TOP STORIES
Associated Press, 2/23/2022
Ice and snow showers made travel dicey on many of California’s mountain highways Wednesday as a very cold and windy storm moved through. Many parts of the state were experiencing overnight freezing temperatures and a widespread hard freeze was predicted for early Thursday.
WATER INFRASTRUCTURE
PEW Charitable Trusts, 2/22/2022
Gripped by drought, communities along California’s coast are exploring innovations and investments to ensure residents have access to drinking water. But desalinating seawater, one proposed solution, has provoked heated debate, as some environmentalists say the process is inefficient, expensive and unneeded.
WATER SUPPLY & QUALITY
ABC 7, 2/21/2022
A sewage spill in Newport Beach forced the closure Monday of ocean waters from the west end of Newport Bay to 8th Street. The OC Health Care Agency's Environmental Health Division announced the closure Monday morning, noting that approximately 35,000 to 50,000 gallons of sewage leaked into the area due to a blocked sewer line of a restaurant in Newport Bay.
Modesto Bee, 2/22/2022
The Modesto Irrigation District will deliver about 60% of its usual water this year because of the persistent drought. The district board voted 5-0 Tuesday morning for this allotment from the Tuolumne River. It affects about 58,000 acres of farmland, as well as a treatment plant that eases reliance on groundwater in Modesto and a few other towns.
Pleasanton Weekly, 2/22/2022
Crews will begin installing a monitoring well at Amador Valley Community Park next month as part of the city's efforts on water supply planning and groundwater basin assessment.
Expected to last most of March, construction on the groundwater monitoring well at approximately $180,000 is a "vital step in the city's PFAS Treatment and Wells Rehabilitation Project," according to Kathleen Yurchak, director of operations and water utilities for the city.
CLIMATE & WEATHER
Phys.Org , 2/23/2022
The global water cycle—that is, the constant movement of freshwater between the clouds, land and the ocean—plays an important role in our daily lives. This delicate system transports water from the ocean to the land, helping to make our environment habitable and soil fertile.
CalMatters, 2/23/2022
Packed onto the slopes of the Sierra Nevada is a precious source of water for California — a frozen reservoir that climate change is already transforming.
As the planet warms, the spring snowpack is dwindling. The snow is creeping up mountainsides to higher elevations, melting earlier in the year and seeping into dry soils rather than washing into rivers and streams that feed reservoirs.
CALIFORNIA WATERSHEDS
PV Magazine, 2/22/2022
The geothermal field beneath California’s Salton Sea contains brine that may hold from one to six million metric tons of lithium, an essential element for producing batteries. A Berkeley Lab study aims to evaluate the resource.
Berkeleyside, 2/22/2022
Snug along the Albany border on Kains Avenue is a verdant new Berkeley open space where monarchs fly among the yellow oxalis flowers common throughout the neighborhood.
Creek lovers, government workers and city officials gathered at the Codornices Creek restoration project Saturday to ceremoniously cut the ribbon on the “Kains Avenue Park,” a $1 million public works development that daylighted a 181-foot stretch of the creek from an almost 100-year-old culvert and created a path alongside it.
CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES
Energy Wire, 2/22/2022
One afternoon last August, a high-definition camera on a Pacific Gas and Electric Co. tower spotted the first smoke plumes of a new California wildfire north of Sacramento, ahead of trained volunteer fire watchers.
In the desperate battle against Western wildfires, when minutes matter, the “find” by the camera and its artificial intelligence analytics was a victory for new technologies intended to counter the expanding threats of extreme weather. Fast detection and response helped limit the fire — which investigators pinned on campers — to 2,616 acres.
AGENCIES, PROGRAMS, PEOPLE
Antelope Valley Press, 2/22/2022
The Palmdale Water District Board of Directors gave the go-ahead to staff to develop a water education class, which customers could attend in lieu of paying fines for overuse, should mandatory water restrictions be put in place.
Suggested by Director Amberrose Merino, the class is modeled after one used successfully in Santa Cruz in 2014, which offered customers a one-time waiver of fees for overuse if they attended a course about water use and conservation.
EVENTS
DWR will host three virtual public workshops on the Riverine Stewardship Program: San Joaquin Fish Population Enhancement Program (SJFPEP) & Urban Streams Restoration Program (USRP) Grants Draft Guidelines and Proposal Solicitation Package (PSP).
Start: Tue 1 Mar 2022, 1:00 PM
End: Tue 1 Mar 2022, 3:00 PM
The first meeting of the California Water Plan Update 2023 (Update 2023) Policy Advisory Committee will be held over Zoom on March 2, 2022.
Start: Wed 2 Mar 2022, 9:00 AM
End: Wed 2 Mar 2022, 12:00 PM
DWR will host three virtual public workshops on the Riverine Stewardship Program: San Joaquin Fish Population Enhancement Program (SJFPEP) & Urban Streams Restoration Program (USRP) Grants Draft Guidelines and Proposal Solicitation Package (PSP).
Start: Thu 3 Mar 2022, 10:00 AM
End: Thu 3 Mar 2022, 12:00 PM
DWR will host three virtual public workshops on the Riverine Stewardship Program: San Joaquin Fish Population Enhancement Program (SJFPEP) & Urban Streams Restoration Program (USRP) Grants Draft Guidelines and Proposal Solicitation Package (PSP). Please note this meeting will be held in Spanish.
Start: Thu 3 Mar 2022, 1:00 PM
End: Thu 3 Mar 2022, 3:00 PM
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