A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation News & Publications Director Vik Jolly.
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The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has introduced its first
nationwide platform designed to help water planners evaluate
whether current and future water needs can be met. The new
National Water Availability Assessment Data Companion aims to
simplify access to critical information that was previously
scattered across multiple sources. According to the agency,
nearly 27 million people in the United States—around 8% of the
population—live in regions where water demand regularly
approaches or exceeds natural supply. The newly released tool
addresses longstanding challenges in accessing comprehensive
datasets by consolidating information on water supply and
demand for approximately 80,000 watersheds.
The billionaire-backed California Forever project, which is in
talks with Suisun City to expand the city’s borders and build a
city for thousands of residents, could threaten the sensitive
Jepson Prairie habitat right outside of its borders and the
endangered species who live there, environmentalists said
during a tour of the site on Friday. Jepson Prairie is a
1,566-acre preserve south of Dixon and east of Travis Air Force
Base that is home to several vernal pools, which are seasonal
wetlands that fill with water in the winter and dry up in the
summer. When the pools exist, flowers bloom around the
perimeter and shrimp and salamanders lay their eggs. When the
pools dry up, they look like muddy plains, which is beneficial
for certain crustaceans.
Large bundles of rock and wood called ‘rockwads’ are being put
into the Sacramento River just north of Turtle
Bay to provide a vital area for young fish to hide. Project
leaders said they hope the novel approach to salmon recovery
will recreate natural hiding areas for native fish. People’s
use of the Sacramento River over the last several decades has
left it fairly bare of debris. The installation of the Shasta
Dam essentially blocking off the historic debris flow that
would come down from the mountains following major storms. That
debris that once acted as hiding spots for young salmon and
trout to avoid larger predators. This has been one of several
factors experts believe to have contributed to California’s
salmon population declining.
Sycamore Island, a 600-acre property on the banks of
the San Joaquin River in the Central Valley,
is a little pocket of nature in the middle of a metropolis.
… Last week, Sycamore Island became part of California’s
largest expansion to its state park system in decades. On Earth
Day, Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled plans for three new California
state parks and announced the expansion of several more. The
state parks expansion touches the redwoods, the Sierra Nevada,
the Pacific Coast and the Central Valley. … The San
Joaquin River Parkway, including Sycamore Island, is a proposed
state park that would consist of 874 acres of riverfront
property and will provide river access and recreation
opportunities for communities in Fresno and Madera.
Spring is already a month in, and rainfall has been scarce
across San Diego. That’s prompting more homeowners to rethink
their backyard landscaping — swapping out thirsty grass lawns
for drought-tolerant plants that are better for the environment
and easier on the wallet. Plants native to Southern California
are built for dry conditions. Drought-tolerant species have
evolved to thrive through the region’s notoriously dry spring
and summer seasons — and now, more residents are taking note.
Sprinkler-heavy landscapes are giving way to low-water designs
that reduce both maintenance and monthly water bills.
With the drought-riddled Colorado River careening toward crisis
levels in the coming months and seven Western states bitterly
deadlocked on how to share its diminished flows, one faction is
attempting to break off and go it alone. Over the past week,
the downstream states of Arizona, California and
Nevada have been negotiating feverishly over a
potential deal to divvy up water delivery cuts for the next few
years and develop a handful of tools for blunting the pain that
will stem from them. It’s a Hail Mary bid to exert some
control over their own fate as the Interior Department prepares
to begin unilaterally operating the river’s system of dams and
canals starting in October.
Utah has taken steps to rein in water use by large data centers
but conservationists and other advocates said more needs to be
done to protect the state’s dwindling water resources.
Lawmakers recently passed the Data Center Water Transparency
Amendments, which require server farm developers to provide an
estimate of future water use. The facilities often need
massive amounts of water to cool their servers,
particularly for artificial intelligence systems. … Utah
is a rapidly growing hub for data centers, featuring 48
operational facilities with more than 900 megawatts of
capacity.
A critical area of Tijuana’s wastewater system, which
repeatedly fails, sending millions of gallons of
untreated sewage a day into the binational Tijuana
River, is being upgraded. On Monday, officials with
Mexico and U.S. governments and the North American Development
Bank (NADBank) broke ground on a project to improve the PB1A
and PB1B lift stations. The pumps move wastewater from a larger
pump station in Tijuana, called PBCILA, across the U.S.-Mexico
border to the South Bay International Wastewater Treatment
Plant that’s located in the Tijuana River Valley. …
[O]fficials said they are also beginning work on a project,
dubbed Tijuana River Gates, to replace 35,700 feet of
deteriorated wastewater pipes along several sections of the
city’s wastewater collection system that repeatedly leak into
the Tijuana River.
The Pacific Ocean is a giant climate cauldron, with a powerful
heat engine that affects storms, fisheries and rainfall
patterns half a world away, and scientists are watching closely
to see if it’s about to boil over. Their projections
suggest the tropical Pacific is simmering toward a strong El
Niño, the warm phase of an ocean-atmosphere cycle that can
intensify and shift those impacts. … Climate scientists
also recently published a study showing that strong El Niño
events can trigger what they called “climate regime shifts,”
meaning abrupt, lasting changes in heat, rainfall and
drought patterns.
Monterey County firefighters have a new piece of equipment to
help train and test, while also saving millions of gallons of
water every year. Monterey County Regional Fire District and
Cal Water partnered on the purchase of the new Pump Pod® DRAFTS
(Direct Recirculating Apparatus Firefighting Training
Sustainability) Unit. … Millions of gallons of water are
needed for training and testing purposes, according to Cal
Water officials. The DRAFTS unit allows water used for
full-flow training to be recycled and reused instead of going
down the drain. Cal Water officials estimates that, with this
unit, the fire district will save more than 7.4 million gallons
of water every year.
California water issues are notoriously complex: an alphabet
soup of agencies manage California water, and the acronym-heavy
insider-speak can be impenetrable—even for an experienced water
expert. Moreover, California does not manage its water alone:
federal agencies are responsible for many water-related
activities and services across the state. In the past year the
federal government has been downsizing—creating uncertainty
across all aspects of California’s water management, including
mitigating the impacts of natural disasters like wildfires and
floods. Managing California’s water in a time of changing
responsibilities, economic pressures, and climate volatility
won’t be easy. Clarity around basic issues will help.
Residents in a Peninsula suburb could be without water until at
least midweek after an active drinking water line became
contaminated during maintenance work. The problems started
Friday in the Mountain View neighborhood of Cuesta
Park when a contractor was working on a water
replacement project, the city said on its website. As the
contractor was attempting to fill an old pipe with cement near
Bonita Avenue and Cuesta Drive, cement slurry, a liquid mix of
cement, water and other chemicals, accidentally spilled into an
active main providing drinking water. … Though city
officials initially told residents that the water could be back
by Monday, it determined that further repairs are needed after
drinking water samples taken from the area came back positive
for bacteria.
The Kern-Tulare Water District in northeastern Kern County is
asking the state to take a closer look at what it says is
excessive pumping in a so-called “whiteland”
area that is harming its own groundwater supplies.
Representatives of the Eastside Water Management Area (EWMA),
meanwhile, say the group is working through a laborious process
to get the legal authority and funding to take action on over
pumping. It was “surprised and disappointed” by Kern-Tulare’s
April 20 letter to the Department of Water Resources’
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) department, a
spokesman said at the Kern Non-Districted Lands April 27
meeting where the dispute spilled over.
A long-running effort to divert water from the Eel
River into the Russian River basin is
under review as Pacific Gas & Electric Co. moves forward with
plans to decommission the Potter Valley Project, a 9.2-megawatt
hydroelectric facility in Northern California. PG&E is
evaluating proposals from entities interested in owning and
operating the project’s dams, a process expected to take years
and carry significant implications for regional water supplies
and fish habitat. … PG&E said the only proposal it
has received so far is from “Sonoma County Water Agency, Inland
Water & Power Commission of Mendocino County,
Round Valley Tribes, Humboldt County, Cal Trout, Trout
Unlimited and California Department of
Fish & Wildlife,” and said it continues to work
with those groups.
Utah cities, ski resorts, farmers and scientists tracking and
preparing for the fallout of this year’s lowest-ever
snowpack and winter drought are already feeling the
effects. … Hosted by the nonprofit Great Salt Lake
Alliance, panelists discussed the wide-ranging implications for
Utah’s economy and environment, and the realities of a future
with less water. … The Monday event followed an
announcement from state water managers last week of a “bleak
outlook” for the next few months. … Also at risk: the
groundwater supply and several springs that are already running
low, said Bethany Neilson, director of the Utah Water Research
Laboratory at Utah State University in Logan.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced
$90 million in grant funding aimed at improving drinking water
and wastewater infrastructure serving Tribal Nations and rural
communities across the United States. … According to the
agency, the funding will be split between targeted investments
and broader technical assistance programs. A total of $30
million will be deployed in collaboration with the Indian
Health Service to advance water infrastructure projects in
Tribal communities. These efforts include expanding access to
centralized drinking water and wastewater systems,
rehabilitating aging infrastructure, reducing contaminants to
meet regulatory standards, and replacing deteriorated sewage
collection and treatment facilities.
When most people hear the word “mussel,” they probably think of
seafood, not a growing environmental threat. But in Colorado,
state officials are urging the public to pay attention to a
different kind of mussel entirely: invasive freshwater species
that can multiply rapidly, disrupt aquatic ecosystems, and
damage critical water infrastructure. Colorado Parks and
Wildlife’s (CPW) aquatic nuisance species program focuses on
preventing the spread of invasive organisms like zebra mussels,
quagga mussels, and golden mussels. Zebra and quagga mussels
have been present in the United States since the late 1980s,
while golden mussels were first detected in California in 2024
and are spreading there quickly. Golden mussels are not
currently known to be in Colorado, but officials say the threat
is real.
The State Water Contractors hailed the Delta Stewardship
Council’s certification of the Delta Conveyance Project, while
a coalition of opponents argued the agency ignored the
project’s flaws for political expediency. The council
determined that the project is consistent with the Delta Plan,
but also sent two issues back to the state Department of Water
Resources to demonstrate consistency with a Golden Mussel
mitigation strategy and the siting of planned Delta Conveyance
Project facilities in relation of farmland designated for use
for recharging recycled water. … Restore the Delta, a
coalition of tribes, environmental interests, fishing advocates
and others, said the decision “ignores state law, threatens
important tribal cultural sites and the health of the Delta
ecosystem.”
Thousands of homeowners have now joined a lawsuit against the
Southern Nevada Water Authority and the grass removal program.
In January, several local residents sued the agency, arguing
the SNWA’s grass removal mandates lack proper legal and
constitutional oversight. … In total, the HOAs and
entities in this case represent more than 10,000 homes and more
than 25,000,000 square feet of grass. They also claim that
since the grass removal mandate was put into place, “to date,
more than 4,000 trees are now diseased, or dead, some of which
have toppled and damaged property.” … They also
previously argued while SNWA has stated the reason for the
grass conversion is conservation, agency experts say there is
enough water to last until the 2070s.
A group of states that use water from the Colorado River is
proposing a new way to break the deadlock in negotiations about
the river’s future: bringing in a moderator. After states blew
through a mid-February deadline for a new plan about sharing
the river’s shrinking supply, the Upper Basin states of
Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and Utah are calling
for state leaders to return to the negotiating table and bring
a moderator into the room. “I really would like to see the
swords laid down,” Becky Mitchell, Colorado’s top water
negotiator, told KJZZ. “Particularly the threats of litigation.
That creates a scenario where it’s really hard to be creative.”
