California and several other Western states endured the hottest summer on record, according to federal data released Thursday, underscoring the ways rapid climate change is unleashing unprecedented wildfires, deadly heat waves and drought conditions. In addition to California, officials said Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Utah also set all-time heat records for the meteorological summer, spanning June through August.
It’s no secret the Colorado River Basin is experiencing one of its worst droughts in record history.
Now, hydrologists are minimizing water usage next year. Lake Mead and Lake Powell are at their lowest water elevation levels ever, and it’s only expected to get worse as we head into 2022, according to Wade Noble, who serves on the general council for four of Yuma’s irrigation districts.
The Fallbrook Public Utility District is now accepting applications for customers to receive free, drought-tolerant succulents. Approved applicants will receive the plants, free of charge, to transform their landscape and save water.
Residents and businesses in Poway soon could be paying more on their water bills.
Poway City Council on Tuesday unanimously voted to set a public hearing on a proposed four-year rate increase for water, recycled water and wastewater rates. It comes as the city grapples with how to deal with the future of water for its residents, challenged by rising costs to import water and the need to pay into capital improvement projects.
It’s like a magic trick for poop. Put it in one end of the machine, and out the other comes electricity, distilled water and a small amount of ash. And there’s none of the greenhouse gas — namely methane — produced by traditional sewage treatment and sewage sludge decomposition.
Though it might seem futuristic, this innovative blueprint has attracted grants from the U.S. Department of Energy and the California Energy Commission, the latter to the tune of $1.6 million. The money is helping to fund a demonstration project at south Orange County’s Santa Margarita Water District. Partners include Stanford University’s Codiga Resource Recovery Center.
As California coastal cities look for methods to avert the harsh realities of the state’s second drought in a decade, desalination has returned as a hot topic. In San Diego County, the drought makes the argument that the controversial choice to build a coastside desalination plant was correct. The Claude “Bud” Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant opened in Carlsbad in 2015. It supplies water to the San Diego County Water Authority, a wholesale agency that supplies about three-quarters of the water used within its 3.3 million population service area for 24 member agencies.
Enough water for 60,000 Orange County residents can be generated by more efficient release of rainwater from the Prado Dam into the Santa Ana River, according to a new multi-agency report.
During a year of average rainfall, that’s the amount of water currently flowing into the ocean that could be captured for urban use, according to the two co-chairmen of the committee overseeing project. The proposed plan, slated to begin phasing in next year, would enable more rainwater to be absorbed into the county’s major groundwater basin before it reaches the Pacific.
In 2018, the state of California updated its Renewables Portfolio Standard to call for obtaining 60% of its power from renewable energy sources by 2030. At the same time, the state also mandated that its electricity system be powered solely by carbon-free, renewable energy sources by 2045. Meeting these ambitious targets will require no shortage of technological developments, particularly batteries or other means of storing electricity generated by intermittent, renewable energy sources, especially solar and wind power.
As part of its recently enacted budget for 2021-22, California included funding to help foster the development of one such storage method, known as pumped-storage hydropower. In particular, the budget provided $18 million to the city of San Diego and the San Diego County Water Authority for use in advancing their planned joint project known as the San Vicente Energy Storage Facility.
Driving between her northern Central Valley rice fields with the family dog in tow, fifth-generation farmer Kim Gallagher points out the window to shorebirds, egrets and avocets fluttering across a thousand-acre sea of green flooded in six inches of water.
“People say agriculture uses so much water, but if you knew who lived in these areas and if you saw the animals taking advantage of it, you’d think there’s a lot more going on here,” Gallagher said. “This is where you’re going to find a Great Blue Heron. If you don’t want that type of bird then we shouldn’t be growing rice.”
