Urgent action on water security is essential to better prepare societies for future global health crises, say experts at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. and Northwestern University in the U.S.
The San Diego County Water Authority announced today it is partnering with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego to better predict atmospheric rivers and improve water management before, during and after those seasonal storms.
The Colorado River millennial mega-drought continues, despite robust snowpack last winter. Above-average temperatures in spring resulted in a paltry 57% runoff, nowhere near enough water to refill the reservoirs that remain half-empty. Based on these conditions, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation recently determined that 2021 will be a “tier zero” year under the Lower Colorado River Basin Drought Contingency Plan, with reduced water deliveries for Arizona, Nevada, and Mexico.
When blackouts rolled across California on August 14 and 15, briefly cutting off power to several hundred thousand households and their air conditioners, fridges, and medical devices during a pandemic and a record-breaking heat wave, some critics blamed the state’s heavy reliance on solar and wind energy. As the state pursues its ambitious renewable energy goals, they asked, will electric power become unreliable?
The San Diego County Water Authority announced Monday it is partnering with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego to better predict atmospheric rivers and improve water management before, during and after those seasonal storms. This month, Scripps’ Center for Western Weather and Water Extremes launched the Water Affiliates Group, which brings together science and hands-on water industry experience to enhance reservoir operations in light of the changing climate. The water authority has a long-running alliance with Scripps.
Gov. Gavin Newsom recently released his Water Resilience Plan, a platform of 142 proposals gathered from state agencies to manage and improve California’s water future.
The big ticket items are two infrastructure projects: the Delta conveyance tunnel and Sites Reservoir, alongside the Sacramento River.
On a cool February morning, around 60 people gathered in the Sierra Nevada foothills to take part in a ceremony that, for many decades, was banned.
Men and women from Native American tribes in Northern California stood in a circle, alongside university students and locals from around the town of Mariposa. Several wore bright yellow shirts made of flame-resistant fabric. For the next two days, the group would be carefully lighting fires in the surrounding hills.
When Gov. Gavin Newsom downsized the Delta tunnels water project last year, the idea was to save money and try to appease at least some of the project’s critics. Yet the project remains controversial — and still figures to be costly. After months of relative quiet, Newsom’s administration released a preliminary cost estimate for the scaled-back project Friday: $15.9 billion for a single tunnel running beneath the estuary just south of Sacramento.
The Vallecitos Water District is known for its sustainable practices in water and wastewater treatment processes, without any compromise in water quality. The district is now using a new ultrasound technology to address water quality at the Stanley A. Mahr Reservoir with a reduced need for chemical treatment. Mahr Reservoir was completed in 1981. Originally called La Costa Storage No. 1 Dam and Reservoir, it was renamed after the district’s original founder 35-year board member Stanley A. Mahr.
Hurricane Genevieve fizzled after hammering Mexico’s Baja Peninsula, but its remnant moisture and spin may boost thunderstorms in the Desert Southwest and fire-ravaged California through Monday.
Genevieve rapidly intensified to a Category 4 hurricane Tuesday, then grazed Mexico’s southern Baja California Peninsula as a weaker hurricane with flooding rain, high winds and high surf.
After that, as most hurricanes in this part of the eastern Pacific do when they move farther northwest over cooler water and more stable air, Genevieve fizzled rapidly into a remnant low west of the Baja Peninsula.
