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The California Supreme Court has ruled that a Southern California water supplier can go ahead with the purchase of five Delta Islands, regardless of the opposition and lawsuit against it. Metropolitan Water District (MWD) will go ahead with the $175 million sale of the Delta Islands as ruled by the Supreme Court. Since MWD initiated the sale, several injunctions have been placed against it stopping the purchase from going through. Several lawsuits have also been filed by San Joaquin and Contra Costa counties, Delta Island farmers and a series of environmental groups.

 

Congressman Jeff Denham introduced the New WATER Act Thursday in hopes of authorizing a pilot project that would provide long-term, low-cost financing for water resources infrastructure in reclamation states.“The Central Valley desperately needs to build more infrastructure for water storage and delivery,” said Denham, who introduced the bill Thursday.

 

San Francisco faces potentially drastic cutbacks in its water supply, as state regulators proposed leaving more water in three Northern California rivers Thursday to protect wildlife in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta estuary, the linchpin of California’s water supply. The draft rules by the State Water Resources Control Board would raise the amount of water into the Merced, Stanislaus and Tuolumne rivers to 30 to 50 percent of what would naturally flow in them. That means less water would be available for urban users and farmers in the northern San Joaquin Valley, compounding their need to conserve.

California plans to reduce water for farms and cities from one of its biggest river systems in order to boost the amount of water for salmon and other threatened fish, state officials said Thursday. The plan, which still must receive final approval, rekindles a divisive fish-versus-farmers debate in the nation’s biggest agriculture state.

Swaths of public land in the California desert will be opened to solar and wind farms under a federal plan released Wednesday that preserves much of the landscape for conservation and recreation. The long-awaited blueprint finalized by the U.S. Interior Department after a years long process seeks to balance renewable energy development and species protection on 17,000 square miles (44,030 sq. kilometers) of desert managed by the federal government.The plan drew sharp criticism from clean-energy producers who warned it would severely limit development.