Fort Bragg, long powered by timber, fishing and tourist economies, is getting notice statewide for its push to create monetary green out of the Blue Economy, state officials said. Blue Economy is the term coined for a nationwide trend seeking revenue from the ocean without extracting its resources or doing things that cause serious environmental harm.
A new analysis says San Diego must raise water rates 17.6% over the next two years to fund the city’s Pure Water sewage recycling system and cover rising costs to buy imported water and replace aging pipes.
The average monthly bill for a customer in a single-family home would increase from $81.07 to $95.03 in November 2023, and then to $103.06 in January 2025. Bills for high-volume water users would likely climb even more.
Last week, California announced initial allocations of just 5 percent of requested supplies from the State Water Project in the coming year. That was actually an improvement from last December, when the state called for zero allocations for 2022. The eventual allotment for this year eventually rose to 5 percent.
Winter is off to a running start in California, after a pair of December storms dropped several feet of mountain snow and soaking low-elevation rains across much of the state. Parts of the Sierra Nevada have recorded more than double the expected snowpack for the time of year, and another significant storm could be on the way this weekend.
An expanded Atmospheric River Reconnaissance program began last month as a result of the unexpected “bomb cyclone” in October 2021 that hit North America’s West Coast, followed by another atmospheric river less than a month later that caused severe flooding in Washington.
“Climatologically, November and December can bring some of the worst floods for that part of the world,” said research meteorologist Marty Ralph, director of the Center for Western Weather and Water Extremes (CW3E) at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Ralph leads the AR Recon program, along with Vijay Tallapragada, Ph.D., Senior Scientist at NOAA’s Environmental Modeling Center, in partnership with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the California Dept. of Water Resources, NOAA Office of Marine and Aviation Operations, and the U.S. Air Force Reserve 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron “Hurricane Hunters.”
An almost limitless supply of fresh water exists in the form of water vapor above Earth’s oceans, yet remains untapped, researchers said. A new study from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is the first to suggest an investment in new infrastructure capable of harvesting oceanic water vapor as a solution to limited supplies of fresh water in various locations around the world.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) is leading a letter signed by 14 other senators urging Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to help Western states survive what they are calling a “22-year mega-drought” that is threatening farms and ranches across the West. “The American West is in crisis. Across the major basins of the American West … farm and ranch families hang in the balance as they grapple with a 22-year mega-drought,” they warned.
Just because the rainy season has arrived doesn’t mean California’s water cops are off the job. With a fourth year of drought looming, some of the Bay Area’s biggest utilities continue to crack down on excessive outdoor watering. Most are responding to heavy sprinkler use or power-washing with a courtesy note, advising customers to stop what they’re doing with the threat of a fine.
Higher utility rates will be here starting on Jan. 1. NBC 7 has already talked about higher energy rates, but water and wastewater rates are rising too. That means higher utility bills are on the way for many San Diegans. But just how much are they going up? Some, like water and wastewater increases, are set in stone, while others are being modified right up to the last minute. That can make it hard for families to plan.
