As the drought tightens its grip on California, several Central Coast cities are rolling out new water conservation messaging and programs for its residents.
“During a hot, dry summer, water supplies are reduced throughout the state due to the drought,” said Santa Maria Utilities Director Shad Springer. “We just want to encourage people to be cognizant of that and to conserve water where they can.”
The undersea power line would run south from San Luis Obispo County, hugging the California coast for 200 miles before making landfall in or near Los Angeles. It would be able to carry electricity from a fleet of offshore wind turbines, providing Southern California with clean power after sundown and helping to replace fossil-fueled generators.
Fewer planet-warming emissions, less risk of blackouts and no chance of igniting the wildfires sometimes sparked by traditional power lines: Those are the arguments for the $1.9-billion Pacific Transmission Expansion.
Last Tuesday marked the end of the 2019 rain year, which runs from July 1 through June 30. Wednesday was the start of the 2020 rain year.
The 2018 rainfall season that occurred from July 1, 2018, through June 30, 2019, produced 15.68 inches of rain at the Santa Maria Public Airport, or about 121% of normal.
A lackluster winter rain season has left much of California on the cusp of a drought — so what does that mean for the state’s much-Instagrammed wildflowers?
Particularly rainy winters yielded super blooms throughout the state in 2017 and 2019, from the Carrizo Plain National Monument in San Luis Obispo County all the way down to Anza-Borrego Desert State Park east of San Diego.
In spring 2019, photo-seeking visitors packed places like Walker Canyon near Lake Elsinore just south of Los Angeles, where a California poppy bloom drew “Disneyland-size crowds.”
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
