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California Abnormally Dry After Low Precipitation Winter

/in , /by /The Associated Pressby Olga R. Rodriguez

A winter with little precipitation has left most of California abnormally dry and officials are bracing for the possibility of an early and more intense wildfire season amid record-breaking temperatures.

Drought has expanded to nearly a quarter of the state, mainly in central California, the heart of the state’s agricultural sector, according to a U.S. Drought Monitor map mad public Thursday. The map shows 70 percent of the state is abnormally dry.

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Everything You Need to Know About California’s Historic Water Law

/in , /by /The Guardian by Susie Cagle

California began regulating surface water in rivers and streams in 1914, but it took the state another 100 years to look underground.

In 2014, for the first time in its history, California passed a law regulating the use of groundwater – the resource on which 85% of its population and much of its $50bn agriculture industry rely.

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Carlsbad Flower Fields Prepped for Spring’s Arrival

/in , /by /The San Diego Union-Tribuneby Carolina Gusman

The March through May wonderment that we know as The Flower Fields at Carlsbad Ranch will once again explode with tissue-like petals of Tecolote ranunculus, Mother Nature’s sign that spring is on the way.

Seven million flowers — in hues of red, purple, orange, gold, rose, pink and white — will fill row upon row of the more than 50 acres of hillside that overlooks the Pacific Ocean.

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Opinion: Climate Change and Water Supply

/in , /by /CalMatters (Sacramento, Calif.)by Dan Walters

California, as everyone knows, receives virtually all of its precipitation during a few fall and winter months and in 2019, some early rain and snow storms promised a bountiful water year.

This year, Mother Nature kept that promise in Southern California, where precipitation is running at or above the normal, but Northern California — far more important from a water supply standpoint — has been a different story.

The north has seen almost no precipitation since Christmas, the all-important Sierra snowpack is less than half of its average depth, and the region’s balmy, springlike weather shows no signs of ending.

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California Drought: Northern California Having Driest February Since 1864

/in , /by /The Mercury News (San Jose, Calif.)by Paul Rogers

With unusually dry, hot weather continuing for weeks on end and the driest February in the Bay Area in 156 years, nearly a quarter of California’s land area now is under drought conditions, federal officials announced Thursday.

Altogether, 23.3% of the state is in “moderate drought” — up from 9.5% last week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, a weekly report issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

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Opinion: California Parties, Trump Administration Must Work Together on Grand Water Plan

/in , /by /The Desert Sun (Palm Springs, Calif.)by The Desert Sun Editorial Board

It shouldn’t have come to this.

California has seen wars over water waged across time eternal it seems. Grand deals negotiated by the likes of former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have been hailed as long-dreamed-for solutions to the complicated battles waged by the competing interests of agriculture, environmentalists and thirsty urban areas, only to fail to live up to their hype.

In recent months, however, it seemed that Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration was breaking the logjam, working on a compromise that would help realign the state’s water paradigm to something all sides could accept.

“I’m trying to put together a peace plan in the delta,” Wade Crowfoot, Newsom’s secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, is quoted in a column this week by the Los Angeles Times’ George Skelton. “I don’t want to be a Pollyanna, but there’s beginning to be a sea change in many of these water users. They’re just tired of fighting.”

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Farmers Review Impact of Federal, State Water Actions

/in , /by /Ag Alert (Sacramento, Calif.)by Christine Souza

After a week that saw President Donald Trump visit Bakersfield to pledge more water for Central Valley farmers and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration respond with a lawsuit, farmers and water agencies looked for ways to continue work on voluntary agreements intended to ease California’s water disputes.

Trump announced his administration had finalized new federal rules to guide operations in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta for the federal Central Valley Project and the State Water Project. The lawsuit filed by the state the next day asserts that new biological opinions prepared by federal agencies lack safeguards for protected species and their habitat.

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California’s New Plan to Deal With Climate Change, Sea-Level Rise OKd

/in , /by /San Francisco Chronicle by Peter Fimrite

A bold new plan to protect California’s ocean ecosystem from climate change and prepare for sea-level rise was approved Wednesday, setting the stage for sweeping coastal restoration, trash cleanup, research and rule-making involving numerous state agencies.

The strategic plan, adopted unanimously by the state’s Ocean Protection Council, is a blueprint for how state agencies should collaborate over the next five years with tribal groups, research organizations and underserved communities to prepare for ocean warming, acidification, rising seas and plastic pollution.

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Researchers Blast ‘Forever Chemicals” into Oblivion With Plasma

/in , /by /Grist by Emily Pontecorvo

Christopher Sales is an environmental microbiologist, and until recently, his world was about harnessing the power of microorganisms to break down contaminants in the environment. But a resilient intruder that does not succumb to the same old tricks has shaken up the remediation community and led Sales to look outside of his field for a solution. It’s a chemical that’s been found in water, soil, and food all over the planet: PFAS.

PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are a group of chemical compounds used in carpet, waterproof clothing, nonstick pans, and many other common products, that have gone unregulated and been dumped into the environment for decades.

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Rural Utilities Sue 3M, DuPont Over PFAS Well Contamination

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Environmentby Amena H. Saiyid

Rural water utilities are accusing 3M Co., E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. and other companies of potentially contaminating groundwater wells with firefighting foam containing chemicals that take forever to degrade.

The city of Millington, Tenn., joined by the National Rural Water Association, alleged in a complaint Tuesday that the companies developed, marketed, and sold chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, despite knowing about the environmental and health risks they posed.

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