Tag Archive for: Los Angeles Times

Dangerous Heat Predicted to Hit 3 Times More Often in Future

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Seth Borenstein

What’s considered officially “dangerous heat” in coming decades will probably hit much of the world at least three times more often as climate change worsens, according to a new study.

In much of Earth’s wealthy mid-latitudes, spiking temperatures and humidity that feel like 103 degrees or higher — now an occasional summer shock — statistically should happen 20 to 50 times a year by mid-century, said a study Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change.

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Northern California Ranchers Told to Stop Diverting Water, Defying Rules Amid Drought

/in , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Associated Press

California has warned a group of farmers and ranchers near the Oregon state line to stop diverting water from an area already wracked by extreme drought and a wildfire that killed tens of thousands of fish.

The State Water Resources Control Board issued a draft cease-and-desist order Friday to the Shasta Water Assn., warning it to stop taking water from the Shasta River watershed.

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California’s Water from Colorado River Could Be Crippled by a Big Earthquake. Drought Makes Fixes Vital

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Hayley Smith

As drought, global warming and chronic overuse push the Colorado River to perilous new lows, water officials are hoping to prevent an earthquake from severing a critical Depression-era aqueduct that now connects millions of Southern Californians to the shrinking river.

Recently, officials from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California celebrated as crews lowered a section of earthquake-resistant pipeline into a portion of the Colorado River aqueduct — the 242-mile system of pumps, tunnels, pipelines and open canals that carry water from Lake Havasu to Southern California.

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15-Day Watering Ban in Portions of L.A. County Due to Pipeline Leak

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Hayley Smith

Drought-pummeled lawns across Los Angeles County will be a little bit thirstier for 15 days in September when officials suspend outdoor watering in several areas to repair a leaking pipeline, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California announced Monday.

The emergency repair will shut down the 36-mile Upper Feeder pipeline — which delivers water from the Colorado River to Southern California — from Sept. 6 to 20, the MWD said. The leak was discovered this year, and the pipeline has been operating at reduced capacity under a temporary fix while officials designed a more permanent solution.

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Biden Administration Moves to Scrap Cadiz Water Pipeline Right-Of-Way Permit, Cleared by Trump

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Alex Wigglesworth, Ian James

Federal authorities have moved to reverse a Trump administration decision that cleared the way for Cadiz Inc. to pipe water across public land in the California desert.

The request filed in federal court Friday, which must still be granted, could deal a blow to the company’s decades-long effort to pump groundwater from beneath its desert property 200 miles east of Los Angeles and sell it to urban Southern California. The project is fiercely opposed by conservationists, who say it will dry up desert springs and seeps relied upon by Indigenous tribes and rare wildlife. Cadiz insists its plans won’t harm springs in the area.

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Opinion: This Proposed Ballot Measure Would Make You Pay for the Ag Industry’s Water Inefficiency

/in , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Michael Hiltzik

Whoever coined the phrase “Whisky is for drinking, water is for fighting” didn’t have things quite right.

In California, water is for scamming. The newest example is a majestically cynical ploy being foisted on taxpayers by some of the state’s premier water hogs, in the guise of a proposed ballot measure titled the “Water Infrastructure Funding Act of 2022” — or, as its promoters call it, the More Water Now initiative.

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OPINION: Gavin Newsom’s Plan for California Water is a Good One. Stay the Course

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby The Times Editorial Board

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s new blueprint for California water policy offers a stay-the-course agenda for projects and policies intended to help cope with a warming climate and more volatile weather patterns that already are affecting the state’s irrigation, environmental and drinking water supplies. There are no moonshots and few surprises, and that’s fine; it will be challenging enough to ensure that all Californians are hooked up to safe and reliable water supplies to meet their needs for the coming decade and beyond.

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Opinion: A Week of Rain is Nice, but Does Virtually Nothing to Help L.A.’s Water Issues

/in , /by /Los Angeles Times by The Times Editorial Board

Southern California’s March rain is a welcome relief, coming as it does after a mostly dry January and an absolutely desiccated February. Los Angeles, like much of the rest of the state, had been in drought and was getting by without severe conservation measures only because of reservoirs still brimming from the soaking winter of 2017 and a succession of moderately wet follow-ups.

We have a name for late winter storms that come at the end of mostly failed rainy seasons. We call them March Miracles. The granddaddy of them all came in 1991, when California was facing a desperate water shortage only to be hit by a late-March Sierra blizzard that packed a whole season’s worth of moisture into three days.

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February Ranked Among the Driest on Record Across California. Forecasters Hopeful for a ‘Miracle March’

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Times by Hannah Fry

After one of the driest Februaries on record across much of California, the first day of March brought a dash of rain and a dusting of fresh powder to the parched landscape.

The storm, which rolled into Los Angeles County on Sunday afternoon, dropped less than one-tenth of an inch of rain on the coast, while higher elevations saw between one-quarter and an inch of precipitation.

Snow Valley Mountain Resort in the San Bernardino Mountains reported a foot of snow from the system, while Frazier Park in Kern County received a 3-inch dusting, said John Dumas, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard.

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Opinion: Newsom Hopes to Broker a Peace Treaty in California’s Water War. Some Worry He’ll Cave to Trump

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Times by George Skelton

Gov. Gavin Newsom may be piloting a lifeboat that will rescue the sinking California Delta. Or he may be in water over his head on a doomed mission.

The governor gets angry with skeptics who say he’s being delusional. But history sides with the doubters.

“I love reading all that, ‘Hey, he’s naive. He’s being misled,'” Newsom recently told a forum sponsored by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California, his voice rising with a touch of sarcasm.

“It means we’re doing something a little different.”

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