Posts

Climate Change Resilience Begins With Water, Say These UC AG Researchers

/in , , /by /KVPRby Kerry Klein

On the rare days it rains in western Fresno County, the soils in Jeffrey Mitchell’s experimental fields soak up the water like a sponge. “The water disappears within less than a minute, even for four inches of water,” he said, laughing.

Mitchell is a cropping systems specialist with the University of California Cooperative Extension. His quick-absorbing soils keep the rainfall from pooling and overflowing, like it does in many surrounding fields.

Full Story

County Supervisors OK Sustainability Plan for San Pasqual Valley Basin

/in , /by /Times of San Diegoby Elizabeth Ireland

County supervisors Wednesday unanimously approved a sustainability plan for the San Pasqual Valley Groundwater Basin.

The plan will have the county be responsible for 10% of basin management costs within its jurisdiction.

The basin is located 25 miles northeast of downtown San Diego, and is home to dairies, orchards and nurseries.

Full Story

In the Midst of Drought, Experts Aim to Improve Central Valley Water Usage With Helicopter-born Technology ‘MRI’ Technology

/in , , /by /KGETby Robert Price

When physicians want to take a look at a patient’s vascular system to see things that aren’t visible to the naked eye, they often turn to MRI technology. That is what experts with the California Department of Water Resources are doing to analyze the state’s water system – specifically the underground aquifers that collect and store precipitation and other surface water.

 

Full Story

Opinion: Madera County’s Groundwater Situation Is Dire. New Efforts Are Underway to Address It

/in , /by /The Fresno Beeby Rob Poythress

The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) made the County of Madera responsible for groundwater management for the more than 200,000 acres that are not part of an irrigation or water district (the “white areas”) in Madera County. Like many regions in the Central Valley, Madera County is heavily groundwater dependent. The average annual shortage in the Madera subbasin alone is approximately 165,000 acre-feet per year, a number calculated over a 50-year period to account for both wet and dry periods.

 

Full Story

A Test for California’s Groundwater Regulations in the Megadrought

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Lawby Stephanie Osler Hastings

Record dry conditions once again in the West have led the federal and state governments to declare water supply shortages. California’s governor has declared that 50 counties, in which approximately 41% of the state’s population exists, are now under a drought state of emergency. This prompted the adoption of emergency regulations ordering water rights holders to curtail their water diversions on numerous northern California rivers.

The state and federal water projects, which together deliver water to approximately 30 million Californians and more than one-third of the state’s agricultural farmland, have reduced deliveries to 5% or less. As a result, agricultural, urban, and environmental water users are being forced to cut back with “devastating impacts on our communities, businesses and ecosystems.”

Full Story

Report: Groundwater Overhaul Could Threaten Drinking Water Of More Than A Million Valley Residents

/in , /by /KVPRby Kerry Klein

As drought settles over the San Joaquin Valley, a new report warns of other circumstances that could result in entire communities losing drinking water. More than a million Valley residents could lose their public water in coming decades under the sweeping groundwater legislation known as the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), according to the paper published earlier this month by the non-profit Pacific Institute. Signed into law in 2014, SGMA aims over the next two decades to reduce California’s groundwater deficit by balancing water pumped out of the ground with the amount replenished.

Full Story

How ‘Sustainable’ is California’s Groundwater Sustainability Act?

/in , /by /High Country Newsby Nick Bowlin

Beneath the almond and citrus fields of the San Joaquin Valley lies an enormous system of aquifers that feeds some of the world’s most productive farmland. Hundreds of miles north and east, along the Nevada border, is the Surprise Valley, a remote, high-desert region undergirded by cone-shaped hollows of sediment that hold deposits of water. Both of these water systems, along with every other groundwater basin in California — a whopping 515 entities — must create individually tailored plans to manage their water use more sustainably. In scale and ambition, California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) has few parallels. And the work becomes increasingly urgent as the climate crisis makes water shortages increasingly severe.

Full Story

LAFCO Remains Neutral on RCD Participation in GSA

/in , /by /Fallbrook Village Newsby Joe Naiman

Under Local Agency Formation Commission law, the county LAFCO agency must grant latent powers to a special district if such latent powers are not already authorized by state law. Under a law called the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act local agencies were required to form a Groundwater Sustainability Agency for high-priority and medium-priority basins by July 2017 and have a January 2022 deadline to develop plans to achieve long-term groundwater sustainability.

Full Story

Opinion: California Needs Comprehensive Groundwater Management

/in , /by /CalMattersby Jeanette Howard, Melissa M. Rohde and Barton H. Thompson

While California’s landmark Sustainable Groundwater Management Act promised comprehensive protection of the state’s groundwater, significant gaps remain in its coverage. The Department of Water Resources now has an opportunity to reduce or eliminate those gaps and should seize the moment. We know all Californians will experience another year of water shortages and warmer, drier conditions that will require conservation and which are likely to fuel destructive wildfires in our forests and around our communities.

Full Story

LAFCO Approves Municipal Service Review, Sphere Updates for RCDs

/in , /by /Village Newsby Joe Naiman

San Diego County’s Local Agency Formation Commission approved municipal service reviews for the county’s three resource conservation districts while also updating the sphere of influence for each RCD. Separate 8-0 LAFCO board votes Monday, Feb. 1, approved the municipal service reviews for the Resource Conservation District of Greater San Diego, the Mission Resource Conservation District and the Upper San Luis Rey Resource Conservation District while approving a sphere of influence update for each RCD which does not alter the sphere boundaries. LAFCO also had a presentation and discussion on the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act that morning, although no board action was taken.

Full Story