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Opinion: Broad-Based Buy-In is Key to Bay-Delta Water Plan

/in , /by /CalMattersby Jennifer Pierre and David Guy

California is at a transformational moment when it comes to managing water. As aridification of the western United States intensifies, we have an opportunity to advance a better approach to flow management in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta and our rivers through a process of voluntary agreements to update the Bay-Delta Water Quality Control Plan.

The agreements, signed by parties from Red Bluff to San Diego, propose a new structure for managing water resources in the Delta and beyond in a way that is collaborative, innovative and foundational for adapting to climate realities while benefiting communities, farms, fish and wildlife.

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Campaign Aims to Dispel Common Myths About Water Use in Las Vegas

/in , , /by /Las Vegas Sunby Ray Brewer

As soon as the U.S. Department of the Interior last month announced that Nevada would lose 8% of its water allotment from the Colorado River next year amid the continuing drought, officials with the Southern Nevada Water Authority started fielding questions from concerned residents.

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Tidal Marsh or ‘Fake Habitat’? California Environmental Project Draws Criticism

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Ian James

Southwest of Sacramento, the branching arms of waterways reach into a patchwork of farm fields and pastures. Canals and wetlands fringed with reeds meet a sunbaked expanse of dry meadows.

These lands on the northwestern edge of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta have now been targeted for restoration following the widespread destruction of estuary marsh habitats that began over a century ago.

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Opinion: Biggest Illusion in California is What Water Use and Development Does and Doesn’t Do

/in , , /by /Turlock Journalby Dennis Wyatt

Water is a mirage in California. We tend to see what we want to see. In my case, the biggest illusion was Auburn Dam.

If you were a resident of Placer County in the 1960s to 1980s you viewed it as almost as a birthright that the American River be dammed in the canyon below Auburn.

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September 2022 La Niña Update: It’s Q and A Time

/in , , /by /Climate.govby Emily Becker

Ocean and atmospheric conditions tell us that La Niña—the cool phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) climate pattern—currently reigns in the tropical Pacific. It’s looking very likely that the long-predicted third consecutive La Niña winter will happen, with a 91% chance of La Niña through September–November and an 80% chance through the early winter (November–January).

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California: Drought, Record Heat, Fires and Now Maybe Floods

/in , , /by /AP News (via U.S. News and World Report)by Brian Melley

Californians sweated it out amid a record-breaking heat wave entering its 10th day Friday that has helped fuel deadly wildfires and pushed energy supplies to the brink of daily power outages.

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Summer is Ending, but Climate Disasters Keep Coming

/in , , /by /E&E Newsby Chelsey Harvey

September marks the start of a new season for meteorologists. It’s the beginning of “climatological fall” in the Northern Hemisphere — and, ostensibly, a transition to milder weather.

But much of the U.S. is still baking, burning, withering or swimming.

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California Drought Raises Red Flags for Agriculture

/in , /by /The Hillby Zack Budryk

More than 97 percent of California is under at least “severe” drought conditions, raising the specter of difficult agricultural decisions in a state that produces a quarter of U.S. food.

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AZ Republicans and Democrats Sign Letters on Colorado River Water

/in , /by /KJZZ 91.5by Matthew Casey

Divvying up Colorado River water has been the subject of at least two letters this week from Republican and Democratic members of Arizona’s congressional delegation.

One note was sent to the head of the U.S. Department of Interior and the other to the governor of California.

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Water Use Drops 10% in July as California Deals With Drought

/in , , /by /AP Newsby Don Thompson

Californians stepped up their water conservation in July, using 10.4% less than two years ago as the state struggles with a years-long drought, state water officials said Wednesday.

July marks the first full month that new conservation rules like a ban on watering decorative grass were in effect, which state water officials said helped make a difference. Water use started to trend down in June after a bump in April and May.

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