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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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Desperate For New Water Supplies, SLO County Bets On Cloud-Seeding Program

/in , /by /The Tribune (San Luis Obispo, Calif.)by Monica Vaughan

It was the summer of 2015, and San Luis Obispo County was in the fourth year of severe drought with no rain in sight. Half-empty reservoirs were declining, the water table was noticeably dropping, farmers had fallowed fields. Water managers responsible for city and agricultural supplies frantically looked for possible emergency water sources if conditions got worse. Brian Talley, third-generation farmer and president of Talley Fields and Talley Vineyards in Arroyo Grande, made the tough call to plant fewer crops in the fields around Huasna Road after the wells used to irrigate the farm and vineyard “became very unproductive.”

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Judge Weighs Newark’s Response to Lead in Its Water (4)

/in , /by /Bloomberg Environment (New York City, N.Y.)by John Herzfeld and David Schultz

Environmental and community advocates are calling for a federal judge to order the city of Newark to speed its response to lead contamination of drinking water. They are asking Judge Esther Salas of U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey to make the city expand and improve its distribution of bottled water and tap filters, as well as expedite a plan to replace lead pipes. Salas pressed the lawyer for Newark, Eric L. Klein of Beveridge & Diamond PC, on the adequacy of the city’s response, amid Aug. 15 arguments on the request for expanded water…

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First-Ever Mandatory Water Cutbacks Will Kick In Next Year Along The Colorado River

/in , , /by /The Arizona Republic (Phoenix, Ariz.)by Ian James

Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will be required to take less water from the Colorado River for the first time next year under a set of agreements that aim to keep enough water in Lake Mead to reduce the risk of a crash. The federal Bureau of Reclamation activated the mandatory reductions in water deliveries on Thursday when it released projections showing that as of Jan. 1, the level of Lake Mead will sit just below a threshold that triggers the cuts. Arizona and Nevada agreed to leave a portion of their water allotments in the reservoir under a landmark deal with California called the Lower Basin Drought Contingency Plan, which the states’ representatives signed at Hoover Dam in May.

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New Sprinklers Will Soon Be More Expensive In California. Here’s Why

/in , , /by /The Sacramento Beeby Andrew Sheeler

Californians, your yard sprinklers are about to get a little bit more expensive. The good news is, your water bill is about to get cheaper. California on Wednesday officially adopted new regulations which are estimated to save more than 400 million gallons of water per day within 10 years, enough to supply San Diego, the second largest city in the state, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council. Beginning in 2020, spray sprinklers will be required to be sold with a component that restricts the water flow to as close as possible to 30 pounds per square inch (PSI), the manufacturer-recommended level.

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New CA Lawn Sprinkler Standards = Huge Water & Energy Savings

/in , /by /NRDCby Ed Osann

California officials today adopted one of the most important and consequential water-saving measures ever implemented by any state, establishing an efficiency standard for new spray sprinklers that will reduce irrigation system misting and overspray that is common around urban landscapes. It’s a huge step given that nearly half of all of California’s drinking water is used outdoors, primarily for landscape irrigation.

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UCLA To Lead $10 Million California Conservation Project

/in , , /by /University Of California by Stuart Wolpert

UCLA scientists are leading a $10 million project to help California officials make ecologically wise decisions as the state continues to confront the effects of climate change.

The California Conservation Genomics Project, which is funded by the state, will involve conservation biologists, geneticists, ecologists and climate scientists from all 10 University of California campuses, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory, the UC Natural Reserve System and California State University campuses, as well as officials from state and federal regulatory agencies and nongovernment agencies, such as The Nature Conservancy. It is intended to run through 2022 or 2023.

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