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.
As we enter the wet season when California gets more than 90 percent of its rainfall and snowfall, we urge state and federal officials to manage the state’s massive water system to ensure everyone gets their share of water this year. A University of California at Davis study found that mismanagement of the state’s water system has contributed to the water shortages facing all of California and has greatly contributed to the drawing down of the underground water supply in the San Joaquin Valley.
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.
California’s Salton Sea and state-straddling Lake Tahoe would receive funding for environmental restoration under a bill set for Senate approval Thursday. More controversial water-related efforts remain stuck in Capitol Hill limbo, however. Put simply, California’s diverse water ambitions face a complicated future in what remains of the 114th Congress. Showing some progress, senators have groomed a bill that includes a 10-year, $415 million Lake Tahoe restoration package. The broader water resources development bill also authorizes help for the endangered Salton Sea, the much-diminished Los Angeles River and Sacramento-area flood control, among other projects.
Giant tunnels that Gov. Jerry Brown wants to build to haul water across California are economically feasible only if the federal government bears a third of the nearly $16 billion cost because local water districts may not benefit as expected, according to an analysis that the state commissioned last year but never released. The findings run counter to longstanding state pledges that the districts that would get water from the tunnels would pay the full cost.
So far this year 4,636 wildfires in California have burned more than 200,000 acres. That’s more fires than this time last year and more fires than the five-year average. In fact, in the last few decades, the number of large fires are on the rise across the Western United States and the length of the fire season continues to expand. One of the biggest reasons for this is warming temperatures, which are impacting snowpack and ushering in an earlier spring. California has an added challenge of dealing with a five-year drought.
In an effort to quicken the pace of habitat restoration in California’s biggest estuary, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) invited private companies, non-profit groups and individuals to submit proposals to create wetlands in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Through a first-of-its-kind Request for Proposal (RFP), DWR seeks partners to help fulfill its obligations under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.
California is suffering through five years of drought. Though our reservoirs aren’t full, the state Legislature has been flooded with proposals to deal with the drought’s impact and to address the Golden State’s future water needs. While the effects of the drought are highly visible — brown lawns, fallowed fields, declining river flows and low reservoirs — what you can’t see is the lack of easily accessible data that’s necessary to effectively manage the state’s water. California does not suffer from a lack of data on water.
There is an ominous presence in the waters off the Pacific Northwest and it has the potential to play havoc with ocean wildlife and could interfere with your winter plans. “The Blob,” a mass of warm water floating off the coast of northern Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alaska, is back, writes University of Washington atmospheric science professor Cliff Mass. But, in fact, the phenomenon never really left. Formed in 2013, Mass writes that the warm pool of ocean water occurs due to sustained high pressure over the region.
California’s ongoing drought has sparked a lot of interest in recycled water – basically, cleaning treated sewage to the highest level to make it suitable for other uses. One of the biggest new projects is the North Valley Regional Recycled Water Program, a collaboration among numerous agencies in the North San Joaquin Valley. The project will take tertiary-treated sewage from the cities of Modesto, Turlock and Ceres and route it through new pipelines into the Delta Mendota Canal, owned by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
