Here we are nearing the end of another year. And the SJV Water team has been taking stock, reflecting and pondering the accumulation of news and events that made up 2022. (Really, we’re taking some much needed time off and I’m, personally, “checkin’ the snow pack” – code for skiing – and needed to stockpile some content. SHHH!)
Atmospheric rivers can wreak havoc on the West Coast. These “rivers in the sky” stream enormous amounts of moisture from the tropics to western North America — double the flow of the Amazon River, on average. This moisture can produce downpours that cause widespread flood damage. From 1978 to 2017, this damage amounted to $1.1 billion per year according to a 2022 study. But atmospheric rivers are also crucial for life in California.
When it comes to the view of desalination as a tool to drought-proof local water systems in California, 2022 has been a roller-coaster year. In May, the California Coastal Commission, a 12-member appointed board responsible for overseeing the state’s 1,100 miles of coastline, rejected on environmental grounds a $1.4 billion desalination facility proposed for Huntington Beach.
With climate change and drought, the state of California is incentivizing not using farmland or fallowing it. The move comes as irrigation in some areas is damaging residential wells. Katie Staack farms 3,500 acres of almonds in Stanislaus County. She is one of the hundreds interested in the newly created LandFlex program. “The program is really unique because it’s focused on wet water, making sure we have wet water for our communities and aquifers, our ecosystems and farms,” Aubrey Bettencourt said.
As California is preparing for their fourth year of drought, the Bureau of Reclamation warns Central Valley Project water contractors of lessened water allocations. Two months after the start of the new water year on Oct. 1, the Shasta Reservoir, the state’s largest reservoir and cornerstone of the Central Valley Project (CVP), is currently at 31% capacity.
The most important piece of California’s water puzzle is the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, the 1,100-square-mile estuary where the state’s two most important rivers meet. The Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers drain a watershed of mountains and hills that stretches about 400 miles from Mount Shasta, near the Oregon border, to the Sierra southeast of Fresno.
It seems like everything is going up in price these days, especially bills, and for residents in Fremont, Newark and Union City, water is no exception. Households in these areas could start paying 4% more for the commodity beginning next March, and another 4% on top of that in March 2024. The increases are being proposed by the Alameda County Water District, which will hold a public hearing on the rate hikes in February.
Technology has allowed scientists to observe water from space for the past several decades. A new satellite called Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) is scheduled to launch early Thursday morning, sending our ability to track and predict our planet’s water supply to new heights.
As we head into winter, and growing season is over in most of the country, it is California’s Imperial Valley that supplies many of the winter vegetables you count on to keep your family eating healthy. It supplies much of the country’s winter vegetables including lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower and other healthy produce. The Imperial Valley also provides a critical food source that consumers never see, but greatly impacts what we eat.
A record number of water wells in California have gone dry as climate change amplifies heat and drought in the parched state. Residents reported having 1,394 dry wells statewide from January through last month, an increase of nearly 40 percent from the same time last year. It’s the highest number since the start of record keeping in 2013.
