After three of the driest years in California history, this winter’s storms brought some of the wettest and snowiest weeks on record to parts of the state. Snowpack accumulated during winter is vital to the state’s water system because the natural form of water storage melts during the spring and fills reservoirs that can then distribute water downstream where needed.
When Bay Area residents wake up later this week and get a look outside, they might wonder if they’ve been transported many degrees north, with snow from an unusually cold and windy winter storm possibly carpeting the region’s major peaks and even reaching hills as low as 1,000 feet.
Their timing wasn’t great.
After moving to Sonoma County from Santa Monica in 2020, Kim and David Lockhart purchased River’s Edge Kayak & Canoe in Healdsburg. Heavy rains across the region the year before had caused widespread flooding, especially along the lower Russian River.
Winter storms have filled California’s reservoirs and built up a colossal Sierra snowpack that’s nearly twice its normal size for this time of year. But years of dry conditions have created problems far beneath the Earth’s surface that aren’t as easily addressed.
Groundwater — found in underground layers containing sand, soil and rock — is crucial for drinking water and sustaining farms.
There’s one word for what six of the seven southwestern states that draw water from the Colorado River are trying to do to California: bullying.
The good news for Californians is that Gov. Gavin Newsom isn’t standing for it.
Customers of the Padre Dam Municipal Water District are getting some relief on their usually hefty bills, thanks to a vote last year by its board to freeze rate increases over five years.
But that freeze only applies to internal rate increases, not those imposed by outside agencies such as the San Diego County Water Authority (CWA) and San Diego Gas & Electric (SDGE), both of which are charging more for their services.
Only weeks ago, Angelenos watched as trillions of gallons of precious stormwater poured into the region’s concrete waterways, slid down slick pavement and washed out to sea. After so many months of drought-related water restrictions, it seemed to many like a missed opportunity.
While officials say they’re making progress when it comes to capturing more of the county’s stormwater, a new report from watchdog group Los Angeles Waterkeeper has focused on the plan’s sluggish progress so far, and calls for improved metrics and a more proactive approach, among other recommendations.
With its haunting rock spires and salt-crusted shores, Mono Lake is a Hollywood vision of the apocalypse. To the city of Los Angeles, however, this Eastern Sierra basin represents the very source of L.A.’s prosperity — the right to free water.
For decades, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has relied on long-standing water rights to divert from the streams that feed this ancient lake as part of the city’s far-flung water empire. But in the face of global warming, drought and lawsuits from environmentalists, the DWP is now facing the previously unthinkable prospect of ending its diversions there.
The San Diego County Water Authority is celebrating National Engineers Week by highlighting how the agency’s engineers are instrumental in keeping the water flowing to San Diegans. Since the Water Authority’s formation in 1944, engineers have played a pivotal role in the establishment and growth of the agency and its commitment to delivering safe, reliable water supplies to San Diego.
(Editor’s Note: Founded by the National Society of Professional Engineers, National Engineers Week (February 19–25, 2023) is dedicated to ensuring a diverse and well-educated future engineering workforce by increasing understanding of and interest in engineering and technology careers.)
Weeks after powerful storms dumped 32 trillion gallons of rain and snow on California, state officials and environmental groups in the drought-ravaged state are grappling with what to do with all of that water.
State rules say when it rains and snows a lot in California, much of that water must stay in the rivers to act as a conveyer belt to carry tens of thousands of endangered baby salmon into the Pacific Ocean.
