When Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 32 into law on Thursday, he said of the sweeping climate change bill, “This is big, and I hope it sends a message across the country.” Q: So what, exactly, does it do? A: SB 32 comes a decade after California’s landmark Assembly Bill 32, which required the California Air Resources Board to reduce statewide emissions of greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020. The legislation Brown signed Wednesday expands on that mandate, requiring California to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030.

 

If you restore aquatic habitat in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, will the fish come back? That’s the basic question behind a major restoration project planned at Prospect Island, a 1,600-acre (650-hectare) tract of levee-protected farmland near Rio Vista that is now owned by the state. The California Department of Water Resources and Department of Fish and Wildlife plan to breach the levees to restore tidal flow to the island, and reshape the terrain to create the kind of shallow habitat that could attract Chinook salmon and delta smelt. The agencies recently released a draft environmental impact report on their project.

Residents of drought-stricken California kept up water conservation in July despite the long, hot days near the peak of summer, officials said. People are most inclined to water their yards when it is the hottest, so dialing back sprinklers also offers the greatest opportunity for savings, officials said. “We’re holding steady” on conservations, said Max Gomberg, a senior climate scientist for the State Water Resources Control Board. “It shows that people understand that the drought’s not over.”