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On the calendar today …
- PUBLIC HEARING: Sites Reservoir Water Right Permit beginning at 9am. The State Water Resources Control Board is holding a multi-day public hearing on the Sites Project Authority’s application for a water right permit to store up to 1.5 million acre-feet of water annually in a proposed reservoir in the Sacramento Valley. View hearing on the Administrative Hearings Office YouTube channel.
In California water news today …
NOTEBOOK FEATURE: Here today, forgotten tomorrow: How shifting baselines transform nature and challenge restoration
“Among the jumbled boulders on the Klamath River’s Ishi Pishi Falls, Ron Reed learned to fish with a traditional salmon dipnet when he was just a few years old. Chinook and coho, Reed remembers, clogged the water below the tumbling rapids during peak migration times. “All I remember is salmon, all over the place,” says Reed, a 62-year-old elder and ceremonial leader of the Karuk tribe. “We caught so many, sometimes all we’d need by noon.” Since the 1960s, salmon habitat along the length of the Klamath and its tributaries has deteriorated, thanks to the construction of dams and the diversion of water to irrigate farms. In response, salmon runs have plunged. A similar trend has occurred throughout California, with returns in most major salmon rivers recently at or near record lows. This prompted officials to ban commercial and recreational fishing statewide in 2023, a closure that has extended through 2024. As salmon wane, tribal relations with the fish have changed, especially in the youngest generation. “They see us fishing, but they don’t see us catching anything,” Reed says of his grandchildren. … ” Continue reading from Maven’s Notebook.
Study finds Central Valley residents continually exposed to ‘toxic soup’ of pesticides
“A recent UC Davis study found that as Central Valley residents go about their day, they regularly breathe in pesticides, including one that has been banned in California and another whose effects on people is unclear. The study, which was conducted in 2022 with the help of Central Valley residents, found that seven of 31 adults and one out of 11 children were exposed to detectable amounts of pesticides, including chlorpyrifos, which was banned by the state in 2020 after research showed it had a harmful neurodevelopmental effect on children. The researchers recruited volunteers to wear backpacks with air-collection tubes for at least eight hours a day. They found that the residents were exposed to five other pesticides including 1,3-dichloropropene, also known as 1,3-D, a pesticide used to eradicate parasitic worms that has been banned in more than 20 countries, and penthiopyrad, a fungicide used to prevent mold and mildew that has not yet been studied for its effect on mammals, so the human impact is unknown. … ” Read more from the LA Times.
Happy New Water Year 2025! – Wet, dry, or just plain weird?
“October 1 marks the beginning of the new Water Year in California. Water years here run from October 1 until September 30 of the next calendar year, and are named for the calendar year of the bulk of the water year (January-October). It is a good time to reflect on the last year and make largely futile predictions of precipitation for the coming 12 months. The 2024 water year was blissfully normal. Not too wet. No major floods. Not a drought. The year was unusually normal, for the last decade. See Figure 1. Little to complain about, except that farmers an environmental interests would like average flows to be higher. … ” Read more from the California Water Blog.
Could the tide be rising for American aquaculture?
“Luke Gardner strides silently among rows of burbling, black drums, and a flat generator hum. Pausing at a drum, he reaches down into the impenetrable white glare at the water’s surface. The hand disappears; the guttural air pipes sing. Then, in his damp palm, a little red web materializes like spun glass. “Dulse,” he says, “tastes like bacon.” Gardner is an aquaculture extension specialist at California Sea Grant, based out of the Moss Landing Marine Lab Aquaculture Facility. At Sea Grant, Gardner speaks the languages of academia and industry, helping scientists direct research toward areas of need. Privately, he has always loved aquaculture and nurturing things. The type of onshore aquaculture Gardner oversees at Moss Landing is novel in California, but seaweed farming is not new to the American West. … ” Read more from & the West.
Coastal restoration: Shifting sand — for better or worse
“Coastal beaches are dynamic systems. Wind, waves, and currents constantly move sand around, enlarging a beach here, narrowing one there. Storms make more drastic changes, sometimes washing away or depositing entire beaches. When humans build houses, roads, hotels, and other structures on or near beaches, they put themselves in conflict with this dynamic nature. Communities trying to protect such infrastructure often employ a variety of methods to hold sand in place, including hard structures such as jetties and seawalls. These don’t actually stop sand from moving, though. They just change where and how it does move, and they often enhance local erosion. Increasingly severe storms and sea-level rise caused by climate change are only making the problem worse. Officials in many towns and cities have turned to another method: beach renourishment. This involves bringing in sand from elsewhere and adding it to eroded beaches. Beach nourishment only accounts for about 5% of the more than 55 billion tons of sand mined worldwide every year — a level of removal that threatens coastal ecosystems worldwide — but experts say its benefits are questionable and its potential for harm perhaps underestimated. … ” Read more from the Revelator.
Untapped potential: Study shows how water systems can help accelerate renewable energy adoption
“New Stanford-led research reveals how water systems, from desalination plants to wastewater treatment facilities, could help make renewable energy more affordable and dependable. The study, published Sept. 27 in Nature Water, presents a framework to measure how water systems can adjust their energy use to help balance power grid supply and demand. “If we’re going to reach net zero, we need demand-side energy solutions, and water systems represent a largely untapped resource,” said study lead author Akshay Rao, an environmental engineering PhD student in the Stanford School of Engineering. “Our method helps water operators and energy managers make better decisions about how to coordinate these infrastructure systems to simultaneously meet our decarbonization and water reliability goals.” … ” Read more from the Stanford Report.
AI-driven water forecasting: enhancing hydropower resilience
“The World Economic Forum’s Risks Report 2023 ranks failure to mitigate and adapt to the climate crisis within its top two priorities globally, for both the near and long term. As climatic change leads to a rise in erratic weather patterns, the increase in storm intensity and unpredictable surges have become a significant challenge for global hydropower infrastructure. Surges cause severe damage to turbines, spillways, and ancillary infrastructure, and increased difficulty in accurately predicting these events leaves operations teams unprepared to respond effectively, leading to severe infrastructure damage and compromised energy production. In 2017, California’s Department of Water Resources issued a mandatory evacuation order for 188,000 residents living below the Oroville Dam, fearing catastrophic failure. A series of unseasonable storms had caused Oroville Lake to rise rapidly, exposing maintenance vulnerabilities in the dam’s spillway and severe structural problems. A recent response to the climate crisis comes from Statkraft, Europe’s largest renewable energy producer, which has announced a capital investment programme amounting to €700 million to shore up its hydropower assets against the impact of increasing storm surges. … ” Continue reading at International Water & Power.
Newsom signs Soria bill for Westlands energy production
“Assemblymember Esmeralda Soria announced Thursday that her bill, Assembly Bill 2661, which aims to advance clean energy development in the Central Valley, was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom. AB 2661 authorizes Westlands Water District, the water district serving farmers and rural communities on the west side of the counties of Fresno and Kings, to broaden its current ability to oversee energy projects, including the generation, storage and transmission of solar energy. The bill authorizes a water district to generate and deliver hydro-electric energy and to construct, operate, and maintain works, facilities, improvements, and property necessary or convenient for generating and delivering that electricity. It also authorizes projects to convert fallowed farmland to solar farms, which will create jobs, help farmworkers retrain and transition into skilled trades and spur economic development, according to a news release from Soria’s office. … ” Read more from The Business Journal.
Governor Newsom signs bills to tighten restrictions on oil and gas drillers
“With pumpjacks nodding in the background, California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday signed new laws to hold oil companies accountable and protect neighborhoods from oil development, protections community groups have fought more than a decade to win. “I just want to breathe for a moment because it has been a long and winding road to get here,” said Martha Dina Argüello, executive director of Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles, standing in front of active oil wells in Los Angeles’ Inglewood Oil Field. “This moment has been fueled by years of persistent and principled organizing by many of the community organizations that are represented here,” Argüello said. “Communities that have lived with the harmful effects of oil drilling and pollution where we live, work, play and learn.” … ” Read more from Inside Climate News.
House passes Costa’s legislation to enhance clean drinking water, forest health in the San Joaquin Valley
“Congressman Jim Costa (CA-21) released the following statement after he voted to pass the bipartisan Fix Our Forests Act to restore forest health, increase resiliency against wildfires, and expedite forest restoration projects. The Fix Our Forests Act includes Costa’s Headwaters Protection Act, which reforms the Water Source Protection Program (WSPP) by boosting authorized funding, expanding eligibility for public entities like local water districts, and increasing the federal cost share to increase interest and participation in the program. “The health of California’s watersheds, waterways, and wetlands are inter-connected to the San Joaquin Valley’s agricultural economy. My legislation will empower local water districts and increase funding for critical restoration projects, ensuring healthier watersheds and safer communities. It’s an investment in our natural resources and the well-being of those who depend on them,” said Congressman Costa. … ” Read more from Congressman Jim Costa.
Autumn heat wave to build in California, Arizona, Nevada
“Temperatures will soar to record-challenging levels from the southwestern United States deserts to the California coast during much of the week, AccuWeather meteorologists say. Along with surging temperatures will come a renewed wildfire risk. “A vast zone of high pressure will expand across much of the West this week, allowing for temperatures to climb well above historical average, even along the Pacific coast, where it can be more difficult for temperatures to climb,” AccuWeather Meteorologist Haley Taylor said. When temperatures rise across the interior west, a cool breeze is often pulled in from the Pacific Ocean, helping regulate temperatures along many beaches and the Interstate 5 corridor. In this case, however, the flow will turn offshore, and the ocean’s cooling effect will be minimal or not occur at all. … ” Read more from AccuWeather.
In commentary today …
Water security for Californians means protecting source waters
Redgie Collins, Legal and Policy Director for California Trout, writes, “Many Californians are familiar with the water infrastructure that connects our state. We’ve driven over canals and enjoyed activities on or near the many reservoirs that supply water to our crops and homes. Yet, many of us are unfamiliar with the incredible places where our water originates. In far Northern California lies one such place where water begins its journey as snow that seeps into deep aquifers, and eventually emerges on the surface as springs. This place is known as Sáttítla to the Pit River Tribe. In the world of conservation, we call these places where water originates source water areas. In times of recurring droughts and rising temperatures, these aquifers and spring systems are becoming even more essential to our state’s water future – but they are in danger. If we don’t protect these places, California’s water security, natural landscapes, and iconic species are at risk. … ” Read more from Capitol Weekly.
In regional water news and commentary today …
NORTH COAST
Volunteers came to clean up Mendocino’s waterways. Instead, they found encampments.
“This last Saturday, September 28, 2024, community members converged on multiple Mendocino County waterways targeting areas inundated by refuse. Volunteers did not just find simple trash to pick up but entire makeshift communities built by the Ukiah Valley’s unhoused population directly in vulnerable waterways. In the end, thousands of pounds of waste were pulled from local riparian habitats. Volunteers met at Low Gap Park at 8:30 am to sign in for the Ukiah Valley Russian River Cleanup. Coffee and pastries from Black Oak Coffee Roasters provided energy for a morning of hauling trash. The Mendocino County Resource Conservation District (MCRCD) organized the event, along with Redwood Waste Solutions, the County of Mendocino, and the City of Ukiah. … ” Read more from Mendo Fever.
BAY AREA
PG&E decision on new San Jose energy project will hurt wildlife in Coyote Valley, environmentalists say
“Coyote Valley, a rural expanse of farmland and scenic open space between San Jose and Morgan Hill, has been the center of development battles for decades. Apple proposed building its world headquarters there in the 1980s. Cisco had similar plans in the 1990s. Now, even though environmental groups and taxpayers have spent $120 million to preserve 1,500 acres of open space and farmland in the past decade, a new battle is shaping up. State officials last year gave New York company LS Power approval to build a 13-mile long high-voltage transmission line from San Jose to Coyote Valley. The project, according to officials at the California Independent System Operator, the agency that runs most of California’s power grid and chose LS Power over four other competitors for the project, is needed to expand the amount of electricity that can flow in and out of Silicon Valley to handle a big jump in demand in the coming years from more electric cars, the expansion of artificial intelligence and population growth. … ” Read more from the San Jose Mercury News.
CENTRAL COAST
Santa Barbara County health department offers free water testing for private wells
“Santa Barbara County Public Health Department, Environmental Health Services will conduct a free water testing program for households in Santa Barbara County who rely on private or shared groundwater wells for their drinking water. The Central Coast Drinking Water Well Testing Program is administered by the Bay Foundation of Morro Bay, in coordination with the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board. The program provides key information to individuals regarding the quality of their private drinking water supply. … ” Read more from Noozhawk.
Restoration of Santa Barbara’s Mission Creek is underway
“Right now, Santa Barbara’s Mission Creek is dry and fenced off. Stones and dirt are exposed, and evidence of construction lies all around it. But with winter and spring rains, water and life will course through the creek once again. It might even look like it’s celebrating, following the completion of the Mission Creek Restoration project. The project, which started in August, spans an 1,800-foot section of Mission Creek at Oak Park, which has been degraded over time due to previous construction of hardened banks and a modified creek bed. For Santa Barbara’s 25th annual Creek Week, the city’s Creeks Division hosted a tour of the project on Wednesday. Attendees met at the Mission Creek bridge while the park around them bustled with the noise of happy families, kids playing with RC cars, and teenagers practicing a dance routine. … ” Read more from the Santa Barbara Independent.
SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY
Officials close Smith Canal for fishing, limit public access after oil spill causes public health threat
“Authorities have closed down a large swath of the Smith Canal in Stockton for fishing activity after an oil spill occurred in the area earlier this week. A safety zone has also been established for all of the Smith Canal limiting public access to the area “for safety and environmental purposes.” On Sunday, California’s Department of Fish and Wildlife issued the closure after it was determined “a threat to public health is likely” for those fishing in the area or consuming fish or shellfish caught in the vicinity of the spill or anywhere the petroleum is anticipated to spread. About a mile of the canal’s waterway from Yosemite Lake at the American Legion Park to Mission Road are off limits to all fishing activity until further notice as cleanup and containment efforts are underway. … ” Read more from Stocktonia.
School district’s new water system may be example for contaminated rural areas
“The long and ultimately successful journey to clean drinking water for a rural school district west of Bakersfield may point to a path forward for other remote areas dealing with groundwater contaminated by nitrates and the carcinogen 1,2,3-TCP. Instead of the bottled water they have relied on for almost a decade, students of the Rio Bravo-Greeley Union School District were able to use the district’s drinking fountains last week — many for the first time — thanks to state grants and proceeds from a lawsuit the district brought against companies found liable for the 1,2,3-TCP pollution. … ” Read more from the Bakersfield Californian.
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Fall baking! SoCal temperatures are set to soar above normal. How high will they go?
“For a minute there, it felt like fall. But even as October kicks off, the cool weather reprieve is ending, and Southern California is going to see temperatures climb into the extreme range again, forecasters say. “There is some potential for record-breaking heat,” said Todd Hall, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard. Highs in some areas could soar into the triple digits. Temperatures this week in Southern California are expected to be about 10 degrees above normal, according to the weather service. Parts of Los Angeles County will begin to see high temperatures starting Tuesday, with Wednesday the hottest day of the week, Hall said. … ” Read more from the LA Times.
Staff shortage at U.S. Forest Service hampers Southland wildfire response, locals say
“On a scorching September afternoon, an Orange County public works crew moving boulders with heavy machinery sparked a brush fire. The blaze ignited less than two miles from the U.S. Forest Service’s Trabuco Station, but the station was unstaffed by federal firefighters. The only crew there was the Orange County Fire Authority’s Engine 18. When that engine arrived on scene, the fire was just half an acre, burning in medium brush with a moderate rate of spread, according to radio communications provided by Orange County Fire Chief Brian Fennessy. The crew also encountered two people who required treatment for smoke inhalation, he said. Fennessy wonders whether, had a Forest Service engine responded with them, the firefighters could have contained the flames to the grassy flats. Instead, the fire raced up steep slopes into forested areas, growing into a 23,000-acre behemoth that destroyed 160 structures and injured 22 people. … ” Read more from the LA Times.
Along the Colorado River …
Why the Sierra Club is suing to change a deal aimed at protecting the Colorado River
“One of the nation’s oldest environmental groups is suing Imperial County’s powerful water agency over a recent deal meant to help conserve the parched Colorado River. Under the terms of the deal, the Imperial Irrigation District, or IID, will try to cut back its consumption of Colorado River water by 750,000 acre feet over the next three years. In return, the agency and farmers who conserve water could receive more than $600 million from the federal Bureau of Reclamation. But those cutbacks will also reduce the amount of water flowing into the Salton Sea, which is slowly drying up. That could accelerate the release of harmful particles into the air from the exposed lakebed, according to the Bureau of Reclamation’s own environmental assessment of the deal. … ” Read more from KPBS.
Why don’t we just fix the Colorado River crisis by piping in water from the East?
“The Colorado River is a lifeline for about 40 million people across the Southwest. It supplies major cities like Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Denver and a multibillion-dollar agriculture industry that puts food on tables across the nation. But it doesn’t have enough water to meet current demands. Policymakers are struggling to rein in demand on the river, which has been shrinking at the hands of climate change. The region needs to fix that gap between supply and demand, and there’s no obvious way to do it quickly. But one tantalizingly simple solution keeps coming up. The West doesn’t have enough water, but the East has it in abundance. So, why don’t we just fix the Colorado River crisis by piping in water from the East? The answer is complicated, but experts say it boils down to this: It doesn’t make sense to build a giant East-to-West water pipeline anytime soon for three reasons — politics, engineering, and money. … ” Read more from KUNC.
Would cutting agricultural water use in Colorado prevent future shortage? Well …
“You’ve heard the news: Farmers and ranchers use roughly 80% of the water in Colorado and much of the American West. So doesn’t it make sense that if growers and producers could just cut a bit of that, say 10%, we could wipe out all our water shortages? We probably couldn’t water our lawns with wild abandon, but still, wouldn’t that simple move let everyone relax on these high-stress water issues? Not exactly. To do so would require drying up thousands of acres of productive irrigated lands, causing major disruptions to rural farm economies and the agriculture industry, while wiping out vast swaths of open space and habitat that rely on the industry’s sprawling, intricate irrigation ditches, experts said. … ” Read more from the Colorado Sun.
Rubber Soul, the path to elevation 1,040, and the game of chicken on the Colorado River
“Two years ago, when the level of Lake Mead was hovering near elevation 1,040, my artist wife Lissa Heineman and I drove out over UNM’s fall break to see it for ourselves. Out beyond the old Boulder Harbor, we walked a half mile across mud flats to get to the water. I could look out across the water to see the elbow of the old Southern Nevada Water Authority intake, above the water line. I was gut-punched by the visceral reality. On the walk back to the car, Lissa carefully picked up some pieces of cracked mud. Her art has always been wrapped up in the conceptual properties of her materials. So she carefully packed up the cracked mud in a box and took it home. It’s been sitting in her studio ever since, and last month she tried firing some of it atop some small ceramic plates in her kiln. It worked, and she gave me the results to give to my Lower Basin/Lake Mead friends. The texture of the mud, with ripples across the sandy and muddy reservoir bottom, captures a moment in history I hope we never repeat. … ” Read more from the Inkstain blog.
Cities in the West are booming. But will they actually need a lot more water?
“When researcher Brian Richter set out to take a close look at how big cities in the Western U.S. were adapting to water scarcity, he already knew the story’s basic contours. Previous studies showed the trend clearly for some large utilities. As a megadrought has baked the Southwest since 2000, the region’s biggest cities have reined in their use to keep pace with the declining supply. But it had been years since someone took a more region-wide look at who was conserving and how much. Richter, a lecturer at the University of Virginia, and president of his own independent research firm, Sustainable Waters, was up to the task. After gathering data for 28 large and medium-size water utilities dependent on the Colorado River, Richter and his team were able to see the more modern trend lines in sharp detail. The results surprised him. It wasn’t just that cities like Denver, Los Angeles, Tucson and Las Vegas were using less. They were doing it while growing rapidly. … ” Read more from the Colorado Sun.
Arizona: Water policy is on the minds of voters as drought continues
“A vast majority of Arizona voters support securing long-term water supplies and enacting stronger groundwater protections, but have little faith in Arizona’s current water policies’ ability to sew long term sustainability, according to the latest survey from the Center for the Future of Arizona. Voters’ recognition of water as a key issue facing the state is not new, but has crept closer to the forefront of voters’ consciousness given prolonged drought conditions, lack of oversight of groundwater supply and general anxiety over the state’s water future. “The interest in water, the concern around water and the desire to make sure we have sustainable practices around water and protect future water resources isn’t a new issue,” Sybil Frances, president and CEO of the Center for the Future of Arizona said. “Certainly, going into this election, there’s great understanding and concern among the public that this is an important issue, but going back quite a ways in our public opinion survey research, we found that Arizona voters understand the centrality of water.” … ” Read more from the Arizona Capital Times.
In national water news today …
Utilities dig deep as key deadline in lead line replacement nears
“The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Oct. 16 deadline is fast approaching and water utilities across the U.S. are preparing to submit their inventories of lead service lines, a key provision of the Lead and Copper Rule Revisions. Finalized in December 2021, the LCRR is part of a multiyear regulatory framework to address the public health risks posed by lead service lines. To comply with the LCRR, water utilities must classify all publicly and privately owned service lines as either known lead, non-lead, galvanized requiring replacement, or lead status unknown. The inventories must be publicly available, and water systems need to be prepared for tier 1 public notification in the event of a lead action level exceedance. … ” Read more from the Civil Engineering Source.
SEE ALSO: Lead Service Lines: From Inventory to Replacement Planning and Programs, from Water Finance & Management
AI is everywhere now—and it’s sucking up a lot of water
“Artificial intelligence has become a part of everyday life, but there’s little regulation thus far of its deployment and use. Currently, there’s no law on the books in the U.S that requires AI companies to disclose their environmental impact in terms of energy and water use. Concerned researchers rely on voluntary data from companies like Apple, Meta and Microsoft. But research is showing that AI generation may be even more resource-intensive than originally thought. Imagine that you want to ask an AI program to write up a 100-word email for you. You get an almost instant response, but what you don’t see are the intensive computing resources that went into creating that email. At the AI data center, generating just two of those emails could use as much energy as a full charge on the latest iPhone. And according to a Pew Research Center study, that 100-word email could use up a whole bottle of water for the cooling that’s needed at data centers. … ” Read more from Inside Climate News.
Reservoir conditions …
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