California and the U.S.

The latest news and analysis covering water issues in Caliornia and the rest of the United States.

Simulating The Weather Created By Fire In New Study

A recent study is helping researchers understand the role of wind in the largest forest fires. Megafires are large, hard-to-manage burns with big economic costs. “These big fires are really hard to deal with,” said Natasha Stavros with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology.  

Improving Long Term Forecasts To Predict Unusual California Precipitation

Last spring, Governor Jerry Brown declared an end to California’s historic drought that caused over $5 billion in damage to agriculture as well as substantial impacts to fisheries, infrastructure, human health, and vegetation. The drought was not only severe, but it also spanned the winters of 2015-16 and 2016-17, which had unusual and unexpected precipitation that affected […]

The Hoover Dam Changed America—And It Might Do It Again

The Hoover Dam is one of the crown jewels of American infrastructure. It was one of the most ambitious projects of the early 20th century, requiring millions of cubic feet of concrete and tens of millions of pounds of steel to build a dam that could provide electricity to 1.3 million people. Millions of people visit […]

California Says This Chemical Causes Cancer. So Why Is It Being Sprayed Into Drinking Water?

A year ago, the active ingredient in Roundup, the nation’s most widely used weed-killing herbicide, was added to California’s official list of chemicals known to cause cancer. The state’s warning about glyphosate followed a similar caution issued by the World Health Organization and coincided with hundreds of lawsuits across the country focused on the herbicide. The first very jury […]

Hot Weather, Land Abuses Fueling Algal Blooms In Western Waters

The West is known for summer wildfires. Now it seems Western summers will be distinguished by another kind of flare-up: algae blooms. This summer has witnessed an explosion of algae problems in Western water bodies. Usually marked by a bright green mat of floating scum, the blooms are unsightly and unpleasant for water lovers. More concerning are […]

Big Water Moves Mark Brown’s Final Months

Nearly six decades ago, shortly after becoming governor, Pat Brown persuaded the Legislature and voters to approve one of the nation’s largest public works projects, the State Water Plan. New reservoirs in Northern California, including the nation’s highest dam at Oroville on the Feather River, would capture runoff from snowfall in the Sierra, and a […]