A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation Writer Matt Jenkins.
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The U.S. and Mexico reached an agreement in June 2025 to work
together on a permanent solution for the sewage crisis in the
Tijuana River Valley. This comes after decades of the crisis,
leading to widespread pollution that closed beaches and filled
the air with toxic hydrogen sulfide. The original memorandum of
understanding outlined goals for both American and Mexican
construction of wastewater infrastructure: Minute 328. This
includes the expansion of the South Bay International
Wastewater Treatment Plant to 50 million gallons per day by the
end of 2027. “Mexico is on schedule with their commitments
that are made in those minutes,” said Mike Martucci, the
Administrator for EPA Region 9, which includes
California. Among those commitments are rehabilitating
pump stations and interceptors along the Tijuana River in 2026
and upgrading their wastewater treatment plants on the Mexican
side of the border in 2027.
Humboldt County environmental health officials are warning
residents to avoid stagnant areas of local waterways after a
dog died shortly after swimming in a slow-moving pool of the
Eel River near Scotia on Thursday, July 23. The incident comes
as conditions become increasingly favorable for cyanobacteria —
microscopic, photosynthetic bacteria commonly known as
blue-green algae — and the harmful algal blooms they can
produce. Warnings are typically issued in late July or early
August, when low river flows and prolonged high temperatures
can contribute to cyanobacteria growth in rivers and lagoons.
… The Oroville Wildlife Area Recreation Improvement Project
will renovate the land near the Feather River boat launch by
adding a riverside trail connector, a 25-site campground
facility, a new boat launch facility, and other landscaping
improvements. … The Oroville Dam was built in the 1960s.
This area was used to harvest and transport materials to the
site. All that was left behind was some pavement, a single boat
ramp and eventually one bathroom that people had to use for
more than 50 years. The Department of Water Resources, along
with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, reached
out to the Sutter Butte Flood Control Agency and asked them to
take on this project. The Sutter Butte Flood Control Agency was
able to secure grants from the Wildlife Conservation Board and
U.S. Fish and Wildlife.
… Located in the northern end of Imperial County, Calipatria
is one of the communities closest to the so-called Lithium
Valley, where an underground reservoir of geothermal brine
beneath the Salton Sea contains one of the world’s largest
lithium deposits. It’s at the center of plans, long touted by
businesses and politicians as high up as Gov. Gavin Newsom, to
transform California’s neglected, polluted and job-poor
Imperial Valley into a hub for green industry. Imperial County
has ambitious plans to develop 51,000 acres of land along the
sea for renewable energy, lithium extraction and associated
infrastructure. But some are concerned that the county’s plans,
including its proposal to fast-track a wide range of industrial
projects, could further exacerbate the region’s public health
crisis.
California and two other states have avoided the harshest water
cutbacks the Trump administration could have imposed over the
next two years to deal with the deepening crisis on the
Colorado River. The Times has learned that federal officials
have agreed with an offer made earlier this year by
California, Arizona and Nevadato
reduce what they take from the river by at least 3.2 million
acre-feet between now and the end of 2028. Under the
plan, California will cut its use of Colorado River water by
about 12% through 2028, Arizona will take about 31% less and
Nevada 28% less, according to two officials at state and local
agencies who spoke anonymously since details of an announcement
are still being finalized.
Mexico says it’s finally going to hire a company to build a
plant that turns the ocean into freshwater in Rosarito,
reviving an idea shelved years ago amid protests that the
government was privatizing water. And, in the name of reducing
how much water Mexico takes from the Colorado
River, the United States is going to help get the
water to the cities that need it. Construction could
start as soon as Aug. 1, according to a federal
Mexican project website. … This is not the only
desalination plant in Baja California. There are multiple
across the state, but they are small in comparison to what’s
being proposed in Rosarito. The Rosarito plant would be
the size of a desalination plant in Carlsbad, which
has the ability to produce 50 million gallons per day and
currently provides San Diego with about 10 percent of its
drinking water needs.
… Salt Lake City is considering a new ordinance that would
limit new nonresidential properties to 200,000 gallons
per day, mirroring the emergency order issued in
March. Uses tied to agriculture would be exempt, as would water
consumed by schools, government-owned or operated facilities
that primarily provide social services, places of worship and
hospitals. … “We have got to get our heads and our hands
around the water crisis, and start to manage things more
responsibly. It’s literally a human survival
issue, so … I would be happier if we went even
stricter,” said Salt Lake City Councilwoman Victoria Petro.
Other drought impact and response news around the West:
On a hot morning in June, dozens of agave plants took root in
the soil of Madera County. The plant has long been grown in
parts of Mexico to make tequila and mezcal. But in California,
it’s only more recently gotten attention from Central Valley
farmers seeking options as they face water shortages
and the prospect of fallowing land. Researchers say
agave could be a useful option for farmers with limited water
supplies. The drought-resilient crop has
demonstrated commercially viable yields with less than a tenth
of the water usage needed for many tree
crops. … Samuel Sandoval Solis, a fellow UC Davis
agave researcher, said the water demands of agave are so little
that researchers are looking to develop a manual for growing
agave without any irrigation.
The developer behind a proposed $10 billion data center has
filed a lawsuit asserting his rights to Colorado River
water in California’s Imperial Valley. Sebastian Rucci
is a Huntington Beach lawyer and businessman pushing the plan
in a region already known as a big water user. The Imperial
Valley sprouted as an agricultural center that’s the largest
user of Colorado River water in the seven states that rely on
the river. Farmers use about 80% of the state’s full
allocation. As managing member of Imperial Valley Computer
Manufacturing, Rucci filed his lawsuit June 5 in California
Superior Court in Imperial County. After two cities — El Centro
and Imperial — snubbed Rucci’s bid to get recycled wastewater
to cool the proposed data center, the developer went
back on a statement that he had no intention of using water
from the over-allocated Colorado River.
Every two to seven years, El Niño generates buzz among
scientists, government officials and communities wondering what
impacts it could have across California. … In Monterey
County specifically, El Niño could manifest in a wetter winter,
though scientists won’t know how severe impacts could be until
individual storms are much closer. It could bring larger
swells, higher water levels and increased coastal erosion as
unusually warm water off Mexico fuels tropical storms in the
Eastern Pacific. … At a meeting of the Big Sur
Multi-Agency Advisory Council on Friday, July 17, officials
said the U.S. Forest Service is planning prescribed burns in
Los Padres National Forest and forming an internal task force
to plan for El Niño-related impacts on trails and roads. The
risk of landslides are elevated during El Niño events.
There are a host of Kern County water board seats up for
election this November. The deadline to throw you hat in the
ring is August 7. Races for water board seats don’t typically
attract the kind of attention that hot congressional or even
city council seats do, but they should. Water boards are in
charge of making sure your water is drinkable; they decide how
much you pay for it; and make rules about whether you can run
your sprinklers on Mondays or Tuesdays and for how long. Some
local boards are in charge of regional and statewide issues
that can impact our economy in very real ways. One such board
with four of its seven director positions up for elections is
the Kern County Water Agency. This is one of the most powerful
water agencies in the county, arguably the state.
Granite Construction announced July 22 that it has
received a $50-million contract from Pacific Gas & Electric
(PG&E) to replace the spillway at Northern California’s
Tiger Creek Regulator Dam, where construction began in May. The
work follows spillway assessments PG&E conducted
after the 2017 Oroville Dam spillway
failure prompted federal and California
dam-safety regulators to require hydroelectric operators to
reevaluate aging spillways using updated hydrologic modeling
and engineering analyses. At Tiger Creek, the review identified
deterioration in the existing spillway chute, uncertainty over
whether the dam’s three spillway siphons would activate as
intended and inadequate hydraulic capacity under probable
maximum flood conditions.
Federal lawmakers are considering whether to expand the
government’s authority to kill more sea lions and seals to
bolster salmon recovery efforts in the Pacific Northwest. The
region’s critical salmon runs are on life
support: Fourteen species and populations of salmon
and steelhead trout in Washington are deemed at risk of
extinction under the Endangered Species Act. … Rep.
Jared Huffman, the top Democrat on the House Committee on
Natural Resources who represents one of California’s
northernmost districts bordering Oregon, said the bill
“goes too far” in greenlighting pinniped killings without
adequate safeguards.
Quitobaquito Springs in south-west Arizona has been called a
biological wonderland with few equals. The springs are an oasis
in the vast Sonoran desert along the US-Mexico border, held
sacred by the O’odham people, who call it A’al Vaipia. … The
spring, located within Organ Pipe Cactus national monument,
provides one of the only reliable bodies of water for
about 100 miles in any direction, making it vital for
wildlife in the area and for humans who have lived here for
millennia. But the spring is in trouble. In 2020, the
Trump administration completed a 30ft-tall (9 meters) border
wall in this remote area, during which time the spring flow
dipped to an all-time low, and the pond partially dried up
after its lining cracked. Now, plans are under way to build a
second massive section of the wall, just 90-150 feet north of
the existing one.
The plan to build California’s largest new reservoir in 50
years has hit a major snag, threatening to undermine
the $6 billion water-supply project and
prompting outcry from supporters, including Gov. Gavin Newsom,
who has called the enterprise vital for the state. Sites
Reservoir, proposed in rural Glenn and Colusa counties, secured
a key state approval earlier this year: a draft water
right that allows the facility to draw water from the
Sacramento River. Project officials, however,
have determined that the draws authorized by the state
could be too little to justify the reservoir’s
expense, as regulators seek to limit water diversions
to protect fish and other water users. … On
Friday, the State Water Resources Control Board is
holding one last hearing for supporters of the reservoir to
make their case …
As Lake Mead begins its nosedive toward historic lows, a
bipartisan group of 12 Western representatives in Congress is
calling for emergency funding to help fund solutions. One of
the officials who sent a letter to House leadership on
Wednesday is Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., who said in a phone
interview that the measure is in direct response to a
record-low water year. … The letter comes days
after the Trump administration said it would pay a water
district in Southern California up to $65 million in
an effort to keep 3 feet of water in Lake Mead; the reservoir,
which provides about 90 percent of Southern Nevada’s drinking
water, will fall to record lows over the next
two years, according to federal projections.
Utah’s recent storms are bringing much-needed rain to
drought-stricken areas, but water experts say the precipitation
is doing little to replenish the state’s reservoirs. While the
rain has provided temporary relief and reduced the need for
outdoor watering, much of the water is absorbed before
it can reach streams and reservoirs, according to the
Utah Division of Water Resources. “It reduces demand, but it
doesn’t increase supply,” said Laura Haskell, drought
coordinator for the division. After extended dry conditions,
thirsty soils and vegetation soak up much of the rainfall
before it can contribute to water storage. … Some Utah
reservoirs remain at critically low levels despite recent
precipitation. Haskell pointed to Yuba Reservoir as being
“almost bone dry,” while water levels at Steinaker Reservoir
have also dropped significantly.
After 13 years, Texas and New Mexico have finally reached a
settlement in a Supreme Court case over Rio Grande water
management. Now comes the hard part. Texas sued New Mexico in
2013, arguing that its upstream neighbor was hogging water on
the river that millions depend on for irrigation and drinking
water. The settlement requires New Mexico to reduce the amount
of water drawn from wells that deplete the flow of Rio Grande
water to Texas. The agreement also introduces a new
accounting method to determine how much water New
Mexico owes Texas. And for the first time, the volume
of water flowing into Texas will be measured at the state
line.
… In 2023 the U.S. Supreme Court dramatically narrowed the
1972 Clean Water Act in Sackett v. EPA. … The Sackett ruling
effectively shifted more clean water oversight to states. About
half already had their own wetland protections on the books,
according to the Environmental Law Institute. Arizona and
Wyoming state laws provided some clean water protections. But
in the rest of the Mountain West, states relied on federal law
to limit pollution. … So, Colorado
stepped in. It became the first state after the Supreme
Court decision to create a new permitting program for waters
that lost federal protection. … Colorado
lawmakers eventually reached a bipartisan compromise in 2024.
It includes expanded protections for isolated wetlands and
requirements to offset harmful impacts but also includes
exemptions for agriculture.
Tijuana River cleanup efforts led by the federal government are
suddenly in limbo after the Trump administration announced it
will not re-sign the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. The
president’s decision now triggers an annual review of the trade
deal, and San Diego leaders are now arguing
that any renegotiated agreement should include
stronger, enforceable requirements for Mexico and the federal
government to address decades of sewage and toxic
pollution flowing through the Tijuana River into California.
… In 2020, the USMCA included a $300 million U.S.
commitment to find and develop infrastructure solutions for the
ongoing, decades-long, river crisis. … But now,
officials say there is an opportunity to require more than was
previously laid out in the original USMC Agreement.
