Watch our series of short videos on the importance of the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, how it works as a water hub for
California and the challenges it is facing.
Some people in California and across the West struggle to access
safe, reliable and affordable water to meet their everyday needs
for drinking, cooking and sanitation.
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As atmospheric rivers blasted across California this year, they
brought epic amounts of rain and snow follwing a three-year
drought.
Devastating and deadly floods hit parts of the state and now all
eyes are on the potential for more flooding, particularly in
the San Joaquin Valley as the record amount of snow in the
Sierras melts with warmer temperatures.
With anticipated sea level rise and other impacts of a changing
climate, flood management is increasingly critical in California.
Groundwater basins in California
and across the world are the source for much of the water that
grows our food. But many challenges come with groundwater:
Keeping use sustainable, nitrate contamination and impacts
from climate change.
The world’s top scientists, policymakers and experts will be
addressing these topics June 18-20 in San
Francisco at the
3ʳᵈ International Groundwater Conference Linking Science &
Policy, along with the latest advancements on
groundwater demand management, conjuctive use, managed aquifer
recharge, groundwater governance and emerging artificial
intelligence resources related to groundwater and agriculture.
Big
Day of Giving is nearly over but you still have
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At the Foundation, we believe that education is as precious
as water. Your donations help us every day to teach K-12
educators how to bring water science into the classroom and to
empower future decision-makers through our professional
development programs.
Our portfolio of programs reach many people and in many
different ways:
California’s contentious and long-debated plan to replumb the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and pump more water south finally
has a price tag: about $20 billion. The new estimate for
the Delta tunnel project — which would transform the massive
water system that sends Northern California water south to
farms and cities — is $4 billion higher than a 2020 estimate,
largely because of inflation. Included is almost $1.2 billion
to offset local harms and environmental damage, such as impacts
on salmon and rare fish that state officials have called
“potentially significant.” The goal of the project is to
collect and deliver more water to two-thirds of California’s
population and 750,000 acres of farmland during
wet periods … But environmental groups and many
Delta residents have long warned that the tunnel could put the
imperiled Delta ecosystem at even greater risk, sapping
freshwater flows needed for fish, farms and communities in the
region.
Policymakers say they’re getting closer to an agreement between
seven Western states on how to manage the Colorado River in the
future. But details from those closed-door negotiations have
been limited. Utah’s top water negotiator said states have met
“three or four times” since they split into two factions and
put out competing proposals back in March. Gene Shawcroft
didn’t give specifics but said they’re making progress on a
strategy to share water after 2026, when the current river
management plan expires. “I think the commitment level to stay
together on a seven state proposal is significantly higher now
than it was a few weeks ago,” he said. It does not appear
likely that Shawcroft and his allies are willing to back off
from a proposal to send less water downstream to California,
Arizona and Nevada each year.
Land subsidence remains the biggest issue in the new state
regulation of groundwater. The state Water Board reports that
subsidence measured as much as 7 feet just east of Corcoran
between June 2015 and January 2024. Groundwater pumping west of
Highway 99 has caused the land to sink at least 4 to 5 feet
according to a DWR database. The worry here is the collapse of
water delivering infrastructure. Tulare Lake farmers have been
asked to install metering on their pumps 90 days after the
decision to put the GSA on probation which was made April 16.
That means by mid-July pumpers must install metering as well as
begin reporting how much water they are extracting.
A water dispute between the United States and Mexico that goes
back decades is turning increasingly urgent in Texas
communities that rely on the Rio Grande. Their leaders are now
demanding the Mexican government either share water or face
cuts in U.S. aid. Sign up for the Climate Coach newsletter and
get advice for life on our changing planet, in your inbox every
Tuesday. In a deepening diplomatic conflict, Mexico is behind
in obligations under an 80-year-old treaty that governs
cross-border flows of the drought-stricken Colorado River. It
has for decades resisted water deliveries to the United States
from its reservoirs in the Rio Grande basin as it faces its own
drought pressures on thirsty and valuable crops bound for sale
across the border. -Written by Scott Dance, reporter for The
Washington Post covering extreme weather news.
As the date of reckoning for excessive groundwater pumping in
Tulare County grows closer, lobbying by water managers and
growers has ramped up. The Friant Water Authority, desperate to
protect its newly rebuilt – yet still sinking –
Friant-Kern Canal, has beseeched the Water Resources Control
Board to get involved. Specifically, it has asked board members
to look into how the Eastern Tule Groundwater Sustainability
Agency (GSA) has, or has not, curbed over pumping that affects
the canal. Meanwhile, the Eastern Tule groundwater agency has
been doing a bit of its own lobbying. It recently hosted all
five members of the Water Board on three separate tours of the
region, including the canal. Because the tours were staggered,
there wasn’t a quorum of board members, which meant they
weren’t automatically open to the public.
Operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the
Bay Model is a giant hydraulic replica of San Francisco
Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta. It is housed in a converted World II-era
warehouse in Sausalito near San Francisco.
Hundreds of gallons of water are pumped through the
three-dimensional, 1.5-acre model to simulate a tidal ebb
and flow lasting 14 minutes.
As part of the historic Colorado
River Delta, the Salton Sea regularly filled and dried for
thousands of years due to its elevation of 237 feet below
sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
