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Could California’s Drought Crisis Block Bay Area Housing Construction?

/in , , /by /San Francisco Chronicleby Emma Talley

The Marin Municipal Water District is considering banning new water service hookups to homes in response to worsening drought conditions. But the move could hurt future housing development in an area already in dire need of more homes.

The move would come amid historic drought conditions in the area, with county officials declaring a local drought emergency last week in light of a “grim and deteriorating” situation. The National Drought Mitigation Center’s drought monitor recently deemed most of the Bay Area as extreme drought zones for the first time since 2015.

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That Mississippi River Pipeline? Bureau of Reclamation Weighed In About A Decade Ago

/in , , /by /KJZZby Ron Dungan

The Arizona Legislature wants to look into the feasibility of pumping water from the Mississippi River to Arizona.

But the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has already studied the idea, and weighed in on the project in 2012.

The agency studied factors such as cost, legal issues, power use and the amount of time the project would take.

A report estimated the project could cost up to $14 billion; the timetable was around 30 years.

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Grim Western Fire Season Starts Much Drier Than Record 2020

/in , , /by /AP Newsby Seth Borenstein

As bad as last year’s record-shattering fire season was, the western U.S. starts this year’s in even worse shape.

The soil in the West is record dry for this time of year. In much of the region, plants that fuel fires are also the driest scientists have seen. The vegetation is primed to ignite, especially in the Southwest where dead juniper trees are full of flammable needles.

“It’s like having gasoline out there,” said Brian Steinhardt, forest fire zone manager for Prescott and Coconino national forests in Arizona.

A climate change-fueled megadrought of more than 20 years is making conditions that lead to fire even more dangerous, scientists said. Rainfall in the Rockies and farther west was the second lowest on record in April, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

 

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What’s Causing California’s Drought?

/in , , /by /The Mercury Newsby Paul Rogers

California’s new drought is worsening. After two severely dry winters, reservoirs are shrinking, fire danger is rising and water supplies are looking more tenuous.

The past two years have been the driest in nearly half a century, since 1976-77. How did the state find itself in a new crisis just as the COVID pandemic is fading? Scientists say California’s parched plight largely comes down to two words: “atmospheric river.”

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Melting Snow Usually Means Water for the West. But This Year, It Might Not Be Enough

/in , , /by /NPRby Michael Elizabeth Sakas

There’s still snow in Colorado’s mountains near the headwaters of the South Platte River, and Brian Domonkos has strapped on a pair of cross-country skis to come measure it.

He’s the Colorado Snow Survey supervisor, and knowing how much snowpack is left from the winter to runoff into streams, rivers and reservoirs this summer is crucial, especially in a year when much of the West is in extreme drought. As it melts, the snowpack here will become the primary source of water for millions of people in Colorado and across the West.

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Colonial Hack Reveals Major Threats to Water Sector

/in , , /by /E&E Newsby Hannah Northey

When hackers penetrated a small water utility in North Carolina three years ago that debilitated its IT systems, operators there refused to “bow” to hackers and fork over ransom money to make the assault stop.

That 2018 cyberattack was part of what experts say is a fast-growing and evolving threat in the water sector and a glaring example of the type of attack — ransomware — that earlier this month shut down the East Coast’s largest fuel supplier, the Colonial pipeline.

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Facing a Drought, California’s Farmers Make Hard Choices

/in , , /by /The Mercury Newsby Lisa M. Krieger

In wetter times, these feathery beds of asparagus would produce generations of tender green spears, reaching for the vast San Joaquin Valley sky.

On Monday they were disked into the dry dirt, their long lives cut short by unreliable and expensive water.

“It’s a really sad day,” said Fresno County’s Joe Del Bosque, who has destroyed 100 acres of organic asparagus so he can divert precious water to more valuable melons. “The water is so uncertain this year. We didn’t think we’d have enough to carry it through.”

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Drought Intensifies and Expands in the American West

/in , , /by /Courthouse News Serviceby Matthew Renda

The scale of the drought hitting the American West is beginning to crystallize as Nevada, New Mexico and Arizona experienced their driest year in terms of precipitation on record, according to the National Center for Environmental Information.

In Utah and California, it was the second-driest winter on record. For Wyoming, it was the third-driest ever. For Colorado, only three winters were ever drier in the 127-year history of record-keeping at the center.

“This is extreme,” said Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute.

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Opinion: Investment in Delta Tunnel, Sites Reservoir Will Ensure Water Supply

/in , , /by /CalMattersby Heather Dyer

California just recorded its’ third driest winter in history, so it’s no surprise that State Water Project deliveries have been cut to just 5% of contracted amounts.

This is bad news for regional water agencies who collectively depend on the State Water Project for a fourth of their water supply.

But these agencies have seen the climate change writing on the wall for a long time. In fact, Southern California has been in an extended drought for the last 20 years. Because of this, 11 San Bernardino Valley water agencies have identified close to $650 million worth of local stormwater capture, storage and recycling projects they plan to build over the next 50 years to lessen their dependence on State Water Project imports.

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Drought Imperils Economy in California’s Farm Country

/in , , /by /The Wall Street Journalby Jim Carlton

Sitting in a pickup truck on his almond farm 100 miles north of San Francisco, Tom Butler pointed to a withered grove he has been planning to bulldoze in order to save his little remaining water for younger trees.

“It’s not a decision any farmer wants to make,” the 42-year-old said last week. “We’re in survival mode.”

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