The Senate’s environment panel pushed through two major water infrastructure bills Wednesday, rejecting a GOP member’s attempt to give Western states more authority over water supplies but agreeing to direct the EPA to set drinking water limits for “forever chemicals” known as PFAS.
Ateam of UCLA undergraduate students has won a national competition sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency seeking innovative plans for stormwater management. The team proposed to redesign elements of a Los Angeles elementary school to improve its environmental sustainability.
In a bid to remove salt and other minerals from ocean salt water, otherwise known as desalination, without using bulky hydraulic pumps, a team from Virginia Tech has developed a simplified pump composed of a fluidic flexible matrix composite material.
Temperatures will reach well into the triple digits again Thursday in the San Diego County deserts, according to the National Weather Service. Conditions in the rest of the county will also remain warm, but will be slightly cooler than Wednesday.
One of many pressing challenges facing San Diego’s next mayor will be the city’s growing infrastructure funding gap – likely to worsen due to the economic fallout tied to the coronavirus pandemic.
The San Diego County Water Authority is distributing 25,000 cloth masks to water and wastewater agency employees in six Southern California counties as part of the national effort to ensure essential workers have enough protective gear during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The masks are available to public and private water and wastewater utilities in Mono, Inyo, San Bernardino, Riverside, San Diego and Imperial counties. Water Authority staff created a drive-through operation to maintain physical distancing while handing out the facemasks.
“It’s a tall order, but one that leverages our core values of collaboration and communication on behalf of our community,” said Water Authority General Manager Sandra L. Kerl. “It’s part of our duty as water and wastewater professionals to continue ensuring a clean, safe, and reliable water supply for our region – and beyond.”
A dry April caused the expected spring-summer runoff into Lake Powell to plunge dramatically, with the water-flow forecast down the Colorado River declining as much in one month as Tucson Water customers use in 10 years.
As the Environmental Protection Agency moves closer to implementing regulations for PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), commonly referred to as “forever chemicals,” in the U.S. drinking water supply, many Americans are “just saying no” to tap water. According to the J.D. Power 2020 U.S. Water Utility Residential Customer Satisfaction Study released today, 25 percent of Americans say they never drink their tap water, setting the stage for a serious set of customer satisfaction challenges on the part of regional water utilities.
For the Chavez family and many others in California’s fertile San Joaquin Valley, bottled water is the toilet paper of their coronavirus pandemic — an everyday necessity that vanished from supermarket shelves.
California’s top water regulator adopted a plan Tuesday that will guide the state in identifying and helping communities that don’t have access to safe drinking water.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
