Watch our series of short videos on the importance of the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, how it works as a water hub for
California and the challenges it is facing.
When a person opens a spigot to draw a glass of water, he or she
may be tapping a source close to home or hundreds of miles away.
Water gets to taps via a complex web of aqueducts, canals and
groundwater.
Learn more about our team in the office and on the Board of
Directors and how you can support our nonprofit mission by
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contributor or supporting specific projects.
Unlike California’s majestic rivers and massive dams and
conveyance systems, groundwater is out of sight and underground,
though no less plentiful. The state’s enormous cache of
underground water is a great natural resource and has contributed
to the state becoming the nation’s top agricultural producer and
leader in high-tech industries.
A new era of groundwater management began in 2014 in California
with the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. The landmark law
turned 10 in 2024, with many challenges still ahead.
Tom Gibson, new director of
California’s Department of Water Resources, will serve as the
keynote speaker for our 42ⁿᵈ annual Water
Summit on Oct. 29.
Guided by this year’s theme, Stewarding a New Era in
Western Water,Gibson and
other leading policymakers and experts will address emerging
topics related to the challenges and opportunities facing water
resource management in California and the West.
Gibson,
an attorney who has held several roles in the state’s Natural
Resources Agency and its various departments, was appointed by
Gov. Newsom on June 29 and sworn in on July 6 to lead DWR and its
nearly 4,000 employees.
Mark your calendars! Registration will be opening soon for two
exciting Water Education Foundation events this fall.
Water Summit | Oct. 29
Join us for our premier event of
the year, bringing together leading policymakers and experts from
all sectors to discuss the most pressing water issues facing
California and the West.
Arizona’s largest and most senior water rights holder says it
was left out of final discussions about the federal
government’s proposed plan to deal with ongoing water shortages
in the Colorado River. The plan, issued by the Bureau of
Reclamation on July 31, outlines several alternative paths to
preserving water levels in the Colorado’s two major reservoirs,
lakes Mead and Powell. … The Colorado River
Indian Tribes submitted a letter to the
bureau Aug. 2 outlining its concerns. CRIT holds
themost senior tribal water rights on the
lower river and 23% of Arizona’s entire allocation of the
Colorado. The tribe said Reclamation had shared
documents regarding the process to publish the final
environmental impact statement with the seven basin states but
did not extend that same courtesy to the tribe.
A federal judge on Monday opted to impose no restrictions on
operations for a massive California water conveyance system,
determining environmental groups failed to meet their burden.
U.S. District Judge Jennifer Thurston wrote that the Center for
Biological Diversity and other plaintiffs must make a
heightened showing before she will issue a preliminary
injunction over the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s operation of
Shasta Dam and Reservoir this summer and fall. … The
groups argued the bureau’s operation of the Central Valley
Project, including Shasta Dam, and California’s State Water
Project failed to comply with a 2024 biological opinion
issued under the Endangered Species Act. They asked
the Joe Biden appointeeto reduce water releases from Shasta and
require the government to adopt a new operating plan.
The Trump administration has ordered construction crews on a
border wall to stop drilling wells in drought-stricken New
Mexico after ranchers saidpumping
groundwater needed to make concrete could threaten their
livestock. The order comes as crews across the
southern border race to complete one of President Donald
Trump’s highest domestic priorities — barriers that span four
states and received over $46 billion in federal funding.
Controversies have sprouted up in Texas and
California, with border-town residents and
environmentalists reporting a wide variety of issues with
construction. U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which
oversees border wall construction, has said water is
needed to make concrete for roads, wall construction and dust
suppression. Cattle ranchers in the area say
the drought has already forced them to reduce their
herd size.
California’s once exponentially growing population of invasive
mute swans has fallen by half, less than a year after a new law
took effect allowing hunters and landowners to kill
them. Over the objections of animal welfare groups, Gov.
Gavin Newsom last year signed legislation allowing property
owners and those with hunting licenses to shoot the nonnative,
destructive swans. The mute swan population had ballooned to
about 15,000, most around the Suisun Marsh on the outskirts of
the Bay Area. … Wetland ecologists and waterfowl biologists
say they represent a profound threat to the struggling
wetlands of the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta. … As their numbers grow, they can
quickly eat through a marsh’s submerged native vegetation on
which other species rely.
Operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the
Bay Model is a giant hydraulic replica of San Francisco
Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta. It is housed in a converted World II-era
warehouse in Sausalito near San Francisco.
Hundreds of gallons of water are pumped through the
three-dimensional, 1.5-acre model to simulate a tidal ebb
and flow lasting 14 minutes.
As part of the historic Colorado
River Delta, the Salton Sea regularly filled and dried for
thousands of years due to its elevation of 237 feet below
sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
Drought — an extended period of
limited or no precipitation — is a fact of life in California and
the West, with water resources following boom-and-bust patterns.
No portion of the West has been immune to drought during the last
century and it occurs with much greater frequency in the West
than in any other region of the country.
