On the calendar today …
- WEBINAR: Climate Policy and the Inflation Reduction Act from 12pm to 1:30pm. Join us for a special lunch & learn to delve into the trajectory of climate policy after the Inflation Reduction Act. What effects has the IRA had and what do we expect down the road? How is it affecting regulatory initiatives by EPA and the states? Don’t miss this opportunity to gain valuable insights into the IRA’s ongoing implementation, broader impacts of the largest climate spending legislation in U.S. history, and what it means for our future. Professor Daniel Farber is the Sho Sato Professor of Law and the Faculty Director of the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at the University of California, Berkeley. A leading authority on environmental and constitutional law, his publications have been influential in addressing the legal and policy challenges posed by climate change. Click here to register.
In California water news today …
El Niño-induced wet winter could begin inundating California next month
“Meteorologists are anticipating strong El Niño conditions this winter, with widespread wetness likely to drench much of the California coast as soon as next month and persisting into spring. “Currently, we have El Niño conditions, strong El Niño conditions at that. And those are continuing to intensify,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles said during a recent webinar on the subject. “Models suggest that the current El Niño event will further strengthen it potentially into a very strong, or a quote-unquote, ‘super’ El Niño event, within the next couple of months,” he added. … ” Read more from KTLA.
What an El Niño winter could mean for California
“Odds are that this winter’s going to be a wet one. The intermittent climate phenomenon known as El Niño, which typically means more rain and snow for California, developed over the summer and is expected to intensify in the next few months. And this year’s El Niño is predicted to be an exceptionally strong one — maybe even ranking in the top five on record, according to Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at U.C.L.A. “This is likely to become an event that is historically significant,” Swain told reporters earlier this month. “All of California has elevated odds of a wetter-than-average winter.” Of course, there are no guarantees. Experts emphasize that not every El Niño period is extra wet in the Golden State, and that the effects of the weather pattern often vary across the state (typically, El Niño’s effects are greater in dry Southern California than in the north). … ” Read more from the New York Times.
Record-breaking rainfall, nearly a foot of snow recorded in California storm
“The San Francisco Bay Area received “a pretty good soaking” of widespread rain on Saturday after offshore winds finally moved an unusually unpredictable storm system eastward through the region, causing temporary flooding, ponding in the roadways and some scattered lightning. “It was the wettest day of the week by far,” Rick Canepa, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service’s Bay Area office, said Sunday. “It was a long wait for that [storm] to get here, and it was a pretty complex system, that’s for sure.” Last week, forecasters were scratching their heads as they tried to determine how the looming storm would play out, noting at the time that the models were trending in “completely different directions” in terms of rainfall intensity. At first, forecasts indicated the possibility of an atmospheric river. … ” Read more from SF Gate.
Bay Area congressmen seek to expand Delta heritage area
“Federal lawmakers are seeking to expand the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area — the first in the state to receive such a designation — by annexing dozens of acres of public lands, including a decommissioned army base. U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, and Rep. John Garamendi, D-Walnut Grove, on Friday introduced legislation to expand the boundary of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area to include approximately 62 acres of publicly owned land in Solano County. According to Thompson’s office, he and Garamendi introduced the legislation at the request of the city of Rio Vista to expand the National Heritage Area’s boundary to include the decommissioned United States Army Reserve Center, U.S. Coast Guard Station Rio Vista, Beach Wastewater Treatment Plant and Sandy Beach Park in Solano County. … ” Read more from CBS San Francisco.
SEE ALSO: Local Lawmakers Seek To Expand Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta National Heritage Area, from SF Gate
Press release: Trinity County calls on Interior Secretary to terminate Trump-era water contract, cites fishery destruction and financial misconduct
“Emerging victorious from a California Appeals Court ruling after a four-year battle against an attempted water grab by the massive Westlands Water District (Westlands), northern California’s Trinity County asked Interior Secretary Deb Haaland to end the matter, once and for all. In a November 8 letter to Secretary Haaland, the Trinity County Administrator did not mince words—a million acre-feet federal water contract between the Trump Administration and Westlands, he wrote, “is materially incomplete, has not been validated and is not binding on Interior. Therefore, Trinity County asks for a rescission of the subject contract.” Trinity County and its allies, including San Joaquin County and numerous non-governmental organizations, proved to the court that the Trump Administration’s contract with Westlands left out terms required by federal and state law to restore fisheries and recoup the costs from Westlands and other federal water contractors. … ” Read more from the Hoopa Valley Tribe.
Schooling fish: Behind the scenes of Putah Creek fish sampling
“It’s a curious thing, teaching a classroom of future fish conservationists about revitalizing degraded ecosystems. Putah Creek was an unconventional place to teach ecology. After the creek turned bad, it stayed that way for decades – deteriorated habitat, nonexistent flow, garbage, rusted cars, even gravel mining. And while conditions have improved, many students, and even some scientists, still remain skeptical that this ecosystem could ever be anything but a spoilt ecosystem. Is it really possible to genuinely rehabilitate an ecosystem like that through improved management and community building? Those lessons work in other cases, for other ecosystems, but surely not this one. This blog explores the outcome of environmental stewardship over time, of patience and persistence that pays off, and of some extremely cool fishes you wouldn’t guess live in our local creek today. It’s a story that catches students, and even many members of the community, off guard. Those who have ties to the area, whether in growing up here or as UC Davis alumni, may vividly remember a time when the creek was a very different place. … ” Read more from the California Water Blog.
“We had a plan and then things kept moving”: battered yet enduring, Highway 1 remains closed
“When a series of atmospheric rivers flowed into California last January, the Big Sur coastline was quickly swamped, and Highway 1, a lone life raft connecting San Simeon in the south and the Monterey Peninsula to the north, was overcome. Long vulnerable to the whims of nature, the iconic serpentine is especially susceptible to landslides, debris flows and terrain ever bowing to the weight of water, no more so than a lonely and lovely stretch of road just south of the New Camaldoli Hermitage and the nearly forgotten outpost, Lucia, and just north of redwood-forested Limekiln State Park and the Ragged Point headlands. Here at Paul’s Slide, fencing and K-rails were no match for last winter’s deluge that piled stones, mud and debris over the pavement, forcing Caltrans to stop traffic and once again create two of the most picturesque cul-de-sacs in California, if not the country. Ten months later — even with crews working seven days a week throughout most of the year — the road is still closed, and holiday travelers, hoping to take in the broad vistas of sea and sky en route to destinations north or south, will be frustrated, having to settle for Highway 101 or even Interstate 5. … ” Read more from the LA Times. | Read via Yahoo News.
Pumped storage hydro could be key to the clean energy transition. But where will the water come from?
“The smell of piñon pine filled the air as the Ghost Train of Old Ely rolled to a stop between the Duck Creek Range and another railway. Two peaks of jagged limestone towered above the sagebrush and juniper trees that filled the range, providing habitat for elk, deer, pronghorn, rattlesnakes and sage grouse. Sundown here in the Great Basin Desert reveals some of the darkest skies in the country. … All of it would be for a 1,000-megawatt, closed-loop pumped storage project—a nearly century-old technology undergoing a resurgence as part of the nation’s clean energy transition. Across the country, the hydropower industry, energy experts and lawmakers alike are proposing such projects that can store energy from wind and solar installations to provide electricity when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. “What makes pumped storage so unique and valuable in the energy transition is its ability to provide additional power when it’s needed most,” said Malcolm Woolf, president and CEO of the National Hydropower Association. … ” Read more from Inside Climate News.
USC study tries using bananas to stop wildfires
“In December 2019, professors Barath Raghavan and Mikey Kantar and doctoral candidate Xiao Fu had an idea: What if we could use bananas to stop wildfires? In a study published Oct. 24, the team of researchers used computer simulations to see how crops of bananas, known as a banana buffer, could slow or stop a simulated version of the Tubbs fire, which struck Northern California in 2017. Through these simulations, the team found that banana buffers can delay a fire by just over five hours and can remain effective as climates in California get warmer. With the risk and intensity of wildfires increasing due to climate change, Raghavan, an associate professor of computer science, said that the need for their research is high, especially since living spaces and infrastructure in Southern California are located next to areas that are prone to wildfires — a relationship known as the wildland-urban interface. … ” Read more from the Daily Trojan.
CW3E’s Mike Dettinger reviews National Climate Assessment released
“On November 14, 2023, the Biden-Harris administration took several bold steps towards addressing the problems of human-caused climate change at national and international levels. First, it announced more than $6 billion in investments in climate action (the largest ever), with the aim of putting the US on a part towards cutting carbon emissions in half by 2023. Second, together with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Biden pledged to accelerate both nation’s efforts to address climate change and steps to reduce emissions of methane and other greenhouse gases besides CO2. Thirdly, the administration released the Fifth National Climate Assessment on this momentous day. The Global Change Research Act of 1990 mandates that the US Global Change Research Program deliver a report to Congress and the President every 4 or 5 years that integrates, evaluates, interprets and discusses current scientific findings and uncertainties associated with global change; effects of global change on the Nation’s environment, agriculture, energy production and use, land and water resources, transportation, human health and welfare, social systems, and biological diversity; and current trends in global change, both human-induced and natural, projecting those trends for the next 25 to 100 years. … ” Read more from CW3E.
In commentary today …
California’s greenhouse gas emissions are rising — and we’re not even counting them all
“California has committed to substantially reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, aiming for carbon neutrality by 2045. The pledge is key to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s claims of climate leadership, which featured prominently in his recent visits to China and the United Nations. But the California Air Resources Board recently released a preliminary greenhouse gas inventory suggesting the state’s emissions increased slightly last year compared with the previous year. This is of course bad news, since addressing climate change requires deep and swift emissions reductions. What I’m even more concerned about, however, is that the state’s greenhouse gas inventory undercounts emissions in the first place. Although the issue seldom gets attention, California’s inventory excludes emissions from a variety of sources, including wildfires and industrial sectors such as shipping, aviation and biofuels. … ” Read more from the LA Times.
In regional water news and commentary today …
MOUNTAIN COUNTIES
Facing the fire: California’s Sierra Foothills residents race to adapt
“Shari Wilson woke up and stared at the sun, dull and orange against a ruddy sky. She checked the Air Quality Index app on her phone and put on a mask. “I felt just kind of down,” she said. “You know, there’s that orange sky, gray day.” Like millions of people across the Midwest and Northeast this past June, she saw smoke from Canadian wildfires. Though the fires were thousands of miles away, she couldn’t shake an uneasy feeling. “I felt trapped in the smoke,” she said. “And it made me think a lot about my friends in California.” Shari Wilson and her husband had moved back to their home state of Michigan less than a year prior. Before that, they had spent nearly four decades in California, more than half of it in Nevada City, a small town on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada mountains, about an hour’s drive from Lake Tahoe. … ” Read more from KQED .
NAPA/SONOMA
Column: Avoiding Mississippi-sized saltwater problems
Susan Gorin, Sonoma County Supervisor, writes, “Recent headlines warned the nation that drinking water for almost a million people was at risk of saltwater contamination, as seawater migrated up the Mississippi River toward New Orleans. Fortunately, nature and humans (through the construction of an underwater dam and other extraordinary measures) intervened and — for now — the risks have been reduced. But with a changing climate increasing both sea level and chances of drought, saltwater will continue to threaten drinking water supplies in the future. The potential for seawater intrusion isn’t limited to the lower Mississippi River. In southern Sonoma County, where the San Pablo Baylands form the boundaries of the Sonoma Valley groundwater sub basin, the potential has long existed for seawater to migrate inland to replace fresher groundwater pumped from aquifers in areas of long-term groundwater depletion. … ” Read more from the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.
Audio: Local writer, activist talks good fire practices with KRCB
“As the season’s first rains fall, KRCB News has been looking at prescribed fire and its role in our Sonoma County landscape. Following an interview with CalFire’s Ben Nicholls, KRCB’s Noah Abrams spoke with local writer and community activist Kristina Rizga about her latest article on fire and its place in our local ecology, Learning How to Garden a Forest, out online in Grist Magazine. You can listen to their conversation about Rizga’s journey to controlled burning, it’s historic tribal roots, it’s current place in the Sonoma County landscape, the important role of local organizations like Pepperwood Preserve, and more.” Listen at Northern California Public Radio.
BAY AREA
New Point Reyes water pollution data add pressure on ranches
“The debate over coastal cattle and dairy ranching has revived as unsafe levels of fecal bacteria continue to contaminate waterways in the Point Reyes National Seashore. Park data from a year of testing concluded that E. coli exceeded health standards in roughly 31% of the samples collected from 24 sites, including at Kehoe Beach and Drakes Bay. The data were presented to the California Coastal Commission on Thursday as part of a first annual update on the National Park Service’s water quality management plan to curb water contamination caused by the ranching. Commissioners and environmentalists said they want a resolution, with many calling for a halting or reduction of coastal ranching. “We do have an expectation of what we’re going to find when we go to our national parks, and I think among the things that we expect is that we are not going to become sick if we enter the water,” said Caryl Hart, vice chair of the commission. … ” Read more from the Marin Independent Journal.
No water, power, Wi-Fi or parking — but for $25 million, this island on S.F. Bay can be yours
“There is no water. There is no power. There is no Wi-Fi. There is no parking. But there also are no neighbor hassles. Red Rock Island, a 6-acre outcropping that is touted as the last private island on San Francisco Bay, is going on the market this week for $25 million, according to its listing agent. Though the island has been for sale before and has been considered for every possible isolated use, from a rocky top Playboy Club to a wind farm, this is the first time it has been included on a multiple listing service, a database that allows brokers to see other agents’ listings. “There have been unsolicited offers in the past, but it has never before been officially for sale,” Red Rock’s listing agent, Chris Lim of Christie’s International, said Sunday. “This is such a rare and unique offering. I’ve never seen anything like this my entire career.” … ” Read more from the San Francisco Chronicle.
There’s a big new sea wall along the S.F. Bay. Is this what our future will look like?
“If you’re a fan of ice plant, the no-nonsense ground cover with spongy fingers and seasonal flowers that will never win a prize at garden shows, there’s plenty of it to see along Beach Park Boulevard in Foster City. The green mat adorns a slope that extends almost two miles along the bay and faces a mix of single-family homes and low apartment buildings, plus a school and a small shopping center. The horizontal monotony is unrelenting, despite the occasional ramps and concrete stairways that allow people to reach the slope’s flat asphalt summit. Welcome to Foster City’s new improved levee, fortified by plates of corrugated steel and roughly six feet taller than the prior edition. It’s also a rock-solid reminder that as the Bay Area prepares for the likelihood of sea-level rise along its shorelines in coming decades, the result often won’t be pretty. … ” Read more from the San Francisco Chronicle.
San Anselmo moves forward on ballot initiative to quit flood district
“San Anselmo is moving forward with a ballot initiative seeking the town’s exit from a county flood district in protest of Ross Valley flood control efforts. The Town Council gave direction to staff at a meeting Tuesday to prepare a report and potential ballot language for review. The council plans to return for a special meeting in December to consider approving the ballot measure, which will seek to withdraw the town from Marin County Flood Control and Water Conservation District Flood Control Zone 9. A petition circulated in the community garnered 1,420 signatures, which put it past the threshold to secure its place on the ballot. Council members voiced their support for the initiative. … ” Read more from the Marin Independent Journal.
CENTRAL COAST
Big Basin: Redwood trees’ recovery is ‘remarkable’ three years after huge fire, while some species are still struggling
“More than three years after a wildfire devastated Big Basin Redwoods State Park in the Santa Cruz Mountains, the massive redwood trees in California’s oldest state park continue to recover with surprising speed. But some wildlife species, particularly salmon and steelhead trout in the park’s streams, and some types of birds, are still struggling and could take many years to bounce back. That was the conclusion of researchers who spoke at a recent scientific symposium exploring how Big Basin is faring in the wake of the 2020 CZU Lightning Complex Fire. The best news: The park’s famed old-growth redwoods, some of which tower more than 250 feet and date back more than 1,500 years, are nearly all green again, showing significant amounts of new growth after the wildfire’s flames charred their bark black and for a while gave them a doomed appearance. … ” Read more from the San Jose Mercury News.
SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY
What El Niño may mean for Tehachapi’s water supply
“Tehachapi had rain and rainbows last week, but whether El Niño conditions will mean another wet year remains to be seen. A large rainbow could be seen from the office of the Tehachapi-Cummings County Water District during a meeting of the Board of Directors on Nov. 15. During the meeting, General Manager Tom Neisler told directors that forecasts continue to predict a significant El Niño for this winter. “While this is typically thought to produce warmer and wetter than normal conditions, that scenario only occurs about a third of the time when El Niño conditions exist,” Neisler said. … ” Read more from the Tehachapi News.
SAN DIEGO
Commentary: San Diegans hold their breath as Newsom defers to Washington D.C. on Tijuana River sewage crisis
Pedro Rios, the director of the American Friends Service Committee’s U.S./Mexico Border program and a longtime human rights advocate, write, ““If I had a chance to tell Gov. (Gavin) Newsom something about the pollution in the Tijuana River Valley, I would tell him to get it fixed as soon as possible because the odor is horrible, and I don’t know what else it’s doing to our health. Like my partner says, if this was happening to rich people in La Jolla, this would have been taken care of a long time ago.” That’s what Analisa Corrales, a nine-year resident of the Nestor neighborhood in San Diego, told me when I asked how she felt about the pollution from the Tijuana River Valley and how aerosolized contaminants might be affecting the health of her and her three children. They are 12 years old, 7 years old and 6 months old, and they live less than 2 miles from the sewage-choked river. “My son is constantly congested with allergies and has stomach aches. My 7-year-old has allergies, too,” Corrales said. “I’m sure it has something to do with the air we breathe, and I’m worried about the health of my baby.” … ” Read more from Cal Matters.
Along the Colorado River …
The future of the Colorado River hinges on one young negotiator
“John Brooks Hamby was 9 years old the last time a group of Western states renegotiated how they share the dwindling Colorado River. When the high-stakes talks concluded two years later, in 2007, with a round of painful cuts, he hadn’t reached high school. Yet this June an audience of water policy experts listened with rapt attention as Hamby, now 27, recited lessons from those deliberations. Hamby, California’s boyish-looking representative on issues concerning the river, sat shoulder-to-shoulder with the other states’ powerful water managers, many of whom have decades of experience, an almost uncomfortable sight given their latest brawl over the beleaguered Colorado River. The group had gathered in a mock courtroom at the University of Colorado Law School to discuss water law and to field questions about their negotiations over shortages that have prompted some cities to restrict growth and farmers to fallow fields. … ” Read more from Pro Publica.
Colorado River windfall
“The Biden administration brokered a historic deal earlier this year for Colorado River users to conserve nearly a billion gallons from the shrinking river through 2026 — at a cost of $1.2 billion in Inflation Reduction Act funds. But our Annie Snider found in an investigation that many of those cuts would have been made anyway under existing conservation deals and water-saving practices — at a much cheaper cost to the taxpayer. And with the focus turning now to a broader, long-term deal to save the river after 2026, the government’s payments today could drive up the price of conservation for the future. “There’s sort of a rumor in the water community that a lot of people are getting paid to do what they would have done anyway,” Eric Kuhn, the former general manager of the Colorado River District, told Annie. … ” Read more from Politico (note: scroll down for story).
Arizona’s Gila River Indian Community moves forward with first solar canal project in the US
“In an effort to address the ongoing drought affecting the Southwest, the Gila River Indian Community is taking an innovative step forward by launching its Solar Canal Project to construct the country’s first solar-over-canal project. “A tribe is leading the way,” Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis said, adding that the shovel-ready project will immediately address water conservation. The Gila River Indian Community and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed an agreement on Thursday in Sacaton, Arizona, kicking off construction on the first phase of the Pima-Maricopa Irrigation Project Renewal Energy Pilot Project, which is expected to be completed in 2025. “This new technology fits and supports our culture and tradition as we look forward to being sustainable in the future in a very real way,” Lewis said. The project may break new ground for the tribe, but he said it furthers their role as stewards of their water. … ” Read more from Grist.
Arizona Senate president wants to replace 100-year water supply requirement
“Calling the figure “arbitrary,” Senate President Warren Petersen wants to scrap the centerpiece of state water law: the heart of the 1980 Goundwater Management Act that requires residential developers in urban areas to show they have a 100-year supply of water and replace it with something much looser. The Gilbert Republican is complaining about the Department of Water Resources announcing earlier this year it would not issue permits for new subdivisions for some areas on the fringes of Phoenix. That came because a modeling analysis of groundwater at the edges of the basin in and around Phoenix shows there simply won’t be enough water to provide the legally required 100-year supply. All that resulted in headlines from coast to coast that Arizona was running out of water. And Petersen blamed ADWR. … ” Read more from the Arizona Capitol Times.
Tucson officials didn’t heed most written public comments on water blueprint
“More water conservation rebates and incentives? Yes. More Tucson Water collaboration on water issues with “stakeholders,” including those in the business community? Definitely yes. Water conservation mandates such as limiting what days in the week people can spray their outdoor landscaping? Not likely. Limits on population growth and new development to keep Tucson’s water supply whole? Definitely not. Those views highlight the reactions of Tucson Water officials to many hundreds of written comments on the city’s newly adopted, long-range water plan. Dubbed One Water 2100, the 118-page document offers a blueprint for how the utility and the City Council that adopted the plan view Tucson’s water future. … ” Read more from the Arizona Daily Star.
An energy company wants to build hydropower projects on the Navajo Nation. Not everyone is on board
“Percy Deal, a member of the Navajo Nation, is looking up at a pale stripe of sandstone that stands out against the rim of Black Mesa in northeastern Arizona. Juniper trees speckle the steep cliffsides facing the site of a proposed hydropower project. “All you have to do is look around here,” Deal said. “This is a very beautiful land.” The hydropower company Nature and People First applied for preliminary permits from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) last year to investigate the possibility of building three pumped water storage projects on and below Black Mesa to generate electricity for nearby cities like Phoenix and Tucson. Deal and other Black Mesa residents are worried that the project could do damage to land and water that has ecological and cultural significance to both the Navajo and Hopi tribes. … ” Read more from KUNC.
Rising against the odds: Remarkable resurgence of America’s second largest reservoir amid persistent drought
“After falling to record lows in early 2023, water levels in Lake Powell—the second-largest reservoir in the United States—rebounded in the summer of 2023. Above-average snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains provided some short-term relief to the reservoir, but long-term drought remains. The images above show portions of Lake Powell, which straddles the border of Utah and Arizona, as of October 20, 2023 (right), compared to September 23, 2022 (left). As of November 12, 2023, lake levels stood at 3,572 feet (37 percent full), which is just below the 1991–2020 average for that date. The 2023 image was acquired with the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 8 and the 2022 image was acquired by the OLI-2 on Landsat 9. … ” Read more from Sci Tech Daily.
In national water news today …
Flood risk for millions in USA from the ageing network of levees
“Authorities had known that the ageing levee on the border of Monterey County, California, could fail. Built in the late 1940s, it provides flood protection for the agricultural town of Pajaro, home to some 3,500 residents – a ‘disadvantaged community’, one elected official would later tell the Los Angeles Times. In the early hours of 11 March 2023, as more than 30 centimetres of rainfall doused parts of the county, the Pajaro River breached the earthen embankment. The town was quickly submerged. When US professor Farshid Vahedifard heard what had happened, he wasn’t surprised. Vahedifard, a specialist in resilient and equitable infrastructure at the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (the UN’s ‘Think Tank on Water’), had been working on a new report on the communities living behind US levees. ‘I was not happy to see proof of what our paper was showing us,’ he says. … ” Read more Geographical.
What’s next for WOTUS following Sackett ruling?
“On Jan. 18, 2023, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Corps of Engineers published a final rule defining “waters of the United States” (WOTUS) under the Clean Water Act despite the fact that a case on that issue was pending on the Supreme Court’s docket. The January rule is the subject of numerous challenges and is stayed in 27 states. On May 25, 2023, the Supreme Court addressed the scope of Clean Water Act jurisdiction in Sackett v. EPA. All nine justices agreed that significant nexus is not a legitimate basis for establishing Clean Water Act jurisdiction. All nine justices agreed that the Sackett’s property in Idaho, which is separated from a large wetland by a road and separated from Priest Lake by dry land and a row of houses, is not regulated by the Clean Water Act. … ” Read more from Water Finance & Management.
In the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, new marine ecosystems are flourishing
“In the Pacific Ocean, between Hawaii and California, at least 79,000 metric tons of plastic has coalesced to create the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The patch, kept together by ocean currents and spanning an area of roughly 1.6 million square kilometers — about twice the size of Texas — is one of the most incriminating examples of human pollution on the planet. It’s also a huge hazard for marine life, killing up to 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals each year via ingestion of plastic or entanglement in plastic pieces. But while the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is harming some creatures, it’s actually helping others to survive. In a study published in April 2023 in Nature Ecology & Evolution, a team of interdisciplinary scientists fished 105 pieces of plastic from the patch and found barnacles and bryozoans stuck to items like toothbrushes, clothes hangers and shampoo bottles. In addition to open-ocean species, coastal organisms were frequently found on the items — the plastics were acting as little rafts, carrying creatures far from their shallow coastal homes. … ” Read more from Knowable Magazine.
More news and commentary in the weekend edition …
In California water news this weekend …
- PG&E formalizes plan to eliminate Lake Pillsbury in Mendocino National Forest in landmark move
- Sites Project Authority certifies Sites Reservoir’s final environmental report
- Republican lawmaker seeks to undo Central Valley Project environmental protections
- CV-SALTS: Salt and nitrate programs continue to benefit permittees and communities
- California’s giant sequoias are in big trouble
- California state scientists strike, demand equal pay
- Salmon fall run in Mokelumne River sets 80-year record
- Biden’s climate and tribal goals conflict on California’s coast
- SDCWA drops suit challenging Fallbrook, Rainbow water split
- Will another snowy winter boost the Colorado River? It hasn’t happened in this century
- And more …
Click here for the weekend digest.
