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.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s potential role leading the Department
of Health and Human Services would not give him carte blanche
over fluoride in drinking water — although he could still
influence the debate in other ways, legal experts say. Kennedy,
President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head HHS, professed this
month that Trump would sign an executive order in January
advising all water utilities to remove fluoride from drinking
water supplies. But while Trump later expressed tentative
support for the idea, the main agency with the ability to
mandate changes on water fluoridation is EPA — not the one
Kennedy was chosen to lead.
The Oakland Unified School District is one of the few districts
in California that has continued to test lead levels in
drinking water years after it was no longer required by state
law. In 2017, an extension to the existing law (AB-746), also
known as the California Safe Drinking Water Act, required
districts to sample water from at least five faucets in every
school and report the findings to the state by July 1,
2019. State funding for lead testing ended after the
deadline. The law resulted in school districts getting a
snapshot of lead contamination in their drinking water at that
time. But because of the one-time requirement that districts
test only a small sample of faucets, and exemptions for charter
and private schools, there are no statewide records that offer
an accurate representation of lead presence in California
schools currently. Seven years after the law went into effect,
school districts and communities, including Oakland, are still
grappling with how to keep lead out of drinking water.
With President-elect Donald Trump’s selection of Robert F.
Kennedy Jr. to head the Department of Health and Human
Services, many Americans are wondering whether they’re in for a
future without fluoridated water. Kennedy, who has widely
spread falsehoods about vaccines causing autism and other false
medical claims, has vowed that the Trump administration will
“advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public
water” as soon as the 47th presidency begins. One place in the
country that can offer a glimpse of the fluoride-free life sits
just outside the Bay Area: Davis. It is among a handful of
communities including Portland, Ore.; Albuquerque; and the
state of Hawaii that have made the choice to go without the
cavity-preventing additive. Towns in Sonoma and Marin counties,
as well as Gridley (Butte County), a small community, have also
opted to go without fluoride.
Los Angeles will soon begin building a $740-million project to
transform wastewater into purified drinking water in the San
Fernando Valley, expanding the city’s local water supply in an
effort to prepare for worsening droughts compounded by climate
change. … When completed, the facilities will purify treated
wastewater and produce 20 million gallons of drinking water per
day, enough to supply about 250,000 people. The drinking water
that the plant produces will be piped 10 miles northeast to
L.A. County’s Hansen Spreading Grounds, where it will flow into
basins and percolate into the groundwater aquifer for storage.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power will later pump
the water from wells, and after additional testing and
treatment, the water will enter pipes and be delivered to taps.
… Nearly 63% of the US population has fluoridated water
flowing through their taps, according to the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). US health experts
describe fluoridated water — a voluntary practice for local
water districts — as one of modern medicine’s greatest public
health achievements, up there with the recognition that smoking
is bad for you. … An important debate over fluoride is
gaining fresh steam among scientists and legal experts. Some
recent studies suggest more research is still needed on safe
fluoride levels for kids. Plus, a federal ruling in California
this year questioned the US government’s recommended dose.
While many medical professionals — chiefly dentists — support
some level of fluoridation, there is growing agreement
that we still aren’t sure how much fluoride is too much.
The city’s drinking water now meets the trihalomethane levels
set forth by regulatory agencies. The levels for the past four
quarters were below the maximum concentration level of 80 parts
per billion. “This progress follows a series of significant
updates and process improvements at the water treatment
facilities aimed at reducing THM levels and ensuring water
quality for Suisun City residents,” wrote City Manager Bret
Prebula. Trihalomethanes, a byproduct of chlorine disinfection,
can be produced during the pre-chlorination step of the water
treatment process. It’s critical for removing organic materials
and heavy metals.
… Denver Water has found nearly 65,000 lead lines in the
city, primarily in homes built before the 1950s. That’s roughly
220 miles of pipe, according to Denver Water officials. The
condition of about 17,000 lines is still unknown. Since
starting the Lead Reduction Program in 2020, the utility has
replaced around half of the lines. They also sent Brita
pitchers and filter replacements to homes that are still
waiting to get their lines replaced. … These replacements
come in the wake of the Flint Water Crisis in Michigan in 2014
when the city changed its water source from Lake Huron to the
Flint River. Pipes corroded and there were no treatment methods
in place. Lead levels were nearly double the lead action level
set by the EPA in most of the homes, while others were in the
hundreds or thousands for parts per billion. It put the dangers
of lead in drinking water in the national spotlight. So why
weren’t Denver’s lines, and others, replaced sooner?
A $10-billion California bond measure to finance water, clean
energy and other environmental projects was leading by a wide
margin in Tuesday’s election. Proposition 4 called for spending
$3.8 billion for water projects, including those that provide
safe drinking water, water recycling projects, groundwater
storage and flood control. An additional $1.5 billion would be
spent on wildfire protection, and $1.2 billion would go toward
protecting the coast from sea level rise. Other money would be
used to create parks, protect wildlife and habitats, fight air
pollution, address extreme heat events and fund sustainable
agriculture.
San Francisco is often said to have some of the best
drinking water in the nation. Fed by snow on the peaks at
Yosemite, the cold, unspoiled supplies are so crisp and clean
that the water requires no filtration before being piped 160
miles to Bay Area taps. Celebrity water sommelier Martin Riese
once called the city’s water “smooth” with earthy notes and
“almost like you have little lime” in the aftertaste. This
beloved elixir, however, may not be as good as some people
think it is. A recent taste test found that the city’s supplies
were slightly inferior to water from other Bay Area
providers. To be clear, the test conducted by researchers
at the University of Colorado at Boulder, with Bay Area
residents doing the tasting, is not the final word on San
Francisco water.
After assuring residents here for months that their tap water
is safe to drink despite earlier tests showing high lead
levels, city officials announced Thursday that some of their
earlier assessments were done improperly. The news in Syracuse
— the latest U.S. city grappling with a crisis over
contaminated drinking water — comes after officials first
disclosed in August that samples collected in the spring found
that dozens of homes had dangerous levels of lead exposure. The
city said 10 percent of the homes it surveyed had levels more
than four times the Environmental Protection Agency threshold
that triggers government enforcement, or more than twice what
officials found during the Flint, Michigan, water crisis a
decade ago.
Tucked in a $10 billion climate bond on the November ballot is
an earmark to improve drinking water quality for communities
such as East Orosi. Proposition 4 would allocate $610 million
for clean, safe, and reliable drinking water and require at
least 40% be spent on projects that benefit vulnerable
populations or disadvantaged communities. But it’s a fraction
of what the state says is needed. While most Californians have
access to safe water, roughly 750,000 people as of late October
are served by 383 failing water systems, many clustered in
remote and sparsely populated areas. A June assessment by the
California State Water Resources Control Board pegged the cost
of repairing failing and at-risk public water systems at about
$11.5 billion.
The Environmental Protection Agency has largely recovered from
many of the staff exits and budget cuts that occurred during
the Trump administration and, in some ways, has swiftly
rebounded. It has banned toxic pesticides, strengthened
chemical safety protections and imposed strong climate
regulations. Enforcement of pollution laws, which had plummeted
under the Trump years, is starting to climb back up. But with
next week’s election looming, the agency charged with
protecting the environment faces more uncertainty than at any
other time since its creation more than 50 years ago.
… The agency … issued the first-ever limits in
drinking water of PFAS, the “forever”
chemicals linked to cancer and other health problems that are
present in the tap water of hundreds of millions of Americans.
Chemical and manufacturing groups have sued, arguing
the E.P.A. exceeded its authority.
In the push to stop burning fossil fuels, California may find
itself becoming less of a national power player after November.
That’s if Donald Trump or the Supreme Court dismantles one of
the state’s key weapons against carbon emissions, a
half-century old Environmental Protection Agency waiver program
that allows California to set regulations that are stronger
than federal rules. … Among other programs, [Pres. Joe]
Biden’s landmark climate law is expected to support the state’s
transition to clean energy with funding for renewables, to
modernize the electric grid and expand EV charging
infrastructure. The state climate bond, Prop 4, will also fund
a wide variety of programs from clean drinking
water to habitat restoration across the state.
The US Forest Service and water bottling company BlueTriton
[Arrowhead Mountain Spring Water] must fight their California
water permit battle in a court closer to the case’s origin, a
federal judge ruled. Judge John D. Bates transferred BlueTriton
Brands Inc.’s bid to reinstate its special use permit related
to San Bernardino National Forest water diversions to the US
District Court for the Central District of California,
according to an order filed in US District Court for the
District of Columbia.
Long term exposure to arsenic in water may increase
cardiovascular disease and especially heart disease risk even
at exposure levels below the federal regulatory limit (10µg/L)
according to a new study at Columbia University Mailman School
of Public Health. This is the first study to describe
exposure-response relationships at concentrations below the
current regulatory limit and substantiates that prolonged
exposure to arsenic in water contributes to the development of
ischemic heart disease. The researchers compared various time
windows of exposure, finding that the previous decade of water
arsenic exposure up to the time of a cardiovascular disease
event contributed the greatest risk. The findings are published
in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.
As a young girl growing up on the Southern Ute Indian
Reservation, Lorelei Cloud learned the value of water in life
lessons every week outside her uncle’s home. “I lived with
my grandparents in an old adobe home they had remodeled. We
didn’t have any running water and so we always hauled water to
our house,” says Cloud, Vice Chairman of the Southern Ute
Indian Tribe in southwest Colorado. … Those early memories –
of water scarcity, not abundance – have helped shape Cloud’s
work today as a state leader in water conservation, and as a
champion for Tribal voices in water decision-making in
Colorado. Native American Tribes hold some of the most
senior water rights in the Colorado River Basin and have
thousands of years of knowledge about water management. But
they have been historically excluded from decisions around
allocations and management of the river and water resources.
And on many Reservations, including the Southern Ute, access to
clean, safe drinking water is still far from universal.
New research released today by the Pacific Institute and the
Center for Water Security and Cooperation (CWSC) reveals
existing laws and policies fail to protect water and sanitation
systems from climate change impacts in frontline communities
across the United States. The report, “Law and Policies that
Address Equitable, Climate-Resilient Water and Sanitation,”
examines federal, Tribal, state, and local laws and policies
governing centralized drinking water and wastewater systems, as
well as decentralized onsite drinking water and sanitation
systems. The research demonstrates that most existing US water
laws and policies were developed assuming historical climate
trends that determine water availability would be constant and
that communities’ vulnerability to climate events would be the
same over time. The research specifically outlines how laws and
policies often do not anticipate or help to proactively manage
the impacts of climate change on water and wastewater systems
in frontline communities.
Days after the administrator of the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency visited a Los Angeles public housing project
with lead-contaminated water, the agency ordered drinking water
systems nationwide to replace every lead pipe within 10 years.
… But in Los Angeles — where the discovery of contaminated
water in public housing in Watts has shocked officials — the
EPA mandate is unlikely to result in immediate change.
When [EPA Director Michael Regan] joined Mayor Karen Bass
on a visit to the 700-unit Jordan Downs complex this
month, he suggested the brain-damaging element could be from
household plumbing — a critical risk in older homes. It’s a
possibility that highlights the difficulty of eliminating the
threat of lead in California drinking water. Although the
new EPA rule targets lead service lines connecting homes to
water mains, it doesn’t address plumbing inside the building
that can still pose a risk, such as lead soldering, brass
fixtures and interior mains.
The Biden administration just approved a massive geothermal
energy project in Utah, marking a significant advance for a
climate-friendly technology that is gaining momentum in the
United States, the White House confirmed to The Washington Post
on Thursday. The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land
Management gave final approval to Fervo Energy’s Cape
Geothermal Power Project in Beaver County, Utah, the White
House said. Once fully operational, the project could generate
up to 2 gigawatts of electricity — enough to power more than 2
million homes. … Despite its climate benefits, some
environmentalists oppose enhanced geothermal because of its
reliance on fracking, which has the potential to
contaminate drinking water and trigger
earthquakes or tremors.
PPIC Water Policy Center senior fellow Ellen Hanak testified at
the Assembly Select Committee on Permitting Reform on October
16, 2024. Here are her prepared remarks. … During our
many discussions with stakeholders over the years, one
consistent theme has emerged: the time and cost of permitting
to undertake water projects both large and small. … While
each individual permitting requirement was introduced to meet a
well-intended policy goal, the cumulative effect can be
daunting, causing years of delay and escalating costs, and even
outright preventing actions that would serve the greater good.
In short, permitting challenges are keeping us from taking
timely action to build water system resiliency, while
increasing affordability challenges.
There are few government agencies more central to daily life in
Los Angeles than the Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California, which spends billions of dollars each year ensuring
that 19 million people have enough to drink, in part by
importing hundreds of billions of gallons from the Colorado
River and Northern California. There are also few agencies more
prone to bitter power struggles. The latest drama could reach a
tipping point Monday, when Metropolitan’s board will consider
firing the agency’s general manager — with potentially huge
consequences for our water supplies, depending on whom you ask.
Water bubbles up in streets, pooling in neighborhoods for weeks
or months. Homes burn to the ground if firefighters can’t draw
enough water from hydrants. Utility crews struggle to fix
broken pipes while water flows through shut-off valves that
don’t work. … Across the U.S., trillions of gallons of
drinking water are lost every year, especially from decrepit
systems in communities struggling with significant population
loss and industrial decline that leave behind poorer residents,
vacant neighborhoods and too-large water systems that are
difficult to maintain.
Water regulation in Arizona has devolved into a game of
chicken. The governor and farmers are rivals revving their
engines, hoping their opponent will flinch first. Caught
in the middle is Gila Bend, a groundwater basin south of
Buckeye, where the state could decide to impose its most
stringent form of regulation, whether folks like it or not.
Both sides are using Gila Bend as a bargaining chip to win
support for competing legislative proposals. But to what
end? - Written by Joanna Allhands, Arizona Republic digital
opinions editor
The U.S. Senate Indian Affairs Committee is holding an
important hearing Thursday on S. 2385, a bill to
refine the tools needed to help Tribal communities gain access
to something that most non-Indian communities in the western
United States have long taken for granted: federally subsidized
systems to deliver safe, clean drinking water to our homes.
… This is the sort of bill (there’s a companion on the
House side) that makes a huge amount of sense, but could easily
get sidetracked in the chaos of Congress. The ideal path is for
the crucial vetting to happen in a process such as Thursday’s
hearing, and then to attach it to one of those omnibus things
that Congress uses these days to get non-controversial stuff
done. Clean water for Native communities should pretty clearly
be non-controversial.
State health officials know that extreme heat can cost lives
and send people to the hospital, just like wildfire smoke. Now,
new research finds that when people are exposed to both hazards
simultaneously — as is increasingly the case in California —
heart and respiratory crises outpace the expected sum of
hospitalizations compared to when the conditions occur
separately. … The study joins a growing body of research
about the intersection of different climate risks. Last month,
California-based think-tank the Pacific
Institute published a report about how converging
hazards — including wildfires, drought, flooding, sea level
rise and intensifying storms — are harming access to drinking
water and sanitation in California and other parts of the
world. The deadly 2018 Camp fire in Butte
County impacted an estimated 2,438 private wells, the
report said.
After more than two decades of
drought, water utilities serving the largest urban regions in the
arid Southwest are embracing a drought-proof source of drinking
water long considered a supply of last resort: purified sewage.
Water supplies have tightened to the point that Phoenix and the
water supplier for 19 million Southern California residents are
racing to adopt an expensive technology called “direct potable
reuse” or “advanced purification” to reduce their reliance on
imported water from the dwindling Colorado River.
… A state audit from the California Water Resources Control
Board released last year found that over 920,000 residents
faced an increased risk of illness–including cancer, liver and
kidney problems–due to consuming unsafe drinking water. A
majority of these unsafe water systems are in the Central
Valley. The matter has prompted community leaders to mobilize
residents around water quality as politicians confront
imperfect solutions for the region’s supply. Advocates point
out that impacted areas, including those in Tulare County, tend
to be majority Latino with low median incomes. … This
year’s extreme weather has only worsened the valley’s problems.
The storms that hit California at the start of this year caused
stormwater tainted with farm industry fertilizer, manure and
nitrates to flow into valley aquifers.
Tiny pieces of plastic waste shed
from food wrappers, grocery bags, clothing, cigarette butts,
tires and paint are invading the environment and every facet of
daily life. Researchers know the plastic particles have even made
it into municipal water supplies, but very little data exists
about the scope of microplastic contamination in drinking
water.
After years of planning, California this year is embarking on a
first-of-its-kind data-gathering mission to illuminate how
prevalent microplastics are in the state’s largest drinking water
sources and help regulators determine whether they are a public
health threat.
A pilot program in the Salinas Valley run remotely out of Los Angeles is offering a test case for how California could provide clean drinking water for isolated rural communities plagued by contaminated groundwater that lack the financial means or expertise to connect to a larger water system.
Martha Guzman recalls those awful
days working on water and other issues as a deputy legislative
secretary for then-Gov. Jerry Brown. California was mired in a
recession and the state’s finances were deep in the red. Parks
were cut, schools were cut, programs were cut to try to balance a
troubled state budget in what she remembers as “that terrible
time.”
She now finds herself in a strikingly different position: As
administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s
Region 9, she has a mandate to address water challenges across
California, Nevada, Arizona and Hawaii and $1 billion to help pay
for it. It is the kind of funding, she said, that is usually
spread out over a decade. Guzman called it the “absolutely
greatest opportunity.”
Across a sprawling corner of southern Tulare County snug against the Sierra Nevada, a bounty of navel oranges, grapes, pistachios, hay and other crops sprout from the loam and clay of the San Joaquin Valley. Groundwater helps keep these orchards, vineyards and fields vibrant and supports a multibillion-dollar agricultural economy across the valley. But that bounty has come at a price. Overpumping of groundwater has depleted aquifers, dried up household wells and degraded ecosystems.
Shortly after taking office in 2019,
Gov. Gavin Newsom called on state agencies to deliver a Water
Resilience Portfolio to meet California’s urgent challenges —
unsafe drinking water, flood and drought risks from a changing
climate, severely depleted groundwater aquifers and native fish
populations threatened with extinction.
Within days, he appointed Nancy Vogel, a former journalist and
veteran water communicator, as director of the Governor’s Water
Portfolio Program to help shepherd the monumental task of
compiling all the information necessary for the portfolio. The
three state agencies tasked with preparing the document delivered
the draft Water Resilience Portfolio Jan. 3. The document, which
Vogel said will help guide policy and investment decisions
related to water resilience, is nearing the end of its comment
period, which goes through Friday, Feb. 7.
Innovative efforts to accelerate
restoration of headwater forests and to improve a river for the
benefit of both farmers and fish. Hard-earned lessons for water
agencies from a string of devastating California wildfires.
Efforts to drought-proof a chronically water-short region of
California. And a broad debate surrounding how best to address
persistent challenges facing the Colorado River.
These were among the issues Western Water explored in
2019, and are still worth taking a look at in case you missed
them.
It’s been a year since two devastating wildfires on opposite ends
of California underscored the harsh new realities facing water
districts and cities serving communities in or adjacent to the
state’s fire-prone wildlands. Fire doesn’t just level homes, it
can contaminate water, scorch watersheds, damage delivery systems
and upend an agency’s finances.
Summer is a good time to take a
break, relax and enjoy some of the great beaches, waterways and
watersheds around California and the West. We hope you’re getting
a chance to do plenty of that this July.
But in the weekly sprint through work, it’s easy to miss
some interesting nuggets you might want to read. So while we’re
taking a publishing break to work on other water articles planned
for later this year, we want to help you catch up on
Western Water stories from the first half of this year
that you might have missed.
Each day, people living on the streets and camping along waterways across California face the same struggle – finding clean drinking water and a place to wash and go to the bathroom.
Some find friendly businesses willing to help, or public restrooms and drinking water fountains. Yet for many homeless people, accessing the water and sanitation that most people take for granted remains a daily struggle.
Californians have been doing an
exceptional job
reducing their indoor water use, helping the state survive
the most recent drought when water districts were required to
meet conservation targets. With more droughts inevitable,
Californians are likely to face even greater calls to save water
in the future.
One of California Gov. Gavin
Newsom’s first actions after taking office was to appoint Wade
Crowfoot as Natural Resources Agency secretary. Then, within
weeks, the governor laid out an ambitious water agenda that
Crowfoot, 45, is now charged with executing.
That agenda includes the governor’s desire for a “fresh approach”
on water, scaling back the conveyance plan in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta and calling for more water recycling, expanded
floodplains in the Central Valley and more groundwater recharge.
Although Santa Monica may be the most aggressive Southern California water provider to wean itself from imported supplies, it is hardly the only one looking to remake its water portfolio.
In Los Angeles, a city of about 4 million people, efforts are underway to dramatically slash purchases of imported water while boosting the amount from recycling, stormwater capture, groundwater cleanup and conservation. Mayor Eric Garcetti in 2014 announced a plan to reduce the city’s purchase of imported water from Metropolitan Water District by one-half by 2025 and to provide one-half of the city’s supply from local sources by 2035. (The city considers its Eastern Sierra supplies as imported water.)
Low-income Californians can get help with their phone bills, their natural gas bills and their electric bills. But there’s only limited help available when it comes to water bills.
That could change if the recommendations of a new report are implemented into law. Drafted by the State Water Resources Control Board, the report outlines the possible components of a program to assist low-income households facing rising water bills.
More than a decade in the making, an
ambitious plan to deal with the vexing problem of salt and
nitrates in the soils that seep into key groundwater basins of
the Central Valley is moving toward implementation. But its
authors are not who you might expect.
An unusual collaboration of agricultural interests, cities, water
agencies and environmental justice advocates collaborated for
years to find common ground to address a set of problems that
have rendered family wells undrinkable and some soil virtually
unusable for farming.
Joaquin Esquivel learned that life is
what happens when you make plans. Esquivel, who holds the public
member slot at the State Water Resources Control Board in
Sacramento, had just closed purchase on a house in Washington
D.C. with his partner when he was tapped by Gov. Jerry Brown a
year ago to fill the Board vacancy.
Esquivel, 35, had spent a decade in Washington, first in several
capacities with then Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and then as
assistant secretary for federal water policy at the California
Natural Resources Agency. As a member of the State Water Board,
he shares with four other members the difficult task of
ensuring balance to all the uses of California’s water.
A new study could help water
agencies find solutions to the vexing challenges the homeless
face in gaining access to clean water for drinking and
sanitation.
The Santa Ana Watershed Project
Authority (SAWPA) in Southern California has embarked on a
comprehensive and collaborative effort aimed at assessing
strengths and needs as it relates to water services for people
(including the homeless) within its 2,840 square-mile area that
extends from the San Bernardino Mountains to the Orange County
coast.
A statewide program that began under a 2015 law to help
low-income people with their water bills would cost about $600
million annually, a public policy expert told the California
State Water Resources Control Board (State Water Board) at a
meeting last week.
Potable water, also known as
drinking water, comes from surface and ground sources and is
treated to levels that that meet state and federal standards for
consumption.
Water from natural sources is treated for microorganisms,
bacteria, toxic chemicals, viruses and fecal matter. Drinking
raw, untreated water can cause gastrointestinal problems such as
diarrhea, vomiting or fever.
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.
This card includes information about the Colorado River, who uses
the river, how the river’s water is divided and other pertinent
facts about this vital resource for the Southwest. Beautifully
illustrated with color photographs.
This 25-minute documentary-style DVD, developed in partnership
with the California Department of Water Resources, provides an
excellent overview of climate change and how it is already
affecting California. The DVD also explains what scientists
anticipate in the future related to sea level rise and
precipitation/runoff changes and explores the efforts that are
underway to plan and adapt to climate.
20-minute DVD that explains the problem with polluted stormwater,
and steps that can be taken to help prevent such pollution and
turn what is often viewed as a “nuisance” into a water resource
through various activities.
Many Californians don’t realize that when they turn on the
faucet, the water that flows out could come from a source close
to home or one hundreds of miles away. Most people take their
water for granted; not thinking about the elaborate systems and
testing that go into delivering clean, plentiful water to
households throughout the state. Where drinking water comes from,
how it’s treated, and what people can do to protect its quality
are highlighted in this 2007 PBS documentary narrated by actress
Wendie Malick.
A 30-minute version of the 2007 PBS documentary Drinking Water:
Quenching the Public Thirst. This DVD is ideal for showing at
community forums and speaking engagements to help the public
understand the complex issues surrounding the elaborate systems
and testing that go into delivering clean, plentiful water to
households throughout the state.
This 30-minute DVD explains the importance of developing a source
water assessment program (SWAP) for tribal lands and by profiling
three tribes that have created SWAPs. Funded by a grant from the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the video complements the
Foundation’s 109-page workbook, Protecting Drinking Water: A
Workbook for Tribes, which includes a step-by-step work plan for
Tribes interested in developing a protection plan for their
drinking water.
A companion to the Truckee River Basin Map poster, this
24×36-inch poster, suitable for framing, explores the Carson
River, and its link to the Truckee River. The map includes the
Lahontan Dam and reservoir, the Carson Sink, and the farming
areas in the basin. Map text discusses the region’s hydrology and
geography, the Newlands Project, land and water use within the
basin and wetlands. Development of the map was funded by a grant
from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Mid-Pacific Region, Lahontan
Basin Area Office.
This beautiful 24×36-inch poster, suitable for framing, displays
the rivers, lakes and reservoirs, irrigated farmland, urban areas
and Indian reservations within the Truckee River Basin, including
the Newlands Project, Pyramid Lake and Lake Tahoe. Map text
explains the issues surrounding the use of the Truckee-Carson
rivers, Lake Tahoe water quality improvement efforts, fishery
restoration and the effort to reach compromise solutions to many
of these issues.
This 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, illustrates the
water resources available for Nevada cities, agriculture and the
environment. It features natural and manmade water resources
throughout the state, including the Truckee and Carson rivers,
Lake Tahoe, Pyramid Lake and the course of the Colorado River
that forms the state’s eastern boundary.
Water as a renewable resource is depicted in this 18×24 inch
poster. Water is renewed again and again by the natural
hydrologic cycle where water evaporates, transpires from plants,
rises to form clouds, and returns to the earth as precipitation.
Excellent for elementary school classroom use.
As the state’s population continues to grow and traditional water
supplies grow tighter, there is increased interest in reusing
treated wastewater for a variety of activities, including
irrigation of crops, parks and golf courses, groundwater recharge
and industrial uses.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to Integrated Regional Water
Management (IRWM) is an in-depth, easy-to-understand publication
that provides background information on the principles of IRWM,
its funding history and how it differs from the traditional water
management approach.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to Groundwater is an in-depth,
easy-to-understand publication that provides background and
perspective on groundwater. The guide explains what groundwater
is – not an underground network of rivers and lakes! – and the
history of its use in California.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to California Water provides an
excellent overview of the history of water development and use in
California. It includes sections on flood management; the state,
federal and Colorado River delivery systems; Delta issues; water
rights; environmental issues; water quality; and options for
stretching the water supply such as water marketing and
conjunctive use. New in this 10th edition of the guide is a
section on the human need for water.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to the Delta explores the competing
uses and demands on California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Included in the guide are sections on the history of the Delta,
its role in the state’s water system, and its many complex issues
with sections on water quality, levees, salinity and agricultural
drainage, fish and wildlife, and water distribution.
Finding and maintaining a clean
water supply for drinking and other uses has been a constant
challenge throughout human history.
Today, significant technological developments in water treatment,
including monitoring and assessment, help ensure a drinking water
supply of high quality in California and the West.
The source of water and its initial condition prior to being
treated usually determines the water treatment process. [See also
Water Recycling.]
A tremendous amount of time and technology is expended to make
surface water safe to drink. Surface water undergoes many
processes before it reaches a consumer’s tap.
The federal Safe Drinking Water Act sets standards for drinking
water quality in the United States.
Launched in 1974 and administered by the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency, the Safe Drinking Water Act oversees states,
communities, and water suppliers who implement the drinking water
standards at the local level.
The act’s regulations apply to every public water system in the
United States but do not include private wells serving less than
25 people.
According to the EPA, there are more than 160,000 public water
systems in the United States.
This printed issue of Western Water examines
groundwater management and the extent to which stakeholders
believe more efforts are needed to preserve and restore the
resource.
This printed issue of Western Water, based on presentations
at the November 3-4, 2010 Water Quality Conference in Ontario,
Calif., looks at constituents of emerging concerns (CECs) – what
is known, what is yet to be determined and the potential
regulatory impacts on drinking water quality.
This printed issue of Western Water examines
desalination – an issue that is marked by great optimism and
controversy – and the expected role it might play as an
alternative water supply strategy.
This printed copy of Western Water examines the challenges facing
small water systems, including drought preparedness, limited
operating expenses and the hurdles of complying with costlier
regulations. Much of the article is based on presentations at the
November 2007 Small Systems Conference sponsored by the Water
Education Foundation and the California Department of Water
Resources.
This issue of Western Water looks at some of the issues
facing drinking water providers, such as compliance with
increasingly stringent treatment requirements, the need to
improve source water quality and the mission of continually
informing consumers about the quality of water they receive.
This issue of Western Water examines PPCPs – what they are, where
they come from and whether the potential exists for them to
become a water quality problem. With the continued emphasis on
water quality and the fact that many water systems in the West
are characterized by flows dominated by effluent contributions,
PPCPs seem likely to capture interest for the foreseeable future.
This issue of Western Water examines the problem of perchlorate
contamination and its ramifications on all facets of water
delivery, from the extensive cleanup costs to the search for
alternative water supplies. In addition to discussing the threat
posed by high levels of perchlorate in drinking water, the
article presents examples of areas hard hit by contamination and
analyzes the potential impacts of forthcoming drinking water
standards for perchlorate.
Drawn from a special stakeholder symposium held in September 1999
in Keystone, Colorado, this issue explores how we got to where we
are today on the Colorado River; an era in which the traditional
water development of the past has given way to a more
collaborative approach that tries to protect the environment
while stretching available water supplies.
