At the March 6, 2025, Ukiah Valley Water Authority (UVWA)
meeting, the Board welcomed its newest member, the Calpella
County Water District, and swore in two new representatives.
The discussion quickly turned to potential expansion, as
several small mutual water companies expressed interest in
joining. The Board also voted to approve a $147,750
comprehensive rate study that could pave the way for regional
water consolidation, while tackling future challenges like
PG&E’s plan to abandon the Potter Valley Project. As the
Board works to secure water for the future, the weight of
rising costs and strained resources looms large.
A group of 29 international students from the International
House at UC Berkeley have been exploring Shasta County this
week, courtesy of the Redding Rotary Club. Their itinerary
included skiing at Mt. Shasta, paddle boarding on Shasta Lake,
and a comprehensive tour of Shasta Dam. The students, hailing
from countries such as China, India, and Pakistan, were given
an in-depth look at the dam, from its towering heights to its
base, along with a lesson in local history. The experience left
a lasting impression on the visitors. Nakul Srikanth expressed
his amazement, saying, “This is so cool… so much history, it
has been around for like, 100 years almost. I learned a lot
about the Hoover Dam to see that this was constructed exactly
the same way, with the same engineers… it is so amazing.”
Last year, Indigenous tribes in California and Oregon realized
a longstanding dream: the removal of four hydroelectric dams on
the Klamath River. It was the largest such environmental
restoration project in U.S. history, opening the way for salmon
to return home to the Klamath and for tribes and other
advocates to begin restoring the ecosystem that once flourished
there. And last week, Grist’s Jake Bittle and Anita
Hofschneider published a five-part, 14,000-word feature delving
into the decades-long history of how it all happened. In their
story, they describe the dam removal as “the result of an
improbable campaign that spanned close to half a century, roped
in thousands of people, and came within an inch of collapse
several times. Interviews with dozens of people on all sides of
the dam removal fight, some of whom have never spoken publicly
about their roles, reveal a collaborative achievement with few
clear parallels in contemporary activism.”
For years, scientists have warned of heightened risks of
extreme storms due to climate change, and those storms have
already begun devastating communities. Weather forecasting will
play an increasingly important role in helping prepare
communities for dangerous weather, but how are extreme snow and
rain events forecasted? Research by professors Ania Panorska
and Tom Kozubowski in the Department of Mathematics and
Statistics, along with colleagues from Scripps Institution of
Oceanography, provides a new predictive model for extreme rain
and snow events as well as the return periods (the average
amount of time between events) and return levels (amount of
precipitation) of extreme events. The study was published last
month in Scientific Reports. … The research was
supported by the California Department of Water Resources
Atmospheric River Program.
It’s going to take an act of God or some savvy last-minute
negotiating for Mexico to liquidate its enormous water debt
with the United States by October 24. A new minute to the 1944
binational water treatment was signed late last year and
American officials particularly in Texas have been pressing for
Mexico to catch up on late – very late – water deliveries to
the Rio Grande. … But the fact remains that northern Mexico is
experiencing a prolonged drought and reservoirs on both sides
of the border are running low, a Mexican official familiar with
the issue told Border Report. … The 1944 treaty requires the
U.S. to deliver water to Mexico from the Colorado
River and Mexico to apportion the water from six Rio
Grande tributaries from Chihuahua to Tamaulipas.
Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed during her
morning press conference that the long-awaited desalination
plant in Playas de Rosarito is moving forward as part of the
National Hydric Plan. “Yes, we’re building it… The
desalination plant in Baja California is happening,” Sheinbaum
declared. The news was met with enthusiasm at the local level.
Rocío Adame, Mayor of Rosarito, quickly took to social media to
celebrate the announcement, emphasizing the project’s
importance for the region. “The Rosarito desalination plant is
now a certainty! President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed it’s on.
This construction is essential for improving water supply in
southern Rosarito and preserving our beaches,” Adame wrote.
A flash fire at the San Jose-Santa Clara Regional Wastewater
Facility prompted an emergency response on Tuesday, but no
serious injuries were reported, authorities said. The fire was
reported at 10:20 a.m. at the treatment plant on Los Esoteros
Road north of Highway 237, according to statement from the San
Jose’s Environmental Services Department. Two workers were
in an enclosed area at the facility and working with
unspecified chemicals when an aerosol ignited, resulting in a
small fire, the department said. The workers’ protective
gear spared them from being injured, the department
said. The San Jose Fire Department was summoned to the
site, and the two affected workers were given an “all clear”
later in the morning.
The California dairy industry, renowned for its significant
contributions to agriculture, is navigating a series of
challenges that demand substantial adaptation to ensure future
success. Water scarcity, stringent labor laws and complex
permitting regulations top the list of challenges in the Golden
State, the nation’s largest milk producer and home to 1.71
million milk cows. Karen Ross, secretary of the California
Department of Food and Agriculture, emphasizes the need to
support the state’s farmers during these challenging
times. “What we would like to do is focus on smart
incentives because, over the years, the cumulative effect of so
many regulatory agencies is adding to the complexity … as well
as the cost of compliance,” Ross said in a one-on-one interview
with Farm Journal during the California Dairy Sustainability
Summit.
… Situated within the Mesa Water District‘s facility on Geisler
Avenue, the 2,400-square-foot education center features more
than 20 visual and interactive exhibits providing an
informative – and even entertaining – A-to-Z lesson on where
water comes, how it arrives at the faucet, where it winds up
after going down the drain and every step in between. …
While the board is holding an official ribbon cutting on March
28, the education center has been open since January, mostly
hosting groups related to the water industry and citizens
groups, Mesa Water District spokeswoman Kaitlyn Norris said.
This center was built with a curriculum that meets Next
Generation Science Standards and STEM guidelines and is a
premier destination for fifth-grade field trips and tours,
district officials said.
The California Solar Canal Initiative (CSCI) aims to increase
the number of solar installations on California’s canals. The
initiative is led by the University of Southern California
(USC) Dornsife Public Exchange and independent advisory Solar
AquaGrid, and includes faculty from seven universities, six of
which are in California. A 2021 study conducted by researchers
from University of California, Merced, found that covering
large sections of California’s 4,000 miles of canals with
arrays of solar panels could help conserve water, reduce air
pollution, save land and generate clean energy using existing
land and infrastructure.
A state meeting on California’s most controversial water
project, attended via Zoom on Monday by dozens of officials and
experts, was hijacked by a rogue broadcast of sexual images and
audio of racist comments against Blacks and Jews. It was not
funny. The State Water Resources Control Board, unable to stop
its own webcast, lost control of the meeting. It was canceled.
And key testimony is not scheduled to resume for at least six
weeks. … At issue Monday was nothing less than the
future of California’s statewide water delivery system at its
geographic heart, the so-called Delta Tunnel. –Written by Tom Phillip, Sacramento Bee
columnist
A billion-dollar blast mine planned along the San Joaquin
River’s prime salmon spawning habitat is facing its first major
political challenge after months of diplomatic silence from
Fresno leaders. Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula
introduced new state legislation last week aimed directly at
stopping global mining giant CEMEX from blasting a crater twice
as deep as Millerton Lake along the San Joaquin River’s planned
parkway near Fresno. Arambula’s proposal has the support
of Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer, who called the CEMEX blast mine an
“unacceptable” assault to the region’s river and
roads. … Arambula’s bill would toss the county’s
playbook for developers in the trash, killing CEMEX’s
controversial mining proposal before the county supervisors get
a chance to approve it.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) announced
today the release of the California Salmon Strategy for a
Hotter, Drier Future: Progress Report, developed in partnership
with the California Natural Resources Agency (CNRA) with
support from the Department of Water Resources (DWR) and the
State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB). The Progress
Report follows the release of the California Salmon Strategy
for a Hotter, Drier Future, released in January 2024.
California’s salmon populations are struggling to recover from
years of drought, climate disruption, and other environmental
and human-made challenges. … Of the 71 action items outlined in
the Progress Report, roughly 67% of the projects are actively
in development. Another 26% have already been fully completed.
Only 7% of the action items are in the early, preliminary
stages.
The federal government has restored funding for a captive
breeding program designed to ensure survival of California’s
delta smelt, even as President Donald Trump has sharpened
criticism of the endangered fish. A five-year grant for the UC
Davis Fish Conservation and Culture Laboratory in Contra Costa
County, which raises the smelt, expired last month, and many
believed the funding would not be reinstated. Eleven of the
lab’s 17 employees were let go. This week, the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and UC Davis confirmed that the federal funding,
which makes up about three-quarters of the lab’s budget, would
resume. Why the financing lapsed and why it ultimately returned
amid the widespread funding cuts initiated by the Trump
administration over the past two months was not immediately
clear.
This Wednesday, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public
Works (EPW) will hold a confirmation hearing for a handful of
EPA appointees, including prospective Assistant Administrator
for Water, Jessica Kramer. Kramer has previous experience
at EPA, having served as policy counsel for the Office of Water
during President Trump’s first term. She has since served as a
deputy secretary in the Florida Department of Environmental
Protection and as water counsel for the current EPW Chair, Sen.
Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.). Kramer was nominated in
mid-February, following the confirmation of EPA Administrator
Lee Zeldin. She has been an advisor in EPA’s Water Office since
her nomination, but will not take on official duties as
Assistant Administrator for Water until she is confirmed by the
full Senate.
The Environmental Defense Fund has filed a second lawsuit
seeking to force more agencies to divulge details about the
Trump administration’s efforts to revoke a cornerstone of U.S.
climate policy. The lawsuit filed Monday in the U.S.
District Court for the District of Columbia calls on the
Interior Department, NOAA and the White House Council on
Environmental Quality to release information related to the
administration’s plans to strike down the 2009 endangerment
finding, which gives agencies authority to regulate greenhouse
gas emissions. EDF said the latest lawsuit comes after the
three agencies failed to respond to a Freedom of Information
Act request — a situation the lawsuit said is “completely
lacking in transparency, in contrast with the extensive public
process that EPA undertook to develop and adopt the
endangerment finding.”
Wetlands and ephemeral streams provide a wide variety of
benefits to people and wildlife, from flood protection for
local communities, to preventing pollutants from entering the
water supply, to breeding grounds for endangered bird species.
Wetlands can also act as carbon sinks, sequestering carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere. … But all that changed with a
May 2023 ruling by the Supreme Court called Sackett v. The
Environmental Protection Agency, which rewrote the legal
definition of wetlands and suddenly left many of these bodies
of water unprotected, according to a new study from the Natural
Resources Defense Council (NRDC).
An initiative led by faculty from seven top research
universities — six of which are in California — aims to
accelerate the deployment of solar arrays over the state’s
extensive canal network. According to a 2021 UC Merced study
published in Nature Sustainability, covering large sections of
the state’s 4,000 miles of canals with solar panels could help
conserve water, reduce air pollution, save land and generate
clean energy using existing land and infrastructure. The
California Solar Canal Initiative (CSCI) research project aims
to accelerate the deployment of solar canals across the state
by equipping government agencies, utilities, community members
and other interested parties with data on optimal locations and
identifying willing host communities.
Alta Irrigation District has purchased 80 acres to develop the
London West Pond recharge basin. The recharge basin will
be located at Ave. 384 and Rd. 56 next to the existing London
Pond recharge site. … Both groundwater recharge basins
will help Alta divert more surface water and boost its
groundwater sustainability efforts to comply with the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. Alta said the
basins will increase the available water supply during dry
years for growers and also support nearby residents who are
reliant on groundwater for drinking water.
A new lawsuit alleges Valley Water CEO Rick
Callender pushed to have his agency sponsor the NAACP
California-Hawaii State Conference — a private group he
personally oversees — with public dollars. The conflict of
interest claim comes from a civil complaint filed March 20 by
Salena Pryor, an NAACP colleague who worked under Callender in
his capacity as the statewide NAACP chapter president. She
accuses Callender of demeaning and undermining her on numerous
occasions while she helped coordinate NAACP events, from
distressing late-night video calls to public embarrassment. It
comes as Callender is on administrative leave from Valley Water
— which cares for Santa Clara County’s streams, flood
protection and wholesale water supply — while the agency
investigates an employee’s misconduct complaint against him.
