Department of Water Resources
A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment
December 1, 2008
2. Supply -
Opinion:
Californians need to worry about food security
San Francisco Chronicle
Drought deepens strain on a dwindling Colorado
Flows falling »
Salt
State water supplies increasingly cloudy
Agencies hoping seeding process can help bolster key watersheds
Officials hope for snow to fill up Lake Tahoe
Normal rainfall predicted for north state this winter
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Opinion:
Californians need to worry about food security
San Francisco Chronicle – 11/30/08
A.G. Kawamura
A.G. Kawamura is the secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture. Kawamura and his family have been growing and shipping produce in
At a time when people are deeply concerned about our dependence on imported oil, we should also be concerned about increasing our state's dependence on imported food. In fact, our ability to feed our state could be seriously threatened by problems such as a long-term drought, the state's aging water delivery and supply system, and court-ordered water supply cuts.
When people talk about food security, it's normally a social justice topic at international conferences on hunger and famine. But it's a term that we're hearing more in
One of the major threats to the state's farming industry is our lack of water.
Because of the water shortage, growers are cutting back on production, fallowing land and stumping trees. The drought has cost the state more than $250 million in lost plantings and 80,000 acres of crops this year alone. And that doesn't include the huge amount of idle farmland that hasn't been planted in the past few years because of an unpredictable water supply.
While the drought seriously complicates matters, our problems will not be solved with just one wet winter. The comprehensive, bipartisan plan proposed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sen. Dianne Feinstein will provide the water necessary to meet California's needs during wet and dry years alike.
Critics like to say that
Furthermore, water use on
It's fashionable today to talk about eating locally. In fact, with the amount of food grown near the Bay Area - a recent study reported that 20 billion pounds of food, valued at $10 billion, is produced within a 100-mile radius of
Feeding our families locally grown food makes sense in many ways. First, we know that farmers in
We Californians have good reason to be proud of our state's agricultural bounty. Anyone who has lived in the Midwest or Eastern parts of the nation knows just how blessed
Will farmers be forced to change their crops because of a lack of water? Will there be sufficient water so we can choose what to grow?
.#
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/11/29/INPD149ND9.DTL
Drought deepens strain on a dwindling Colorado
Flows falling »
Salt
By Patty Henetz
The drought gripping
That's grim news for all of us in the West, perhaps most especially for the 10 million residents along the northern stretch of the Colorado River -- Utah, New Mexico, Wyoming and Colorado -- whose water rights are newer, and therefore junior, to those in Southern California, Nevada and Arizona.
Making matters worse, the
Even so, demand for the
Right now,
Demand is up. Flows are down. Something has to give. And when it does,
The West lacks water, he wrote in his 1879 Report on the Lands of the Arid Region of the
Law of the River
The 1922 Colorado River Compact may have given California water rights senior to the other six states, but the Metropolitan Water District (Met), which supplies up to 60 percent of the water for 19 million people spread across six Los Angeles-area counties, made its claims after the state's allocation already had been divvied up. That means the most populous part of
"If
That's already happened.
In 2003,
Because of its junior standing, Met had to eat about half the total shortage. No one else in the state had to cut supplies, Patterson said.
In February, Met agreed to a rationing plan for most of Southern California, including
A federal judge has ordered
Other populous regions of
-- Developers in
-- The state has brought back a water bank, last used 17 years ago, in which Southern California cities can buy water from willing
--
-- In
-- Met residents have cut back to about 185 gallons of water per person per day. Residents of
"If
Splish, splash
Upstream, Utahns on average use 291 gallons of water per person per day, a rate second only to
Sixty percent of
The system might seem out of balance. Yet no state, not even
There is, however, a growing sense that the
"Everybody ought to share in the reality of the river," said former Utah Attorney General Paul Van Dam, now director of Washington County-based Citizens for
Dozens of scientific studies issued since 2004 have documented the
The river's annual flow has averaged 11.7 million acre-feet this decade, according to federal records. In 2002, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation measured only 6.2 million acre-feet passing Lee's Ferry below Glen Canyon Dam, the lowest flow of the decade. Even after this year's above-average precipitation,
A 2007 U.S. Geological Survey report found that, by 2050, rising temperatures in the Southwest could rival those of the nation's fabled droughts, including the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. Hotter weather is expected to reduce
If the USGS is correct, and if this century's trend persists, average annual flow in the
Imagine that. The Law of the River requires 9 million acre-feet to pass Lee's Ferry on the way to the
A far more likely scenario would have the states banding together to rework the river allocations. But when Arizona Sen. John McCain suggested just that during his failed presidential campaign, the shrieks emanating from
Pipeline dream
Dennis Strong, director of the Utah Division of Water Resources, in October told the state Water Development Commission that the state is using about 1 million acre-feet of its yearly 1.4 million acre-foot allotment from the
Tribal water settlements yet to be signed would take up about 186,000 acre-feet, he said. New agricultural uses, mostly dedicated to controlling the salinity of the water that flows back to the
The state hasn't actually secured rights to the 100,000 acre-feet for the pipeline. Strong said that would have to be nailed down by 2010, when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is expected to issue the license necessary to start building it. He's confident the water will come.
By 2040, the pipeline's water would be entirely committed to a regional population of about 400,000, Strong said.
Given current scientific warnings about the shrinking
But Strong isn't worried. He's skeptical about global warming, though he "sees evidence" of it.
"Water managers," he said, "have been dealing with drought forever."#
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_11096669
State water supplies increasingly cloudy
Agencies hoping seeding process can help bolster key watersheds
By
SAN ANDREAS - Keep your eyes on the clouds rolling east this week. If they're fat enough, they'll get squeezed.
Thirsty
In fact, the cloud-seeding programs are growing and could potentially double in coming years, according to the California Department of Water Resources.
The year's first seeding in the central Sierra could happen this week if conditions are right.
The seeding involves the use of chemicals such as silver iodide that cause more water droplets or snowflakes to condense and fall to the ground. Various agencies spend more than $3 million a year statewide on the seeding, which typically generates rain and snow fall that yields an extra 300,000 to 400,000 acre-feet a year of water, according to the California Department of Water Resources.
An acre-foot is enough water to cover an acre 1 foot deep. Water managers say an acre-foot is about enough water to serve two typical family homes for a year.
"It definitely is worth it," said Kevin Cunningham, hydro facilities manager for the Northern California Power Agency, which this year for the second time is seeding clouds over watersheds in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties that feed the
The Northern California Power Agency, whose local members include the Lodi Electric Utility and Turlock Irrigation District, wants the extra water to spin the turbines at its power generation plant at Collierville Powerhouse on the
Cunningham said that he estimates the seeding will squeeze an extra 7 percent of water out of a winter's storms. That adds up to about 28,000 acre-feet during a typical year on the North Fork Stanislaus. And the power agency isn't the only beneficiary. The extra water also means better conditions for boaters at Spicer Meadow, and Union and
The Northern California Power Agency program is only in its second year. Pacific Gas and Electric Co., however, has been seeding clouds over the Sierra for five decades, including portions of the
PG&E also has a new cloud-seeding effort this year in the watersheds of the Pit and McCloud rivers in the far north end of the state. The announcement of cloud seeding there stirred consternation among community residents concerned about the effects of the chemicals used.
Independent experts, however, say the concentration of silver in the resulting water and snow, although measurable, is so low that it is below typical background concentrations, or the concentrations humans already encounter from dental fillings or silverware.
"We really haven't seen negative effects associated with it," said Jeffrey Mount, a geography professor and expert on state rivers at the
Cloud seeding got a brief spurt of fame this summer when word got out that Chinese officials used the technique to squeeze rain out of clouds before athletes and fans got to
In
A draft of the California State Water Plan update for 2009 calls for more research on cloud seeding, including how the process interacts with the effects of air pollution. According to the plan draft, recent research suggests that clouds here are yielding less rain and snow because of the effects of dust and other air pollution.
Still, the state Department of Water Resources estimates that
In a state where water sometimes sells for $200 or $300 an acre-foot, that's a bargain.#
http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081129/A_NEWS/811290323/-1/A_NEWS
Officials hope for snow to fill up Lake Tahoe
By Annie Flanzraich
With
“We desperately need a big winter and a big snowpack to bring
When the water in Lake Tahoe nears the natural rim, at 6,223 feet, water flows more slowly into the
At midweek the lake measured 6,223.25. Under normal conditions, the flow into the
“We can’t get any more water out of it,” Stone said. “It’s like a bathtub, we do not have the ability to release water through the natural rim.”
Water from Boca Reservoir and smaller natural streams will continue to flow through the
Stone said there is enough water in Boca to supply the river until sometime in December.
Stone said the region needs a winter with three or four times the average snowpack to bring the river above the natural rim and to an adequate level.
“It’s a very tenuous situation,” he said.
The average winter precipitation for the Tahoe area is 31.77 inches, said Jim Ashby, climatologist with the Western Regional Climate center. In the past 100 years, only two winters have topped 60 inches of precipitation, in 1981-1982 with 64.25 inches and 1994-1995 with 61.21 inches.
“Those winters are pretty unusual,” he said.
A snowpack large enough to keep the lake safely above the rim would be unusual and unprecedented, said Dan Greenlee, a Water Supply Specialist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service.
“We’d be buried from here until next July Fourth,” he said.
Although this fall has been mild, anything could happen this winter, Greenlee said.
“It’s not untypical to have no snow at these sites,” he said. “You can’t tell what’s going to happen at this point in the year.”#
Normal rainfall predicted for north state this winter
Sacramento
By Philip Reese
Weather experts believe
It'll be just average, though. And these days, just average may not be enough.
There's disagreement about whether a normal year will be sufficient to completely erase a water-level deficit left by drought.
"Even if we get a nice, wet winter, there's still going to be difficulties," said Dave Kranz, a spokesman for the California Farm Bureau. It would take at least a couple years of good rain to replenish resources, he said.
Paltry rainfall during 2006 and 2007 marked the first time since the early 1990s that most of
But the water supply can only stretch so far. Another dry season would likely mean mandatory restrictions on water use in many cities across the state – and would have a steep economic impact on everything from ski resorts to
Against that backdrop, several experts met recently to compare weather models at a
"Just be glad you don't live in Southern California," Klaus Wolter, a
So what does a normal rainfall year mean for the
Most local cities should continue to do fine, though a crisis might only be forestalled, not avoided, said
"We are in pretty good shape," Woodling said. "If we get a normal water year, it probably keeps us where we were during this last year."
City leaders in Folsom, the local community most affected by drought, agree and are planning accordingly.
Folsom, which has little groundwater and draws from an oft-siphoned reservoir, recently declared a water alert, telling residents to limit watering lawns, and ordering restaurants to serve water only when it's requested.
A dry winter would likely mean stricter measures in Folsom. A normal year probably would mean existing restrictions stay in place, said Ken Payne, Folsom's utilities director.
Farmers and ranchers also are worried. During this drought, good rangeland has disappeared. Crops have withered sooner. And it could get worse.
"It'll take more than one year in the sense that you are already behind," said Jerry Maltby, owner of Broken Box Ranch in Williams. "(The drought) puts everyone in a real bind."
Maltby usually keeps his cattle out grazing until late May or early June. This year, he pulled them back in mid-April; there was no good rangeland. Maltby had to buy expensive feed for his cattle.
This year is even more precarious, Maltby and others said, because high cattle and crop prices seen during much of the drought have recently fallen, leaving little extra money for feed.
Just as worrisome is the state of Maltby's local reservoir, which is way below normal levels.
It's a justified concern, water experts say, because ranchers often find themselves at the bottom of the water-rights pecking order.
"The big cuts will be in the agricultural supply," said Maury Roos, chief hydrologist of the California Department of Water Resources, describing what will happen if there is another dry year. "The cities can buy their way out."
Roos, however, is more optimistic than most experts. He thinks a normal rainy season in
Tahoe ski resorts are also anxious about the upcoming season, though they have a more mixed recent history with the drought. Two years ago, the state's snowpack was far below average for much of the year. But during the most recent winter, things didn't get dry until late in the season – after snowfall had given ski resorts a solid base.
"We did receive quite a bit of snow," said Rachael Woods, spokeswoman for Alpine Meadows Ski Resort, referring to some large early and mid-winter storms last season. "So we had this wonderful spring ski season."
So far, signs are promising. Thanks to a large storm system around Halloween,
Ultimately, though, everyone is making an educated guess: It could be months before the water situation becomes clear. Few would be happy, for instance, if the region enjoyed solid precipitation at the start of winter but the spigot turned off again around February.
This year, given the recent depletion of water reserves, the stakes are higher.
"It's a make-or-break winter," said Kelly Redmond, deputy director and climatologist at the
http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/1438420.html
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