California and the U.S. Archives

Los Angeles and the Future of Urban Water in California

January 26, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Water Deeply (New York)

Los Angeles is a grand American urban experiment. It brings emerging ideas into the mainstream, sometimes for better, and sometimes for worse. In the early 20th century, it seemed fanciful to build a metropolis in a region receiving limited seasonal rainfall. But L.A. adopted the ideas of the time at grand scales. It built pipelines over hundreds of miles of rugged terrain to import water from the Owens Valley (1913), Colorado River (1939) and Northern California (1972). In a quest for growth, L.A. has always adopted new ideas to keep ahead.

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Another Leak: Sacramento County Joins Action Alleging Illegal Communications Over Twin Tunnels

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Sacramento News & Reviewby Scott Thomas Anderson

Already facing a lawsuit claiming decades of state mismanagement of the Oroville dam and a “culture of corruption” that fostered harassment, the California Department of Water Resources drew a new legal challenge from Sacramento County—one that accuses its employees of improper communications around the twin tunnels project.The latest DWR drama was triggered January 15, when attorneys for Sacramento and San Joaquin counties, and the city of Antioch, filed a motion demanding that the State Water Resources Control Board halt the phase-two public hearings for WaterFix, better known as “the twin tunnels” project.

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One Possible Delta Tunnels Deal Would Give Cheap Water to Farmers — and More Expensive Water to Cities

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Los Angeles Times

Months of behind the scenes talks have failed to drum up enough money to pay the full costs of replumbing the center of California’s sprawling waterworks with two giant water tunnels. That has left the state with little choice but to scale down a roughly $17-billion water delivery project to fit a funding pot of less than $10 billion. State officials are expected to soon announce exactly what form a revised California WaterFix would take.

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Idea of ‘Maximizing’ Water Deliveries Takes a Beating

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Chico Enterprise-Record

The Bureau of Reclamation came to Chico Thursday to take input on a proposal to maximize water deliveries from the Central Valley Project, and for two hours a succession of speakers told them it was a bad idea. The meeting was nominally to get comments just on what the environmental studies for the proposal should look at, but most of the speakers objected to the basic idea of taking more water from the north to deliver to the San Joaquin Valley for what more than one speaker called “desert agriculture.”

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DWR Says There Was Redundant Power for Spillway Gates

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Chico Enterprise-Record

The state Department of Water Resources now says there were “many redundant systems” to ensure the Oroville Dam spillway radial gates had power during February’s crisis. This comes after environmental groups voiced concern in an article published in this newspaper Wednesday about, seemingly, a lack of backup generators that would allow the department to control the gates even if crucial power lines went down. Radial gates at the top of the spillway allow for water releases.

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OPINION: Options for Gov. Brown’s delta tunnel project look to be drying up

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /The Orange County Register

Gov. Jerry Brown’s $17 billion plan for two massive tunnels to move water under the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta could be on the rocks. The governor’s office is reportedly holding talks with water contractors around the state to gauge support for downsizing the project to one tunnel at a cost of about $10 billion. But whether the smaller project would accomplish its goals or justify its cost remains unclear.

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State Of The State: Brown Focuses On Environment, Legacy Projects In Final Address

January 25, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /Capital Public Radio News (Sacramento)

Thursday marks the final State of the State address for California Gov. Jerry Brown. He’s entering his record sixteenth and last year in office. Check back here throughout the day as we’ll be adding updates on Gov. Jerry Brown’s State of the State address, including a transcript of the governor’s remarks and analysis from Capital Public Radio reporters.

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Bay Area Expected To Get Hit With Heavy Rain; Snow In Sierra

January 24, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /SF Gateby Sophie Haigney

One of the Bay Area’s last storms of the winter is expected Wednesday, with rainfall likely beginning this morning and continuing into the evening. “The rain will enter the North Bay early this morning and slowly push southward for the day,” said Brian Mejia, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

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Could A Major California City Run Dry Like Drought-Stricken Cape Town?

January 24, 2018/in California and the U.S. /by Mike Lee /The Mercury News (San Jose)by John Woolfolk

A dystopian drama is unfolding in Cape Town, a popular tourist destination of nearly 4 million on the coast of South Africa that in April is expected to become the modern world’s first major city to run out of water after three years of drought. For Californians, who panted through five years of record drought before last winter and have seen a fairly dry winter so far this year, it raises the worrisome question: Could it happen here?

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