One morning in the summer of 2018, Kelly Stober woke up and started to get ready for work. But when she turned on the faucet in her shower, no water came out.
Stober lives in a rural neighborhood a few miles east of downtown Sonoma. Like her neighbors, she relies on a well for drinking water, household uses, and irrigation. And her well, sunk 800 feet into the ground, had run dry.
Solvang commercial, industrial and institutional water system customers will face steep financial penalties if they don’t immediately cut back their water usage at least 20%.
City Council members on July 11 unanimously adopted a drought ordinance update that clarifies rate tier penalties in relation to declared drought stages. The city has been in a Stage 2 drought stage since August 2021.
Several parts of Texas are under excessive heat warnings as temperatures are expected to hit triple digits for the 24th day in a row. Temperatures reached 110 degrees in the Dallas area on Tuesday. The high temperatures caused heat-fueled wildfires to burn several homes near Dallas on Monday and forced several people into mandatory evacuations.
California’s forests are in rapid retreat, which bodes ill for the future.
Using satellite data, researchers from the University of California, Irvine found that trees in the state’s mountainous regions declined 6.7 percent between 1985 and 2021 thanks to wildfires, drought and other climate-related sources of stress.
Once you’ve finalized your landscaping plans, you’ll have some demolition work ahead of you, including the existing turf you plan to remove or replace. Removing turf presents choices about the best way to accomplish this task. Learn more about turf removal options and understand the steps before you begin.
To ensure a successful water-saving landscape, pick your plants for each water-use category to ensure you meet your water-conservation goals. Focus on local native plants or plants from similar climate regions.
Once you’ve chosen your plant types, there are additional important considerations.
A rare triple-dip La Niña is looking increasingly likely for the Northern Hemisphere. The latest outlook by NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, released Thursday, indicates there’s a 62% to 66% chance the current La Niña climate condition will persist through fall and early winter.
If that happens, it’ll be the third La Niña winter in a row – a rare phenomenon we’ve only seen twice since 1950. A third consecutive La Niña year would likely have a major impact on California.
California’s historic drought may leave the state with the largest amount of empty farmland in recent memory as farmers face unprecedented cuts to crucial water supplies.
The size of fields intended for almonds, rice, wine grapes and other crops left unworked could be around 800,000 acres, double the size of last year and the most in at least several decades, said Josue Medellin-Azuara, an associate professor at University of California Merced.
When it comes to slaking Southern California’s colossal thirst for water, more and more local governments are searching their own sewer lines for a solution.
In the face of dire drought, cities and water agencies are now investing heavily in large-scale wastewater recycling facilities — systems that will purify the billions of gallons of treated sewage that are currently flushed out to sea.
Damon Ayala patrols the streets of drought-stricken Los Angeles every day, inspecting the sidewalks. Each time he sees a puddle, he stops.
He is part of the city’s Department of Water and Power team, which looks into hundreds of community complaints filed by neighbors each week about water waste.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
