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As a wet and windy storm blows in off the Pacific, a new San Jose-based radar system is watching it with the greatest precision ever, estimating rainfall in individual communities rather than providing a more general Bay Area forecast.

Discrete patches of incoming moisture are detected by a humming “X-band” radar unit on the rooftop of a treatment plant owned by the Santa Clara Valley Water District, predicting precipitation and flood risk with much greater accuracy than current technology. Four more units will be phased in over the next five years for the Peninsula, East Bay and North Bay.

Recently, some legislators have been demanding that state and federal agencies – or Congress – overrule the decisions of agency biologists and scientists in order to increase the amount of water pumped out of the Delta, complaining that the state and federal water projects are not capturing most of the water from recent storms. Yet recent analysis by The Bay Institute shows that approximately 66% of the runoff in January 2016 was captured or diverted, with only one third of the unimpaired runoff actually making it through the Bay-Delta estuary. For the period of October 1st to January 31st, 60% of the storm runoff has been diverted or stored. Compare this level of diversions to the prevailing science, which shows that, to maintain a healthy river system, no more than 20% of its flows, on average, should be diverted.

America’s two leading climate science agencies are conducting an unprecedented survey via land, sea and air to investigate the current El Niño event and better understand its impact on weather systems that have brought both parched and soaking conditions to North America.

The project, which will conclude in March, will deploy resources from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and NASA to analyze one of the strongest El Niños on record. El Niño is a periodic phenomenon in which parts of the eastern Pacific warm, causing a ripple effect for weather around the world.

A new revised drought relief bill introduced by Senator Dianne Feinstein puts California one step closer to comprehensive water policy reform, according to California Citrus Mutual (CCM) President Joel Nelsen.

In a release, Nelsen said the California Long-Term Provisions for Water Supply and Short-Term Provisions for Emergency Drought Relief Act identified several paths by which the state could improve its water infrastructure and create a more reliable water system for all users.