Facing the challenges of sustainably managing and sharing water,
our most precious natural resource, requires collaboration,
education and outreach. Since 1977, the Water Education
Foundation has put water resource issues in California and the
West in context to inspire a deep understanding of and
appreciation for water.
Taking a steady pulse of the water world, the Foundation offers
educational materials, tours of key watersheds, water news, water
leadership training and conferences that bring together diverse
voices. By providing tools and platforms for engagement with wide
audiences, we aim to help build sound and collective solutions to
water issues.
What We Do
We support and execute a wide variety of programming to build a
better understanding of water resources across the West,
including:
Mission: The mission of the Water Education
Foundation, an impartial nonprofit, is to inspire understanding
of water and catalyze critical conversations to build bridges and
inform collaborative decision-making
Vision: A society that has the ability to
resolve its water challenges to benefit all
Where We Work
Our office is located in Sacramento, CA.
Connect with Us!
Sign up here to get email announcements
about upcoming workshops, tours and new publications.
You can learn more about the daily comings and goings of the
Foundation by following @WaterEdFdn on Twitter,
liking us on Facebook or
following us on
LinkedIn.
The Water Education Foundation’s
just-released 2020 Annual Report recaps how, even in
the midst of a global pandemic, we continued educating about the
most crucial natural resource in California and the West –
water.
The annual report takes readers along to see the array of
educational events, trainings and articles we produced last year,
including engaging virtual water
tours that educated participants on pressing water
issues and allowed them to interact with each other and a wide
range of experts offering different viewpoints.
Join us next Thursday,
Sept. 9, for an engaging online Bay-Delta
Tour that will feature live Q&A with key experts on the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, the state’s vital water hub and the
West Coast’s largest freshwater tidal estuary.
You’ll learn about Delta ecosystem restoration, impacts to
ocean fisheries from changes in the Delta, agriculture and
municipal water use and the Delta’s role in supplying water to
Southern California. You’ll hear from farmers, fish biologists,
water managers, people working on restoration efforts and
more. Plus, you’ll get your hands on the newest update of our
Layperson’s
Guide to the Delta, published in 2020.
Water is flowing once again
to the Colorado River’s delta in Mexico, a vast region that
was once a natural splendor before the iconic Western river was
dammed and diverted at the turn of the last century, essentially
turning the delta into a desert.
In 2012, the idea emerged that water could be intentionally sent
down the river to inundate the delta floodplain and regenerate
native cottonwood and willow trees, even in an overallocated
river system. Ultimately, dedicated flows of river water were
brokered under cooperative
efforts by the U.S. and Mexican governments.
The Water Education Foundation was
hoping to host a few in-person events this fall (and you
told us in a survey that you wanted us to) but with the rise in
the Delta variant of COVID-19 cases, we have decided to
present our Water Summit and Headwaters Tour in a virtual
format.
However, while our annual Water Summit will be virtual on Oct.
28, we are hoping to include an optional outdoor reception
aboard a boat for a Sacramento River cruise. Stay tuned for
details!
The Water Education Foundation has a
full-time job opening for a programs and communications
manager interested in educating and informing the
public about our most vital natural resource — water.
In addition, our news and publication team is looking for
freelance writers with deep knowledge and experience covering
water issues in California and the Colorado River Basin.
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta,
the largest estuary on the West Coast, is a vital hub in
California’s complex water delivery system as well as a rich
farming region, an important wetlands area – and often, a source
of conflict.
Join us for an engaging online
journey on Sept. 9 to go deep into
the Delta and its 720,000-acre network of islands and
canals that supports the state’s two large water systems -
the State Water Project and the federal Central Valley
Project.
Join us for a Sept. 9 virtual
journey into California’s most critical and
controversial water region in the state, the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta, and learn how the drought is impacting water
quality and supply.
The Delta, a 720,000-acre network of islands and canals, supports
the state’s two large water systems – the State Water Project and
the federal Central Valley Project – and, together with the San
Francisco Bay, forms an important ecological resource.
State work to improve wildlife habitat and tamp down dust at California’s ailing Salton Sea is finally moving forward. Now the sea may be on the verge of getting the vital ingredient needed to supercharge those restoration efforts – money.
The shrinking desert lake has long been a trouble spot beset by rising salinity and unhealthy, lung-irritating dust blowing from its increasingly exposed bed. It shadows discussions of how to address the Colorado River’s two-decade-long drought because of its connection to the system. The lake is a festering health hazard to nearby residents, many of them impoverished, who struggle with elevated asthma risk as dust rises from the sea’s receding shoreline.
Curious about the significance of
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta? Looking for the latest
information on the drought hitting California and the West? Want
to read up on some of the historic figures in California water?
The Water Education Foundation has an array of online resources
to help you keep up with what’s new, what you need to know and
what you might be curious about involving water in California and
the West.
Immerse yourself in California’s key water sources this fall with
the Foundation’s schedule of engaging virtual tours.
Each tour event will run from 2:30-5:30 p.m. PT
and includes:
An overview presentation of the region’s
critical topics
A guided video tour of key locations
— farms, wetlands, dams and reservoirs, wildlife
habitats — to gain a stronger understanding on a
variety of water supply issues and the latest policy
developments
Live Q&A with experts in chat
rooms so participants can dive deeper into the topics,
including the drought gripping California.
As part of the events, participants
will receive a copy of one of our Layperson’s Guides and be
entered into a drawing to win one of our beautiful
water maps.
Dear Friends and Supporters of the
Water Education Foundation!
We hope everyone is enjoying their summer!
At the Foundation, we are busy preparing to move to a new office
near the confluence of the Sacramento and American rivers,
planning a blend of virtual and in-person programming for
the fall and offering a sale on our beautiful water maps and
guides so we don’t have to move them.
We’re in the final weeks of our
moving sale as we prepare to head to new quarters next month, so
you still have a little time left to knock 30 percent off the
price of our water maps, Layperson’s Guides, DVDs and more.
Use the code MOVINGSALE when you check out
to claim your 30 percent discount and get those updated maps,
guides and DVDs you’ve wanted.
Join the team at the
Water Education
Foundation, a nonprofit that has been a trusted
source of water news and educational programs in California and
across the West for more than 40 years.
We have a full-time opening for an enthusiastic, team-oriented,
multitasking Programs & Communications
Manager at our office in Sacramento.
Las Vegas, known for its searing summertime heat and glitzy casino fountains, is projected to get even hotter in the coming years as climate change intensifies. As temperatures rise, possibly as much as 10 degrees by end of the century, according to some models, water demand for the desert community is expected to spike. That is not good news in a fast-growing region that depends largely on a limited supply of water from an already drought-stressed Colorado River.
We’re moving later this summer to
new quarters closer to the Sacramento River, and we don’t want to
haul all of our water maps, Layperson’s Guides, DVDs and more to
the new home. So we’re making you a limited-time offer we hope
you can’t refuse: Take 30 percent off the price of all of
our maps, guides and more.
Use the code MOVINGSALE when you check out
to get your 30 percent discount.
For anyone trying to keep up with
the unfolding drought in California and the West, the Water
Education Foundation has created a special resource page
that offers links to real-time reservoir data and water supply
forecasts, an ongoing newsfeed to help you stay up to date
on the latest news and tips so you can help
conserve the region’s most precious natural resource.
The Water Education Foundation has
hosted successful virtual tours and events during the COVID-19
pandemic and is now closely monitoring developments – as capacity
and distancing restrictions are lifted from public health
guidelines this summer – to inform the format choices for
our fall programs.
When you oversee the largest
supplier of treated water in the United States, you tend to think
big.
Jeff Kightlinger, general manager of the Metropolitan Water
District of Southern California for the last 15 years, has
focused on diversifying his agency’s water supply and building
security through investment. That means looking beyond MWD’s
borders to ensure the reliable delivery of water to two-thirds of
California’s population.
As California slowly emerges from
the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic, one remnant left behind by
the statewide lockdown offers a sobering reminder of the economic
challenges still ahead for millions of the state’s residents and
the water agencies that serve them – a mountain of
water debt.
Concerns about water affordability, long an issue in a state
where millions of people struggle to make ends meet, jumped into
overdrive last year as the pandemic wrenched the
economy. Our
latest article in Western Water explores
the hurdles to helping consumers, how some water agencies have
devised workarounds and how far more lasting solutions remain out
of reach.
As California slowly emerges from
the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic, one remnant left behind by
the statewide lockdown offers a sobering reminder of the economic
challenges still ahead for millions of the state’s residents and
the water agencies that serve them – a mountain of water debt.
Water affordability concerns, long an issue in a state where
millions of people struggle to make ends meet, jumped into
overdrive last year as the pandemic wrenched the economy. Jobs
were lost and household finances were upended. Even with federal
stimulus aid and unemployment checks, bills fell by the wayside.
The Water Education Foundation’s tours offer participants a
first-hand look at the water facilities, rivers and regions
critical in the debate about the future of water resources.
From recent news articles to publications, maps and tours, Water
Education Foundation has everything you need, including the
award-winning Layperson’s Guide to the Delta.
