The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has announced a $170 million Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act loan to Poseidon Resources in San Diego County, California, to support its Carlsbad Desalination Plant Intake Modification and Wetlands Project, which will help provide sustainable access to drinking water.
The power and technology behind the Claude “Bud” Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant, which turns seawater into drinking water, is described in this video report from Reporter Trason Bragg.
The Carlsbad Desalination Plant is the largest, most technologically advanced and energy-efficient desalination plant in the nation, and it has produced more than 100 billion gallons of drinking water for San Diego County since operations began in December 2015.
Nothing says the end of drought like ending water restrictions — and the pesky drought surcharges on utility bills.
On the heels of California’s remarkably wet winter, the Bay Area’s biggest water agencies, including the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and East Bay Municipal Utility District, have either rescinded their drought policies or are about to do so.
Colorado is awash in white this spring, with statewide snowpack topping 140% of average this week, well above the reading a year ago, when it stood at just 97% of normal.
“Conditions in the American West are way better than they were last year at this time,” state climatologist Russ Schumacher said Tuesday at a joint meeting Tuesday of the Water Availability Task Force and the Governor’s Flood Task Force.
Congress on Wednesday approved a resolution to overturn the Biden administration’s protections for the nation’s waterways that Republicans have criticized as a burden on business, advancing a measure that President Joe Biden has promised to veto.
Republicans have targeted the Biden administration’s protections for thousands of small streams, wetlands and other waterways, labeling it an environmental overreach that harms businesses, developers and farmers.
The Bureau of Reclamation March 28, announced an increase in Central Valley Project 2023 water supply allocations. After below average precipitation in February, Reclamation announced a conservative initial water supply allocation for the CVP on Feb. 22. Additional atmospheric river systems have since boosted hydrological conditions and storage volumes, allowing for a more robust water supply allocation.
Since making initial allocations last month, Shasta Reservoir, the cornerstone of the Central Valley Project, has increased from 59% to 81%, and San Luis Reservoir, the largest reservoir south-of-Delta, from 64% to 97%. Record-breaking snowpack conditions currently exist in the Southern Sierra coupled with significant snowpack in the Central Sierra and Northern Sierra/Trinity.
A colossal amount of rain and snow has fallen on California over the past few months from a dozen atmospheric rivers: more than 78 trillion gallons of water and counting.
It’s not the wettest year the Golden State has ever seen, but it is a massive amount of water in a state that has been beset by drought for several years. The number of gallons is according to data from the National Weather Service that was compiled by meteorologist Ryan Maue.
Last fall, when the state Legislature authorized $40 million for floodplain restoration, Julie Rentner knew just what she would do with it. Her group, River Partners, would spend more than a quarter of the funds buying a 500-acre dairy farm abutting the San Joaquin River in Stanislaus County.
Then millions more would be spent on removing debris, sheds, manure heaps and levees. They would plant native vegetation, and eventually restore the parcel to its natural state as a woodland and floodplain.
The California Department of Water Resources is using the winter storms to claim that the proposed Delta Conveyance project would help ensure a more reliable water supply for the State Water Project in light of how climate change will alter seasonal patterns of rain and drought.
In reality, the benefits of the conveyance project are speculative at best.
If you’re an East Bay Municipal Utilities District (MUD) customer, you will be saving money. Thanks to the very wet winter and spring, the agency said it will not be charging its 1.4 million customers in Alameda and Contra Costa counties an eight percent penalty for excessive water use because the reservoirs are full.
These changes go into effect on March 29 following an executive order signed by Governor Gavin Newsom that rolls back some of California’s drought restrictions.
