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Study Raises Questions About Fluoride And Children’s IQ

/in , /by /The Washington Postby Ben Guarino

A study of young children in Canada suggests those whose mothers drank fluoridated tap water while pregnant had slightly lower IQ scores than children whose mothers lived in non-fluoridated cities. But don’t dash for the nearest bottled water yet. Health experts at the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Dental Association cautioned that public policy and drinking water consumption should not change on the basis of this study. “I still stand by the weight of the best available evidence, from 70 years of study, that community water fluoridation is safe and effective,” said Brittany Seymour, a dentist and spokeswoman for the American Dental Association. “If we’re able to replicate findings and continue to see outcomes, that would compel us to revisit our recommendation. We’re just not there yet.”

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Facing Water Crunch, Clovis Gets To Work On Drought Resiliency

/in , /by /The San Joaquin Valley Sunby George Hostetter

When it comes to securing a strong future for water deliveries, Fresno City Hall through its half-billion-dollar Recharge Fresno project gets a lot of hard-earned publicity of the good sort. But don’t overlook the fine work being done in a similar regard by Clovis City Hall. Fresno’s neighbor to the northeast is busy making sure it, too, is drought resilient during what figures to be a 21st century full of impressive growth. The Clovis City Council in July approved an amended deal with the Fresno Irrigation District concerning the conveyance of Kings River water to the city’s water system.

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Can Water Agencies Work Together Sustainably? – Lessons From Metropolitan Planning

/in , , /by /California WaterBlogby Jay Lund

It is said that, “In the US, we hate government so much that we have thousands of them.” This decentralization has advantages, but poses problems for integration. Integration is easy to say, and hard to do. Integration is especially hard, and unavoidably imperfect, for organizing common functions across different agencies with different missions and governing authorities. (Similar problems exist for organizing common functions across programs within a single agency.) Much of what is called for in California water requires greater devotion of leadership, resources, and organization to multi-agency efforts.

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How Ground-Based GPS Stations Help Weather Forecasters Predict Heavy Rain And Flooding

/in , /by /The Sacramento Beeby John Lindsey

Geodesy is the study of Earth’s shape, gravity field and rotation. An excellent method to study the Earth is by use of high-precision Continuous Global Positioning System (CGPS) stations that are firmly mounted on bedrock and can measure the slow, persistent ground motion of Earth’s crustal plates down to a few millimeters over time. In the western United States, there are more than 1,200 CGPS stations, including more than 25 on the Central Coast. A few of these stations are classified as Global Positioning System Meteorology (GPS-Met), such as the ones located in Cambria, Los Osos and Point Sal.

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6 Things To Know About Cadiz’s Plan To Pump Water In San Bernardino County’s Mojave Desert

/in , , /by /The San Bernardino Sunby Sandra Emerson

The story behind a proposal to pump water from under the Mojave Desert in San Bernardino County is a long and complicated one. Since its approval in 2012, the Cadiz Valley Water Conservation, Recovery and Storage Project has been tied up in litigation from environmental groups, fought over in the state legislature and faced hurdles by state and federal government officials. Here’s more about the Cadiz water project: 1. Who’s behind it? The project is a partnership between Cadiz Inc., a Los Angeles-based natural resources company, and several Southern California water agencies. The company owns about 35,000 acres with water rights in San Bernardino County.

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New Maps Show How Little Is Left Of West Coast Estuaries

/in , , /by /San Francisco Chronicleby Peter Fimrite

The most detailed study ever done of coastal estuaries concludes that nearly 750,000 acres of historic tidal wetlands along the West Coast, including enormous swaths of Bay Area habitat, have disappeared largely as a result of development. The cutting-edge survey led by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration determined that 85% of vegetated tidal lands that once existed in California, Oregon and Washington has been diked, drained or cut off from the sea. The study, published Wednesday in the scientific journal PLOS One, documented dramatic decreases in wetland habitat around San Francisco Bay, the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta and nearly 450 other bays, lagoons, river deltas and coastal creek mouths throughout the West.

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Arizona, Nevada Cuts To Colorado River Water Negligible

/in , , /by /Associated Pressby Felicia Fonseca

Arizona and Nevada will face their first-ever cuts in Colorado River water next year, but the changes aren’t expected to be overly burdensome for either state. The water is delivered through Lake Mead, one of the largest manmade reservoirs in the country that straddles the Arizona-Nevada border. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation said Thursday that Lake Mead barely will fall below 1,090 feet (332 meters) on Jan. 1, triggering cuts for the junior users in the river’s lower basin, at 1,089.4 (332 meters) above sea level. For Arizona, that means less water for underground storage, recharging aquifers and for agricultural use. About 7% of its 2.8 million acre-feet, or 192,000 acre-feet, will be left behind Lake Mead.

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Plan For Public Buyout Of Local Cal Am Water System Set For MPWMD Board Review

/in , /by /The Monterey County Herald (Monterey, Calif.)by Jim Johnson

A written plan for acquisition and ownership of California American Water’s local water system, and perhaps other privately owned local systems, is headed to the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District board for review. Released on Friday, the 15-page plan authored by water district general manager Dave Stoldt outlines a recommended approach to meet the district’s formal policy of pursuing public control of all “water production, storage and delivery assets and infrastructure,” as established by voter-approved Measure J. The plan was written to comply with the district’s public ownership rule requiring a written plan within nine months of the rule’s effective date in December last year, and the presentation to the board is considered informational with no action recommended.

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SMUD Set To Buy PG&E’s Only Hydroelectric Powerhouse On The American River For $10.4 Million

/in , /by /The Sacramento Beeby Vincent Moleski

The Sacramento Municipal Utility District is moving forward with plans to buy a hydroelectric powerhouse and reservoir from Pacific Gas and Electric Co. for $10.4 million. In a joint statement, the local utility providers announced that the Chili Bar Hydroelectric Project — a dam, reservoir, spillway and powerhouse that generates electricity north of Placerville on the South Fork of the American River — would be changing hands after SMUD’s board of directors voted Thursday evening to greenlight the purchase. The purchase is expected to be finalized in 2020.

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Caps On Groundwater Use Create A New Market In California

/in , , /by /The Economist

A long stretch of highway running between Los Angeles and San Francisco separates the dry hills to the west from the green plains of the San Joaquin Valley to the east, where much of America’s fruit, nuts and vegetables are grown. Every couple of miles billboards hint at the looming threat to the valley. “Is growing food a waste of water?” one billboard asks. Another simply says, “No Water, no Jobs”. In the San Joaquin Valley agriculture accounts for 18% of jobs and agriculture runs on water. Most of it comes from local rivers and rainfall, some is imported from the river deltas upstate, and the rest is pumped out of groundwater basins.

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