[Water_news] 2. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: SUPPLY - 5/04/09

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment 

 

May 4, 2009

 

2. Supply –

 

Officials celebrate project to cut water loss on All-American Canal

The Los Angeles Times

 

Lined canal ends seepage, saving water

The San Diego Union Tribune

 

Latest idea to fill Tulare Lake all wet?

The Fresno Bee

 

Paul Brotzman: Setting the record straight on our local water supply

The Santa Clarita Signal

 

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Officials celebrate project to cut water loss on All-American Canal

The Los Angeles Times – 5/2/09

By Tony Perry

Reporting from Gordon's Well, Calif. -- Running through an obscure strip of isolated Imperial County, the All-American Canal rarely gets the attention of the other ditches that have shaped Southern California.

The Los Angeles Aqueduct, which brings water from the Owens Valley; the Colorado River Aqueduct, which supplies coastal Southern California; and the California Aqueduct, which brings water from Northern California, are near major population areas.

The All-American Canal brings copious amounts of Colorado River water to turn 500,000 acres of desert into some of the most productive farmland in the world.

As California struggles with drought, the 82-mile channel could be key. So on Thursday, water officials gathered at the canal to celebrate what they called a rare example of cooperation in the often contentious arena of water politics.

"This event is a big deal," said Karl Wirkus, deputy commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, whose motto is "Managing Water in the West."

 

At a patch of desert 35 miles east of El Centro and barely 50 yards north of the metal fence that separates the United States and Mexico, officials of several sometimes warring water agencies came together to celebrate the nearly completed project to line 23 miles with concrete to prevent seepage. The section was considered the leakiest part of the earthen canal.

The project is part of an agreement under which the Imperial Irrigation District, the canal's operator, grudgingly agreed to sell some of its mammoth share of the Colorado River to water-deprived San Diego County. The cost of the $300-million project was split between the state government and the San Diego County Water Authority.

Lester A. Snow, director of the California Department of Water Resources, praised more than 300 officials and others at the ceremony for overcoming numerous political, legal and financial problems when much of state government seems paralyzed. He joked that he was carrying a message from the governor: "Congratulations on finally getting something done in this state."

Lining the canal is seen as a major step toward Southern California learning to live within a "water budget" instead of looking to the Colorado River or Northern California for more water.

"The era of limits on the Colorado River imposes new expectations -- and responsibilities -- on all water users," said Brian Brady, general manager of the Imperial Irrigation District.

But less seepage from the canal will mean less water for the farmers of the Mexicali Valley, where the aquifer has been replenished for decades by the leaking water.

Lining the earthen canal is expected to save 67,700 acre-feet of water a year.

The water sales agreement between Imperial and San Diego may also mean less fresh water for the Salton Sea, which straddles Imperial and Riverside counties. Less water could mean a smaller, smellier sea, and could possibly lead to dust storms.

"In water projects, there are collateral benefits and collateral damages," said Steve Erie, water policy expert and professor of political science at UC San Diego.

Many of the Imperial Valley's farmers have never liked the water sale agreement. One group sued to block the lining, delaying construction for three years before losing. The Mexican government also sued unsuccessfully to protect Mexicali farmers.

Completed in 1942, the All-American Canal replaced a canal that traveled, in part, through Mexico. It is the longest irrigation canal in the world, according to NASA scientists who have studied satellite pictures. It captures water rushing south toward Mexico and, because much of the Imperial Valley is below sea level, the canal redirects the water north largely through the force of gravity.

The late Imperial Valley farmer-poet Richard Mealey, praising the valley's pioneers, wrote: "They built the mighty All-American, a wonder in its day / A canal that ran a river a hundred miles the other way."

By paying for the lining of the All-American Canal, the San Diego County Water Authority is being allowed to buy a share of the Imperial Irrigation District's allocation from the Colorado River; the district has rights to 70% of the state's portion of the river. Also, several bands of Indians in northern San Diego County will receive additional water to settle years of litigation over water rights.

The lining of the canal had been a dream of water officials for so long that Thursday's ceremony began with a tribute to those who died before the project was finished. Planning began in the early 1980s.

"Man, look at that: Isn't that a beautiful sight? A lined canal," Robert Johnson, former commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, told the gathering.#

 

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-all-american-canal2-2009may02,0,919882.story

 

Lined canal ends seepage, saving water

The San Diego Union Tribune – 5/3/09

By Sandra Dibbe and Michael Gardner

 

EL CENTRO – It seemed like such a simple idea at the time: Line a porous earthen canal with concrete and ship the saved water to San Diego and other thirsty coastal cities.

 

But to pull off the Imperial Valley project, it took an urgent act of Congress, court rulings settling cross-border disputes, a seven-state agreement to share the Colorado River and at least $170 million of state taxpayer money.

 

Twenty-one years after its first serious incarnation, a new 23-mile, lined segment of the All-American Canal is being celebrated – and lamented. Top officials with the San Diego County Water Authority attended a dedication ceremony last week outside El Centro.

 

In addition to the state money, the water authority spent $130 million for an extra 66,000 acre-feet of water annually, or enough to supply about 132,000 households a year. The deal for the water will last 110 years.

 

“Right now, it's very difficult to find a reliable supply for that long,” said Halla Razak, who oversees Colorado River programs for the authority.

 

But the project threatens to dry up valuable groundwater used by farmers and wildlife in Mexico. For decades, the seepage from the canal flowed south to irrigate fields and nourish wetlands.

 

“At this stage of the game, I am 50 years old, and I can't get work elsewhere – all I know is farming,” said Nazario Ortiz, who heads a communal farming group a few miles from the canal that is dependent on seepage.

 

The lack of water also could lead to the collapse of Mexico's Andrade Mesa wetlands, home to more than 100 bird species, environmentalists on both sides of the border say.

 

“At a certain point, there's going to be nothing left,” said Kara Gillon, an attorney with Defenders of Wildlife.

 

Osvel Hinojosa-Huerta, a wildlife ecologist with Pronatura, Mexico's largest environmental group, said: “It's very sad, in part because of the loss of wetlands, and it's sad how an international process can go so wrong and be mismanaged.”

 

The newly lined portion runs alongside an existing segment of the 82-mile All-American Canal, which starts at Imperial Dam near Yuma, Ariz., and roughly parallels the U.S.-Mexico border.

 

The conserved water will be sent to the Metropolitan Water District system, which will then provide the same amount to the San Diego region.

 

Built by federal Bureau of Reclamation engineers in 1938, the original All-American Canal transformed the arid Imperial Valley into the nation's salad bowl. Today, the system delivers water to 500,000 acres of farmland growing an array of produce year-round. Broccoli, carrots and lettuce are the anchors, and cattle grazing on lush pastures outnumber humans 3-to-1. Farming reaped $1.37 billion in the valley last year.

 

“It means everything, literally everything,” said Linsey Dale, executive director of the Imperial County Farm Bureau.

Said longtime farmer and local irrigation district director John Pierre Menvielle: “The canal is the lifeblood for the entire valley.”

 

The tussle with Mexico over rights to the seepage is somewhat of a role reversal.

 

In the early 1900s, California farmers were dependent on the Carter River, which has since been renamed the Alamo. The Carter dipped 50 miles into Mexico, where growers used most of the supply, creating sporadic shortages on the U.S. side.

 

“Sometimes the water never got to the (Imperial) valley,” said farmer Jack McConnell, whose father, Leslie, helped prepare the canal route using teams of horses.

 

For self-survival, that early generation of farmers persuaded Congress to approve an “All-American Canal” solely on the U.S. side.

 

“Without water, we're just a desert,” Jack McConnell said.

 

Metropolitan, the Los Angeles-based wholesaler, first advanced the idea of lining the canal, but the plan stalled amid suspicions within the Imperial Irrigation District about who would actually benefit.

 

“The project was ready to go for a decade,” said Jeff Kightlinger, then Metropolitan's attorney and now the wholesaler's general manager.

 

Then, a confluence of events overtook the original proposal.

 

Metropolitan and the San Diego County Water Authority were brawling in court over rate structures and the cost of delivering water. California was under pressure to stop using more than its share of the Colorado River. Imperial Valley farmers were threatened with losing rights to the river water.

 

Over the course of several years, various agreements were struck, but none so important as the 2003 compact to divide the water supplied by the Colorado River. To make it work, San Diego County officials secured the right to pursue the canal-lining project. Metropolitan won a favorable financial deal for acting as the delivery system.

 

The agreement sought by the county divided Metropolitan directors, who had difficulty giving up control of the project.

 

“Money has not been a driver,” Kightlinger said. “We wanted the water.”

 

Richard Katz, who represented then-Gov. Gray Davis in the Colorado River negotiations, called the canal project “pivotal.”

 

“This is really a game-changer for San Diego,” Katz said of the river agreement. “The significance of this piece is it gives San Diego its first independent supply of imported water.”

 

But the issue of how to pay for it wasn't resolved until the California Legislature allocated $235 million for various pieces of the related water agreements.

 

“It was really tough. In the water world, nobody trusts anybody. Every time you try to work with anything in the water world, it's five times harder,” said former Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg, a Los Angeles Democrat who helped negotiate the funding package.

 

The fight shifted to the courts, involving tiny Calexico and the mighty U.S. Congress. Calexico joined environmental and economic interests on both sides of the border in suing to block the lining. Pressured by powerful water interests and the Bush administration, Congress intervened to put an end to litigation by approving a last-minute rider to a tax bill ordering completion “without delay.”

 

More than two years later, there is still fear on the Mexico side, where much of the produce grown is exported to the United States.

 

“I felt like the water was mine,” said Geronimo Hernandez, whose 370-acre family farm is near the Algodones border crossing.

 

In the 1940s, Hernandez's father, Miguel, had watched helplessly as his fields were flooded by seepage from the All-American Canal. As a remedy, the Mexican government built the La Mesa Drain, which to this day allows Hernandez and his neighbors to irrigate their crops. They are painfully aware that this supply will soon vanish.

 

“This will affect everybody,” said Alfonso Cortez Lara, a Mexicali-based researcher for a Tijuana think tank. He estimates the annual water loss could be equivalent to the yearly domestic consumption of Mexicali, with a population of nearly 1 million.

 

He said the project underscores the urgency of investing in new conservation projects in the Mexicali Valley.

 

By putting the canal dispute behind them, some see an opportunity for improved relations that could lead to more cross-border cooperation.

 

“In today's world, with limited resources, we will all have to work together instead of fighting,” said Menvielle, the Imperial Irrigation District director. #

 

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/may/03/1n3canal01733-lined-canal-ends-seepage-saving-wate/?california

 

Latest idea to fill Tulare Lake all wet?

The Fresno Bee – 5/2/09

By Lewis Griswold

 

Filling now-dry Tulare Lake with water would be better for water management than building a dam on the San Joaquin River at Temperance Flat, an environmentalist told the Tulare County Water Commission at a recent public meeting.

 

Water engineers rolled their eyes, then promptly trashed the idea.

 

"Not much can be accomplished by using Tulare Lake as a reservoir," said Dick Schafer, a consulting engineer and commissioner.

 

They've heard it before: Put water into the Tulare Lake bed in southwest Tulare County.

 

Historically, a freshwater lake was there, but the water going into the lake got diverted for farming until the lake all but went dry. The lake bottom is now farmed.

 

Environmentalists have favored restoring the lake as a wetland for wildlife. Twenty years ago, their bumper sticker read: "Save Tulare Lake -- Flood It!"

 

The new twist is to use the lakebed as a reservoir, and pump out the water when it's needed to where it's needed. Which means no need for a dam on a river.

 

Steve Haze of Auberry, who once ran for Congress, posted a 10-page "concept proposal" at www.sjvwlf.org. Filling 10% of the historic Tulare Lake and using it as a reservoir and for underground water storage would cost $1 billion, according to Haze, compared to $5 billion for Temperance Flat.

 

He said a state grant helped pay for his study.

 

A Temperance Flat dam would indeed be costly, said Dennis Keller of Visalia, a water consulting engineer and member of the Tulare County Water Commission, which meets monthly to discuss local water issues such as nitrate contamination of groundwater.

 

Restoring Tulare Lake might be an environmentalist's dream, but from his point of view as an engineer, using Tulare Lake as a reservoir would be "a nightmare," Keller said.

 

The water would pool at the lowest point in the Valley, and it would have to be pumped uphill, he said. That means using pumps, and losing the advantage of gravity.

 

But Haze said pumps already are there to move water around for farming. Pumping water out of the lake so water rights holders could use it would mean going uphill only 75 feet and tying into existing canals like the California Aqueduct. By comparison, Aqueduct water is now pumped 3,000 feet uphill out of the Valley to get it to Los Angeles, he noted.

 

Keller said a revived Tulare Lake would be wide and shallow, and would evaporate too much water. Furthermore, the acidity of the water would get too high, even hazardous. That has happened before when there has been water in the lake. Also, algae would grow and cause problems for pumping.

 

But Haze said the some of the water would be in the underground aquifer and would not evaporate, and the technical details would have to be worked out by engineers.

 

"There aren't any engineers saying this is the kind of project you'd want to have out there," Keller said. #

 

http://www.fresnobee.com/columnists/griswold/story/1374866.html

 

Paul Brotzman: Setting the record straight on our local water supply

The Santa Clarita Signal – 5/3/09

 

Paul Brotzman is director of community development for the city of Santa Clarita; Dirk Marks is resources manager for Castaic Lake Water Agency. Their column reflects their own views and not necessarily those of The Signal.

Response to April 23 "Environmentally Speaking" commentary in The Signal: "A perfect storm for water woes in the SCV."

 

Recently, the city of Santa Clarita Planning Commission met jointly with Castaic Lake Water Agency staff to help familiarize the city's land use decision makers with our current water-supply management and planning activities.

Considering the fact that California has endured three years of drought, it's only logical for anyone - including those responsible for land use planning - to ask, "Where do we stand regarding water supply?"

Despite the state's current circumstances, the Santa Clarita Valley is in relatively good shape water-wise.

The Castaic Lake Water Agency advocates an ongoing ethic of "smart water use" and conservation, a diversity of imported and local supply sources, and prudent planning, which have resulted in our community being spared from mandatory reductions in water use, unlike some other California communities.

Further, the long-term outlook shows there will be sufficient water to meet the future needs of our valley, including anticipated population growth.

This is based on available state-planning studies that consider the impacts of climate change on the State Water Project as well as other supplies and water banking programs that enable us to store water for future use on a not-so-rainy day.

Perchlorate treatment
Locally, a handful of water wells have been closed since 1997 due to contamination by perchlorate, a by-product of rocket fuel. The wells in question were contaminated over several decades of munitions testing and manufacturing by Whittaker-Bermite and other explosives manufacturers on property near the center of our valley southeast of Saugus Speedway.

It has taken a great deal of hard work by the Castaic Lake Water Agency, the city and the local water retailers, but in the very near future we expect to see the opening of a new treatment plant that uses ion exchange technology to remove perchlorate from the water. The treated water will be safely blended into the water supply.

The technology is proven, the plant is nearing completion, and we will have it in operation within a few months.

The $5 million plant and $14 million pipelines are being built at no expense to local residents as a result of the favorable settlement of litigation by Castaic Lake Water Agency and three local water retailers against the current and former owners of the Whittaker-Bermite property.

 

Water supply portfolio

Castaic Lake, which wholesales water to most of the Santa Clarita Valley, does not rely on contaminated water or "paper water" that does not exist. Further, CLWA does not rely solely on the State Water Project.

A great deal of CLWA's planning efforts are focused on securing and managing additional sources of water to help absorb the State Water Project's "down years."

In planning for 2009, CLWA and the local water retailers based their water supply outlook on the state's initial estimate that the State Water Project would provide its contractors (like CLWA) just 15 percent of their "full" contract amounts this year, as a result of the ongoing drought and court-ordered reductions in pumping from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

The State Water Project subsequently announced an increase in its allocation to 20 percent and then to 30 percent.

As a result, the greater-than-initially projected State Water Project allocation will provide additional flexibility, enabling Castaic Lake to save more water for use in future dry years.

In addition to the State Water Project, other sources secured by CLWA include water from the Kern River (which is not subject to the allocation fluctuations of the State Water Project), a Yuba County water purchasing program called the Yuba Accord, two Kern County water banking programs, locally recycled water, CLWA's "flexible storage" of water in Castaic Lake and, last but not least, local groundwater, which provides about half of our total supply.

CLWA and local water retailers are proud of this diverse water-supply portfolio, which is the product of many years of prudent and sound water management and planning.

What about chloride?

During the joint study session, city planning commissioners inquired as to the relationship of our local water supply and the chloride levels in the Santa Clara River.

Complying with the chloride standard is mainly the responsibility of the Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts, which plan to implement a treatment system to meet the standard.

CLWA and the local water retailers worked with the Sanitation Districts and other stakeholders in the downstream "reaches" of the Santa Clara River to develop the plan, which will most cost-effectively address the issue and preserve a critical element of our water supply portfolio, recycled water.

In answer to the question of whether the planned expansion of CLWA's Rio Vista Water Treatment Plant will meet the standards for chlorides being released into the Santa Clara River, the answer is "yes."

The water released from the treatment plant meets current and future chloride-emission standards, and will continue to do so after the expansion is completed.

CLWA and the city each take a great deal of pride in doing the public's business transparently. Residents can be certain the city is exercising a high level of care and caution when it comes to issues like public safety and water supply for new development.#

 

http://www.the-signal.com/news/article/12731/

 

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DWR’s California Water News is distributed to California Department of Water Resources management and staff,  for information purposes, by the DWR Public Affairs Office. For reader’s services, including new subscriptions, temporary cancellations and address changes, please use the online page: http://listhost2.water.ca.gov/mailman/listinfo/water_news . DWR operates and maintains the State Water Project, provides dam safety and flood control and inspection services, assists local water districts in water management and water conservation planning, and plans for future statewide water needs. Inclusion of materials is not to be construed as an endorsement of any programs, projects, or viewpoints by the Department or the State of California.