OPINION: Jeff Denham: Bureaucrats Impede Water Development

A simple and relatively inexpensive way to expand California’s available water is to modify spillways on reservoirs. Congressman Jeff Denham noted experts have estimated it would allow access to a million acre feet of water annually. That’s enough to meet the typical water needs of almost 11 million people a year based on per capital consumption figures supplied by the United States Geological Survey.


But it requires more than the proverbial act of Congress. Denham noted the big roadblock is the federal bureaucracy — the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to be more precise — that only relicenses hydroelectric operations every 40 to 50 years.