The California Aqueduct, a critical part of the State Water
Project, carries water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta to the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California.
Established as part of a $1.75 billion bond passed by voters in
1960, the 444-mile-long California Aqueduct (formally known as
the Edmund G. Brown California Aqueduct) begins at the Harvey O.
Banks Pumping Plant in the Delta.
It parallels Interstate 5 south to the Tehachapi Mountains.
The California Environmental Quality
Act, commonly known as CEQA, is foundational to the state’s
environmental protection efforts. The law requires proposed
developments with the potential for “significant” impacts on the
physical environment to undergo an environmental review.
Since its passage in 1970, CEQA (based on the National
Environmental Policy Act) has served as a model for
similar legislation in other states.
California will always be
inextricably linked to its water resources. Water continues
to shape the state’s development and no resource is as vital to
California’s urban centers, farms, industry, recreation, scenic
beauty and environmental preservation.
But California’s relationship to water is also one that continues
to generate controversy.
Every five years the California Department of Water Resources
updates its strategic plan for managing the state’s water
resources, as required by state law.
The California Water Plan, or Bulletin 160, projects the
status and trends of the state’s water supplies and demands
under a range of future scenarios.
California’s Legislature passed the
Wild and Scenic Rivers Act in 1972, following the passage of the
federal Wild and Scenic Rivers Act by Congress in 1968. Under
California law, “[c]ertain rivers which possess extraordinary
scenic, recreational, fishery, or wildlife values shall be
preserved in their free-flowing state, together with their
immediate environments, for the benefit and enjoyment of the
people of the state.”
In the Northern California community of Redding, he was a justice
of peace, a renowned water rights attorney in the law firm of
Carr and Kennedy and helped form the Anderson-Cottonwood
Irrigation District. He was often in the nation’s Capitol in
Washington, D.C., advocating for funds from Congress to get this
visionary project built for the benefit of all of California. In
his honor, the Judge Francis Carr Powerplant was named after him.
The East Fork begins in the mountains of California’s Sonora Pass
and after flowing through California and Nevada, it meets the
West Fork just south of Carson City. The West Fork forms at
California’s Carson Pass, running through California and into
Nevada to its junction with the East Fork.
Rachel Carson (1907-1964) authored Silent Spring, a book
published in 1962 about the impacts of pesticides on
the ecosystem and credited with beginning the modern
environmental movement.
Before becoming a full-time writer, she worked at the U.S. Bureau
of Fisheries, renamed the Fish and Wildlife Service, from
1935-1952 as a biologist and then editor-in-chief of
publications.
Birthed in the midst of the Great
Depression, the Central Valley Project today is one of the
largest water storage and transport systems in the world. In
years of normal precipitation, it stores and distributes about 20
percent of the state’s developed water through its massive system
of reservoirs and canals.
In the Central Valley, wetlands—partly or seasonally saturated
land that supports aquatic life and distinct ecosystems— provide
critical habitat for a variety of wildlife.
Ira J. “Jack” Chrisman (1910-1988) became a well-known force in
California’s water history beginning back in 1955 after his
family home was flooded in the San Joaquin Valley town of
Visalia.
Climate change involves natural and man-made changes to weather
patterns that occur over millions of years or over multiple
decades.
In the past 150 years, human industrial activity has accelerated
the rate of change in the climate due to the increase in
greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide,
among others). Scientific studies describing this climate change
continue to be produced and its expected impacts continue to be
assessed.
The Coachella Valley in Southern California’s Inland Empire is
one of several valleys throughout the state with a water district
established to support agriculture.
Like the others, the Coachella Valley Water District in Riverside
County delivers water to arid agricultural lands and constructs,
operates and maintains a regional agricultural drainage system.
These systems collect drainage water from individual farm drain
outlets and convey the water to a point of reuse, disposal or
dilution.
Directly detecting harmful
pathogens in water can be expensive, unreliable and incredibly
complicated. Fortunately, certain organisms are known to
consistently coexist with these harmful microbes which are
substantially easier to detect and culture: coliform bacteria.
These generally non-toxic organisms are frequently used as
“indicator
species,” or organisms whose presence demonstrates a
particular feature of its surrounding environment.
Gordon Cologne (1924-2019) served for 10 years in the California
Legislature during the 1960s and early 1970s while the California
State Water Project was being built.
His interest in water issues began from his early life in the
Coachella Valley desert. An attorney, he worked in both the
public sector in Washington, D.C, and then in private practice in
California. He also served his local community as a member of the
city of Indio City Council, including as mayor, before his
decision to run for election to fill an open seat in the
Assembly.
Often referred to as the lifeline of
the Southwest, the Colorado River and its tributaries provide
water to nearly 40 million people and irrigate 5 million acres of
farmland in California, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico,
Utah and Wyoming. It also serves about 2.3 million people and
500,000 farmland acres in northern Mexico. The river’s water is
critical for 30 federally recognized Native American tribes,
Grand Canyon National Park and several other units of the
National Park system, and a number of wildlife refuges.
The Colorado River Aqueduct, a
242-mile-long channel completed in 1941 by the Metropolitan Water
District of Southern California, carries water from the Colorado River to urban Southern
California. The aqueduct is one of three conveyance systems of
imported water to Southern California, the other two being the
California Aqueduct
and the Los Angeles
Aqueduct.
