State water officials have asked local groundwater agencies to better prevent land subsidence. Simultaneously, the state is also working to fix the damage caused by sinking land.
Subsidence is caused by the over-pumping of groundwater. It occurs in many parts of California but is especially pronounced in the San Joaquin Valley during drought years.
In a stunning turnaround, Marin County water supplies that were once at risk of going dry next year have refilled to above-average levels following a series of unusually early downpours.
Marin water officials are reevaluating some drought restrictions and penalties that were adopted earlier this year, especially with more rain in the forecast this week.
After two years of drought, Gov. Gavin Newsom remains reluctant to put limits on statewide water use. His administration, however, is looking to take a first step.
Next month, the State Water Resources Control Board is expected to adopt temporary prohibitions on outdoor water practices, including hosing down driveways, filling up decorative fountains and watering lawns within 48 hours of rain.
A one-two punch of storm systems is expected to drape the Bay Area in rainy weather for much of the upcoming week while potentially making holiday travel in the Sierra Nevada mountains “very challenging to impossible,” meteorologists say.
A proposed ballot measure that would dedicate $100 billion to bolster California’s water supply is drawing a sharp rebuke, not only for the amount of spending but also for the dramatic sidesteps it would allow in the environmental review process.
For example, the proposal would make the controversial plan for a Huntington Beach desalination plant eligible for a huge taxpayer subsidy — even though the private, for-profit Poseidon Water company currently intends to pay for the $1.4 billion in construction costs.
Residents across the western United States who have drought relief on their holiday wish lists this season will be in luck over the next week. A series of storms will take aim at the West Coast and deliver needed rain and mountain snow from Southern California to the Pacific Northwest through Christmas Day.
The drought is far from over in California, but this week’s atmospheric river may have begun to put a small dent in the state’s worrisome water deficit. While a prior October atmospheric event earlier in the year brought historic rainfall totals to Northern California, this most recent storm delivered drenching rains to both the north and the south and blasted the Sierra Nevada with snow.
Trying to stave off dangerously low levels of water in Lake Mead, officials in California, Arizona and Nevada have reached an agreement to significantly reduce the amount they take from the Colorado River.
The problem took on new urgency this summer when the federal government declared a first-ever water shortage in the 86-year-old reservoir near Las Vegas.
A plan to build a new $2.3 billion reservoir in southern Santa Clara Couty passed a significant milestone on Wednesday when a key state agency ruled that it continues to qualify for nearly half a billion dollars in state funding.
