Department of Water Resources
California Water News
A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment
August 31, 2009
1. Top Items–
Delta levee projects must now prepare for rising sea level
Sacramento Bee
History should be a guide for Delta's future
Sacramento Bee
We can't restore the Delta by squeezing agriculture
Sacramento Bee
Second Thoughts: Worries abound as the Delta nears collapse
Tracy Press
Democrats blocking real fix on water
San Diego Union-Tribune
A $54 billion water bill
S.F. Chronicle
UN seeks better data on hurricanes, droughts
S.F. Chronicle
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Delta levee projects must now prepare for rising sea level
Sacramento Bee-8/31/09
By Matt Weiser
Levee projects in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta will have to account for rising sea levels under a new federal policy aimed at shoring up the region's main line of defense against climate change.
It's the first comprehensive policy by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to require that projects under its jurisdiction be designed with higher sea levels in mind.
Many low-lying areas on the edges of the Delta would be under water given the higher seawater levels predicted by the end of this century. Fragile Delta levees also could be overtopped, especially when high tides and storm surges are added into the mix.
"Regardless of what you think the reason is, sea level is rising worldwide and it will continue to rise in the future," said Kevin Knuuti, chief of the engineering division at the Army Corps' Sacramento District and lead author of the new policy. "I think the bigger victory is really increasing awareness. We recognize we have a better job to do with that, and that's why we have come out with this policy."
One of the oldest sea level monitors on the West Coast, at the Golden Gate Bridge, has recorded a sea level increase of about 2 centimeters per decade during the 1900s. This rate is expected to continue due to human consumption of fossil fuels, which scientists believe is gradually warming the Earth's climate.
Failure to consider this increase in new levees and coastal structures – such as buildings, water intakes and wastewater outfalls – could mean these investments are jeopardized later, or that people are put at risk.
"The question we have is, how do we incorporate that future rise into our planning and design of projects so they can be sustainable into the future?" Knuuti said.
The Army Corps has had a policy since 1986 requiring engineers to consider sea level rise in project designs. It was updated in 2000, but remained buried in a much larger document and was rarely heeded, Knuuti said.
The new policy is a stand-alone document that describes how engineers should design for sea level rise. The authors included scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and U.S. Geological Survey.
The policy does not specify a water depth. It lays out a procedure engineers must follow to estimate low, medium and high sea level projections for their area. Officials will use those estimates to decide how to build the project.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 estimated the upper range of sea level rise at about 2 feet by 2100. This did not include the effect of melting ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica, which is under way.
California scientists considered this uncertainty and, in 2008, urged officials to plan for 4.5 feet of sea level rise.
UC Davis geology professor Jeffrey Mount was one of those scientists. A frequent critic of state and federal flood-control policy, he praised the new Army Corps rules.
"I don't compliment the Corps often. This is a major breakthrough. I'm actually quite pleased," Mount said. "What they're really trying to say is, if you think this (project) is vulnerable to sea level rise, you need a big safety factor."
Knuuti said the policy won't necessarily require a structure to accommodate the greatest sea level prediction. But it might require the builder to buy more land up front, or build the foundation differently so it can be made taller and stronger later.
"Sure, this will increase project costs," said Will Travis, director of the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission. "But it means you will be designing and building projects … that are resilient and sustainable rather than something you will have to repair, replace or abandon later."
Knuuti said Sacramento levees have not typically accounted for sea level rise, because the effects inland have been poorly understood.
Now they will have to consider it, he said. They also must consider how tidal pulses change with higher sea levels. High tides that now change water levels only a few inches in Sacramento could become much bigger in the future.
The new policy is likely to have a bigger impact in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, especially for major projects to secure the freshwater supply that serves 23 million Californians.
Joe Countryman, president of MBK Engineers in Sacramento, said the policy helps levee districts plan for gradually changing sea levels, a more practical approach than using "worst-case" estimates.
"We could not go out there today and raise all the levees 2 feet, because the foundations just can't handle it," Countryman said. "But if we have 50 years, we can do it."#
http://www.sacbee.com/1268/story/2149351.html?mi_rss=Delta
History should be a guide for Delta's future
Sacramento Bee-8/30/09
By Timothy F. Brick
Opinion
Burt Wilson's Aug. 23 Forum article – "A peripheral canal won't make any more water; it will just send more of it from north to south" – brought home the fundamental challenge the Legislature faces as it takes on the most important water debate in a generation. The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is in crisis. There is widespread agreement that action is needed. Yet there is fear in changing the water system, fear of doing more harm than good, fear of a "water grab."
My friend Burt and I shared that concern 27 years ago as we helped lead the fight in Southern California against the so-called peripheral canal. That proposal to move water supplies around the Delta truly was a supply-side solution to a perceived water problem. Voters defeated the canal in 1982. And Southern California's importer of Delta water, the Metropolitan Water District, got the message.
The old water strategy – find new supplies from somewhere else – was jettisoned for a better, local approach. Metropolitan's long-term water plan does not rely on more water from the Delta to meet the challenges of growth. Conservation, recycling and seawater desalination are among the emerging tools to fill the gap. As an example, in June water use in the city of Los Angeles was no greater than what it was 32 years ago.
In the Delta, however, a political culture of fear and indecision has persisted. The water systems, pulling water south, are among many stressors that have caused the ecosystem's collapse. As fish populations have declined, restrictions on water supplies have increased. The status quo threatens the Delta environment and the economy.
A comprehensive solution has emerged through a state-federal process known as the Bay Delta Conservation Plan. The evidence is overwhelming that a new conveyance system – a canal, tunnel or some combination – is essential.
Movements of water need to be separated from the Delta so that it can regain its function as a natural tidal estuary. A real solution also requires thousands of acres of restored wetlands habitat. And local communities need to be recognized as valued, important partners in managing the Delta.
The conservation plan, along with a package of complementary governance and water management reforms by the Legislature, would transform the Delta and all of California water policy in a new, sustainable and reliable direction. While fears and memories persist, we must learn the lessons of Delta history rather than be forever prisoners of it.#
Timothy F. Brick is chairman of the board of directors of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/story/2146832.html
We can't restore the Delta by squeezing agriculture
Sacramento Bee-8/30/09
By Charles Burt
Opinion
When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared that the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta was in a worsening crisis that threatened statewide economic and ecological disaster, he set in motion a process to cure a "sickness" before it spread throughout California.
The governor created a special Delta Vision Task Force in 2006 to achieve what were called two co-equal goals: restore the Delta and make California's water supply more reliable.
The flurry of water bills being debated by the Legislature makes this clear, since the core proposals focus on restoration of the Delta. Regardless of Sacramento politics, the Delta environment will still dominate decisions because the federal Endangered Species Act and other regulations give the environment priority over human needs.
U.S. District Judge Oliver Wanger emphasized that point in his decision on Delta smelt. He stated that the Endangered Species Act requires protecting species, "whatever the cost." Therefore, until the Endangered Species Act is changed, the co-equal goals of the task force cannot be met.
What does it mean to restore health to the Delta? The Delta Vision Task Force's 2008 strategic plan correctly notes that the Delta ecosystem cannot be returned to its pre-European condition or a pristine state. It calls for a "regeneration" of the ecosystem and more conservation by all water users in California. Even so, regeneration still implies returning the Delta to some previous healthy condition.
At least two fundamental principles must be applied when advancing the ideas of the task force.
First, the water needs of the Delta must be quantified and documented, which has not been done. Water resources are limited. Therefore, a plan must be developed to effectively use the water available within the Delta, and the results must be quantified to show the environmental benefits.
Second, conservation must also apply to water allocated to the environment – not just agricultural and urban uses, as the task force implies. Agricultural and urban users already measure how efficiently they use their water; there is no similar requirement for the environmental use of water in the Delta.
More water for the Delta is not better when there is no guarantee of improved performance with the water that is already available – especially because under the current understanding, "more water" will come from other users who are already efficient.
In dry years, about four times as much water flows through the Delta and into the ocean as is used for urban and agricultural purposes within the region. This is not efficient when measured the same way as other water uses.
Delta water-use efficiency during wet years drops dramatically when about 25 times as much water flows through the Delta and out to the ocean as is used for other purposes.
Additional storage such as the proposed Sites reservoir in the Sacramento Valley could significantly increase the level of water-use efficiency during wet years by saving some of this unused water for environmental purposes during dry years.
We can't squeeze more water out of California's already highly efficient agricultural areas for the Delta without further depleting groundwater aquifers and making them unsustainable.
The Sacramento Valley is a fertile region at risk of being sacrificed for the Delta. The Valley extends from Sacramento northward to Mount Shasta. It relies on irrigation to grow a variety of crops, fruits, nuts, cattle and dairy products.
Rice lands, croplands and wildlife refuges in the Sacramento Valley also provide habitat for several endangered species and 4 million to 6 million geese and other waterfowl. Clean, renewable hydroelectric energy, drinking water and recreation are also important uses of Sacramento Valley water.
Farmers and irrigation districts in the Sacramento Valley use sophisticated technology to achieve a very high level of water-use efficiency. Almost all the remaining water ends up in the Delta.
Requiring major increases in water conservation in the Sacramento Valley, as suggested by the task force, would result in eliminating agriculture and the food, jobs and wildlife habitat it provides.
As state leaders consider water issues, they should accept the simple truth that we cannot conserve our way out of the water-supply crisis.
Additional storage and conveyance facilities are critical. But the public also deserves a scientific accounting of how much environmental benefit is achieved with specific amounts of water for the Delta compared with the cost or loss to the rest of California.
We can't be expected to absorb the cost of providing an unlimited amount of water to the Delta without knowing the benefits. This is asking too much of the people and environment of California.#
Charles Burt is chairman of the Irrigation Training and Research Center at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/story/2146798.html
Second Thoughts: Worries abound as the Delta nears collapse
Tracy Press-8/28/09
by Jon Mendelson
Over the past few years, I’ve talked to farmers, fishers, water managers, environmentalists, activists and politicians about the state of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Almost all agree that the Delta — the state’s largest water system and in many ways the carrier of California’s lifeblood — is in serious trouble. And they all agree it needs fixing, fast.
As a response to those concerns and a three-year drought, a quintet of bills is floating through the state Legislature with the goal of completely overhauling the state’s patchwork water system.
Not everyone is impressed.
Bill Jennings, longtime activist and a member of Restore the Delta and the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, doesn’t mince words. He told me this week that the legislative package is a rush job that could have a “horrific impact” on the Delta and those who depend upon it.
To say that this cure is worse than the illness is quite the indictment.
The Delta is dammed, diverted, polluted and plain overused. Fish populations have crashed, water quality has cratered and there’s not nearly enough water there to give the state’s users what they’ve been promised.
Not to wade into hyperbole, but the Delta’s close to collapse.
Following the example of the past 30 years and doing nothing seems to invite disaster.
Still, to Jennings and several other watchdogs, the most recent attempt to repair the West’s largest estuary is really no healing effort at all. It’s a way to rework water rights to favor Southern California urbanites and those using exported wet stuff to farm the west side of the Central Valley at the expense of those who call the Delta home.
Specifically, Jennings and Restore the Delta’s Barbara Barrigan-Parilla say the bills are based not on the best possible water policy but on the premise of building a peripheral canal that will funnel fresh water straight to Parts Previously Unwatered, leaving farmers, boaters and anglers in the lower reaches of the Delta high and dry.
Their take, it should be noted, isn’t the whole story. Sen. Lois Wolk, who authored one of the five bills, is a stated opponent of such a canal and fierce advocate for Delta residents. And other lawmakers have insisted their legislation does not support or argue for such a project.
However, Jennings contends the package paves the path for a peripheral canal by granting governance of the Delta to a “stewardship council,” with a majority of the council’s positions being gubernatorial appointees.
There’s no denying a peripheral canal has been a long-stated goal of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. If such legislation were to pass, it’s no stretch of the imagination to picture a board stacked with canal rah-rahs.
That in and of itself should worry anyone who calls the Central Valley home. Because if you live here, your life is affected by the rhythms of the Delta. It might not be by the ebb and flow of the tide, but it’s guaranteed you drink the water, know someone who farms thanks to that water, or eat the food produced by it.
Tracy is no exception. Many local farmers depend on it, the city uses the estuary to dispose of its treated wastewater, and each time a Tank Towner turns on the shower, a little bit of the Delta comes streaming out.
Wholesale changes to a river system that provides water to millions of acres of farmland and millions of people — not to mention one that is home to more than 4 million people — should not be made in a hurry. Especially if those changes lead to the creation of a new system that drains our region’s environmental and economic vitality.
There’s no denying that the Delta’s pulse is faint and getting fainter, nor is there any argument that the status quo is unacceptable.
But not just any fix will do. It must be the right one.
What’s on the table doesn’t seem to fit that description.
The five water bills
• Senate Bill 12, by Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto
• Senate Bill 229, by Fran Pavley, D-Santa Monica
• Senate Bill 458, by Lois Wolk, D-Davis (Tracy representative)
• Assembly Bill 39, by Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael
• Assembly Bill 49, by Mike Feuer, D-Los Angeles#
Democrats blocking real fix on water
San Diego Union-Tribune-8/30/09
By Dennis Hollingsworth
Opinion
It's time for California's legislative Democratic leaders to either get serious about water reform or get out of the way.
So far they haven't done either one.
California is in the midst of a water crisis that affects everyone who lives here. The existing water system is broken and is no longer capable of meeting our needs. Millions of residents are facing cutbacks in their water supplies, rising costs and the threat of rationing. Tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars have been lost from the state's economy in just the last three years. And federal environmental regulations are sending billions of gallons of our fresh-water supplies to waste into the ocean.
Fortunately there is a growing consensus among the state's academic experts, environmental, fisheries and wildlife agencies, farmers, public water providers, business leaders and specialists in economics and engineering on what needs to be done.
Environmental restoration in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, increased surface and groundwater storage, water conservation and new conveyance systems to protect the purity of the water supplied to two-thirds of California's population are all part of that prescription.
But instead of getting behind the plan, Democratic leaders in the Senate and Assembly are backing a package of “water bills” that set us back decades in the discussion and offer no options for increasing water supplies or reliability.
Instead of supporting the twin objectives defined by the Governor's Delta Vision Commission — repairing the delta environment and restoring water system reliability — the bills do the bidding of the radical environmental movement in seeking to multiply, elaborate, extend and confuse them.
To give you a small example of that confusion, if the bills were enacted, the entire state would wind up paying for economic development in the villages and small towns of the delta while well-established private water rights were involuntarily taken away from others without any compensation.
For the last two years, a coalition of fish and wildlife agencies, conservation groups and water districts have been working together on a Bay Delta Conservation Plan, to balance improvements in conveyance with the need to ensure that there will be sufficient water flows through the Delta to restore endangered fish populations.
But instead of expediting those carefully coordinated plans, the bills throw up roadblocks that probably guarantee they will never be implemented. And certainly guarantee there would be no increase in water supply or reliability.
Instead of focusing on the needs of the state as a whole, the bills focus only on the needs of the delta and the agenda of the radical environmental lobby. Everyone agrees that protection of the delta is a key issue that must be addressed as part of any plan to fix our broken water system.
But these so-called water bills propose to create a new government bureaucracy, dedicated to the interests of the delta above all else, that would be given a stranglehold over the water supplies that all the rest of California needs.
This isn't solving problems. It's only making a bad situation worse.
The debate over these bills is one that pits the people who are concerned with California's future against those who want to maintain an intolerable and unsustainable status quo. On one side are people of both parties, representing diverse communities from one end of the state to the other, who recognize that California cannot rebuild the economy we all depend upon unless we fix the water system.
On the other side are a small band of special interests allied with the extreme environmentalists who don't want any change at all.
If the majority-party members of the Legislature cannot demonstrate the leadership to advance California's future, then we will all be paying the price for having lost another year to legislative power plays and gridlock.
Hollingsworth represents the 36th Senate District covering mostly eastern and northern San Diego County and southern Riverside County. He also serves as the Republican leader in the Senate.#
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/30/democrats-blocking-real-fix-water/?uniontrib
A $54 billion water bill
S.F. Chronicle-8/30/09
Editorial
Water. California never has enough of it.
That makes it one of the few state issues to rival the importance of our busted budget right now. For six months, the Legislature has been working on a package of bills that would drastically shift the way Californians use and receive water.
At the same time, a comprehensive Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta restoration and water plan supported by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger just got an eye-popping price tag: at least $23 billion, and maybe as much as $54 billion.
These costs are merely estimates and should be treated as such. But the estimates, which came courtesy of a consulting economist's report last week, underline the tremendous cost of addressing such a huge problem. No wonder Sacramento has avoided doing it for so long.
Thanks to those costs, Sacramento may be able to sit on its hands just a little longer. With less than two weeks left in the legislative session, it seems unlikely the Legislature will pass its five-bill package of complex and costly reforms that took six months of work to complete.
"Most water legislation of less ambition than this has taken years," said state Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis. Wolk authored one of the bills in the package, which would create a Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservancy. "We just don't have answers to a lot of the big questions."
The biggest question of all is how the state of California is going to pay for anything.
Legislators claim that any new projects will be paid for with a mix of bond money and user fees. But the price tags for these projects call for drastic measures - probably more drastic than most Californians realize.
"If you look at the cost of an $11 billion bond, that's $800 million a year in interest," Wolk said.
State Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, has already said he doesn't want to pass any water bonds larger than $10 billion. Considering the state's finances - and its shoddy credit rating - that may not be a problem.
And if those "user fees" require a two-thirds vote of the Legislature to pass, it's highly unlikely that any Republican legislator will sign off on them. The result could be another monthslong standoff, just like the budget.
The governor 's fix for the collapsing delta relies on enormous new infrastructure projects - dams, levees, aqueducts and the ever-controversial "water conveyance" (formerly known as the peripheral canal) idea. (It's been updated in the governor's plan to a tunnel under the delta instead of a canal around it.) Every one of these projects will be contentious. But he, too, is likely to run into the same larger problem: How is the state going to pay for any of this?
This is an awful conundrum for California. We desperately need a new water plan - one that supports the ecosystem of the delta, honors conservation and water recycling, and ensures that cities, residences and farmers get their fair share of good-quality water at appropriate prices.
The growth of our state depends on this. Unfortunately, the state's budget problems have made it impossible to plan for the future.#
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/30/EDJ019DHLC.DTL
UN seeks better data on hurricanes, droughts
S.F. Chronicle-8/31/09
By Eliane Engeler (Associated Press)
The United Nations opened talks Monday on setting up a better weather surveillance system worldwide so all nations can get earlier, more accurate warnings about hurricanes, droughts and floods.
About 1,500 officials, diplomats and scientists were attending the weeklong meeting in Geneva, which aimed to help the world better adapt to climate change.
This week's meeting will not discuss the controversial issue of cutting carbon emissions — those talks will come in December in Copenhagen.
Instead, the World Climate Conference seeks to help developing countries generate better data on their own climate issues and share that information with other countries.
A large U.S. delegation is attending, eager to highlight the new Obama administration's commitment to combatting climate change.
"Around the world, the costs for adapting to climate change will run to several tens of billions of U.S. dollars every year, with more than half of the expenditure being required in developing countries," host Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz said.
Merz, whose country donated $1.7 million to the conference, said better weather forecasts and hazard maps "could also prevent deaths and reduce the extent of the damage."
"We all want our societies to be able to withstand the consequences of climate change," he said. "Scientists and experts will have to provide the information that makes this possible."
The meeting is expected to agree on a "Global Framework for Climate Services" to ensure that early warnings for tsunamis and hurricanes reach everyone, and that farmers even in remote African regions know about upcoming droughts and floods.
Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, noted before the meeting that decision-makers need reliable information about the current and projected impacts of climate change, but many countries lack basic information about their own climates.
"Until now, the way that we deliver climate information to some sectors has been ad hoc," Michel Jarraud, head of the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization, said Monday." What we need is a formal system that all people can trust to access vital information that can save their lives and protect property and economies."
Jarraud says hydrological networks in Africa are "totally insufficient" and that "many water basins are managed without any information about precipitation and the runoff amount of water in the underground water table."
Governments across the globe are facing a December deadline for separate U.N. talks aimed at forging a new accord to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse gases blamed for global warming and climate change.
Organizers of the Dec. 7-18 U.N. meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, hope to reach an agreement on limiting the warming of the Earth's temperature to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above levels 150 years ago.
The U.N. says global warming will continue even if Copenhagen is a success. It says rising sea levels may prompt some countries to build more dikes, relocate residents from low-lying islands and ensure that health services can cope with spreading diseases such as malaria.
This week's conference brings together about 15 heads of state, including those from Cameroon, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Slovenia, Tajikistan and Togo, as well as 80 ministers. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is to speak Wednesday.#
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/08/30/international/i001738D54.DTL
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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.
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