if the Senate passes it, it will mean
$20 million for the Valley Link project to connect Bay Area
Rapid Transit to the Altamont Corridor Express commuter train.
… California would be a big winner under the proposed
law. The bill includes more than $900 million for projects
throughout the Golden State. They include bridges, bike lanes
and express lanes … wastewater and drinking water
projects and other infrastructure to prepare for rising sea
levels.
The Santa Barbara City Council will discuss negotiating a water
supply agreement with La Cumbre Mutual Water Company during
their regular meeting Tuesday. Due to water supply
shortages exacerbated by drought conditions, officials from La
Cumbre Mutual Water Company have asked the City to negotiate a
long-term supply agreement tied to the Charles E. Meyer
Desalination Plant. The Desal plant, which was
constructed by the City in 1991, acts as a regional water
supply for the City, the Goleta Water District and the
Montecito Water District.
I’ll keep this section brief, as there is much to discuss
regarding the upcoming pattern itself. But suffice it to say
that the interior of NorCal has continued to bake for most of
July, despite the slightly lessened pace of record-breaking
high temperatures. Some areas across the NorCal interior are
continuing to experience their hottest summer on record to
date, and this is in the midst of an extreme to record breaking
drought in the same region.
American Canyon is requiring residents and businesses to up
their water conservation efforts from 10% to 20%, though it’s
not yet ready to impose penalties. … While all five Napa
County cities are taking water conservation measures, each is
in a different situation when it comes to water sources. The
south county city of American Canyon has no local reservoir and
relies on State Water Project supplies that have seen a drastic
cutback.
As the drought tightens its grip on California, several Central
Coast cities are rolling out new water conservation messaging
and programs for its residents. … [Santa Maria Utilities
Director Shad Springer] noted the city receives most of its
water from a robust groundwater supply, supplemented by a small
portion of State Water. He said that although supplies continue
to remain strong, its vital the public conserve every drop.
Los Angeles received less than half its average rainfall last
year, most of the state is in a drought emergency, and Governor
Gavin Newsom has asked all residents to reduce their water
usage by 15%. But a stroll through any well-watered
neighborhood in Southern California would suggest otherwise.
… So far in Southern California, the golf courses are
almost as green as they were when it rained a lot a couple
years ago. Some Northern California communities have
already issued mandates to cut back water use, and some
homeowners have seen their wells run dry.
So what exactly is La Niña? The La Niña climate
pattern is a natural cycle marked by cooler-than-average ocean
water in the central Pacific Ocean. It is one of the main
drivers of weather in the United States and around the
world, especially during the late fall, winter and early
spring. It’s the opposite to the more well-known El Niño, which
occurs when Pacific ocean water is warmer than average.
Officials with the Monterey Peninsula water district
begrudgingly agreed Monday to pay for a feasibility study
requested by an intergovernmental body that has control over
the future of the district’s plan to take over California
American Water Co. The board of directors of the Monterey
Peninsula Water Management District during its regular meeting
Monday approved up to $70,000 to pay for a study that was in
effect ordered by the Local Agency Formation Commission…
In Northern California, wildfires are burning hot and fast.
…UC Davis Climate Modeling Professor Paul Ullrich says
without sufficient rain, fires are burning much hotter than
normal.
As the West descends deeper into drought, climate and water
experts are growing increasingly alarmed by California’s
severely shriveling reservoirs. On Monday, Shasta Lake — the
largest reservoir in the state — held a scant 1.57 million
acre-feet of water, according to the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation, or about 35% of its capacity. A series of
satellite images captured by NASA show just how dramatically
the water level has fallen.
I recently wrote about how the U.S. Drought Monitor increased
the severity of the drought throughout the Central Coast from
an Abnormally Dry (D0) classification in late February to an
Extreme Drought (D3) level in June. On May 4, the entire
Central Coast reached a D2 (Severe Drought) classification. I
assumed that San Luis Obispo County would remain at this level
through the summer since we had moved into our historically dry
season of May through September. -Written by John Lindsey, a meteorologist and a media
relations representative for PG&E.
Fueled by a trifecta of dangerous weather conditions — strong
winds, low humidity and high temperatures — a series of
wildfires, including a so-called megafire that has already
charred more than 100,000 acres, continue to burn huge swaths
of drought-dried vegetation in Northern California. In Plumas
County, the massive Sugar fire, the first 100,000-acre fire in
California this year, had burned more than 105,000 acres by
Sunday night and was 82% contained, officials said.
Local water districts are suing Santa Barbara County, claiming
that they should not be subject to restrictions over certain
water sales and purchases. The districts claim that the
county doesn’t deliver or pay for any water and therefore
shouldn’t be able to dictate terms to them. The districts argue
that the county’s imposition of restrictions ultimately hurts
consumers. In response, the county claims that the
oversight is needed to maximize the entire water supply for all
consumers.
For years, petroleum hydrocarbons have been seeping from the
groundwater beneath the old oil tank farm property in Avila
Beach into tide pools below. Much of the source of the
pollution has been cleaned up, but an unknown amount remains.
The question now is, what should be done with it and could
over-aggressive remediation cause more harm than good?
The trickle of hydrocarbons — comprised of a mixture of
diluted, broken-down gas from the tank farm — was discovered in
May 2012 …
Official estimates of unpaid water and energy bills accumulated
during the pandemic verge on $2.7 billion, affecting a few
million Californians — and those figures have been
growing rapidly. The state has so far prioritized
rent relief — keeping people housed — over utilities
relief. [O]f the $158 million distributed as of July 16, less
than $40,000 had gone to utilities relief. Utility debt makes
up about 6% of all assistance requested so far. On July
11, lawmakers revealed a plan to use one-time federal relief
money to address the debt. … But it doesn’t extend current
shutoff moratoria past Sept. 30.
With California descending deeper into drought, Santa Rosa is
getting serious about water use. So are other communities that
are increasingly urging residents to conserve, sometimes asking
for water reductions, sometimes mandating them. Gov. Gavin
Newsom joined the cause last week, issuing a statewide plea for
voluntary savings. Still, amid the growing calls for
conservation, the Bay Area’s initial response has been slow.
Nearly a dozen of the region’s largest water suppliers that
have sought cutbacks recently have come up short of their
water-savings goals, according to water agency data reviewed by
The Chronicle.
When Gov. Gavin Newsom asked Californians to voluntarily
conserve water last week as he stood in front of the retreating
shoreline at Lopez Lake in San Luis Obispo County, some must
have had déjà vu. It was only six years ago when former Gov.
Jerry Brown stood in a field near Lake Tahoe that was bereft of
normally plentiful snow and called for water restrictions amid
the state’s punishing years-long drought. … As Californians
wonder when mandatory water restrictions might be coming,
officials and experts including those who played roles in
addressing the 2012-2016 drought say the pace and strategy of
Newsom’s current response sufficiently incorporates insights
gained from the past.
City of Santa Cruz water rights — that were established more
than 50 years ago — are up for revision and will be discussed
at two forthcoming public meetings. The rights, allocated by
the California State Water Resources Control Board, dictate
where and how water suppliers can use and move water.
… The revision to the rights, could open up doors for
the city to store winter water in aquifers such as the Mid
County Groundwater Basin, by which Soquel Creek and Central
Water Districts both pull water from.
The number of wildfires in California to date this year is
greater than the amount recorded in the same time period in
2020 — a year which saw more burned acreage than any recorded
year in history, according to data from the California
Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Between
January 1 to July 11 of this year, approximately 4,163 fires
have burned in California, the department said. During the same
time period in 2020, 3,645 fires were reported by the
department.
The fires have burned more than 140,000 acres, from soaring
mountains along the California-Nevada border to forest north of
Mt. Shasta and the gateway to Yosemite. But many of 2021’s
biggest blazes have one thing in common: They are burning
faster and hotter than some firefighters have seen this early
in the year. A winter and spring of little rain and minimal
snow runoff — followed by months of unusually warm conditions
and several summer heat waves — left the vegetation primed to
burn fast, giving crews little time to get a handle on the
flames before they explode.
For the past few weeks, the American West has been confronting
a hellish climate nightmare of scorching heat waves, a severe
drought, and raging wildfires. And it’s not just the
West—or even the United States. In
typically chilly Siberia, ground temperatures reached
a blistering 118 degrees Fahrenheit. The Middle
East has been gripped by a searing heat wave and a drought
that has especially hammered Syria. In late June, a
small Canadian village was almost completely consumed
by wildfire. China is also bracing for another year
of extreme weather…
California is off to another record-breaking year of wildfires
as the state enters its most dangerous months, with extreme
heat and dry terrain creating the conditions for rapid
spread. More than twice as many acres burned in the first
six months of this year than during the same period last year —
and hundreds more fires, officials said. June saw a series
of destructive blazes that swept through rural counties at the
northern edge of the state, fueled by a historic Pacific
Northwest heat wave. But July is already shaping up to be
worse.
Slowly but surely, the San Lorenzo Valley community is
rebuilding itself after the CZU Lightning Complex fire. Its
water district is no exception. The San Lorenzo Valley Water
District lost all of its water intake infrastructure at the
Lyon Water Treatment Plant in Boulder Creek, built in 1994 with
the purpose of treating surface water coming from many streams
on the Empire Grade mountain. About 50% of the water stored at
the plant was lost as well. All of the 1,600 acres of the
watershed were affected by the wildfire.
The Contra Costa Water District is asking customers to reduce
their water use by 10% amid worsening drought conditions in
California. The district’s Board of Directors on Wednesday
voted unanimously to declare a Stage 1 water shortage level,
which includes calling for 10% voluntary
conservation … The district provides water to about
500,000 people in central and eastern Contra Costa County, from
the city of Martinez to Brentwood. Its main source of water is
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, which conveys water allocated
from the Central Valley Project through a contract with the
federal government.
Although 41 of California’s 58 counties are in drought
conditions, legislators are debating bills, such as Senate Bill
9 and Senate Bill 10, that address the construction of housing
to meet the state’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation. Between
2023 and 2031, the state mandate for the nine-county Bay Area
is 441,000 units, representing an expected population increase
of 1,102,500. The allocation for Los Angeles County is
1,327,000 housing units to accommodate an expected population
increase of 3,317,500. The state’s propensity to accept the
RHNA numbers ignores our drought conditions. -Written by Rick Johnson, a retired 40-year
veteran of the San Francisco water department.
Another extreme heat wave is about to smother Northern
California — high temperatures well into the triple digits are
expected this weekend in Sacramento. … Temperatures are
predicted to soar as high as 115 farther north in the
Sacramento Valley, including near Redding. South Lake Tahoe
could approach 90 degrees.
Migrating agriculture north to the Sacramento Valley can’t be a
one-to-one trade where every venture survives. The Sacramento
Valley is approximately one-half the size of the San Joaquin
Valley, and at most, 15 to 20 percent of the land could host
relocated agriculture. The majority of San Joaquin agricultural
businesses won’t survive in their current form—but some could
find new life by converting their fallowed fields into solar
farms to help the state achieve its goal of fossil fuel-free
electricity by 2045. Or we can allow the San Joaquin Valley to
revert to the desert it was before our forefathers planted a
garden in it.
Lake Mead, which provides water for 25 million people in
the American West, has shrunk to 36 percent of its capacity.
One rural California community has run out of water entirely
after its well broke in early June. Fields are sitting fallow,
as farmers sell their water allotments instead of growing
crops, putting the nation’s food supply in peril. As the West
withers under extreme drought, legislators in the US House of
Representatives have introduced HR 4099, a bill that would
direct the Secretary of the Interior to create a program to
fund $750 million worth of water recycling projects in the 17
western states through the year 2027.
Major renovations will begin Wednesday on the Anderson Dam
tunnel project in Santa Clara County. The project will
require the reservoir to be drained – and it will be unable to
be used for 10 years. The timing is not great as
California remains in a drought but water officials say this is
a vital project for flood protection that will protect the
public for years to come. The reservoir can hold more than
300,000 gallons of water and is the water district’s largest
drinking water reservoir.
After a broiling Fourth of July holiday weekend, temperatures
are expected to keep climbing across Southern California. The
heat is expected to build throughout the week, with highs
soaring into the triple digits in some parts this weekend. The
National Weather Service predicts excessive heat will be
possible Friday through Sunday, with temperatures reaching
highs of 100 to 112 degrees in the Antelope Valley and the
interior of San Luis Obispo County.
In Sept. 2020, the 7-year-old female mountain lion pictured
above was dehydrated and burnt on the bottom of her paw pads.
The pain made it unbearable to walk. According to data
from a satellite tracking collar and camera footage, seven
months later she is chasing deer, mating, and has even
travelled hundreds of miles through the San Gabriel Mountain
wilderness in southern California, on those once lifeless feet.
… She was found at the edge of a Monrovia resident’s
backyard pond, where she crawled in search of water during the
Bobcat Fire …
The water spigots on California farms will soon be twisted
tighter. As the state faces a growing threat from drought, an
increasing number of water agencies are planning to require
flow meters on agricultural wells, part of a landmark effort to
measure and constrain pumping that used to be free and
unlimited. It’s a controversial step aimed at protecting water
supplies that could change cultivation practices in the Golden
State’s thirsty fields.
The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) published
its first reviews of local groundwater sustainability plans as
part of a 2014 state law regulating groundwater—and two Central
Coast aquifers are included in the initial wave of feedback.
DWR reviewed and found “deficiencies” in the Paso Robles
Groundwater Basin and Cuyama Valley Groundwater Basin
sustainability plans—declining to give final approval to
either.
Sprinkled along the foothills of California’s Central Valley
stand the iconic blue oak woodlands. Towering up to 80 feet
tall and some reaching over 400 years old, the trees are home
to one of the most biologically diverse ecosystems in the
state. But extreme drought and wildfires are forcing the
woodlands into an uncertain future. A new study conducted by
U.S. Geological Survey researchers found that the historic
drought of 2012-2016 alone caused nearly 490 square miles of
tree cover loss — or the reduction of leaves and branches — in
the blue oak woodlands.
Wildfire season came early this year in the Bay Area after a
meager rainy season left the landscape tinder-dry, offering an
abundance of fuel for wildland blazes. In just the past few
years, California has seen some of the largest, deadliest and
most destructive fires in state history. Last year was a
record-buster, with nearly 10,000 blazes burning more than 4
million acres. Meanwhile, most of the state is in extreme or
exceptional drought conditions, prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom to
declare a drought emergency in a majority of the state’s
counties.
Here’s some good news (and then, some not-so-good news) for
those seeking a summer respite by the sea: Beaches across
California are much cleaner than in years past. In its annual
survey of more than 500 beaches, Heal the Bay reported Tuesday
that 93% of California’s beaches logged good water-quality
marks between April and October 2020 — an encouraging
assessment for a coastline that sees all manner of trash,
pesticides and bacteria (not to mention microplastics,
automotive fluids and tire particles) flushed into the ocean
whenever it rains.
With a record-shattering heat wave suffocating much of the
Pacific Northwest and a drought-fueled wildfire season already
well underway in New Mexico, Arizona and California, President
Biden will attend a virtual meeting with leaders of Western
states on Wednesday to discuss strategies to minimize
weather-related disasters this summer. Jen Psaki, the White
House press secretary, told reporters that the president
planned to bring together members of his cabinet and the
Western governors to assess “the devastating intersection of
drought, heat, and wildfires,” as well as “prevention,
preparedness, and response efforts for this wildfire season.”
An inter-governmental body wants Monterey Peninsula water
officials to pay for an independent third-party review of costs
associated with a planned takeover of California American Water
Co., a study water officials say they’ve already performed at a
cost of over a half-a-million dollars. A majority of
commissioners with the Local Area Formation Commission for
Monterey County (LAFCO) said Monday night they want the
Monterey Peninsula Water Management District to foot the bill
for an independent review to better establish the financial
wherewithal of the district to operate a water delivery
system…
A new study released Monday found that recent years of drought
in California devastated the state’s blue oak woodlands,
destroying more than 460 square miles of blue oak, a tree only
found in the Golden State. Named for the color of its leaves,
the blue oak woodlands date back to pre-European settlement and
are considered “one of the most biologically diverse”
ecosystems in the state, according to the study published in
the journal Frontiers in Climate.
Much of the Western half of the United States is in the grip of
a severe drought of historic proportions. Conditions are
especially bad in California and the Southwest, but the drought
extends into the Pacific Northwest, much of the Intermountain
West, and even the Northern Plains. Drought emergencies have
been declared. Farmers and ranchers are suffering. States are
facing water cutbacks. Large wildfires burned earlier than
usual with more major fires burning in Arizona, New Mexico and
other states. There appears to be little relief in sight.
The 2021 California drought is as bad if not worse as the one
in 2014, which endured for five long, dry years. As of Friday,
33 percent is in a state of “exceptional drought,” the most
severe drought category given by the federal U.S. Drought
Monitor. … Yet San Diego officials aren’t just calm in
the face of these troubling conditions, they’re downright
celebratory. The Water Authority initially scheduled a
press conference and photo op to tout its “drought-safe” status
and “how far the region has come since prior droughts,” but
postponed the event when Mayor Todd Gloria couldn’t make it.
Bay Area-born startup Lumineye began with a goal of giving
soldiers power to see through walls. But climate change has
broadened the market, and Lumineye is now working with
firefighters to tweak its product — a hand-held device that
uses radar to see people inside buildings and in thick brush.
… California’s drought, plus forests full of fuels and
communities along narrow roads in heavily treed areas make for
a lethal recipe, tragically exemplified by the 2018 Camp Fire
that killed 86 people in Paradise.
California’s drought and wildfire conditions are accelerating
at unprecedented rates, according to state officials, and
residents should brace for a summer of widespread burning and
mandatory water conservation measures in some regions. As
reservoir levels across the state continue to drop, and as
parched vegetation poses an increasing threat of wildfire,
officials in Sacramento and Southern California offered a bleak
assessment of the state’s drying climate, saying it has already
begun to affect people, plants and animals.
When discussing the drought, the question of which crops use
the most water comes up a lot. A Pacific Institute analysis of
California Department of Water Resources data sheds light on
the state’s top 10 water-intensive crops in 2015, the most
recent year for which the department has published water-use
estimates. … The analysis ranked pasture first among
California’s top 10 most water-intensive crops …, followed by
nuts and alfalfa…
We are excited to announce that a CalTrout project to Reconnect
Habitat is moving forward thanks to grant funding from the
California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW)
voter-approved Proposition 1 Watershed Restoration Grant. This
project is part of the South Coast Steelhead Coalition
portfolio to recover this endangered trout from the brink of
extinction.
In the weekly newsletter sent out by the City of Santa Barbara
on June 14, we are given a peek at how the water policy
followed by the city over the past decade has worked out. The
city provides us with a chart showing that consumers of water
in Santa Barbara pay substantially more for their water than do
Goleta, Carpinteria or Montecito at all but the very least
levels of consumption. Remarkably, huge estates in Montecito
irrigate their grounds at 68 percent of the cost of urban
homesteads in our city! -Written by Glen Mowrer, contributor to the Santa Barbara
Independent.
As Santa Barbara County and the rest of the state enter another
major drought crisis, a consortium of eight county water
districts just sued the County of Santa Barbara Board of
Supervisors, alleging the board is illegally interfering with
the water agencies’ ability to use the State Water pipeline
system to buy and sell water on the open market.
PG&E will pay the Central Coast Regional Water Quality
Control Board $5.9 million in a landmark settlement that
recognizes the long-term impacts of dumping water used to cool
Diablo Canyon Power Plant back into the Pacific Ocean — but
also the realities of a plant that is expected to close in the
next decade.
The board of the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District
approved a letter to state water officials Tuesday that is a
stinging rebuke of what they say is California American Water
Company’s attempt to blame the district for Cal Am’s failure to
meet required milestones in its proposed desalination project.
Information supplied to the State Water Resources Control Board
is important to the entire Monterey Peninsula because it will
take that information and data and use it to make decisions
affecting the water availability to the Monterey Peninsula.
The Central Coast Water Authority is suing Santa Barbara County
over the management of the State Water Project. The
organization filed the lawsuit in Santa Barbara County Superior
Court and called the suit “significant and unprecedented” in
its announcement Monday. The Water Authority alleged in a news
release that the County Board of Supervisors inserted itself
into decisions about how to manage State Water supplies.
Drought may be the sneakiest of natural disasters. Although
human history teems with people engulfed by abrupt aridity —
the Akkadians of four millenniums ago, the Maya in the ninth
and 10th centuries A.D., the Great Plains farmers of the 1930s
— even today drought is a poorly appreciated phenomenon. …
The American West is once again facing drought, one of the
worst on record. Across a vast region encompassing nine states
and home to nearly 60 million people, the earth is being wrung
dry. -Written by Farhad Manjoo, NY Times opinion columnist.
The Central Coast Water Authority (CCWA) and its eight member
cities and water districts has filed a significant and
unprecedented lawsuit in Santa Barbara Superior Court against
the County of Santa Barbara regarding management of the State
Water Project. CCWA manages, operates and finances the
portion of the State Water Project in Santa Barbara
County.
Before last year’s devastating fire season, Gov. Gavin Newsom
directed firefighters to clear huge lines of trees and shrubs
near more than 200 communities to help stop or slow a potential
blaze. Much of the work was done in the Bay Area. These widely
promoted fuel breaks, a centerpiece of the governor’s
billion-dollar strategy to protect California from catastrophic
wildfire, however, have had limited success, according to data
reviewed by The Chronicle.
California, like the rest of the world, must wrestle with a
hard truth: Our climate has changed. As we face another
water-shortage crisis, we must acknowledge a sobering reality:
We’re not in a drought. This is our new normal. And we need to
adapt. It’s becoming increasingly clear that we can’t solve our
drought, or the myriad other environmental crises, without
protecting our ecosystems. And we can’t protect our ecosystems
without acknowledging that this work is globally connected. -Written by Assembly Member Laura Friedman,
D-Glendale; LA-based environmental and social policy
advisor Rosalind Helfand; and Mike Young, political and
organizing director of the California League of Conservation
Voters.
The Bay Area enjoyed a significant cooldown on the first day of
summer as the first major heat wave of the year subsided Sunday
— but forecasters are predicting another record-breaking hot
spell by next weekend. Last week’s heat wave saw a strong area
of high pressure build from the Southwest desert, strengthening
as it baked the central and southern regions of California
… Experts said the heat is likely to
intensify California’s already dire drought
conditions and bring potential wildfire danger.
After two decades at the helm of the California State Coastal
Conservancy, Sam Schuchat retires on June 25. His
replacement is yet to be named. But the emotional and political
intelligence he brought to the job will be missed. In the
coming years, Schuchat says he hopes to spend more time riding
his bike and playing music, not to mention travelling post
shelter-in-place. But he also expects to keep his finger on the
pulse of the California coast and to delve more deeply into
national climate change work.
It might be tempting to shrug at the scorching weather across
large swaths of the West. This just in: It gets hot in the
summer. But this record-setting heat wave’s remarkable power,
size and unusually early appearance is giving meteorologists
and climate experts yet more cause for concern about the
routinization of extreme weather in an era of climate change.
These sprawling, persistent high-pressure zones popularly
called “heat domes” are relatively common in later summer
months. This current system is different.
The Central Coast Water Authority, along with a number of its
customers — namely eight nearby California cities and water
districts — filed a lawsuit Friday claiming the Santa Barbara
County Flood Control and Water Conservation District
overstepped its authority by passing a new resolution that
imposes an undue burden on their water rights. The lawsuit,
filed in Santa Barbara County Superior Court, accuses the
district of meddling in its affairs by improperly imposing
restrictions on its right to transfer and exchange water with
other entities.
Monterey County elected officials on Tuesday gave an
enthusiastic thumbs up to a $45 million restoration project at
the mouth of the Carmel River that will provide a host of
environmental benefits, including natural flood control for an
area that has historically been hit hard by river flooding. The
Monterey County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a
resolution that will move the project, called the Carmel River
Floodplain Restoration and Environmental Enhancement, forward
with the nonprofit Big Sur Land Trust as its key partner.
Legislation from Sen. Bill Dodd, D-Napa, that would help
hundreds of thousands of Californians who have fallen behind on
their water bills and are at risk of being disconnected from
water service cleared a key committee on Wednesday.
… Sen. Dodd’s legislation comes as the State Water
Resources Control Board heard results of a survey that found
water debt in California climbed to about $1 billion. The
survey estimated 12% of California households are behind on
their water bills with an average debt of $500 per
household.
Santa Cruz Water Department staff is completing its annual
spring fish survey, and with it comes some important
dispatches. Steelhead numbers are low with drought
conditions plaguing Santa Cruz for a second consecutive year.
But coho salmon, a species at-risk of extinction, were spotted
off Santa Cruz’s North Coast in the Laguna Creek estuary.
Documenting coho anywhere in Santa Cruz County is a relatively
rare event, explained Chris Berry, watershed compliance manager
with the city.
The intensive engineering of the river exacted a huge toll on
its native ecosystems. No species suffered more than the
Chinook salmon, whose epic migration from the Pacific Ocean to
its spawning grounds in the High Sierra was cut short by
numerous choke points, not the least of which was Friant’s
impenetrable barrier of concrete. … Rife with
compromises, [a 1988] settlement mandated that a mere half of
the San Joaquin’s original flow be restored. The river’s many
dams would remain, but alternative passages would be built and
new spawning areas added in the lower river.
Not long after former Gov. Jerry Brown announced the end of a
grueling six-year drought in 2017, the Legislature passed two
controversial water-efficiency laws designed to promote even
more conservation – even though residents have done a
remarkable job reducing their water usage. Those new laws
required utilities to reduce daily water usage by an average of
55 gallons per person by 2023.
Dangerously hot temperatures across the US south-west will
continue to climb this week, reaching higher than 120F (49C) in
some areas, exacerbating the region’s already-dire drought
conditions and increasing the risk of new fire
ignitions. Extreme heat will be felt across much of Utah,
along with southern and central California, Nevada and
Arizona. More than 48 million people across the west are
now under heat advisory watches or warnings …
A $45 million project that will partially reshape the area
around the mouth of the Carmel River promises to increase flood
control and restore the biodiversity in the area. Called the
“Carmel River Floodplain Restoration and Environmental
Enhancement,” the nonprofit Big Sur Land Trust, Monterey
County, the Monterey Regional Parks District and the state are
collaborating to restore the historic floodplain of a portion
of the Carmel River where it meets Highway 1.
Creeks and springs at Point Reyes National Seashore haven’t
completely dried up but they’re looking parched enough that
park staff set up three large troughs last week to ensure tule
elk herds get enough water to make it through what could be an
unprecedented drought. The 250-gallon troughs at the south end
of the Tomales Point Tule Elk Reserve will stay in place at
least until rains return next winter, National Park Service
officials said.
With a worsening drought gripping the West and wildfire season
looming, California is bracing for the most severe heat wave of
the year — one that promises to tax the state’s power supplies
while also offering a grim preview of challenging months to
come. The heat wave will bring triple-digit temperatures to the
valleys and inland regions of Southern California as well as
many parts of the rest of the state, heightening fire risks. It
comes as parts of Northern and Central California are turning
to water restrictions as the drought rapidly alters the
landscape.
Farmers are concerned for their crops as dry conditions has
worsen throughout the Central Coast. Earlier this year, it
started off a major storm. Ever since, farmers have not seen
much rainfall. According to the National Weather Service, the
‘extreme drought’ conditions has expanded throughout Santa
Barbara and San Luis Obispo County.
Higher bills will soon be on the way for the roughly 1.4
million people who get their water from the East Bay Municipal
Utility District, but at least for now they won’t be required
to cut their water use despite the drought. Beginning July 1,
the agency will charge customers 4% more for both water and
sewer services. And a year later, on July 1, 2022, the rate
will climb another 4%. The district’s board of directors
unanimously approved the rate increases at its meeting Tuesday
as part of the $2.25 billion budget it adopted for the next two
fiscal years.
One of the largest water districts in the San Francisco Bay
Area announced mandatory restrictions Wednesday and declared a
water shortage emergency, signaling the seriousness of drought
conditions across the region and state after two consecutive
dry winters. The Board of Directors for Santa Clara
Valley Water District, which serves 2 million customers,
unanimously approved a resolution requiring customers to reduce
water use by 15% compared with 2019 levels. The board is also
urging Santa Clara County to proclaim a local emergency.
Officials are raising the prospect of a permanent water
pipeline over the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge as a potential
drought-fighting strategy for Marin County. … [Ben]
Horenstein, the general manager of the Marin Municipal Water
District, was among the participants of a teleconference on
drought and wildfires organized by Assemblyman Marc Levine on
Wednesday. … For Marin, Horenstein said, the focus now
is on promoting as much conservation as possible through
mandatory water use restrictions and rebates for
water-efficient appliances and landscaping.
The first assessments of groundwater sustainability
plans have been released by the California Department of
Water Resources (DWR). In lieu of waiting until the end of the
two-year review period, DWR has decided to release assessments
as they are completed. Assessments have been completed for the
Santa Cruz Mid-County Basin in Santa Cruz County and 180/400
Foot Aquifer Subbasin in Monterey County. Assessments
for the Cuyama Valley Basin and Paso Robles Subbasin have also
been completed.
California’s drought is accelerating the start of the 2021
wildfire season — and intensifying the pressure on PG&E
Corp. to prevent more mega-fires of the sort that drove the
state’s largest utility into bankruptcy. Pacific Gas and
Electric Co. executives said Wednesday they’ve begun gearing up
for wildfire season weeks earlier than usual, including putting
helicopters in the air to practice for PG&E’s “public
safety power shutoffs.”
San Luis Obispo’s 2020 Water Quality Report shows zero
violations of health regulations. Jason Meeks is the supervisor
of the city’s water treatment plant. He has been working in
water and wastewater for nearly 22 years. Meeks said one of the
most important things for city residents to know about the 2020
Water Quality Report is that it only shows substances that were
detected in the water.
When a historic drought gripped California and the Bay Area,
water managers came together to keep drinkable water in the
homes of vulnerable areas in Marin and Contra Costa Counties.
Two veterans of those efforts describe the dramatic process,
and consider lessons it offers for today’s imminent drought.
Storms from the Pacific set to swing into the rain-starved West
Coast this week may end up turning detrimental, AccuWeather
forecasters say, by whipping up gusty winds and heightening the
risk of lightning-induced wildfires. With over 87% of the
Western states in moderate to exceptional drought, the news of
Pacific storms poised to sweep onshore may sound good on the
surface. However, the pattern will be a double-edged sword.
Each storm is expected to arrive with “very limited moisture,”
according to AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alex
Sosnowski.
A proposal that would more than double the cost of sewer
service in the region over the next five years and has drawn
the rage of the area’s hospitality and business interests heads
to a board for final approval on June 7. The board of directors
for Monterey One Water, the regional wastewater management
service, will vote on the proposed schedule of rate increases.
If approved, ratepayers will see a 47-percent jump in their
sewage bills after July 1. By 2025, rates would be 122-percent
higher than they are today. … [T]he increase is needed to
maintain and update the utility’s $750 million infrastructure
assets, some of which are more than 30 years old.
Drought conditions in California remain at record highs, with
most of the state now classified in “extreme” or “exceptional”
drought, reflecting conditions across the Southwest, according
to a new report from climate scientists. Much of the Bay
Area and the northern Central Valley have been included in the
most severe “exceptional drought” zone, along with much of
southeast California, the U.S. Drought Monitor reported.
The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) released its
first assessments of groundwater sustainability plans developed
by local agencies to meet the requirements of the Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). DWR has completed its
assessment and approved plans for the Santa Cruz Mid-County
Basin in Santa Cruz County and 180/400 Foot Aquifer Subbasin in
Monterey County.
Too often, ocean water is laced with sewage and pollutants,
affecting how safe beaches are for swimming and surfing –
that’s the message of this year’s Clean Water Report released
Tuesday, May 25, by the Surfrider Foundation. …
[T]he report highlights inefficiencies in sewer
infrastructure and a need to stop urban runoff before it
reaches the coast, both main contributors to dirty water that
plagues the country’s coastlines.
The state Senate today approved legislation from Sen. Bill
Dodd, D-Napa, to help hundreds of thousands of Californians who
have fallen behind on their water bills and are at risk of
being disconnected from water service. … Sen. Dodd’s
legislation comes as the State Water Resources Control Board
heard results of a survey that found water debt in California
climbed to about $1 billion. The survey estimated 12% of
California households are behind on their water bills with an
average debt of $500 per household.
The Predictive Services 4-month outlook for the North Ops
region calls for drier and warmer than average weather through
September. There is some indication of a semi-regular low
pressure trough positioned along the west coast much of the
summer, which could lead to shorter stretches of intense dry
heat. Fuels, both dead and live and of all size classes, are
expected to dry to critical values earlier than usual at all
elevations, leading to a start to the active fire season 4-6
weeks earlier than usual.
Having received just 48% of normal rainfall for the water year,
which began Sept. 1 and will end Aug. 31, Santa Barbara County
may be experiencing a bit of déjà vu, having been placed in the
“severe drought” category again by the U.S. Drought Monitor.
But despite a winter that brought less than half the normal
rainfall, the county’s water supply is generally in good shape,
and able to provide enough for drinking, firefighting and
irrigation in the short term, city and county officials said.
Will the current drought increase the chances of another bad
fire season this year? We talked to Scott Stephens―a fire
ecologist at UC Berkeley and a member of the PPIC Water
Policy Center research network―about the risks, and what can be
done.
With California’s rivers running low after two consecutive dry
winters, state officials and local water agencies have pumped
out a steady stream of drought declarations and calls for water
conservation in recent weeks. It’s clear the Golden State is in
a drought and it could escalate to a crisis, but, you may be
wondering, just how bad is it?
Nearly half of the country — from the Pacific coast to the
Great Plains and upper Midwest — is experiencing moderate to
exceptional drought conditions. That’s expected to get worse
throughout the summer. … UCLA climatologist Park Williams:
“This drought is far from over. 2021 is shaping up to
potentially be the driest of all of the drought years in the
last century, and definitely one of the driest of the last
millennium.”
The state’s extensive water system supplies cities and farms;
prevents pollution of lakes, rivers, and coastlines; protects
against floods; and supports freshwater ecosystems and the
forested headwaters that are a major source of water supply.
Many local, state, and federal agencies oversee this system and
raise revenues from a variety of sources. California spends
about $37 billion annually, with the lion’s share (84%) coming
from local water bills and taxes. The balance comes from state
(13%) and federal (3%) contributions.
In just a few weeks, California’s water conditions have gone
from bad to terrible. Sacramento residents have been asked to
cut water usage 10%. Their counterparts on the Russian River
are being told to reduce their consumption 20%. Farmers across
the Central Valley are letting fields lie fallow and
dismantling their orchards. Government agencies are warning of
massive fish kills on the Sacramento River. After
a warm spring dried up practically the entire Sierra
Nevada snowpack — and robbed California of enough water to fill
most of Folsom Lake — state and federal officials have been
forced to dramatically ramp up their drought response plans.
In Watsonville, there are big developments for flood prevention
efforts along the Pajaro River. On Monday, local, state
and federal representatives signed a design agreement for the
river levee to prevent flooding for homes and farms. Overall
it’s a $400 million project designed to tame the constant
threat of flooding brought on by heavy rainfall.
Wildfires have burned roughly 14,000 acres in California
this year as a deepening drought grips the Southwest — more
than five times the acreage charred by the same time last
year. It’s a worrying trend that has fire officials taking
a proactive approach — from more funding to wildfire
prevention to hiring additional crews — after the state saw
its worst fire season ever in 2020. Only five
months into the year, a total of 2,340 fires have burned 14,340
acres, an increase of 1,284 fires and 11,793 acres over the
same period in 2020, according to new data from Cal Fire.
California’s drought, already rated “severe” to “extreme” for
most of the state, is expected to worsen throughout the summer,
combining with higher-than-average temperatures and dry
vegetation to steadily increase the risk of wildfires,
according to the interagency National Integrated Drought
Information System. That assessment comes in the wake of the
state’s worst wildfire season on record, 2020, which saw five
of California’s six largest recorded infernos and
extended the trend of wildfire seasons here growing longer
and more intense.
Through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009,
NOAA funded 125 habitat restoration projects in coastal areas
throughout the country. … Through the Recovery Act, NOAA
partnered with the [California Conservation Corps] to support
more than 30 coastal habitat restoration projects. These
projects benefitted threatened and endangered salmon and
steelhead throughout coastal California. More than 200 corps
members worked to open waterways to fish migration, stabilize
stream banks, conduct project monitoring, and more.
California’s new drought is worsening. After two severely dry
winters, reservoirs are shrinking, fire danger is rising and
water supplies are looking more tenuous. The past two years
have been the driest in nearly half a century, since 1976-77.
How did the state find itself in a new crisis just as the COVID
pandemic is fading? Scientists say California’s parched plight
largely comes down to two words: “atmospheric river.” An
increasing body of research is showing that the state’s water
supply each year depends almost entirely on a handful of big
make-or-break storms. And the last two winters, too few
arrived.
The 2020 fire season was brutal for California. Wildfires
wreaked havoc across the state, burning more than 4.2 million
acres, the most in recorded history, and resulting in the
deaths of 33 people and the destruction of more than 10,000
structures. The outlook for the 2021 fire season isn’t any more
promising. A Chronicle analysis shows multiple measures of fire
danger all pointing in the same direction — California is
headed toward alarming, perhaps record-setting, dryness, and
heightened risk of wildfires.
Growers in the Central Coast region of California produce most
of the cool-season vegetables for the U.S. from March to
mid-November. After several years of multi-cropping vegetables,
the groundwater in many of the coastal valleys has become
contaminated with nitrate. Some wells have concentrations of
nitrate several times the federal drinking water standard of 10
ppm (parts per million) nitrate-N. Rural communities that rely
on groundwater as their sole source of drinking water must
purchase bottled water or install small reverse osmosis
systems.
The Estrella-El Pomar-Creston Water District (EPCWD) has begun
creating a groundwater level monitoring network. Initially, the
district has begun work to add 30 new groundwater level
monitoring sites, using existing wells, throughout the
37,000-acre district. The campaign marks a significant
effort in the basin to move toward groundwater sustainability
in the Paso Robles Subbasin, according to the EPCWD.
A growing number of drought stricken California farmers are
making the painful decision not to plant as much or anything at
all for fear of losing it all. It costs a lot of money to put
seeds or seedlings into the ground. But if a farmer cannot be
reasonably sure of a crop, why do it?
Tiny structures inspired by the shape of cactus spines allow a
newly created material to gather drinkable water from the air
both day and night, combining two water-harvesting technologies
into one. The material, a micro-architected hydrogel membrane
(more on that later), can produce water through both solar
steam-water generation and fog collection—two independent
processes that typically require two separate devices. A paper
about the material was published in Nature Communications on
May 14.
Facing extended drought, diminishing snowpack, and depleted
aquifers, California water managers face a harsh reality: our
20th century water systems – essentially linear designs in
which fresh water is extracted, centrally treated, distributed
to users, returned as wastewater, and finally treated and
discarded – are breaking down. Although this approach has
served us well for decades, we can no longer sustain ourselves
with a paradigm that uses water once and throws it away. -Written by Peter Fiske, a scientist at
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and executive director of
the Department of Energy’s National Alliance for Water
Innovation.
More wildfires. Hotter days. Drought. Sea-level rise. Those
conditions are an increasing reality in California, which is
steadily becoming an altered state. But if the grimmest
predictions of experts about our state and climate change
become true, the conditions will become far worse.
Californians are gearing up for what could be another dangerous
wildfire season, particularly in light of significant drought
conditions. Grasses, shrubs, and forests are drying out early
due to a lack of precipitation, providing potential fuel for
wildfires. Red flag warnings—when high winds and low humidity
increase fire risk—have already been issued this year across
broad swaths of the state. Small spring wildfires have put
firefighters and communities on edge. Is the state prepared for
another bad wildfire season? And how much progress has been
made to improve the resilience of vulnerable communities and
headwater forests?
