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Cuyama Passes Pay-To-Pump Groundwater Sustainability Structure

/in , /by /Santa Maria Sunby Kasey Bubnash

Cuyama landowners will soon have to pay to pump groundwater, a decision that some say will place the burden of Cuyama’s dwindling water supply largely on farmers’ shoulders.

At a board of directors meeting on July 10, the Cuyama Basin Groundwater Sustainability Agency voted to approve a pay-to-pump funding structure, in which landowners are charged extraction fees each time they pump water from Cuyama’s groundwater basin. The pumping fees will fund the sustainability agency’s continued efforts to implement a groundwater sustainability plan as ordered by the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, a state law that requires critically overdrafted basins to submit plans for groundwater sustainability by Jan. 31, 2020.

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The Importance Of Groundwater And Of Predicting Human Impacts On It

/in , /by /Forbesby Natalie Parletta

It may be out of sight, but it should not be out of mind. Water hidden beneath the earth’s surface comprises 98% of the planet’s fresh water. On average, this groundwater provides a third of all total water consumed, and its preciousness is ever more palpable since Cape Town’s water crisis sent shock waves rippling around the world.

Despite this, its regulation is far from ideal – especially now that drought conditions are intensifying around the globe and people are increasingly drilling downwards.

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Ties Between The Delta And Groundwater Sustainability In California

/in , , /by /California Water Blogby Jay Lund

Groundwater overdraft is a major problem globally and has been a persistent and growing problem in California for decades. This overdraft is predominantly driven by the economic value of water for agricultural production and cities. Spurred by the recent drought, California passed legislation requiring the elimination of groundwater overdraft by 2040. To explore potential water supply effects of ending long-term groundwater overdraft in California’s Central Valley, we compared several water policies with historical and warmer–drier climates, employing a statewide hydroeconomic optimization model, CALVIN, in our new paper.

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California Groundwater Program Could Help Farmers

/in , , /by /Water & Wastes Digestby Staff

A California water district developed a groundwater trading project that could help farmers in the area with state restrictions for over pumping groundwater aquifers.

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Market-based Program Would Encourage Farmers to Buy, Sell Local Groundwater

/in , /by /Bakerfield.comby John Cox

A local water district is developing a novel, market-based groundwater trading program that, if successful, could be expanded or copied to help Central Valley farmers cope with new state restrictions against over-pumping the region’s aquifers.

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Groundwater Pumping Has Significantly Reduced US Stream Flows

/in , , /by /Phys.Orgby University of Arizona

Groundwater pumping in the last century has contributed as much as 50 percent to stream flow declines in some U.S. rivers, according to new research led by a University of Arizona hydrologist. The new study has important implications for managing U.S. water resources. Laws regulating the use of groundwater and surface waters differ from state to state. Some Western states, Arizona among them, manage groundwater and surface water separately.

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Groundwater Sustainability Plan To Be Released In July

/in , , /by /Times Publishing Groupby Michael Oppenheimer

California has over 500 groundwater basins and only 21 are classified as “high-priority basins in critical overdraft.” The Santa Cruz Mid-County Groundwater Basin is one of these 21 basins. In the Santa Cruz Mid-County, critical overdraft means our freshwater supply is threatened by active seawater contamination at the coast and a locally developed Groundwater Sustainability Plan (GSP) must be in place by January 31, 2020 that addresses how to achieve a sustainable basin by 2040. The Santa Cruz Mid-County Groundwater Basin provides water for a population of approximately 95,000 people from Live Oak to La Selva Beach and the Santa Cruz Mountains to the Coast.

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Big Boost Of Water Is Headed To Ventura County’s Overstressed Groundwater Basins

/in , /by /Ventura County Starby Cheriann Carlson

In a first-of-its-kind move, the Fox Canyon Groundwater Management Agency agreed to pay up to $3 million to help recharge overstressed groundwater resources in Ventura County. The money will buy roughly 15,000 acre-feet of water, which started spilling out of Santa Felicia Dam at Lake Piru Monday. From there, the water rushes down creeks and the Santa Clara River past Fillmore and Santa Paula to Freeman Diversion off Los Angeles Avenue near Oxnard. Its destination: Spreading ponds near Oxnard and Camarillo. Then, the water will start slowly seeping into the ground and recharging the aquifer – relief sorely needed after a years-long drought, said Jeff Pratt, the county’s public works director.

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OPINION: No, We Shouldn’t Pump Desert Groundwater Near Joshua Tree To Help Store Electricity

/in , /by /Los Angeles Times

For years developers have tried to figure out how to repurpose Kaiser Steel’s former open-pit iron mine at Eagle Mountain in Riverside County. One idea: Use it as a massive landfill, a proposal that fortunately never came to fruition. The current owners of the site now want to convert it into an immense, $2.5-billion hydroelectric battery, using daytime power to pump water from a lower-elevation pit to a pit 1,400 feet farther up the mountain, then running the water downhill at night through turbines to create energy.

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Owens Valley Groundwater Basin Goes Low

/in , /by /Sierra Wave Mediaby Deb Murphy

California’s Department of Water Resources came out with its latest prioritization of state groundwater basins and, tentatively, the Owens Valley basin is now low. Over the short life of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, Owens Valley has gone from medium to high and now low priority. That prioritization would have had an impact three years ago.

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