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 Chris Bowman.
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Current and former political leaders, water managers and
environmental advocates descended on Sacramento Monday to
commemorate the 10-year anniversary of California’s Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), its first ever attempt to
regulate groundwater use. The law was passed by former Governor
Jerry Brown in 2014 during a multi-year punishing drought to
protect California’s overpumped aquifers. The Department of
Water Resources (DWR,) which is the agency that oversees the
law’s implementation, organized Monday’s event.
The climate is changing, and Californians are feeling the
effects. In our recent Priorities for California’s Water
report, we outline what’s been happening and forecast the
changes that lie ahead. But walking through the effects of a
changing climate on California’s water can quickly become a
slog—a litany of depressing facts with no end in sight. … We
asked four water experts to conduct a thought experiment: we
offered them a series of positive water headlines from the year
2050 and asked them to tell us how we got there.
A study commissioned by the Utah Division of Water Resources
recommended that Utah implement “more aggressive” tiered rates
for water use. Tiered rates refer to the amount charged for
water based on the type of usage and consumption amount.
According to the study, which was completed by LRB Public
Finance Advisors, a “more aggressive” rate structure would
charge higher amounts to those who use more water.
… Increased pricing was just one of six recommendations
made by the study. The study also recommended clarifying
water policy priorities and defining “reasonable water rates.”
The document said that Utah water policy currently does not
address priorities or determine what a reasonable rate would
be.
Water Audit California sued the City of St. Helena this week
over its management of water. The watchdog group says the city
is violating its “public trust” responsibilities relating to
the Napa River and its aquatic habitat. It cites the city’s
policies on groundwater pumping, well permitting, and water
consumption by vineyards and wineries. The claims are similar
to ones Water Audit made against Napa County in a separate
lawsuit filed earlier this month. Both lawsuits claim that
local water policies need to account for the hydrological
relationship between groundwater extraction and surface flows
in streams like the Napa River. Water Audit’s lawsuit against
St. Helena also alleges poor documentation of water use at the
Stonebridge wells and water deliveries to vineyards, wineries
and Meadowood.
After 13 years of planning and building, the Hester Marsh
Restoration Project had its unofficial “ribbon-cutting” moment
over the weekend of Nov. 15-17. Project researchers, managers
and volunteers gathered at the marsh on the edge of Elkhorn
Slough to observe how the newly completed marsh interacted with
water seeping in with the King Tides. The key question: Were
the final plans for the marsh designed at the correct
elevation? If the marsh was built to plan, observers should see
the water at high tide cover the marsh’s surface – only
slightly. And at 9:35am on Friday, Nov. 15, that is exactly
what they observe.
Carlsbad has decided to proceed with a feasibility study of
whether it should build a solar power farm on 30 to 40 acres in
a rarely visited corner of the city. The site is at the city’s
Maerkle Reservoir, near the border of
Oceanside and Vista, where Carlsbad owns about 100 acres
including the 17-acre reservoir topped by a floating fabric
cover. One of the hurdles is the location, said Amanda Flesse,
general manager for the Carlsbad Municipal Water District. The
only easy access is from a paved road through Vista, although
it also can be reached from El Camino Real in Carlsbad over the
narrow, unpaved Sunny Creek Road. Also, recent fires at
lithium-ion battery storage facilities in Escondido and
elsewhere have raised concerns about possible fires, Flesse
said.
How do you find, maintain and preserve water in the desert?
Cooperation. This was the most important strategy used by the
seven municipalities in southwestern San Bernardino County,
Calif., as they successively joined the Inland Empire Utility
Agency (IEUA) after it was founded in 1950. They had to band
together because water resources are so limited in southern
California that its residents had to create IEUA as a special,
independently elected district, which could import water from
the state’s northern regions, and eventually collaborate on
solving a variety of wastewater treatment issues to make them
more efficient, too. —Written by Jim Montague, executive editor of
Control.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife is examining the
carcasses of several Canada geese and one duck found dead
around Truxtun Lakes to determine what killed them and about a
dozen other geese earlier this month. But it will take several
weeks to get the necropsy results back from the state’s
Wildlife Health Laboratory, according to Abby Gwinn, a
biologist with CDFW who bagged several dead birds from Truxtun
Lakes on Nov. 7. She wrote in an email that another live, but
sick, goose was found last week and taken to a wildlife
rehabilitation facility. It also died. “This one will be
particularly valuable as we know it was sick prior to passing
and we have a report of the symptoms,” Gwinn wrote in an email.
“It is not uncommon to have an increase in bird diseases
observed during migration when birds flock together, especially
when habitat is limited like it is locally this year with the
dry Kern River through town.”
A historically strong storm system with the strength of a
hurricane whipped damaging winds through the Pacific Northwest
overnight leading to power outages across the region. It was
creating large ocean waves and ushering in a drenching
atmospheric river that is expected to continue soaking Northern
California. … In the winter outlook from the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction
Center, forecasters warned that the season’s storm paths would
favor abundant rainfall across the Northwest, a pattern often
associated with La Niña … As of now, the Pacific Ocean is
still in a neutral phase and not quite meeting La Niña
criteria. During a neutral phase, less predictable weather
patterns can dominate, something Dr. Johnson called “weather
wild cards.”
These chemicals are in the tap water of the majority of
Americans, and the Trump administration could decide their
fate. No, not fluoride, the cavity-fighter that Robert F.
Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald J. Trump’s health secretary
pick, wants out of public drinking water. Rather, they’re
harmful “forever chemicals,” also known as per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS. For all of Mr. Kennedy’s
talk, and his contentious views on fluoride, larger
battles loom over chemicals in the water we drink. Public
health advocates worry that federal efforts to protect the
public against PFAS and replace lead pipes could unravel under
a Trump presidency.
The Washington County Water Conservancy District was selected
as one of five recipients of federal funding to put dollars to
work for saving water in the West — an urgent goal due to
decades of drought. … In Utah’s Washington County, the
$1 billion system will get a boost of $641,222 for new water
treatment facilities, advanced purification technology, new
conveyance pipelines and storage reservoirs, according to the
bureau’s release on Monday. The southern Utah area has
often come under attack for what its critics say is excessive
water use — which the district disputes.
San Diego’s congressional delegation Tuesday praised President
Joe Biden for including $310 million for the South Bay
International Wastewater Treatment Plant in proposed disaster
relief funding. If passed, the money would add to a previously
awarded $400 million in federal funding to get the plant
running at full capacity and even double its capabilities.
… In May, the local Congressional delegation, including
Vargas and Reps. Scott Peters and Sara Jacobs, both D-San
Diego, and Rep. Mike Levin, D-Dana Point, called on the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to begin an
investigation into pollutants from the ongoing sewage crisis at
the border.
The California Water Board is set to convene a meeting in Chico
on Tuesday, where they will share important updates regarding
their ongoing efforts in the Butte Creek Watershed. The board
has begun the project to gain a deeper understanding of water
supply and demand dynamics in various watersheds throughout the
state. One of the key focus areas of the initiative is the
Butte Creek Watershed, where they are analyzing factors
influencing water availability and consumption patterns. The
study will help inform sustainable water management practices
and promote better resource allocation in the region.
The race to get bills signed into law before President Joe
Biden leaves office is on, and two water bills sponsored by
Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Denver, are trying to get on that
list. The first is an extension of the Colorado River Basin
System Conservation Act, which earlier this year put $125
million into the system conservation pilot program operated by
the Upper Colorado River Commission. Under the latest
iteration, the act would be extended until 2026. The system
conservation pilot program is a voluntary, temporary, and
compensated agreement to conserve consumptive use (or
depletion) of agricultural, municipal, or industrial water. It
was tested between 2015 and 2018 and allowed lapses, but it was
restarted in 2023. However, the program does not require water
conservation targets. The second, the Drought Preparedness Act,
would Reauthorize the Reclamation States Emergency
Drought Relief Act through 2028.
Last week, an unexpected discovery washed up on the shoreline
of Oakland’s Lake Merritt: several dead Chinook salmon.
They had likely swum hundreds of miles in the Pacific
Ocean before making their way inland, past the Golden Gate
Bridge and into the tidal lagoon, where they attempted to spawn
and lay eggs. While the image of multiple fish carcasses
might strike some as bleak after recent algal
blooms killed off thousands of animals in
the nation’s oldest designated wildlife refuge back
in 2022, the presence of the threatened species shocked and
thrilled Bay Area researchers.
A new federal rule will require water utilities across the
country to pull millions of lead drinking water pipes out of
the ground and replace them, at a cost of billions of dollars.
States, cities and water utilities agree that the lead pipes
need to go to ensure safe water for residents. But they say
they may struggle to do so in the 10-year window required under
the rule, and they fear some ratepayers will be hit with
massive cost increases to pay for the work. State officials are
urging Congress to provide ongoing funding for the lead
replacement effort. Local leaders say they’ll need lots of help
to meet the deadline. And environmental advocates are calling
on states to issue bonds or provide other financial support to
water utilities.
Reservoirs, a major component of California’s water storage
system, are a significant source of climate-warming emissions,
releasing more greenhouse gases across the state than 300,000
gas-powered cars in a year, according to a report published
today by the Center for Biological Diversity. Beneath the
Surface outlines the environmental threats of big water
infrastructure projects and exposes why reservoirs’ water
storage benefits will only diminish as climate change
intensifies. The report comes as California plans three massive
reservoirs and dam expansion projects, including Sites
Reservoir, that will cost a total of $7 billion. These and
similar projects across the western U.S. would divert large
quantities of water from nearby rivers and cause irreparable
harm to imperiled fish and other wildlife.
Replicating a historic survey from 30 years ago, the
Intermountain West Shorebird Survey is a five-year effort to
count shorebirds at more than 200 wetland sites across 11
states in the Intermountain West. The program aims to better
understand shorebirds and their distribution across wetlands,
how that distribution has changed over the past three decades,
and how the wetlands themselves have changed. During peak
migration—a one-to-two-week period in the spring and fall—a
network of volunteers, including state and federal agency
biologists, are on the ground, spotting scopes and binoculars
in hand, counting shorebirds. … This is a photo diary
from two of those survey teams: one on Great Salt Lake, where
over 100 participants surveyed almost the entire lake and its
wetlands in one “Big Day” and the other at Salton Sea, where
surveyors split their survey between three days.
A committee meant to oversee elected officials on how they
charge San Diegans for water and sewer services hasn’t been
able to do its job due to a lack of members. The
Independent Rates Oversight Committee, or IROC, has served as
the official advisory body to the mayor and City Council on
issues related to the Public Utilities Department’s operations
since 2007. Yet the committee has met just twice this year —
even as residents face rising water rates. Officials say IROC
and other city committees are facing the same struggle:
vacancies. Five of IROC’s 11 seats are open, and the remaining
spots are held by members serving beyond their terms that
expired years ago. IROC members have long raised concerns over
the vacancies.
…. California will be managing its water under changing
conditions for the indefinite future. The state has taken
important steps to adapt to climate change’s effects on water,
but as Public Policy Institute of California researchers argued
in a new report, it’s not yet on the right trajectory to
manage some of the changes underway — or the greater challenges
ahead. The good news is that California can make
significant progress when it pays attention to a problem. Urban
water use has remained flat since 1990, despite millions of new
residents, which is a testament to the power of California’s
famed innovation and creative thinking. The state is also
undertaking difficult but necessary work to improve management
of its vitally important groundwater resources, as well as
the headwater forests that supply some two-thirds of the
state’s water. —Written by Letitia Grenier, director of the Public
Policy Institute of California Water Policy Center
