The San Joaquin Valley stretches from across mid-California
between coastal ranges in west and the Sierras on the east. The
region includes large cities such as Fresno and Bakersfield,
national parks such as Yosemite and Kings and fertile farmland
and multi-billion dollar agriculture industry.
The federal Central Valley Project and State Water Project (about
30 percent of SWP water is used for irrigation) helped
deliver water to the valley. Today, San Joaquin Valley crops
include grapes, tomatoes, hay, sugar beets, nuts, cotton and a
multitude of other fruits and vegetables. At the same time, water
used to grow these crops has led to the need for agricultural
drainage.
In April, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order outlining
the temporary strategies for California to manage the ongoing
drought. Within this order, he outlined rules for counties,
cities and other public agencies as it relates to new wells or
alterations to an existing well. One rule requires farmers and
ranchers to get written verification from their local
groundwater sustainability agency that the new well or
alterations “would not be inconsistent with any sustainable
groundwater management program” for the area.
A state program aimed at retiring and repurposing farmland
could get $60 million – more than doubling its current funding
– under Gov. Newsom’s proposed budget. The Multibenefit Land
Repurposing Program was created with $50 million from the 2021
state budget. The program helps pay for farmland to be taken
out of production and repurposed to less water intensive uses.
Farmers in the San Joaquin Valley have pumped groundwater for
crops without limits for generations. But groundwater levels
are plummeting …
[On the southeast side of California’s Central
Valley] farmers are pumping unreliable groundwater to make
up the difference, hoping their already struggling wells don’t
go dry … Others will rip up their trees and leave their
fields fallow. … About 100 miles away, on the northwest
side of the Central Valley, the situation could not be more
different. Even during an unprecedented drought, the almond and
pistachio farmers around the city of Los Banos will get around
75 percent of a normal year’s water … The startling contrast
is the result of an obscure and contentious legal agreement
known as the exchange contract …
Assemblyman Adam Gray, D-Merced, is maneuvering against a bill
that seeks higher flows on local rivers. Assembly Bill 2639
would set a Dec. 31, 2023, deadline for the State Water
Resources Control Board to complete its plan for tributaries to
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. They include the Stanislaus,
Tuolumne and Merced rivers. The decision would follow decades
of wrangling over whether fish should get more water on the
lower rivers at the expense of farms and cities.
The California Department of Food and Agriculture says that
more than 90% of the cotton harvested in California has been
grown in the San Joaquin Valley but continuing dry weather is
posing significant challenges for growers. Consumer demand is
driving the market for cotton, including high-quality Pima
cotton now reaching record levels of more than $3 a pound. But
as California faces another dry year many farmers in Kern
County are impacted not only by an increase in price but also
by a decrease in production.
On March 22, 2022, the Second District Court of Appeal
published its Opinion in Buena Vista Water Storage District v.
Kern Water Bank Authority, upholding the Environmental Impact
Report (EIR) for the Kern Water Bank Authority’s Conservation
and Storage Project (“Project”) and reversing the trial court’s
ruling. The Project proposes to divert up to 500,000
acre-feet-per-year (AFY) from the Kern River for recharge,
storage, and later recovery within the Kern Water Bank.
The California Water Commission approved a white paper that
contains its findings and the potential next steps for State
engagement in shaping well-managed groundwater trading programs
with appropriate safeguards for vulnerable water users: natural
resources, small- and medium-size farms, and water supply and
quality for disadvantaged communities. The white paper will be
shared with the Secretaries for Natural Resources,
Environmental Protection, and Food and Agriculture, who
requested the Commission’s engagement on this topic.
Environmentalists advocating new state restrictions on oil and
gas drilling have seized upon confirmation last week that two
idle wells were leaking methane near a residential area in
northeast Bakersfield decades after they were improperly
abandoned. Details remained sketchy Monday, including how much
gas the wells were emitting and for how long. … Late
last month, California officials outlined plans for doing more
to cap the state’s orphan oil and gas wells using $25 million
in federal money they said will help them prioritize work in
populated areas most vulnerable to methane leaks and
groundwater contamination.
New Melones Reservoir is the proverbial canary in the mine when
it comes to where state water policy wedded with the return of
megadroughts is taking California. Using historical hydrology
data on the Stanislaus River basin between 1922 and 2019:
*Based on current regulatory rules New Melones Reservoir would
fall below 250,000 acre feet of storage in 3 out of the 98
years. -Written by Dennis Wyatt, editor of The Manteca
Bulletin.
State Sen. Melissa Hurtado (D-Bakersfield) and state Sen. Dave
Cortese (D-San Jose) are calling for U. S. Attorney General
Merrick Garland to investigate possible drought profiteering
and water rights abuses in the western states. … A
county supervisor in Arizona joined the California state
senators in calling for the investigation. … In addition
to raising anti-trust questions, Hurtado and Cortese expressed
concern about the potential for hedge funds to divert water
intended for food production to cannabis growing operations.
Three years ago, when he sank everything he had into 66 acres
of irrigated pasture in Shasta County, [farmer Josh] Davy
thought he’d drought-proofed his cattle operation. He’d been
banking on the Sacramento Valley’s water supply… But this
spring, for the first time ever, no water is flowing through
his pipes and canals or those of his neighbors: The district
won’t be delivering any water to Davy or any of its roughly 800
other customers.
California needs more water and renewable energy, and Solar
AquaGrid CEO Jordan Harris is trying to help. … A big
idea is starting with a small stretch of canals in
the Turlock Irrigation District, located just south of
Modesto. This fall, groundbreaking will begin on a pilot
project to build solar panel canopies over existing canals.
… A study from UC Merced concluded that shading all
of the roughly 4,000 miles of California canals with solar
panels could save 63 billion gallons of water every year by
reducing evaporation, while potentially creating about one
sixth of the state’s current power capacity.
City of Porterville Manager John Lollis … announced at
Tuesday’s Porterville City Council meeting the County and State
may exercise its right to take 3 million gallons of
water a month at no charge from a city well as part of the
arrangement the city, county and state reached to supply East
Porterville with water after the 2015 drought. … Lollis
noted the state still hasn’t fulfilled its portion of the
agreement which called for the development of three wells for
the City of Porterville as part of the East Porterville
project.
Local and state water leaders were practically upbeat two years
ago at the last in-person Water Summit put on by the Water
Association of Kern County. At least as upbeat as California
water folks typically get. They advocated for new ideas,
radical partnerships and solutions that could benefit both ag
and environmental interests. That was then. Facing a third year
of punishing drought and the bleak realities of new groundwater
restrictions, the vibe at this year’s summit was more “in the
bunker” than “in it together.”
Last week, an official and dire-sounding warning about high
nitrate levels in the city of Exeter’s water supply began
appearing on social media sites, and with them came comments
rife with speculation, fearful reactions and visions of
impending doom. The water situation in the midsize foothill
town, however, is not as dangerous or widespread as some of
those who stumble across the notice without context imagine it
is. … The reality, says Exeter’s Director of Public Works
Daymon Qualls, is Exeter’s water remains safe for most
consumers. It should not be consumed by infants and pregnant
women until the nitrate levels drop, probably in the autumn
when the dry season ends.
The Interior Department’s internal watchdog on Thursday said it
found no evidence that former secretary David Bernhardt
violated lobbying laws regarding a former client, a California
water district that is the nation’s largest agricultural water
supplier, although he continued to advise them on legislative
matters on occasion after he stopped being their lobbyist.
New numbers continue to show California Sierra snowpack is
dropping along with the state’s groundwater but why is that
important? Check out this image below and you’ll see all of the
ways we use snowpack. That Spring snowmelt not only fills
our streams, reservoirs and lakes, we also use it for
agriculture, household, ecology and hydropower. In total
providing one-third of the state’s water supply. The
problem lately, we just can’t get enough storms to keep the
snowpack at normal levels. This year only finished at 42%
of normal.
The ongoing water feud between two of Kings County’s biggest
farming entities recently spilled into Kern County and up to
Sacramento with allegations on both sides of misuse of water
and other public resources. In a May 12 letter, the Southwest
Kings Groundwater Sustainability Agency complains that the J.G.
Boswell Company has been pumping and storing massive amounts of
groundwater for irrigation in a shallow basin, subjecting it to
extreme evaporation and contributing to the area’s already
significant subsidence problems.
California lawmakers and the governor are hashing out the final
details for investing billions of state dollars into a drought
relief plan with long-term water investments and some benefits
to farmers.
With 60% of the state now in extreme drought conditions, state
officials are warning water-right holders that they should
expect more curtailments during peak irrigation season in June
and July. … Drought emergency curtailment
regulations were issued last fall by the California State Water
Resources Control Board for certain watersheds in response to
persistent dry conditions and spurred by a drought emergency
declaration by Gov. Gavin Newsom. Curtailment orders
adopted last year are effective for up to one year unless
readopted.
When it comes to finding innovative solutions to drinking water
problems, the tiny community of Allensworth in Tulare county
has long been on the front lines. This spring, community began
testing a new technology that would “jolt” arsenic out of its
groundwater. And since 2021, Allensworth has also been home to
another new technology that “makes” water out of thin air. Both
technologies are currently being field-tested in Allensworth.
If successful, they could become viable paths to clean water
for residents of Allensworth and other small, rural San Joaquin
Valley communities …
Lemoore is speaking out against the efforts of an out of town
water entity to export water from the Kings River. The Lemoore
City Council approved a letter in opposition to a petition to
revoke the Fully Appropriated Stream (FAS) status of the Kings
River on Tuesday. The letter is directed to the State Water
Resources Control Board, which is hearing a petition from Kern
County water agency Semitropic Water Storage District to revoke
the FAS status.
An online
short course starting Thursday will provide
registrants the opportunity to learn more about how groundwater
is monitored, assessed and sustainably managed. The class,
offered by University of California, Davis and several
other organizations in cooperation with the Water Education
Foundation, will be held May 12, 19, 26 and
June 2, 16 from 9 a.m. to noon. If you attended
the Foundation’s Water 101 Workshop in April,
you get a discount on registration! at $60!
Central California lawmakers, growers and advocates are calling
on the state to invest in canal repairs that they say will help
improve water security. The call for funding comes as the state
experiences the third year of drought. SB 559, known as
the State Water Resiliency Act, aims to fix canals that deliver
water across Central California fully. Currently, $200 million
has been allocated in the 2021 and 2022 budgets. But the
bill’s author, State Senator Melissa Hurtado of Sanger, said
that funding would only cover limited repairs.
The implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management
Act (SGMA) over the next two decades may require taking at
least 500,000 acres of cropland in the San Joaquin Valley out
of irrigated production (about 10%). To soften the blow on jobs
and economic activity, it will be important to identify
alternative land uses that generate income. Solar development
is one of the most promising options.
A plan has been put in place to help replenish
groundwater supplies in Allensworth, a community historically
affected by water supply issues. Led by the Tri-County
Water Authority, the Allensworth Project is a multi-component
plan aimed at replenishing groundwater supplies and mitigating
emergency flood water damage by constructing two gravity-fed
basins to catch flood runoff from the White River. The basins
will divert water from the river for direct use and recharge,
and will be used as a recreational park during dry seasons.
A Democrat lawmaker from the central San Joaquin Valley wants
to put cash in the hands of eligible farmworkers to help them
deal with the devastation of California’s drought. Proposed by
State Sen. Melissa Hurtado, a Democrat from Sanger, Senate Bill
1066 would allocate $20 million to create the California
Farmworkers Drought Resilience Pilot Project, a state-funded
project that would provide unconditional monthly cash payments
of $1,000 for three years to eligible farmworkers, with the
goal of lifting them out of poverty.
Chuck Williams, the longest serving “interim, acting” Kern
River Watermaster, died Friday. He was 93. Attorney Scott
Kuney, who worked with Williams at North Kern Water Storage
District, remembered Williams as a “man of great faith,
integrity and a consensus maker. … Williams came to Kern
in the 1960s after obtaining an engineering degree from
Stanford University and went to work for the big dog in water
locally, the Kern County Land Company.
Fractures have appeared within Kern County’s largest
groundwater agency as pressure mounts for it to show the state
how it plans to address the region’s massive groundwater
deficit. Four water entities recently notified the Kern
Groundwater Authority they were pulling out of the 16-member
group to write their own groundwater sustainability plan. That
will add a sixth plan covering the Kern subbasin, which extends
across the San Joaquin Valley portion of the county.
In farming areas across the Central Valley, a well-drilling
frenzy has accelerated over the last year as growers turn to
pumping more groundwater during the drought, even as falling
water levels leave hundreds of nearby homes with dry wells.
Counties have continued freely issuing well-drilling permits in
the years since California passed a landmark law, the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act of 2014 … Some state
legislators are now supporting a bill that they say would
strengthen oversight and limit the well-drilling frenzy by
requiring a review of permits for new wells by the same local
agencies that are charged with managing groundwater.
As the deadline for local agencies to implement plans to reduce
groundwater use approaches, a new study finds California’s
landmark legislation may have less of an impact on the local
agriculture economy than originally predicted. A study
authored by Professor Michael McCullough on the effect of the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) in the Tule Sub
Basin in the Central Valley … says by 2040, the deadline for
local agencies to reach groundwater sustainability, the 2014
law will likely result in the loss of some crops, but probably
not the more valuable ones, such as fruit and nuts…
Southern Californians will face new water restrictions starting
June 1 due to extreme drought. But the circumstances are
particularly worse for unincorporated communities along the
banks of the San Joaquin Valley, known as colonias where mostly
Black and Latino families have lived for decades. These
problems are rooted in racial inequity and environmental
injustice, according to David Bacon, who recently wrote about
their lack of access to water.
With water scarcity increasing around the globe, arid regions
are striving to develop more flexible and diversified water
supplies. For example, California’s 2020 Water Resilience
Portfolio Initiative recommends improving and expanding the
state’s conveyance and storage infrastructure as well as
developing groundwater banking and other means of more flexibly
sharing water. The success of such initiatives depends in large
part upon the ability of water providers to collaboratively
finance and build new infrastructure.
In the midst of a years-long drought, California is
implementing the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act,
creating even more concerns for the state’s dairy farmers.
… The biggest impact for dairies may be not so much on
the dairy facility but on the feed side. Without adequate water
or certainty of water, the question is where the feed will come
from. The implementation of SGMA is going to impact local
forages, hay, silages and wheat …
Multiple San Joaquin Valley groundwater projects got a
significant shot of state funding this week to kickstart
recharge, and other, projects. On Monday, the Department of
Water Resources (DWR) announced $150 million was awarded to 20
agencies through its first round of the Sustainable Groundwater
Management Grant Program. That includes almost $84 million for
11 agencies in the San Joaquin Valley.
Chances are, you’ll eat something grown in California today.
Its farms churn out a third of US-grown vegetables and
two-thirds of its fruits and nuts, and more milk than any other
state. But as I’ve documented in many articles and in my 2020
book Perilous Bounty—released in paperback today, May 2—its
water resources are dwindling, parched by climate change and a
relentless expansion of thirsty nut groves. ..Where will we get
our fruits and vegetables as California’s farms inevitably
adapt to a hotter, drier new normal? -Written by reporter Tom Philpott.
Kern River watershed watcher Scott Williams put out what will
be his final Kern River Snow and Water Report May 3 and the
news was grim. The predicted run off for the Kern River has
dwindled from an already meager 33% of normal last month to a
downright miserly 28% of normal this month. The snow pack just
didn’t materialize this year and what snow there was has
diminished quickly, according to Williams’ report.
In an effort to boost water supply reliability for millions of
Californians, the California Department of Water Resources
(DWR) has announced its first round of funding to 20 agencies
responsible for managing critically overdrafted groundwater
basins throughout the state. A total of $150 million in funding
is being awarded to regional groundwater agencies through the
Sustainable Groundwater Management (SGM) Grant Program. The
funding will go toward projects focused on water efficiency,
groundwater recharge, feasibility studies for alternative water
supplies, and the installation of monitoring wells.
Has a seat on the sleepy Kings County Board of Supervisors
become a proxy fight for control of water flows in the southern
San Joaquin Valley? It sure looks that way as political
youngster Martín Chavez, a member of the Stratford Public
Utilities District, has received unprecedented financial
backing from Bay Area native and controversial water giant John
Vidovich and affiliates. Vidovich … is currently locked
in a fight with the Tulare Lake Canal Company over a water
pipeline that he is trying to construct in Kings County to
connect to a larger interconnected conveyance system.
Advocates are sounding the alarm for what they think could be
the collapse of the San Joaquin Valley’s agriculture workforce.
As drought continues to hammer the state and groundwater
pumping restrictions take effect, farmland will need to be
retired en masse. While there have been many
conversations, including legislation, on how to support farmers
during intermittent droughts, advocates say there has been
little to no planning for what will happen to the nearly
167,000 farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley when swaths of
farmland are permanently fallowed.
Water officials believe the past three years could end up as
the driest in California’s history. State reservoir levels are
alarmingly low, and measurements of the Sierra Nevada snowpack
are “grim,” the state’s natural resources secretary tells
Lester Holt. The drought is impacting the water supply for
residents and farms, which supply critical crops for the
nation.
Some ideas are so satisfying that you wonder how they haven’t
been done before. Solar canals, which will get their first U.S.
pilot later this year in California, fit that mold. Western
states are crisscrossed by thousands of miles of irrigation
canals, some as wide as 150 feet, others just 10 feet across.
By covering those channels with solar panels, researchers say,
we could produce renewable energy without taking up precious
land. At the same time, the added shade could prevent billions
of gallons of water loss through evaporation.
Gov. Newsom’s emergency drought order that singled out
agricultural wells for extra scrutiny is continuing to cause
confusion and angst in some parts of the San Joaquin Valley,
while other areas are stutter-stepping forward. Selma raisin
farmer Tony Panoo was happy to finally have his well drilled on
Monday after several tense weeks when his permit application
was stuck between Fresno County and the Central Kings
Groundwater Sustainability Agency (GSA), which covers his
20-acre vineyard.
A coalition of water stakeholder organizations from across
California joined together to send a letter addressed to
Gov. Gavin Newsom and six key legislators requesting
action to address water issues. The nine page document dated
April 19, 2022 was signed by 18 organizations and entities
including the San Joaquin Valley Water Blueprint and 10
Southern California, four Bay Area and three trade groups. The
letter laid out the need to include a $6.5 billion
appropriation in the 2022-2023 General Fund budget to
strengthen statewide drought and flood resilience. -Written by Don Wright, a contributor to The San
Joaquin Valley Sun.
Pixley residents have had questionable water to drink for the
last four years but will soon have access to free water from a
vending machine. The Pixley Public Utility District
recently published a public notice that says they will offer
free drinking water at water fill stations in town. The notice
says the plan “will consist of the installation of two water
vending machines and shade cover for the machines, which will
be attached to the Pixley Public Utility District building.
This will provide the community of Pixley with clean drinking
water at no cost due to the community’s issue with contaminated
water.”
A sale of agricultural water within the Panoche Water District
on the upper west side of the San Joaquin Valley hit the
eye-popping price of $2,000 per acre foot recently. The buyer
bought 668 acre feet in a deal that was brokered by Nat DiBuduo
with Alliance Ag Services. … Last year, the same sellers,
also unnamed, sold water for $1,648 and $1,800 per acre foot,
indicating how a third year of drought is pushing up the price
of water, according to the broker.
A new bill aimed at bringing relief to farmworkers affected by
the drought is now one step closer to becoming law. The
bill, introduced by Sen. Melissa Hurtado (D–Sanger), aims
to provide financial assistance to farmworkers struggling to
afford basic necessities. Wednesday it passed in a state senate
committee, four to one. Senate Bill 1066 aims to create a
program called the California Farmworkers Drought Resilience
Pilot Project. The project is a state-funded supplemental pay
program that would give eligible farmworkers $1,000 for three
years.
As part of a broader research effort to conserve California’s
scarce water resources, a $20-million pilot project in the
state will investigate the use of solar canals as a major
source of renewable energy. Known as Project Nexus, the
state-funded venture is expected to demonstrate how covering
canals with solar panels can reduce water delivery system costs
and generate enough electricity to meet ambitious clean power
goals.
A new bill aimed at bringing relief to farmworkers affected by
the drought is now one step closer to becoming law. The bill,
introduced by Senator Melissa Hurtado, aims to provide
financial assistance to farmworkers struggling to afford basic
necessities. Wednesday it passed in a state senate committee,
four to one. Senate Bill 1066 (see the full text
below) was introduced by Hurtado and aims to create a program
called the California Farmworkers Drought Resilience Pilot
Project.
Scattered across California’s San Joaquin Valley are colonias,
the unincorporated communities home to some of the Valley’s
poorest residents in one of the richest agricultural areas in
the world. … Water access is a critical question in
California. Former Governor Jerry Brown declared an official
drought in 2014. The state today is even drier, and the
declaration is still in force. Teviston, a tiny community
established by African Americans in the 1940s, went completely
without water for a month last summer when its only well
stopped working.
Throughout western Fresno County, fertile land has been taken
out of production because the irrigation supply isn’t stable
enough to bring a crop to harvest. Many of Joe Del Bosque’s dry
fields in Firebaugh will stay that way this season.
… Without adequate surface water delivered from
reservoirs, some growers must continue to pump groundwater from
their wells. But the California Groundwater Live website
shows 64% of monitored wells are below normal.
The controversial Kings County water pipeline saga pitting two
of the region’s largest water players has turned into a
campaign issue for Kings County elections. Water giant
Sandridge Partners, led by John Vidovich, began installing a
sprawling water pipeline system that would be part of a larger
interconnected conveyance system that will run from north of
Highway 198, west of Lemoore, to the Blakeley Canal, south of
Stratford.
The former general manager of a Central Valley water district
has been charged with stealing more than $25 million worth of
water over 23 years, the latest development in a years-long
saga of corruption and theft, federal authorities said
Thursday. … [In 1992, Dennis] Falaschi was informed
that an aging, abandoned drain turnout on the Delta-Mendota
Canal, part of the federal Central Valley Project, was leaking
water into a parallel canal that the water district controlled,
the document stated.
Valley groundwater agencies are mired in confusion and concern
over Gov. Newsom’s March 28 executive drought order, which
added new steps for permitting agricultural wells, according to
agencies’ staff. As groundwater agency managers scramble
to hash out exactly how to comply with the order, well permits
in some areas are stuck in limbo leaving well drillers and
small farmers without answers — or water.
This tour ventured through California’s Central Valley, known as the nation’s breadbasket thanks to an imported supply of surface water and local groundwater. Covering about 20,000 square miles through the heart of the state, the valley provides 25 percent of the nation’s food, including 40 percent of all fruits, nuts and vegetables consumed throughout the country.
Across a sprawling corner of southern Tulare County snug against the Sierra Nevada, a bounty of navel oranges, grapes, pistachios, hay and other crops sprout from the loam and clay of the San Joaquin Valley. Groundwater helps keep these orchards, vineyards and fields vibrant and supports a multibillion-dollar agricultural economy across the valley. But that bounty has come at a price. Overpumping of groundwater has depleted aquifers, dried up household wells and degraded ecosystems.
Innovative efforts to accelerate
restoration of headwater forests and to improve a river for the
benefit of both farmers and fish. Hard-earned lessons for water
agencies from a string of devastating California wildfires.
Efforts to drought-proof a chronically water-short region of
California. And a broad debate surrounding how best to address
persistent challenges facing the Colorado River.
These were among the issues Western Water explored in
2019, and are still worth taking a look at in case you missed
them.
To survive the next drought and meet
the looming demands of the state’s groundwater sustainability
law, California is going to have to put more water back in the
ground. But as other Western states have found, recharging
overpumped aquifers is no easy task.
Successfully recharging aquifers could bring multiple benefits
for farms and wildlife and help restore the vital interconnection
between groundwater and rivers or streams. As local areas around
California draft their groundwater sustainability plans, though,
landowners in the hardest hit regions of the state know they will
have to reduce pumping to address the chronic overdraft in which
millions of acre-feet more are withdrawn than are naturally
recharged.
Bruce Babbitt, the former Arizona
governor and secretary of the Interior, has been a thoughtful,
provocative and sometimes forceful voice in some of the most
high-profile water conflicts over the last 40 years, including
groundwater management in Arizona and the reduction of
California’s take of the Colorado River. In 2016, former
California Gov. Jerry Brown named Babbitt as a special adviser to
work on matters relating to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and
the Delta tunnels plan.
Groundwater helped make Kern County
the king of California agricultural production, with a $7 billion
annual array of crops that help feed the nation. That success has
come at a price, however. Decades of unchecked groundwater
pumping in the county and elsewhere across the state have left
some aquifers severely depleted. Now, the county’s water managers
have less than a year left to devise a plan that manages and
protects groundwater for the long term, yet ensures that Kern
County’s economy can continue to thrive, even with less water.
The whims of political fate decided
in 2018 that state bond money would not be forthcoming to help
repair the subsidence-damaged parts of Friant-Kern Canal, the
152-mile conduit that conveys water from the San Joaquin River to
farms that fuel a multibillion-dollar agricultural economy along
the east side of the fertile San Joaquin Valley.
There’s going to be a new governor
in California next year – and a host of challenges both old and
new involving the state’s most vital natural resource, water.
So what should be the next governor’s water priorities?
That was one of the questions put to more than 150 participants
during a wrap-up session at the end of the Water Education
Foundation’s Sept. 20 Water Summit in Sacramento.
The Sacramento and San Joaquin
rivers are the two major Central Valley waterways that feed the
Delta, the hub of California’s water supply
network. Our last water tours of
2018 will look in-depth at how these rivers are managed and
used for agriculture, cities and the environment. You’ll see
infrastructure, learn about efforts to restore salmon runs and
talk to people with expertise on these rivers.
More than a decade in the making, an
ambitious plan to deal with the vexing problem of salt and
nitrates in the soils that seep into key groundwater basins of
the Central Valley is moving toward implementation. But its
authors are not who you might expect.
An unusual collaboration of agricultural interests, cities, water
agencies and environmental justice advocates collaborated for
years to find common ground to address a set of problems that
have rendered family wells undrinkable and some soil virtually
unusable for farming.
New water storage is the holy grail
primarily for agricultural interests in California, and in 2014
the door to achieving long-held ambitions opened with the passage
of Proposition
1, which included $2.7 billion for the public benefits
portion of new reservoirs and groundwater storage projects. The
statute stipulated that the money is specifically for the
benefits that a new storage project would offer to the ecosystem,
water quality, flood control, emergency response and recreation.
California voters may experience a sense of déjà vu this year when they are asked twice in the same year to consider water bonds — one in June, the other headed to the November ballot.
Both tackle a variety of water issues, from helping disadvantaged communities get clean drinking water to making flood management improvements. But they avoid more controversial proposals, such as new surface storage, and they propose to do some very different things to appeal to different constituencies.
Get a unique view of the San Joaquin Valley’s key dams and
reservoirs that store and transport water on our March Central
Valley Tour.
Our Central Valley
Tour, March 14-16, offers a broad view of water issues
in the San Joaquin Valley. In addition to the farms, orchards,
critical habitat for threatened bird populations, flood bypasses
and a national wildlife refuge, we visit some of California’s
major water infrastructure projects.
The 2-day, 1-night tour traveled along the river from Friant
Dam near Fresno to the confluence of the Merced River. As it
weaved across an historic farming region, participants learn
about the status of the river’s restoration and how the
challenges of the plan are being worked out.
A few tickets are still available for our Nov. 1-2 San Joaquin River
Restoration Tour, a once-a-year educational opportunity to
see the program’s progress first-hand. The tour begins and ends
in Fresno with an overnight stay in Los Banos.
Explore more than 100 miles of Central California’s longest river
while learning about one of the nation’s largest and costliest
river restorations. Our San Joaquin River
Restoration Tour on Nov. 1-2 will feature speakers from key
governmental agencies and stakeholder groups who will explain the
restoration program’s goals and progress.
The Sacramento and San Joaquin are the two major rivers in the
Central Valley that feed the Delta, the hub of
California’s water supply network.
Our last two water tours of 2017 will take in-depth looks at how
these rivers are managed and used for agriculture, cities and the
environment. You’ll see infrastructure, learn about efforts to
restore salmon runs and talk to people with expertise on these
rivers.
Protecting and restoring California’s populations of threatened
and endangered Chinook salmon and steelhead trout have been a big
part of the state’s water management picture for more than 20
years. Significant resources have been dedicated to helping the
various runs of the iconic fish, with successes and setbacks. In
a landscape dramatically altered from its natural setting,
finding a balance between the competing demands for water is
challenging.
Our water tours give a behind-the-scenes look at major water
issues in California. On our Central Valley Tour, March
8-10, you will visit wildlife habitat areas – some of which are
closed to the public – and learn directly from the experts who
manage them, in addition to seeing farms, large dams and other
infrastructure.
The recent deluge has led to changes in drought conditions in
some areas of California and even public scrutiny of the
possibility that the drought is over. Many eyes are focused on
the San Joaquin Valley, one of the areas hardest hit by reduced
surface water supplies. On our Central Valley Tour, March
8-10, we will visit key water delivery and storage sites in the
San Joaquin Valley, including Friant Dam and Millerton Lake
on the San Joaquin River.
ARkStorm stands for an atmospheric
river (“AR”) that carries precipitation levels expected to occur
once every 1,000 years (“k”). The concept was presented in a 2011
report by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) intended to elevate
the visibility of the very real threats to human life, property
and ecosystems posed by extreme storms on the West Coast.
Contaminants exist in water supplies from both natural and
manmade sources. Even those chemicals present without human
intervention can be mobilized from introduction of certain
pollutants from both
point and nonpoint sources.
Both the drought and high nitrate levels in shallow groundwater have necessitated deeper
drilling of new wells in the San Joaquin Valley, only to expose
water with heightened
arsenic levels. Arsenic usually exists in water as arsenate
or arsenite, the latter of which is more frequent in deep lake
sediments or groundwater with little oxygen and is both
more harmful and difficult to remove.
Whiskeytown Lake, a major reservoir in the foothills of the
Klamath Mountains nine miles west of Redding, was
built at the site of one of Shasta County’s first Gold Rush
communities. Whiskeytown, originally called
Whiskey Creek Diggings, was founded in 1849 and named in
reference to a whiskey barrel rolling off a citizen’s pack mule;
it may also refer to miners drinking a barrel per day.
A new era of groundwater management
began in 2014 with the passage of the Sustainable Groundwater
Management Act (SGMA), which aims for local and regional agencies
to develop and implement sustainable groundwater management
plans with the state as the backstop.
SGMA defines “sustainable groundwater management” as the
“management and use of groundwater in a manner that can be
maintained during the planning and implementation horizon without
causing undesirable results.”
This issue examines the impacts of California’s epic
drought, especially related to water supplies for San Joaquin
Valley rural communities and farmland.
This handbook provides crucial
background information on the Sustainable Groundwater Management
Act, signed into law in 2014 by Gov. Jerry Brown. The handbook
also includes a section on options for new governance.
This 3-day, 2-night tour, which we do every spring,
travels the length of the San Joaquin Valley, giving participants
a clear understanding of the State Water Project and Central
Valley Project.
This 30-minute documentary-style DVD on the history and current
state of the San Joaquin River Restoration Program includes an
overview of the geography and history of the river, historical
and current water delivery and uses, the genesis and timeline of
the 1988 lawsuit, how the settlement was reached and what was
agreed to.
This 25-minute documentary-style DVD, developed in partnership
with the California Department of Water Resources, provides an
excellent overview of climate change and how it is already
affecting California. The DVD also explains what scientists
anticipate in the future related to sea level rise and
precipitation/runoff changes and explores the efforts that are
underway to plan and adapt to climate.
Salt. In a small amount, it’s a gift from nature. But any doctor
will tell you, if you take in too much salt, you’ll start to have
health problems. The same negative effect is happening to land in
the Central Valley. The problem scientists call “salinity” poses
a growing threat to our food supply, our drinking water quality
and our way of life. The problem of salt buildup and potential –
but costly – solutions are highlighted in this 2008 public
television documentary narrated by comedian Paul Rodriguez.
A 20-minute version of the 2008 public television documentary
Salt of the Earth: Salinity in California’s Central Valley. This
DVD is ideal for showing at community forums and speaking
engagements to help the public understand the complex issues
surrounding the problem of salt build up in the Central Valley
potential – but costly – solutions. Narrated by comedian Paul
Rodriquez.
This 3-day, 2-night tour travels the length of the San Joaquin
Valley, giving participants a clear understanding of the State
Water Project and Central Valley Project.
15-minute DVD that graphically portrays the potential disaster
should a major earthquake hit the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
“Delta Warning” depicts what would happen in the event of an
earthquake registering 6.5 on the Richter scale: 30 levee breaks,
16 flooded islands and a 300 billion gallon intrusion of salt
water from the Bay – the “big gulp” – which would shut down the
State Water Project and Central Valley Project pumping plants.
30-minute DVD that traces the history of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and its role in the development of the West. Includes
extensive historic footage of farming and the construction of
dams and other water projects, and discusses historic and modern
day issues.
This beautiful 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, features
a map of the San Joaquin River. The map text focuses on the San
Joaquin River Restoration Program, which aims to restore flows
and populations of Chinook salmon to the river below Friant Dam
to its confluence with the Merced River. The text discusses the
history of the program, its goals and ongoing challenges with
implementation.
Fashioned after the popular California Water Map, this 24×36 inch
poster was extensively re-designed in 2017 to better illustrate
the value and use of groundwater in California, the main types of
aquifers, and the connection between groundwater and surface
water.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to Integrated Regional Water
Management (IRWM) is an in-depth, easy-to-understand publication
that provides background information on the principles of IRWM,
its funding history and how it differs from the traditional water
management approach.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to Groundwater is an in-depth,
easy-to-understand publication that provides background and
perspective on groundwater. The guide explains what groundwater
is – not an underground network of rivers and lakes! – and the
history of its use in California.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to
Flood Management explains the physical flood control system,
including levees; discusses previous flood events (including the
1997 flooding); explores issues of floodplain management and
development; provides an overview of flood forecasting; and
outlines ongoing flood control projects.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to California Water provides an
excellent overview of the history of water development and use in
California. It includes sections on flood management; the state,
federal and Colorado River delivery systems; Delta issues; water
rights; environmental issues; water quality; and options for
stretching the water supply such as water marketing and
conjunctive use. New in this 10th edition of the guide is a
section on the human need for water.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to the Central Valley Project
explores the history and development of the federal Central
Valley Project (CVP), California’s largest surface water delivery
system. In addition to the project’s history, the guide describes
the various CVP facilities, CVP operations, the benefits the CVP
brought to the state and the CVP Improvement Act (CVPIA).
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to the Delta explores the competing
uses and demands on California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Included in the guide are sections on the history of the Delta,
its role in the state’s water system, and its many complex issues
with sections on water quality, levees, salinity and agricultural
drainage, fish and wildlife, and water distribution.
A new look for our most popular product! And it’s the perfect
gift for the water wonk in your life.
Our 24×36 inch California Water Map is widely known for being the
definitive poster that shows the integral role water plays in the
state. On this updated version, it is easier to see California’s
natural waterways and man-made reservoirs and aqueducts
– including federally, state and locally funded
projects – the wild and scenic rivers system, and
natural lakes. The map features beautiful photos of
California’s natural environment, rivers, water projects,
wildlife, and urban and agricultural uses and the
text focuses on key issues: water supply, water use, water
projects, the Delta, wild and scenic rivers and the Colorado
River.
Located in the middle of California, the San Joaquin Valley is
bracketed on both sides by mountain ranges. Long and flat, the
valley’s hot, dry summers are followed by cool, foggy winters
that make it one of the most productive agricultural regions in
the world.
The valley stretches from across mid-California between coastal
ranges in west and the Sierras on the east. The region includes
large cities such as Fresno and Bakersfield, national parks such
as Yosemite and Kings, millions of people, and fertile farmland.
Flowing 366 miles from the Sierra
Nevada to Suisun Bay, the San Joaquin River provides irrigation
water to thousands of acres of San Joaquin Valley farms and
drinking water to some of the valley’s cities. It also is the
focal point for one of the nation’s most ambitious river
restoration projects to revive salmon populations.
The Pacific Flyway is one of four
major North American migration routes for birds, especially
waterfowl, and extends from Alaska and Canada, through
California, to Mexico and South America. Each year, birds follow
ancestral patterns as they travel the flyway on their annual
north-south migration. Along the way, they need stopover sites
such as wetlands with suitable habitat and food supplies. In
California, 90 percent of historic wetlands have been lost.
This issue of Western Water looks at the BDCP and the
Coalition to Support Delta Projects, issues that are aimed at
improving the health and safety of the Delta while solidifying
California’s long-term water supply reliability.
This printed issue of Western Water features a
roundtable discussion with Anthony Saracino, a water resources
consultant; Martha Davis, executive manager of policy development
with the Inland Empire Utilities Agency and senior policy advisor
to the Delta Stewardship Council; Stuart Leavenworth, editorial
page editor of The Sacramento Bee and Ellen Hanak, co-director of
research and senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of
California.
This printed issue of Western Water examines the issues
associated with the State Water Board’s proposed revision of the
water quality Bay-Delta Plan, most notably the question of
whether additional flows are needed for the system, and how they
might be provided.
This printed issue of Western Water examines
groundwater banking, a water management strategy with appreciable
benefits but not without challenges and controversy.
This printed copy of Western Water examines the challenges facing
small water systems, including drought preparedness, limited
operating expenses and the hurdles of complying with costlier
regulations. Much of the article is based on presentations at the
November 2007 Small Systems Conference sponsored by the Water
Education Foundation and the California Department of Water
Resources.
This Western Water looks at proposed new measures to deal with
the century-old problem of salinity with a special focus on San
Joaquin Valley farms and cities.
