n WATER
C
alifornia’s recent drought was the state’s worst in
The state’s recent extreme weather events are just a pre-
centuries, scientists have said. It began in December view of what’s to come in the next few decades, warn local
2011, and lasted more than five years, killed or mor- scientists, who say global warming will drive an unnerving
tally injured more than 100 million trees, exacerbated climate roller coaster that will kill thousands of Californians,
the state’s groundwater deficit and pushed fish spe- destroy cropland, wipe out species, cause billions in damag-
cies toward extinction.
es and force fast-thinking innovation among officials who
Then came torrential rains that made the early months manage California’s water supply.
of 2017 one of the wettest winters on record, producing tor-
rents that nearly destroyed Oroville Dam’s spillway system HOW TO SAVE MORE OF OUR WATER
and blanketing the Sierra Nevada with an unusually heavy Building more dams is not likely in the cards. One notable
snowpack. Quickly, the weather turned, and by July the state project, the proposed Sites Reservoir in Colusa County, is
was broiling through the hottest summer in California’s his- advancing in the planning stages and could eventually store
tory, and, by late fall, California had been scorched by two 500,000 acre-feet of diverted Sacramento River water. For the
unprecedented heatwaves and several devastating flurries of most part, though, dams will be looked upon as clunky fea-
wildfires, including the North Bay infernos. More recently, a tures of the 20th century.
storm in May 2019 produced re-
Lawmakers and policy an-
cord daily rainfall in many lo-
alysts are looking ahead, and
cations. One month later came
they see a variety of possibilities
a record-torching heatwave.
for mitigating the impacts of
Mediterranean
climates,
climate change. The City of Sac-
like California’s, typically fol-
ramento along with the Placer
low boom and bust cycles,
and Sacramento county water
marked by a predictable shift
agencies, which rely mostly on
between cold and wet and hot
water from the American River,
and dry. But the changing cli-
have a tentative plan to tap into
mate will amplify that pattern
the Sacramento River during
with “wetter wets, drier dries
times of surplus flow. The proj-
and hotter hots,” warns Jeffrey
ect, called RiverArc, would also
Mount, a senior fellow at the
integrate groundwater into the
water policy center of the Pub-
new pipelines but remains in
lic Policy Institute of California
the planning stages as agencies
and a professor emeritus at UC
seek funding.
~ Jeffrey Mount, senior fellow, water policy center of the
Davis.
Statewide, the most popular
Public Policy Institute of California
Precipitation, he explains,
idea for protecting water sup-
will fall in faster, more furious
ply is making better use of un-
fits over a briefer window of
derground storage. Geologists
time before the rapid onset of longer, brutally hot summers. believe the volume of aquifer capacity is several times that
Warmer average temperatures will mean less snowpack, a of all the state’s reservoirs combined, especially after years
key storage supply. “This will compress the window where of aggressive pumping in recent dry years. “The overdraft of
we get our rainfall,” Mount says. “We already have a short groundwater that we caused during the drought has actual-
winter.” Climate models, Mount says, indicate that average ly created an opportunity for storage,” says Heather Cooley,
annual rainfall may remain steady even in a much warmer director of research at the Pacific Institute, an Oakland think
future. However, because that rain might fall in larger and tank geared toward water policy.
fewer storms in a shorter amount of time, “It means we can’t
California passed a groundbreaking law in 2014 aimed
store it all, and we have to let some of it flow downstream to- at stabilizing and recharging depleted aquifers, though the
ward the ocean.”
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act might not pro-
“That means a net loss,” Mount says, explaining that duce significant results for 20 more years. But already, water
when water is needed most — the summer and early fall — agencies, environmental organizations and landowners are
much of the year’s precipitation will have already been re- taking action to put water underground. To do this, water
leased to the sea.
must be slowed down, allowed to spread over a wide area of
“(Because rain might fall in
larger and fewer storms in
a shorter amount of time), it
means we can’t store it all, and
we have to let some of it flow
downstream toward the ocean.
That means a net loss.”
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comstocksmag.com | August 2019