We have a situation going on in California right now that will tell us whether the State Water Resources Control Board can manage the state’s water resources for the benefit of the whole state rather than for the benefit of south San Joaquin Valley agriculture worth less than one-half of one percent of the state’s...Read More

Then, earlier this month, the State Water Resources Control Board sent a notice to Diverters of Surface Water alerting them to lower-than-average storage levels in reservoirs resulting from two years of record dry and warm conditions.  “For 2013,” they note, “the combined total precipitation for the months of January through May is the driest in...Read More

No.  Despite the suggestion that water is being reserved for releases to meet Delta water quality standards, water project operators have asked the Water Board to change this year’s classification from dry to critical because they expect to violate Delta outflow and salinity standards.   The Water Board justified this violation of standards by arguing...Read More

No.  The effect of reduced water quality and flows on salmon could be dire in a year when a record number of salmon are expected to return to spawn. “We’re only in a second dry year, not even a declared drought, and the system is fundamentally broken,” according to Bill Jennings of CSPA.  “The State...Read More

One of the many gargantuan problems with the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) is that it makes poorly-supported assumptions about available Sacramento River flows.  As the Bureau of Reclamation said in its comments on the BDCP’s environmental impact statement (EIS), “The current BDCP analysis assumes no operation impacts to upstream reservoir operations.”  But Sacramento River...Read More

What do we do in California to avoid making hard choices about sharing a limited resource? We build something bigger to store or move water. The Bureau of Reclamation wants to add 18.5 feet to the top of Shasta Dam, a project that would, it is claimed, increase storage capacity 14 percent, provide drinking water...Read More