Lake Hodges Water Levels Dry Up Prospects for Grebes
For years, pairs of grebes would zoom across the water at Lake Hodges in a dazzling mating dance, and then build their nests on mats of dried brush suspended above the waterline.
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Why It’s Way Too Early to Worry About Rain Deficits in SoCal
Yes, it’s been pretty dry so far this winter, but there is no need to worry. The major winter storm that roared through Southern California Monday proved we can erase a month’s worth of rain deficit in one day. I recently explained how the climate where we live — the Mediterranean Climate — sees the majority of its annual rainfall in the winter months. In fact, a whopping 80% of Southern California’s annual rain and snow falls from December through March.
Trump Signs Spending Bill That Could Send Millions of Dollars to the Salton Sea
President Donald Trump on Sunday signed a roughly $900 billion stimulus package meant to tackle both COVID-19 relief as well as federal spending. Tucked in the 5,593-page-long law, courtesy of Southern California Democrats, are provisions that hold the potential to unlock millions of dollars of new federal spending to address the Salton Sea.
The bill notably modifies the Water Resources Development Act by authorizing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to expedite a study on the feasibility of constructing a perimeter lake around the Salton Sea. It’s one of the large-scale plans floated to address the lake’s woes, and this move could speed up the process.
The law also includes more than $150 million for the Army Corps to carry out such studies on water issues at the Salton Sea and elsewhere.
Vanderlaan Named LAFCO Chair, Reappointed to New Term
Bonsall resident Andy Vanderlaan will chair the 2021 meetings of San Diego County’s Local Agency Formation Commission, and he was also reappointed for another four-year term on the LAFCO board.
One 8-0 LAFCO vote Dec. 7 reappointed Vanderlaan as LAFCO’s public member. A separate 8-0 vote elected Vanderlaan as the LAFCO board chair for 2021 while electing County Supervisor Jim Desmond as the vice-chair for the 2021 meetings.
The public member’s term actually expires in April 2021. LAFCO had the option of reappointing Vanderlaan or seeking additional applicants. The reappointment of Vanderlaan was contingent upon his willingness to serve a seventh term. “I’m inclined to do that,” he said.
FPUD Adopts PSAWR Guidelines
Earlier this year, the San Diego County Water Authority approved an ordinance adopting a Permanent Special Agricultural Water Rate and setting the eligibility criteria. On Dec. 7, the Fallbrook Public Utility District board voted 5-0 to update FPUD’s Administrative Code to incorporate the PSAWR.
“It will become a permanent SAWR program with eligibility changes,” Ken Endter, board president of FPUD, said.
Calgon Carbon Given FPUD Contract for Granulated Activated Carbon System
Calgon Carbon Corporation was awarded the Fallbrook Public Utility District contract to provide granular activated carbon treatment system equipment. FPUD’s board voted 5-0, Dec. 7, to award Calgon Carbon a contract for $1,260,493. A separate 5-0 vote that day approved a change order to the construction contract with Filanc Alberici JV to install pipelines associated with the granular activated carbon treatment system.
Water News Network Top Stories of 2020
The Water News Network top stories of 2020 reflect the San Diego region’s interest in water conservation, the environment and efforts to diversify water supply sources. But the year was dominated by the coronavirus pandemic, which impacted water infrastructure and operations.
San Diego’s First Winter Storm Drops Snow in Mountains, Rain Elsewhere
A Monday storm that dumped much-needed rain and snow across San Diego County was expected to peter out overnight into Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service in San Diego.
Monday’s storm brought the county’s first significant traces of precipitation since the first week of November, when a North Pacific storm dropped several inches of snow in the mountains and some rain off to the west.
San Diego Scientist Gets Closer to Understanding Why the Coast Collapses
Adam Young spent the last three years firing a laser from the back of his truck at Del Mar’s cliffs which are crumbling into the Pacific Ocean.
Cliff collapses along the California coast killed three Encinitas beachgoers in 2019. That same year, another bluff collapse in Del Mar destabilized a set of train tracks regularly carrying passengers between Los Angeles and San Diego. Policymakers need to make big decisions about how best to reckon with earth that seems to fall at random, but scientists still don’t understand what truly causes them to fall.
That’s what Young, a coastal geomorphologist (the study of how the earth’s surface formed and changes) at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, wants to know: If we know how ocean waves and winter rains eat away at a cliff face, can we eventually predict where and when it will collapse?
Port of San Diego Approves Pilot Project to Develop Rapid Stormwater Monitoring Device
The Port of San Diego has approved a pilot project with FREDsense Technologies Corp. to develop a portable five-in-one field-testing sensor device to provide real-time metals analysis for stormwater monitoring. FREDsense will utilize their pre-existing titration platform optimized for the environmental remediation industry to produce an automated testing system for stormwater analysis, which will test the levels of various metals in San Diego Bay including aluminum, copper, lead, zinc and nickel, all of which are currently manually monitored under the Port’s stormwater programs.
