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2 San Diego-Area Water Projects Win International Recognition

/in /by /Times of San Diegoby By Chris Jennewein Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

The $1 billion desalination plant in Carlsbad and San Diego’s innovative water recycling program both received international recognition earlier this week at a global water summit in Abu Dhabi.

The Claude “Bud” Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant was honored as the desalination plant of the year, and the City of San Diego’s Pure Water program was recognized as the water reuse project of the year. The awards came at the 2016 Global Water Summit in the capital of the United Arab Emirates on the Arabian Gulf.

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Lawsuit Accuses Regulators of Loosening Sacramento Delta Water Rules

/in /by /The Sacramento Bee by By Ryan Sabalow

Three environmentalist groups filed a lawsuit Friday alleging that to increase water flowing to farms and cities, state and federal regulators in the drought have repeatedly relaxed water-quality standards on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to the detriment of its wild fish species.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco claims the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency failed to enforce the Clean Water Act.

 

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City of Santa Barbara Sets Record Straight on Desalination Misinformation

/in /by /KEYT (Santa Barbara)

The City of Santa Barbara released an update on a future possible agreement with the Montecito Water District for the sale of desalinated water.

In the press release, the City says: “In response to inaccurate information in today’s Santa Barbara News Press concerning the assertion of an agreement between the City of Santa Barbara and the Montecito Water District regarding the sale of desalinated water, the City would like to clarify that there has been no agreement reached on the sale of desalinated water to the Montecito Water District.”

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Optimistic “Beyond Drought” Report From Water Authority

/in /by /San Diego Reader Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

Despite an ongoing drought, the San Diego County Water Authority is boasting in its annual report — released April 21 and titled “Beyond Drought” — that the region’s water supply is stable and in excess of current demand, despite mandatory conservation measures remaining in place.

“While some areas of the state suffered serious water supply shortages after four years of drought, the Water Authority and its member agencies had enough water to meet demands,” reads a statement from the authority’s board of directors accompanying the report.

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OPINION: Creating new sources of water

/in /by /Valley Road Runner (Valley Center)by Marie Waldron

Since agriculture in our region depends largely on imported water, I have long supported initiatives to increase local supplies, including the use of recycled water.

As many of you know, as a member of the Escondido City Council, I was an early supporter of a plan to use treated wastewater to irrigate citrus and avocado groves on the city’s outskirts.

This year I introduced Assembly Bill 2438 to help speed construction of recycled water pipelines along existing rights of way by streamlining costly, time consuming regulations that have delayed or prevented these projects statewide.

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OPINION: Must Fight Metropolitan Water’s Purchase of Islands

/in /by /Marin Independent Journal

Predictions that La Nia conditions may deepen the drought in California this winter would be more alarming if the results of a Field poll released last week had been different.

Fortunately, the poll showed an overwhelming majority of Californians continue to believe that the state faces an extremely serious water shortage and are continuing to conserve water. With two notable exceptions: Los Angeles and San Diego. They’re failing to do their part.

 

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Plan Would Pipe Alaska Water to California

/in /by /Associated Press (As Published by Capital Press - Salem, Ore.)

A Juneau entrepreneur is asking the state to approve his plan to collect fresh water from the Pacific Ocean south of Ketchikan and transport it to drought-stricken California.

Steven Bowhay’s application to the Alaska Department of Natural Resources, which he filed four years ago, has gone through two public comment periods. The second ends Wednesday, The Ketchikan Daily News reported. Under Bowhay’s River Recycler System plan, a system of buoys, anchors and sheeting would be deployed to trap fresh water on the ocean surface in Boca de Quadra, an inlet between the Ketchikan and Canadian border.

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Putting Every Drop of Water to Use

/in /by /Capital Press (Salem, Ore.)by By Sean Ellis

As El Nino was producing some powerful storms this winter, officials from a water district serving farms just outside of Sacramento got an idea.

They opened the gates of a swelling Cache Creek and let the flood waters flow into the Yolo County Flood Control and Water Conservation District’s system of irrigation canals. The canals’ dirt lining is porous enough to allow the water to seep into the aquifers, recharging a groundwater supply that’s becoming more and more important to growers.

 

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Extreme and Exceptional Drought Decline in California

/in /by /Capital Public Radio (Sacramento)by By Ed Joyce

The U.S. Drought Monitor says extreme and exceptional drought was reduced slightly in California last week and for the first time since the week of July 2013, there is no exceptional drought in Nevada.

“Little or no precipitation fell on the areas of dryness and drought in the Far West from the southeastern fringes of Washington southward through Oregon, California, and Nevada, but with the wet season winding down (especially in California), its impact on the long-term drought situation and the conditions being set up for the summer dry season are coming into better focus,” according to the report released April 21.

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Water watchdogs sue

/in /by /newsReview (Chico)

Local nonprofit water advocates AquAlliance filed a lawsuit on Friday (April 15) against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed multibillion-dollar water-tunnel system under the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, now branded California WaterFix.

The lawsuit alleges that the Army Corps violated the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by withholding records requested by AquAlliance—first by failing to “conduct a reasonable search for records,” the document reads.

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