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Lake Oroville Spillway Construction On Schedule, Says DWR

/in /by /Chico Enterprise-Recordby Dani Anguiano

Construction at the Lake Oroville spillways is on schedule to meet a Nov. 1 deadline for this year’s repairs, according to the Department of Water Resources. The department has passed the midway point on its construction timeline for this year’s repairs on the main spillway, which was badly damaged during high February releases. Construction efforts will remain focused on meeting the Nov. 1 deadline, DWR staff said during a conference call with media.

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Update On California Water Fix: MWD Board To Vote In September

/in /by /The Planning Reportby Jeff Kightlinger

In early August, two Metropolitan Water District committees met to discuss a series of whitepapers on potential financing strategies for the comprehensive infrastructure upgrades known as California Water Fix. The plan calls on the state to invest billions into replumbing the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, including Governor Jerry Brown’s signature tunnel project. In TPR, MWD General Manager Jeff Kightlinger discusses the need for an updated, reliable water conveyance system for Southern California. The veteran water leader also explains the importance of combining state projects like the Water Fix with MWD’s multi-state, and multi-national, work around the Colorado River watershed.

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Sites Reservoir Supporters Requested Half Of Prop. 1 Funds

/in /by /Capital Public Radio (Sacramento)by Amy Quinton

More than a dozen water storage projects are vying for money from the Proposition 1 water bond California voters approved in 2014. The largest request comes from supporters of Sites Reservoir, which would be built about an hour northwest of Sacramento in Colusa County. Mary Wells walks along a dirt road tucked into the valley there. She owns a cattle ranch here.

 

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Bill Before California Legislature Could Help Supply Clean Water To All

/in /by /Water Deeply (New York)by Kirsten James

California is home to some of the most agriculturally productive regions in the nation. Yet in many small communities scattered throughout those regions, residents lack the most basic commodity of all: clean, safe drinking water. Instead, what comes out of the taps in upward of 300 rural public water systems is water contaminated with arsenic, nitrates and other toxins, according to the State Water Resources Control Board. Each year, around 1 million Californians are exposed to unsafe water to meet their basic human needs.

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OPINION: Fund A Public Good — Clean Water For All

/in /by /San Francisco Chronicle

In California, a state that considers itself among the most advanced nations in the world, nearly 2 million people live without safe drinking water. These Californians reside in 300 small, sometimes remote, but always impoverished communities where the state’s 2012 first-in-the-nation law guaranteeing a right to safe and affordable drinking water is but an empty promise. It will take every Californian to ensure clean water is available to all. Groundwater in these communities is contaminated by naturally occurring pollutants, such as arsenic, but more typically by agricultural runoff.

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3.2-Magnitude Earthquake Strikes Near San Francisco

/in /by /The Sacramento Beeby Laura Sussman

A 3.2-magnitude earthquake struck Tuesday morning near San Francisco Tuesday morning at 5:36 a.m. The earthquake, reported at 5:36 a.m., was recorded at a 4.9-kilometer depth, according to United States Geological Survey. The quake occurred right along the San Andreas Fault Line. The epicenter of the tremor was in the Pacific, about 6.8 miles from the Golden Gate Bridge, 9.9 miles from San Francisco and 6.8 miles from Tamalpais-Homestead Valley in Marin County.

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Water Updates Large And Small

/in /by /The Bakersfield Californianby Lois Henry

What’s new in water? Oh, I thought you’d never ask. I’ve got some important tidbits for you. Oh don’t whine, this is the last water column by me you’ll have to slog through so COWGRRRL UP! The biggest, immediate water question right now is: Will they? Or won’t they? I’m talking about the California WaterFix and whether local farmers will help pay for it. WaterFix is the new generation “peripheral canal” project being pushed by Gov. Jerry Brown to route water through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta via two tunnels, to avoid further damage to endangered fish species.

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BLOG: It’s Crucial to Upgrade America’s Water Infrastructure

/in /by /Scientific American

What implications will Trump administration policies have for America’s rivers? When I was first asked this, I felt like a school kid caught daydreaming in class by the teacher. It was during the Q&A following a public talk I’d given at the Smithsonian a few months ago on the science of rivers, and I didn’t have a ready answer. I’m a science geek, not a policy wonk.

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Study: Heavy Storms May Be Enough to Recharge California Groundwater

/in /by /Water Deeply (New York)

California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, passed in 2014, requires some 250 groundwater basins throughout the state to halt the overdraft in their aquifers. The big question for everyone is: Where will the water come from to do that? It could come from “high-magnitude flows” – flooding events, essentially, that occur from just a handful of storms every winter. Tiffany Kocis, a PhD student in hydrologic sciences at University of California, Davis, is the lead author of a new study that attempts to quantify these high flows.

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OPINION: The Scheme to Pump Desert Water to L.A. Could Destroy the Mojave. California’s Legislature Needs to Block It

/in /by /Los Angeles Times

Unlike some deserts, California’s Mojave Desert is full of life. There are tortoises and bighorn sheep, breathtaking wildflower blooms and Joshua trees. Many of the state’s plant and animal species can be found only there. It’s a unique and beautiful ecosystem, but also a fragile one. Life in the Mojave is sustained by underground aquifers and springs, many of them formed over thousands of years. These aquifers support surrounding communities, including Native American tribes, and some 2,100 jobs in tourism, mining, ranching and other industries.

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