Keith Umbreit is no stranger to gardening. Back when he was living in Riverside, he was a devoted rose grower and member of the local rosarian society.
“I had 69 rosebushes in my yard,” he recalled. “Every kind of tea roses, and vining roses, and hybrid roses. I had them all.”
But when Umbreit bought his current home in an Oceanside suburb in 2013, he gave up roses.
Despite a wet winter, California and other western states will still need to cut back how much water they draw from the Colorado River. The question federal and state officials are weighing is: How much will they each need to cut?
The Biden administration floated two ideas this week to reduce water usage from the dwindling Colorado River, which supplies 40 million people.
The Imperial Irrigation District released its IID Annual Report 2022, highlighting the projects and programs that IID brought forth throughout the year.
This report ranges over a wide variety of topics, including water and energy projects, information on the Salton Sea, the Colorado River, Coachella Valley Energy Commission, energy assistance for customers, and community improvement projects.
The world’s largest water recycling plant just got even bigger.
The final expansion of Orange County Water District’s Groundwater Replenishment System has been completed.
For the first time in years, Ojai Valley residents won’t be required to curb their water use or risk fines.
Starting in June, the Casitas Municipal Water District plans to end its mandatory water conservation measures and stiff penalties — ones in place for the past eight years in the drought-stressed region. The Casitas board unanimously approved the move at a meeting this week.
The federal government has laid out its ideas for water cuts in the Colorado River Basin, which means time is running out for basin states to agree on a plan of their own.
In Colorado, water officials say the onus is on California and Arizona to make it work.
Just as federal officials were laying out alternative scenarios last week for steep water supply cuts from the Colorado River due to the drying Southwest, California officials were warning that this year’s historic Sierra snowpack could flood much of the state later this year.
The powerful Imperial Irrigation District and others with historic first dibs to Colorado River water are once again facing possible threats to their jealously guarded supply. At a press conference at the Hoover Dam on Tuesday, federal officials announced possible unprecedented, across-the-board cuts to all water contractors in three states if levels in its massive reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, fall so low that they might no longer function.
A new water pipeline project recently finished construction in Encinitas. On Tuesday local and congressional leaders held a ribbon cutting to mark the opening of the pipeline.
The Manchester Avenue Recycled Water Pipeline Project involved the construction of approximately 1.4 miles of six-inch diameter recycled water pipeline. According to a press release, customers connecting to this new pipeline will now irrigate with recycled water, reducing the demand for imported drinking water by more than 27 million gallons per year.
