John Entsminger walks a fine line as Southern Nevada’s top water official.
On one side, he has to explain the seriousness of a shrinking Colorado River to climate change skeptics and people who are content with not immediately handling the West’s water woes. On the other, he has to quell concerns of crisis on a river that supplies water to 40 million people in the U.S. and Mexico.
A Southern Nevada water board approved a pair of resolutions Monday that seek to scale back future water consumption to accommodate population growth over the next several decades.
The Southern Nevada Water Authority board of directors approved one resolution to ban the installation of grass in new developments and another that supports a moratorium on the use of thirsty cooling units for new buildings.
Droughtsville, California, is in trouble.
Its water supply is endangered as multiple crises intensify: worsening droughts, competition for scarce supplies, sea level rise, groundwater contamination, earthquakes, wildfires and extreme weather. All of these factors, and more, threaten Droughtville’s ability to provide clean water to its residents.
The city is fictional, but the threats are not.
In the San Joaquin Valley, water is becoming a commodity equal to life and death.
California is a powerhouse of food production, growing some 40 percent of the country’s fruit, vegetables and nuts. However, the agriculture industry depends on a water supply that’s increasingly fragile and unreliable as the climate warms. As a means to increase access to livable drinking water, community and elected leaders alike are rallying behind “Building More Dams.” But this is simply not a viable solution.
If You’re Headed Up to Tahoe This Week and Dreaming of a White Christmas, Meteorologists Say You’ll Get Your Wish. But It Might Not Be the Smoothest Trip Through the Sierra Nevada.
The Mountains Are Expected to Get Blanketed With Snow From a Series of Storms That Will Bring Rain to the Bay Area, With Donner Pass Seeing Possibly a Total of 80 to 100 Inches of Snow Tuesday Through Saturday, According to the National Weather Service Office in Sacramento.
State water officials have asked local groundwater agencies to better prevent land subsidence. Simultaneously, the state is also working to fix the damage caused by sinking land.
Subsidence is caused by the over-pumping of groundwater. It occurs in many parts of California but is especially pronounced in the San Joaquin Valley during drought years.
In a stunning turnaround, Marin County water supplies that were once at risk of going dry next year have refilled to above-average levels following a series of unusually early downpours.
Marin water officials are reevaluating some drought restrictions and penalties that were adopted earlier this year, especially with more rain in the forecast this week.
After two years of drought, Gov. Gavin Newsom remains reluctant to put limits on statewide water use. His administration, however, is looking to take a first step.
Next month, the State Water Resources Control Board is expected to adopt temporary prohibitions on outdoor water practices, including hosing down driveways, filling up decorative fountains and watering lawns within 48 hours of rain.
A one-two punch of storm systems is expected to drape the Bay Area in rainy weather for much of the upcoming week while potentially making holiday travel in the Sierra Nevada mountains “very challenging to impossible,” meteorologists say.
A proposed ballot measure that would dedicate $100 billion to bolster California’s water supply is drawing a sharp rebuke, not only for the amount of spending but also for the dramatic sidesteps it would allow in the environmental review process.
For example, the proposal would make the controversial plan for a Huntington Beach desalination plant eligible for a huge taxpayer subsidy — even though the private, for-profit Poseidon Water company currently intends to pay for the $1.4 billion in construction costs.
