Thread: US West Faces 'Worst Drought in 500 Years'

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Jan 7, 2014 - One year after construction began, the $1 billion Carlsbad desalination plant is under budget and on schedule to begin producing 50 million gallons per day . . .

Health experts warn of water contamination from California drought

BY SHARON BERNSTEIN
SACRAMENTO, California Tue Feb 18, 2014 10:50pm EST


A tumbleweed is seen at an irrigation channel on a farm near Cantua Creek, California February 14, 2014.
CREDIT: REUTERS/ROBERT GALBRAITH

(Reuters) - California's drought has put 10 communities at acute risk of running out of drinking water in 60 days, and worsened numerous other health and safety problems, public health officials in the most populous U.S. state said on Tuesday.

Rural communities where residents rely on wells are at particular risk, as contaminants in the groundwater become more concentrated with less water available to dilute them, top state health officials said at a legislative hearing on the drought.

"The drought has exacerbated existing conditions," said Mark Starr, deputy director of the California Department of Public Health.

The state has helped about 22 of 183 communities identified last year as reliant on contaminated groundwater to bring their supplies into conformance with environmental guidelines, but the rest are still building or preparing to build systems, he said.

The contamination warning comes days after President Barack Obama announced nearly $200 million in aid for the parched state, including $60 million for food banks to help people thrown out of work in agriculture-related industries as farmers leave fields unplanted and ranchers sell cattle early because the animals have no grass for grazing.

The California Farm Bureau estimates the overall impact of idled farmland will run to roughly $5 billion, from in direct costs of lost production and indirect effects through the region's economy.
Last month, Democratic Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency, as reservoir levels dipped to all-time lows with little rain or snow in the forecast.

On Tuesday, the state's top public health officials said they were targeting 10 communities for immediate relief, trucking in water when necessary and helping to lay pipes connecting residents with nearby public water systems.

Worst hit is the small city of Willits in the northern part of the state, public health director Ron Chapman said. Also targeted for priority help included tiny water systems throughout the state, one so small it serves 55 people in a community listed simply as Whispering Pines Apartments.

"Small drinking water systems are especially vulnerable to drought conditions," the public health department said on its website. "They have fewer customers, which can mean fewer options in terms of resources like funding and infrastructure."

STAGNANT POOLS, CONTAMINATED WELLS
Linda Rudolph, co-director for the Center for Climate Change and Health in Oakland and a former state health official, said millions of Californians rely on wells and other sources of groundwater where the concentration of contaminants is growing because of dry conditions.

"Many groundwater basins in California are contaminated, for example with nitrates from over application of nitrogen fertilizer or concentrated animal feeding operations, with industrial chemicals, with chemicals from oil extraction or due to natural contaminants with chemicals such as arsenic," Rudolph said.

In addition, as dry conditions turn ponds and creeks into stagnant pools, mosquitoes breed, and risk increases for the diseases they carry, she said at the hearing. Residents with asthma and other lung conditions are also at risk as dry conditions create dust.

The state's firefighters put out 400 blazes during the first three weeks of January, normally the state's wettest season and its slowest for wildfires, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

"We are experiencing conditions right now that we would usually see in August," its website quoted Chief Ken Pimlott as saying.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/...A1I06P20140219

February 19, 2014

Jerry Brown, legislative leaders to announce drought aid



Gov. Jerry Brown and legislative leaders on Wednesday will unveil plans to spend roughly $680 million on efforts to alleviate the impacts of California's drought.

The proposal elaborates on a plan Senate leaderDarrell Steinberg had been working toexpedite approval of water recycling and stormwater reuse projects by adding emergency food and housing assistance to farmworkers who will be out of work due to the drought, according to sources familiar with the legislation.

Today's announcement -- set for the Governor's Office of Emergency Services at Mather Field -- comes five days after Brown joined President Barack Obama on a visit to Fresno to talk to farmers about the drought and tout federal assistance including money for livestock losses, watershed protection and summer food programs.

Steinberg's Senate Bill 731 would direct roughly $475 million toward local governments that are ready to build drought alleviation projects. The money would come from Proposition 84, a water bond voters approved in 2006.

The bill also calls for spending roughly $50 million -- largely from a housing bond voters approved in 2006 -- to provide emergency food and shelter to people who are out of work because the farms they normally work on are fallow due to drought.

Another roughly $40 million from cap-and-trade funds would be spent on water efficiency projects that save energy, while roughly $80 million from a 2006 flood bond would be available for projects that prevent flooding while making more water available for dry times, such as infrastructure to capturestorm water.

PHOTO: Farmer Tom Muller walks out to a fallow field at his farm in Woodland on February 13, 2014. The Sacramento Bee/ Randall Benton

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2014/...3221392837828/

California Storms Bring Rain, Threat of Floods

SAN FRANCISCO February 26, 2014 (AP)


Much-needed rain fell on downtown San Francisco and elsewhere in California on Wednesday at the outset of what the parched state hopes is the start to a one-two punch of stormy weather.

The storm was expected to move down the coast, dumping a half-inch to an inch of rain in southern areas late in the day, forecasters said.

A potentially stronger storm moving in late Thursday could bring thunder and dump up to 2 inches of rain in central and southern valleys, 2 to 4 inches in the foothills and up to 6 inches in some mountain spots.

State water officials plan Thursday to survey the anemic mountain snow pack, and will likely find that California's precipitation is badly lagging what's needed to quench the region's thirst.

After 2013 ended as the state's driest year on record, all that predicted rain and snow should be nothing but good news. But there also was a risky side of the downpours.

If the rainfall rate is intense, it could bring flash flooding, "and our ground is so dry ... that we'll probably get more runoff than we're absorbing," said Bonnie Bartling, a National Weather Service weather specialist in Oxnard.

About 25 miles northeast of Los Angeles, the suburbs of Glendora and Azusa were taking precautions well in advance of Friday's predicted heavy rains because they sit at the foot of the steep San Gabriel Mountains where a wildfire last month burned nearly 2,000 acres.

Glendora on Wednesday raised its flooding protocol alert level for a second time, urging that residents near the burn area voluntarily evacuate or prepare essentials such as medications and important papers in case a mandatory evacuation order is given.

Glendora provided thousands of sandbags to residents who streamed into a city yard to fill the bags and drive them away.

Sandbags were also being provided in other foothill communities along mountain ranges east and west of Los Angeles, where other fires have burned in recent years.

The National Weather Service said light-to-moderate rain from the first storm was expected through midday Thursday in Southern California, and that as of late Wednesday morning light rain and sprinkles had fallen only as far south as the border of Ventura and Los Angeles counties, well north of Glendora-Azusa burn area.

The weather service said the second storm will be stronger and move across Southern California from late Thursday through late Saturday, reaching Los Angeles County early Friday morning with rainfall amounts ranging from 3-6 inches in the foothills, and up to 8 inches in localized areas.

"Residents located near burn areas should be alert for the potential of mud and debris flows Friday through Saturday," forecasters said.

The National Weather Service also noted the potential for mud and debris flows from the burn area of the May 2013 Springs Fire, which scorched nearly 38 square miles of the Santa Monica Mountains as it burned from the edges of suburban homes down to the beach about 50 miles west of downtown Los Angeles.

Numerous other wildfires statewide left scarred landscapes over the past year, including a 400-square-mile area devastated by last summer's forest fire in and adjacent to Yosemite National Park in the Sierra Nevada.

A so-called Pineapple Express storm brought rain and snow to California earlier this month, and when it departed, the Sierra Nevada snowpack had grown but was still only 29 percent of normal.

"The big difference between the storm earlier in the month in California and the coming two storms is in the area it will affect," Ken Clark, an Accuweather meteorologist, said in an email. "Much of the rain that occurred with the storms early in the month was in the northern half of the state with only very small amounts getting down into the Los Angeles and San Diego area."

The second of the two storms will bring by far the heaviest of rain to Southern California, he wrote. "In fact as much, or more rain, may fall in parts of Southern California than fall, let's say, around the (San Francisco) Bay Area when all is said and done."

Downtown San Francisco is close to its February average of 3.86 inches of rain to date, but it is 11.62 inches below normal for the rain year that began on July 1.

Downtown Los Angeles has recorded only 0.23 inch of rain this month, 3.05 inches below normal to date. The location has received only 1.23 inches since July 1, a deficit of 9.52 inches.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/c...inglePage=true

Looking soooooo forward to the rain!

The rain is wonderful for a change! Yet....if you watch this daily resevior level chart....keep an eye on the Northern CA lake levels....they are still letting out water. After this weeks rain im lookin forward to seeing how much they release compared to whats coming in.
http://www.cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/current/RES

San Gabriel Mountain dams could get major fill-up from storm system

The reservoirs behind 14 major dams that line the front range of the San Gabriel Mountains — nearly empty after two years of drought...

http://www.latimes.com/#ixzz2ueE2nKqj

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