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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In the South Bay, engineers are racing to finish a new levee
system meant to shield thousands of homes from rising seas.
Behind the levee, workers are restoring tidal wetlands to
absorb storm surges. The South San Francisco Bay Shoreline
project is a model for climate adaptation — and also a case
study in how long it takes California to approve a project like
this. The project has been slowed by over a decade of
environmental review and multi-agency coordination under the
California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), even as the water
levels in the Bay creep higher each year. This is a pattern
across California: From groundwater recharge basins in the
Central Valley to coastal retreat fights in Pacifica, CEQA
timelines, exemptions and litigation are directly influencing
whether adaptation keeps pace with our changing climate. –Written by Erin Gustafson, environmental planner and UC
Davis graduate student.
In 2020, a panel of social scientists from across the country
provided a roadmap and motivation for increasing social science
in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Five
years later, we’re asking — “What do we have to show for it?”
Humans are a central part of the Delta system. A truly
resilient Delta that supports a reliable statewide water supply
and healthy ecosystems — as well as thriving communities — must
understand 1) the people who live, work, and recreate in and
around the estuary, 2) how the region impacts their health and
well-being, and 3) how their behavior influences environmental
issues. The social sciences can help us design management
approaches that earn trust, reflect shared values, and advance
equity.
San Diego State University officially broke ground on the One
Water Laboratory (OWL), a pioneering facility dedicated to
research, education and community outreach focused on
sustainable water management. Situated adjacent to the river
park at SDSU Mission Valley, the OWL will be an active research
and training facility, with construction to be completed later
next year. Once operational, SDSU students will have the
opportunity to gain real-world experience, deepening their
understanding of watershed science and hydrological systems.
The project is made possible by $2.6 million in grant funding
from the San Diego River Conservancy.
The San Bernardino Municipal Water Department (SBMWD)
celebrated its 120th anniversary with a dedication of its new
Tertiary Treatment System (TTS) at its water reclamation plant
on Chandler Place. The TTS can treat and reuse up to 2.5
million gallons per day of recycled water. … Operational
since September, the TTS uses recycled water to increase
operational efficiency at the Water Reclamation Plant and
reduce reliance on potable water supplies. … Looking
forward, the TTS also positions the Department to expand the
system’s recycled water capacity to 5 million gallons per day
and help to recharge the Bunker Hill Groundwater Basin.
California’s biggest water districts presented their own
framework Tuesday for how to share the Colorado River’s
dwindling water supply, including a commitment to conserve
440,000 acre-feet of water per year – enough to meet the needs
of 1.5 million households annually. Last month, the seven
western states that rely on the Colorado River missed a
federally-imposed deadline to submit a preliminary agreement
for a plan to replace the river’s operating guidelines set to
expire at the end of 2026. Those negotiations continued Tuesday
during the annual Colorado River Water Users Association’s
conference in Las Vegas at Caesars Palace. … California
is projected to cap water use at 3.76 million acre-feet in 2025
– the lowest annual use since 1949.
The board of California’s largest agricultural water district
approved a master plan Tuesday to convert over a quarter of the
land in its service area into solar farms, a sign that Central
Valley growers are looking for new business as their water
sources dry up. The board of the Westlands Water District
approved the plan to develop 136,000 acres on the west side of
the Central Valley into solar farms, complete with new
transmission lines and substations at a Tuesday morning meeting
in Fresno. The new master plan, called the Valley Clean
Infrastructure Plan, would allow for the development of up to
20 gigawatts of new solar farms, which taken together would be
the largest solar installation in the world.
If Mexicali farmers can’t cut a deal with Mexican President
Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration, the city of Tijuana’s at
risk of losing its water supply from the Colorado River.
For generations, these farmers – known as Irrigation District
14 – sold river water the Mexican government ceded to them for
agricultural production to coastal cities like Tijuana and
Ensenada. The Colorado River flows through Mexicali, but
because of this deal, it’s diverted over 100 miles the coast
via an aqueduct. But Mexico’s president has taken a hard
stance on how the country’s constitution defines ownership of
water: It belongs to the nation and cannot be privatized.
… How did entire communities find themselves in the midst of
raging fires without enough water on hand to fight them? The
answers have exposed the weaknesses of Los Angeles’ water
systems and prompted widespread calls to redesign Southern
California’s water infrastructure. Water managers and experts
said the water systems in Pacific Palisades and Altadena were
never designed for wildfires that rage through entire
neighborhoods, or for infernos intensified by climate change.
In fact, their design effectively guaranteed that hydrants
would lose pressure and fail during a giant fire. … So
far, however, local officials in Los Angeles and L.A. County
appear to have taken few, if any, concrete steps toward major
changes.
As Tijuana River sewage has contaminated neighborhoods in
southern San Diego County, the federal government has pledged
two-thirds of a billion to clean it up. Now local
lawmakers are calling on California to step up the fight
against cross-border pollution, and one introduced a bill this
week to revisit air quality standards for noxious gas from the
river. … The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
on Monday announced a new agreement with Mexico to plan for
wastewater infrastructure to accommodate future population
growth in Tijuana. On Wednesday State Sen. Steve Padilla
introduced a bill to update state standards for hydrogen
sulfide, a noxious gas with a rotten egg smell that’s produced
by sewage in the river.
United States Representatives John Garamendi and Mike Thompson,
alongside five other California congressional representatives,
penned a letter to Acting Commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation Scott Cameron, blasting his plan to siphon
additional water out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
… The letter, penned in response to the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation’s Dec. 2 Notice of Decision on Executive Order
14181, argues that the delta is too ecologically,
agriculturally and municipally important to convey for other
purposes. The delta is the hub for California’s water
supply, providing fresh water to approximately 30 million
Californians and six million acres of farmland,” the letter
reads.
Senate Democrats rebuked EPA on Wednesday for the sluggish pace
of loan closings under a popular water financing program,
accusing the Trump administration of putting up “red tape.” In
a letter to Administrator Lee Zeldin, the lawmakers said the
slowdown affecting the Water Infrastructure Finance and
Innovation Act (WIFIA) program is stunting water projects in
California, Florida, Maryland, Nebraska and other states. Led
by Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) … “Our states and
municipalities rely on WIFIA loans to finance large-scale
projects to provide clean water to our constituents, and it is
imperative that EPA use the resources Congress has provided to
address the significant need for water infrastructure
improvements,” the lawmakers wrote.
California has reached a major milestone in understanding the
condition of its wastewater systems with the completion of
Phase 1 of the statewide Wastewater Needs Assessment (WWNA).
Led by UCLA’s Luskin Center for Innovation and partners, the
effort established a first-ever comprehensive baseline
evaluation of wastewater infrastructure performance, risks, and
unmet needs—creating a foundation for more equitable sanitation
policy and investment across the state. The WWNA was
conceived to help answer a simple yet critical question: how
well are California’s thousands of wastewater systems serving
people and communities, especially disadvantaged and
underserved areas?
A record 2,150 king salmon (or Chinook salmon) returned to
spawn in Putah Creek this fall. Timely water releases, habitat
creation and regional collaboration among various public and
private organizations are being credited with the successful
run. Putah Creek, which runs along the border of Yolo and
Solano Counties near Sacramento has historically supported a
small, but vital salmon population. Estimates in 2016 put the
salmon return at 1,700, but this year’s record-breaking number
is the result of a precise, individual count conducted by
biologists with UC Davis at the department of wildlife, fish
and conservation biology.
Colorado took a major step last week to protect
wetlands and streams by finalizing rules for a
new state-run permitting program. The new ‘dredge-and-fill’
rules address a gap by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Sackett
decision two years ago, which drastically shrunk the number of
waterways eligible for federal protections. The ruling left
millions of acres of wetlands and miles of streams nationwide
vulnerable to pollution. Under the new rules, businesses or
landowners must obtain a state permit to dig ditches or fill
wetlands that no longer qualify for federal protection.
… New Mexico passed similar legislation this year and
its environment department expects to hold a rulemaking hearing
next summer.
More than 15 months after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a trio of
bills to bring clean drinking water to homes in East Orosi,
residents are still waiting for the project to break ground.
The 950 residents of the tiny northern Tulare County community
got a bit of good news last month when the Tulare County Board
of Supervisors voted to hire a contractor, West Valley
Construction Company, to build the $13.5 million water system
more than a decade in the making. But construction won’t
start until the state Water Resources Control Board first
issues a Notice to Proceed.
Valley groundwater agencies are continuing their push for
landowners to register wells, some by holding workshops and
others by extending deadlines. Landowners in the
Mid-Kaweah Groundwater Sustainability Agency (GSA) can get help
registering wells at two workshops on Friday, Dec. 19 and
Friday, Jan. 16 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. … The board of
directors of the North Kings GSA in northeast Fresno County,
recently voted to extend the deadline to register wells to Jan.
30. Nearly 6,000 wells were registered by the original
Nov. 30 deadline and the new grace period will allow well
owners to register without penalty. Approximately 1,000 more
wells need to be registered.
Three people have put their hats in the ring for a Kern County
Water Agency board seat that was left vacant when that board
member was hired as the agency’s General Manager. Tamara
Johnson, Director of California Water Service’s southern
region; Greg Wegis, longtime farmer and farm manager; and Mark
Mulkay, retired General Manager of the Kern Delta Water
District, all submitted letters of interest for the seat. The
board is expected to select the new board member at its meeting
on Wednesday.
Surging use of AI has led to a frenzy of construction activity
to build new data centres, particularly in the U.S. Estimates
put the total number of these facilities in operation worldwide
this year at 6,111, with upwards of 2,000 more set to come
online by 2030. There has been a lot of focus on the
implications for power grids, but less on the toll this
unbridled growth will take on a commodity that is in even
shorter supply: fresh water. … Periods of prolonged
drought, an over-allocation of water supplies from the
Colorado River, as well as dwindling
groundwater resources make Phoenix a “severely water-stressed
region”, according to the Ceres report. If all the data centres
now planned come online, the city will experience a 32%
increase in annual water stress.
… [M]etal concentrations in Colorado are increasing over time
as warming summer temperatures thaw previously frozen sites
containing acid-forming bedrock. This result is alarming from
an ecological perspective. If metal concentrations climb too
high, they can kill aquatic species, as evidenced by one
mountain lake that washed up hundreds of dead fish this
summer. But, these increased concentrations may also
present an opportunity. That’s according to Baolin Deng and Pan
Ni, two distinguished researchers at the University of
Missouri’s Missouri Water Center, who are now working to unlock
an efficient process capable of extracting rare earths from
acid rock drainage.
Western states are brawling over the future of the Colorado
River — with President Donald Trump looming in the background.
Talks kicking off Tuesday in Las Vegas will help determine
whether the Trump administration has to step in and take the
political heat of deciding how to divide the shrinking river’s
water supplies among powerful industries and more than 40
million people — a fight that includes the swing states of
Arizona and Nevada, politically influential farmers and
ranchers, and burgeoning semiconductor and artificial
intelligence companies. It’s the highest-stakes water
fight the U.S. has seen in more than a century.
