This compilation of drone footage from May 20, 2017 through November 1, 2017 highlights the transformation of Lake Oroville’s main spillway during repairs. Kiewit Infrastructure has led the massive construction effort to repair and reconstruct the main spillway by Nov. 1, 2017 to handle flows of 100,000 cubic-feet per second this winter.
You’ll want to hold onto your hat if you’re headed to the Sierra this week. A storm system moving over the mountain range shared by California and Nevada will bring a light dusting of snow, and more conspicuously high winds on ridge tops Wednesday through Thursday, with isolated gusts up to 100 miles per hour possible. “The wind is the most dramatic part of this storm system,” says Chris Johnston, a forecaster with the National Weather Service in Reno. “In the case of this storm, we are talking about what we call strong downslope winds.”
Snowpacks in Oregon, Idaho, Washington and California and are expected be much smaller by mid-century if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, according to federal projections released Friday. The Fourth National Climate Assessment, completed once every four years, asserts that the mild winter of 2014-15 may have foreshadowed the future. “As a harbinger, the unusually low Western U.S. snowpack of 2015 may become the norm,” according to the report.
Reps. John Garamendi, D-Walnut Grove, and Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, Monday introduced to a bill that would require the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to conduct an additional environmental review of the Oroville Dam. The congressmen would like to see a review done before the commission approves the relicensing of the dam under state Department of Water Resources’ management. Garamendi is advocating for another environmental review since the Oroville Dam has undergone major structural changes in the aftermath of February’s crisis, sending over 180,000 downstream residents fleeing from their homes, he stated in a press release.
State Sen. Jim Nielsen, Assemblyman James Gallagher and Oroville Dam Coalition members are heading to Washington, D.C., this week to address what they say are outstanding issues following the spillway crisis. The group will attend meetings with commissioners and staff of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and attend briefings with the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Additionally, the group will meet with the Federal Highway Administration regarding improvements to Highway 70.
It sounds like a nice, elegant compromise for a California water project swamped in uncertainty: If there isn’t enough money to build two Delta tunnels, why not build just one? Drastically downsizing Gov. Jerry Brown’s tunnels wouldn’t merely save money. It would also reduce the project’s footprint and make it more palatable to some of its critics. A coalition of environmental groups has endorsed a lone-tunnel approach.
The rains that swept into Northern California this weekend from the Gulf of Alaska didn’t turn out to be as extensive as forecasters had expected. But along with slick roads and soggy children’s soccer games, they brought some good news. There were no reports of mudslides or other major problems in Napa and Sonoma counties, where tens of thousands of acres of bare ground from last month’s fires raised concerns about significant erosion.
When a top Interior Department official acknowledged recently that the Trump administration wouldn’t try to block removal of four hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River, he signaled a monumental victory for local Native American tribes, salmon fishermen and the national dam removal movement. Yet this development is less momentous than it would have been in 2015, when dam removal was just one component of a broad plan for the Klamath Basin, which straddles the California-Oregon border.
The first fall storm of 2017 is expected to dump up to 2 1/2 feet of snow across the Sierra region over the weekend. The National Weather Service in Sacramento is predicting 24 to 30 inches of snow in Lassen Park and 12 to 18 inches in Donner, Carson, Ebbets, Tioga and Sonora passes. Several inches are also expected in the Shasta National Forest.
If you thought California’s water wars were bitter, just wait until you see our water data wars. Digital tools have expanded the ability of governments, companies and nonprofits to measure the uses of California water in detail, and thus build more water-efficient products, boost water conservation, and replace expensive and inefficient infrastructure. But the abundance of water data effectively makes every piece of land and every drop of water in California the subject of measurement – and conflict. The data also exposes the fragmentation and deficiencies of California’s system of water management.
