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
donating in someone’s honor or memory, or becoming a regular
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.
The Water Education Foundation’s
2025 Annual
Reportis now available in an interactive,
digital format and recaps how we accomplished a lot of
“firsts” last year.
A standout moment was our first-ever Klamath River
Tour, where we brought 45 participants into the heart of
the watershed that underwent the nation’s largest dam removal
project.
Big Day of Giving may be ending soon but
you have until midnight to support the Water Education
Foundation’s tours, workshops, publications and other programs
aimed at building water literacy across California and the West!
Donate
now to help us reach our $10,000
fundraising goal by midnight - we are only
$4,120 away!
At the Foundation, we believe that education is as precious as
water. Your donations help us empower next-generation
leaders from all sectors of the water world to broaden their
knowledge and build their collaborative skills through our
popular Water Leader programs in
California and the Colorado River Basin.
Gov. Jared Polis on Thursday issued a statewide drought
emergency declaration, potentially freeing up additional state
funding for the state’s response to record-low snowpack
and prolonged warm temperatures across
Colorado. Colorado’s snowpack peaked in early March about
a month earlier than usual and at the lowest level since 1987.
Farmers, ranchers, fishing and rafting outfitters, and cities
and reservoir managers are already feeling the impacts of tight
water supplies this year on their wallets and water supply
budgets. Polis’ declaration follows recommendations Monday from
the Colorado Drought Task Force and the Water Conditions
Monitoring Committee.
When rain falls on California shopping centers and warehouses,
the water runs off parking lots carrying metal dust and
chemicals from vehicle tires and brake pads, oil and grease
from engines, and bacteria from trash. The gunk washes into
storm drains and pollutes creeks, rivers and beaches. Now
environmental advocates are pushing state regulators to
crack down by requiring stormwater permits.
… Groups that represent the businesses say they are
already paying property taxes that in L.A. County include a
special tax for cleaning up stormwater, and that imposing new
regulations in this way doesn’t make sense. But California
Coastkeeper Alliance and other nonprofit groups submitted
petitions to regional water officials across the state this
week demanding they begin regulating commercial propertiessuch
as big-box stores, auto dealers and industrial parks.
The top federal official on the Colorado River said his agency
is targeting the middle of this summer to formalize a new
water-sharing plan. Scott Cameron, the acting commissioner of
the Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency which manages the
nation’s largest reservoirs, addressed a crowd of water experts
in Boulder, Colorado. “I can’t give you exact dates,” he
said, “But I would expect mid to late summer, and as we get
closer, we’ll try to signal a bit more precision around that.”
… Federal water officials have urged the seven states
that use the Colorado River to agree on a plan for sharing its
water. If they don’t, Reclamation will likely
install its own, but risk getting sued by states that could
accuse the federal government of overstepping its
authority.
The environmental footprint of data centers already rivals some
of the world’s largest countries, according to a United Nations
University report, which also predicts their water and energy
use and pollution will double in just four years as use of
artificial intelligence grows. Last year, global data centers
used 448 trillion watt-hours of electricity, more than all but
10 countries of the world, said the report issued Wednesday.
That electricity use produced about 208 million tons of carbon
dioxide, about the same amount as Argentina, and
producing that much energy consumed about 1.2 trillion
gallons of water, according to the report on the
environmental consequences of AI’s energy use.
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.
During California’s 2012–2016 drought, much of the state
experienced severe drought conditions: significantly less
precipitation and snowpack, reduced streamflow and higher
temperatures. Those same conditions reappeared early in 2021
prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom in May to declare drought emergencies
in watersheds across 41 counties in California.
