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The Biggest Share of Colorado River Water in the West is up for Grabs

/in , /by /The Desert Sun (Palm Springs)by Sammy Roth

A public agency and a powerful farmer are gearing up for a high-stakes court battle to determine who owns the largest share of Colorado River water in the West, complicating the river’s future as seven western states scramble to avoid severe water shortages. There’s a long history of fighting over water in California’s Imperial Valley, which has a legal right to more than 1 trillion gallons of Colorado River water each year — twice as much as the rest of California, and as much as Arizona and Nevada combined.

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Southern California To Face Enhanced Fire Danger Through Start Of November

/in , /by /AccuWeatherby Kristina Pydynowski

Locally gusty winds, warm weather and no signs of needed rain returning will keep the fire danger elevated across Southern California through the start of November. November is expected to pick up where October ended with winds blowing over parts of Southern California. “While the peak of the Santa Ana wind event occurred on Wednesday morning, locally gusty winds can persist in the wind-prone areas of Southern California late this week,” according to AccuWeather Meteorologist Maggie Samuhel.

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The Precarious Plan for the Lake Powell Pipeline

/in , /by /High Country News (Colorado)by Emma Penrod

Nearly a decade ago, Gabriel Lozada, a man with a wiry frame and waves of steel-gray hair who looks exactly like the mathematician he is, set out to answer what he thought was a relatively simple question: Could Utah’s proposed Lake Powell Pipeline — a plan to ferry Colorado River water to southern Utah — live up to the state’s rosy forecasts of growth and prosperity? Or was it more likely to tank the economy of a small but lively retirement community in the southwestern Utah desert?

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San Francisco Leaders Hate Trump Enough They Voted to Limit the City’s Water Rather Than do This

/in , /by /The Sacramento Beeby Ryan Sabalow and Dale Kasler

For months, San Francisco, a hotbed of anti-Donald Trump sentiment, has found itself in the awkward position of being aligned with his administration over California water policy. On Tuesday, the city’s leaders said the alliance was unbearable. In an 11-0 vote, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors agreed in a resolution to support the State Water Resources Control Board’s proposal to leave more water in the San Joaquin River and its tributaries to benefit struggling fish populations. The supervisors’ vote is subject to veto by Mayor London Breed, although the board could override the veto.

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Los Angeles Water Officials Cancel Settlement Meeting with San Diego County Water Authority

/in , /by /The San Diego Union-Tribuneby Jeff McDonald Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

An offer last week by the San Diego County Water Authority board chairman to settle a host of litigation with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California was not well received by water officials to the north. MWD leaders accused their San Diego counterparts of violating an agreement to negotiate in private and abruptly canceled a meeting previously scheduled for Tuesday. “We were surprised by the unilateral decision by the San Diego County Water Authority to make the proposal letter public as our ongoing discussions … were confidential and our agencies have an executed confidentiality agreement governing those discussions,” the MWD chairman wrote Monday.

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Massive California Water Tunnel Project Forges Ahead on Several Fronts

/in , /by /Water Deeply (New York)by Cariad Hayes Thronson

The spring and  summer of 2018 saw frenzied activity around California WaterFix, the latest iteration of a decades-long, on-again-off-again effort to convey fresh water from the Sacramento River to the South Delta export pumps while bypassing the Delta itself. Governor Jerry Brown has made WaterFix a top priority, but as his administration heads into its final months, the project – one of the largest infrastructure projects in state history – still faces a raft of uncertainties.

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Permit Delays Dam Up Hydro Projects, Relicensing Costs Millions

/in , /by /Bloomberg Environmentby Rebecca Kern

Alvin Thoma’s youngest son was born the year his employer, Pacific Gas & Electric Co., began the process of renewing the license for its Upper North Fork Feather River hydropower facility in northern California. His son is 19 years old now. The facility, however, is still undergoing relicensing. “For me, that’s a mental image of just how long it takes to go through this process,” Thoma, a director of power generation at PG&E, which runs one of the largest hydro systems in the country, told Bloomberg Environment.

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California’s Dry October Could be a Sign of More Concentrated Rainy Seasons

/in , /by /Capital Public Radioby Ezra David Romero

The first part of fall has been dry so far in California, and that trend might continue. UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain said it’s not unusual for rain to be scarce in October, but that dry conditions – like the ones forecast over the next few weeks – are increasingly being pushed deeper into autumn. “We expect there to be a further concentration of California’s already narrow rainy season into even fewer months during just the middle of winter,” Swain said, as laid out in his recent blog post. Swain’s research suggests this trend is already evident, especially in Southern California.

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Pipeline 5 Upgrades Begin in Fallbrook

/in , /by /Water News Network Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

A $25.3 million Pipeline 5 relining project is under way in North County to improve the reliability of the San Diego region’s water delivery system. The project involves rehabilitating approximately 2.3 miles of one of the San Diego County Water Authority’s regional wholesale water pipelines in eight segments along a 9.5-mile stretch through the community of Fallbrook. Construction work will be done in phases and completed in summer 2019. When finished, the Pipeline 5 Relining Project will help extend the service life of this vital piece of infrastructure for more than 75 years. Generally, relining construction rehabilitates segments of pipelines based on their age and the need for improvements.

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OPINION: Untangling the Complexities of California’s Proposition 3 Water Bond

/in , /by /Water Deeply (New York)by Heather Cooley, Sonali Abraham, Sarah Diringer and Cora Kammeyer

On November 6, California voters will decide the fate of Proposition 3 (the Water Supply and Water Quality Act of 2018), which authorizes the sale of $8.9 billion in new general obligation bonds for water-related infrastructure and environmental projects. This includes funds – most of which would be distributed through grants – for various projects related to water supply, watershed health, flood management, groundwater, facility upgrades and fish and wildlife habitat. Many are confused about the bond, and numerous organizations have taken positions supporting or opposing it. We at the Pacific Institute, a California-based think-tank focused on water, are taking no formal position on Proposition 3, opting instead to offer the voting public some insights into its complexities.

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