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Operators Ready Reservoirs To Hold Large Snowpack

/in /by /California Farm Bureau Federation (Sacramento) by Christine Souza

As Gov. Brown declared an official end to the California drought emergency last week, reservoir operators continued preparations to handle runoff of a Sierra Nevada snowpack that stood at roughly 170 percent of average at the start of the week. The governor’s order maintained water-reporting requirements and prohibitions on practices such as hosing off city sidewalks and irrigating ornamental turf on public street medians. It also ordered state agencies to continue requiring agricultural and urban water suppliers to “accelerate their data collection, improve water system management and prioritize capital projects to reduce water waste.”

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Oroville Dam Document Secrecy Frustrating Lawmakers

/in /by /Oroville Mercury Registerby Dan Reidel

It’s not just the residents of Oroville, Gridley and Yuba City who are frustrated with the Department of Water Resources’ lack of transparency concerning the Oroville Dam spillways.Two California legislators who represent those living downstream from the dam are also upset that they aren’t getting answers. State Senator Jim Nielsen, R-Gerber, and Assemblyman James Gallagher, R-Yuba City, published a statement in early April that said written communication between the federal government and the California Department of Water Resources should be made public in the interest of “full transparency.”

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Lawmakers Outraged Over Secrecy, Governor Defends State’s Handling Of Oroville Dam Spillway Emergency

/in /by /CBS Sacramentoby Lemor Abrams

California Gov. Jerry Brown held his first news conference in February on the Oroville Dam emergency after the threat of lake Oroville sent nearly 200,000 people from their homes. The governor defended the state’s handling of the crisis, while asking for federal assistance for the emergency. Now, about two months after declaring a state of emergency in Oroville, Brown’s administration is blocking a public review of records relating to what happened when the spillway began eroding, how it was maintained, and the crisis aftermath.

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EPA To Use 2 Rulemakings To Repeal And Replace WOTUS

/in /by /E&E Newsby Ariel Wittenberg

U.S. EPA plans to repeal and replace the Clean Water Rule with two separate rulemaking processes, an EPA official told the Association of State Wetland Managers yesterday. In a talk to the association’s annual winter meeting, Mindy Eisenberg, acting director of the EPA wetlands division, said that the agency plans to first rescind the Obama administration’s contentious regulation and then work on a new definition for “waters of the United States,” according to multiple people who attended the meeting.

 

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From Extreme Drought To Record Rain: Why California’s Drought-To-Deluge Cycle Is Getting Worse

/in /by /Los Angeles Timesby Rong-Gong Lin II, Paige St. John

California’s climate has long been dominated by cycles of intense dry conditions followed by heavy rain and snow. But never before in recorded history has the state seen such an extreme drought-to-deluge swing. Experts and state water officials say California is seeing more of these intense weather swings as temperatures warm, which has profound implications for the droughts and floods the state may face in the generations to come.

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From Extreme Drought To Record Rain: Why California’s Drought-To-Deluge Cycle Is Getting Worse

/in /by /Los Angeles Timesby Rong-Gong Lin II and Paige St. John

California’s climate has long been dominated by cycles of intense dry conditions followed by heavy rain and snow. But never before in recorded history has the state seen such an extreme drought-to-deluge swing. Experts and state water officials say California is seeing more of these intense weather swings as temperatures warm, which has profound implications for the droughts and floods the state may face in the generations to come.

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VIDEO: With More Snow Ahead, Northern Sierra On Pace To Set Record

/in /by /The Weather Network USby Dalia Ibrahim

California’s Northern Sierra could be breaking a record this week as additional precipitation moves onshore across the West Coast. The region — which supplies water for the rest of the state — is expected to surpass its record for the wettest year.

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See California Reservoirs Fill Up In These Before-And-After Images

/in /by /San Francisco Chronicleby Amy Graff

At the height of the California drought, images of empty reservoirs became the poster children of a state that desperately needed water. Their low water levels revealed massive swaths of dry, cracked lake beds. Now that the state has finally moved out of the drought with a rainy season marked by ceaseless moisture-packed storms, these same reservoirs are filled with water and 100 to 170 percent of their historical averages. Brimming and replenished, they’re a symbol of the state’s recovery.

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Conservation Group Lists Lower Colorado as America’s ‘Most-Endangered’ River

/in /by /Las Vegas Review-Journal by Brooke Wanser

The lower Colorado is the most-threatened river in America, a conservation advocacy group said in its annual report published Tuesday. The nonprofit American Rivers had placed the entire Colorado River and upper river atop its list of “most-endangered rivers” in previous years. But this is the first time the lower Colorado, which supplies Las Vegas with 90 percent of its water via Lake Mead, has been designated as in danger. “The main criteria we use is whether there’s a key decision point in the year,” said Amy Kober, a spokeswoman for the group. In the case of the lower Colorado,

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California Groundwater Supplies Remain A Mystery

/in /by /Ventura County Starby Tom Elias

In this remarkable water year, which ended more than five years of severe drought in most areas of California, there are still plenty of noteworthy water questions to contemplate and act upon. Here’s the central one: Three years after California passed what’s often called a landmark groundwater regulation law, no one knows how much under-surface water remains accessible to wells and no one has a clue about how much replenishment the state’s supplies actually got from the winter’s massive storms.

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