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Can Lithium Cure What Ails the Salton Sea?

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Louis Sahagún

Studying the complexity of mud on the ocean floor is a life’s work for Timothy Lyons, so when the tall and lean biogeochemist asks you to join an expedition in search of chemical mysteries buried deep beneath the waves, be prepared to get wet and dirty.

On a recent foray onto California’s largest and most troubled lake, Lyons rode a Zodiac skiff with a 15-horsepower engine across the Salton Sea against a backdrop of desolate mountains, dunes and miles of shoreline bristling with the bones of thousands of dead fish and birds.

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SFPUC Calls For 10% Voluntary Reduction In Water Use As It Declares Water Emergency

/in , , /by /CBS 5 Bay Area

The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is urging nearly 3 million water customers throughout the Bay Area to cut water usage by 10%, as it declares a water shortage emergency due to the ongoing drought.

“With California still experiencing devastating drought and the uncertainty around this rainy season, we need to make tough decisions that will ensure that our water source continues to be reliable and dependable for the future,” Mayor London Breed said in a statement Tuesday.

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These Four Metrics Are Used to Track Drought, and They Paint a Bleak Picture

/in , , /by /KUNC Coloradoby Alex Hager

Drought has tightened its grip on the Western U.S., as dry conditions tick on into their second decade and strain a river that supplies 40 million people. Experts agree that things are bad and getting worse. But how exactly do you measure a drought, and how can you tell where it’s going?

Brad Udall is an expert on the subject, studying water and climate at Colorado State University’s Colorado Water Center. Lately, his forecasts for the basin haven’t been particularly uplifting.

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Infrastructure Bill Passage to Boost California Projects

/in , , /by /AgAlertby Christine Souza

In actions that carry out President Biden’s economic agenda, the U.S. House of Representatives last week passed two pieces of significant legislation, including a $1.2 trillion bipartisan package that includes $8.3 billion for critical water projects in drought-parched California and the West.

On Friday, the House also passed the president’s social safety-net bill, the $1.75 trillion Build Back Better Act, on a party-line vote. That bill, which funds universal pre-K, expansion of Medicare, renewable energy credits and affordable housing, now moves to the Senate.

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Opinion: Arizona Farmers Must Use Less Water to Survive. Here Are 5 things to Do Differently

/in , , /by /Arizona Centralby Gary Nabhan

A profound reduction in the Colorado River water earmarked for Arizona’s crops has at last triggered the rationing that irrigation farmers have dreaded. The Tier 1 shortage will prompt a 512,000-acre-foot reduction in Arizona’s Colorado River deliveries.

That amounts to about 30% of Central Arizona Project’s normal supply. Extrapolating from University of Arizona studies, it will result in a decrease of about $100 million in farmgate sales, and much more if the indirect effects are fully factored in.

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California Utilities Leaving Millions in Debt Relief on the Table

/in , , /by /Capital and Mainby Dan Ross

As the application window for a near billion-dollar state program designed to help cash-strapped Californians with pandemic-related drinking water debt nears its close date, almost 50% of eligible water systems have fully completed the application, but nearly one quarter haven’t yet started the process — a scenario that could see many struggling households lose the chance to have their financial burdens alleviated.

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State Attorneys Want Biden to Further Undo Trump’s NEPA Rule

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Law by Jennifer Hijazi and Stephen Lee

The Biden administration’s proposal to bolster environmental permitting review is a good first step but doesn’t go far enough towards scrapping Trump-era rules, according to a coalition of Democratic attorneys general.

The changes included in President Joe Biden’s National Environmental Policy Act proposed rule fall short of undoing Trump-era regulations that undermined the environmental review process, the attorneys general said in their comment letter submitted Tuesday.

 

 

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California Drought Unlikely to End This Winter

/in , , /by /The Orange County Registerby Martin Wisckol

Don’t hold your breath for California’s drought ending with this winter’s rains. Instead, you’d do well to hold your shower time to a minimum.

There’s less than a 40% chance of water supplies getting back to normal after this winter, with a slightly better than 50% chance that the state’s drought will worsen, according to forecasters at a Monday, Nov. 22, drought webinar hosted by the National Integrated Drought Information Center. The center is led by NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

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Rainy Season Checklist | How to Help Keep San Diego Waters Clean

/in , , /by /CBS8by Karlene Chavis

The rainy season is in full swing. When we talk about the rainy season, there’s a checklist that the County of San Diego wants you to remember because stormwater pollution is a major problem here.

“While you’re looking at your property and your home and your world, you should do everything we can to keep pollutants off of the streets, off of our curbs and gutters, out of our storm drains and out of our local waterways,” said Stephanie Gaines, the Program Coordinator for the County of San Diego.

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Cloud Seeding Gains Steam as West Faces Worsening Droughts

/in , , /by /The Seattle Timesby Maddie Stone

As the first winter storms rolled through this month, a King Air C90 turboprop aircraft contracted by the hydropower company Idaho Power took to the skies over southern Idaho to make it snow.

Flying across the cloud tops, the aircraft dropped flares that burned as they descended, releasing plumes of silver iodide that caused ice crystals to form and snow to fall over the mountains.

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