Laura Harnish is the California Regional Director.
Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

Environmental Defense Fund is delighted that the package of water policy reform bills has passed both houses of California’s legislature and will be sent to Governor Schwarzenegger for his signature. We believe this package provides a foundation that will guide environmental protection and sustainable water supply management for many years to come. And we expect that as a result, California’s farms and cities, as well as fisheries in the Bay Delta and Central Valley watershed, will be better off.

Most obviously the legislation establishes a framework for managing the Delta and the rivers that supply it with freshwater. It formally recognizes the importance of the Delta as an ecosystem while acknowledging its role in moving water from north to south. It empowers our Water Board to determine the inflows that are necessary to meet public trust requirements under California law. And the legislation establishes important oversight roles for both the legislature and a newly created Delta Stewardship Council to ensure that any changes to water infrastructure accommodate protection of the Delta and its fisheries.

It is important to realize that the legislation does not authorize a peripheral canal. It does assure, however, that a canal will only be built if important habitats are restored, water exports from the Delta are biologically sustainable, and the beneficiaries of those exports pay the full cost of construction, including environmental mitigation.

The legislation also takes important steps toward achieving our stated goal of reducing per capita water conservation in our cities 20% by 2020, thereby reducing the pressure to withdraw increasing amounts of water from the natural environment.

We are also pleased that the legislation includes provisions to identify and prevent illegal diversions of water, though we regret that the initial language was “watered down”. Similarly, we are pleased that the legislature has finally made progress in moving toward statewide management of groundwater (the source of up to 40% of our overall supply in the driest years), though there is still much work to be done in this area.

Our largest concern is that the legislature passed an 11 billion dollar bond measure along with the policy reform bills. It is important to note that the bond measure does not become effective but will be on the ballot as an initiative in 2010. At that time California’s voters will have the opportunity to decide if we can afford it given our fiscal problems and other competing needs. Moreover, California’s electorate will be asked whether it is good public policy to make these investments as a State or if at least some of the investment decisions should be made with local funds. If approved by the voters, the funds would be used to pay for a variety of environmental, water quality and water supply programs, potentially including controversial dams in the Central Valley. In its place we would have preferred a beneficiary pays fee structure to fund the Council and needed ecosystem restoration efforts in the Delta and left the big dams and water projects to be funded directly by the users.

It would be nice to celebrate – get a six-pack, stroll down the river bank and watch restoration magically take place. But of course the ultimate outcome of this far-reaching legislation will not be known for many years and will depend considerably on how well its provisions are implemented. All stakeholders, including those who opposed the legislation, will need to work together to ensure as it is adopted that our public resources will indeed be protected as intended. The environment that Californians care so deeply about and the legacy we want to leave for our children depend on it.

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

The coverage of California water by Fox News Host Sean Hannity last night was disappointing. It was simplistic, one-sided, misleading and, in some cases, flat wrong. And perhaps most egregiously, the famously “small government” host delivered his message on behalf of wealthy farmers who owe their very existence to the federal handouts and are still deep in debt to United States taxpayers.

Let’s be fair. Mr. Hannity got some things right. He is correct that unemployment is particularly high in many towns in the San Joaquin Valley. The food lines and human suffering are real. In 2009, water deliveries to farming communities on the west side of the Valley have been significantly reduced. And part of that reduction is due to the Endangered Species Act protections designed to protect Delta smelt from extinction.

But Mr. Hannity does not tell the whole story. Read more »

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

The Wall Street Journal’s editorial “California’s Man-Made Drought” (Sept. 2), buys into the false choice of fish versus jobs. It is disappointing that the Journal, given its financial focus, fails to address or even acknowledge opportunities for market-based solutions to improve water use efficiency. The editorial also ignores many salient aspects of water management in California.

The WSJ seems to believe that the “pumps” are off (pumps which convey water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to cities and farms to the south). The pumps were never “off” but pumping rates were reduced during spring months to protect endangered fish. While the legal rulings are in place due to concern over Delta smelt, it is only one of several species whose populations have plummeted in recent years as diversions of freshwater have reached record levels. The pumps are now at full capacity. Lester Snow, Director of California’s Department of Resources, estimated that protecting fish in the Delta reduced overall pumping only about 5% for the year. The largest reason for reduced deliveries is that California is in its third year of drought. Read more »

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

The $77 million proposal to sell 14,000 acre-feet of the Central Valley’s agricultural water to suburban San Bernardino County puts a new twist on the debate over water use in California.

Throughout 2009, the third consecutive dry year in California, there has been unprecedented media focus on the effects that legal rulings to protect endangered fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta have had on water exports to farming communities with junior water rights on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley. The debate has been loud. Read more »

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

How can we store some of the high river flows in California’s Central Valley in wet years without building expensive new storage projects? Well, there is currently about 15 million acre-feet of unused storage space at Lake Mead, the combined storage capacity of Shasta, Oroville, San Luis, New Melones and Don Pedro Reservoirs. Due to increased demand in the Colorado Basin and depressing hydrologic projections, experts doubt that the reservoir will ever fill again, so the space is highly likely to be available.

Read more »

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

Over the last 20 years, water agencies have invested far more in groundwater storage projects than they have in surface storage. When discussing groundwater development, it is first and foremost essential to distinguish between drilling new wells simply to “mine” limited and unsustainable supplies and installing injectors, establishing recharge areas or other infrastructure so that aquifers can be deliberately replenished in wet years. The former is a huge problem; the latter is an opportunity and the subject of this blog.

As of 1980, large dams have collected the flow of all major streams in the Central Valley. Building additional surface storage would provide little additional supply in many watersheds as river flows, even in most wet years, would often be insufficient to fill a new reservoir. In addition, the best dam sites have already been used and additional sites would be more costly to develop.

On the other hand, new technologies have made it possible to replenish groundwater basins during wet years in many areas that were overdrafted throughout much of the 20th century. Read more »

 Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

“California needs more storage!” is a familiar refrain, especially when the legislature is considering water issues. Usually it refers to building dams and is often uttered with a twinge of nostalgia for the mid-20th century when most of the state’s major dams were built.

The public, however, according to the recent Public Policy Institute if California poll, prefers investing in conservation and efficiency to building new storage as a means to solving our water woes.

The debate over storage is sometimes described as religious, with tree-hugging river lovers in opposition and self-described “water buffaloes” in favor. Read more »

Jennifer Witherspoon is the California Communications Director at EDF.

I was thrilled to learn from the most recent Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) survey, Californians and the Environment that half of the Californians polled prefer that the state focus on conservation and efficient use of current water supply, while only 43 percent favor building storage systems and increasing water supply. Remarkably, the poll also found that nearly one out of five Californians named water supply and drought as the most important environmental issue, a nearly four-fold percentage increase from last year's poll.

To me, these numbers are an indication that an environmental ethic is still running strong in the Golden State. Voters intrinsically understand that we can meet our current water supply needs for farms, urban areas, and protect our precious natural resources like the unique estuary known as the Bay-Delta and the fisheries and fishermen that depend upon it.

The timing of this poll is impeccable—in the coming weeks the State Legislature is expected to turn its attention to water. It is likely that the Senate Natural Resources Committee and the Assembly Water, Parks & Wildlife Committee will hold a joint informational session on Tuesday, August 18 on a package of Bay-Delta water-related measures. This hearing may be the first of several intended to set the stage for legislation this session. At least five bills are expected though details on the legislation remain to be seen.

Let’s hope the legislators are willing to think outside the box on how we use water in California, creating savings by using water more efficiently. Hopefully they’ll take heed of the new PPIC survey and see that half of Californians are ready to “flex their power” and “Save Our H20.”

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

The urban Bay Area’s historically derived “patchwork water supply”, reported in today's San Francisco Chronicle, is one example of many in California demonstrating how our antiquated water system is so often imbalanced and unfair. Another significant example lies in the agricultural sector in the San Joaquin Valley. As is often reported, agriculture uses upwards of 80 percent of California’s developed water supply, so attention to water use in that sector is crucial to finding a solution to the State’s water woes.

During this recent drought some farms with plentiful supplies (and senior water rights) pay as little at $8 per acre-foot for water while neighboring farms with more junior water rights and thus more limited supplies must pay up to $600 per acre-foot to keep orchards alive. The results of this inequity are many: (1) farms with cheap supplies have insufficient incentives to adopt modern state-of-the art irrigation technologies, (2) farms where water is not cheap and abundant must often fallow their fields, putting people out of work and providing less food for our kitchen tables, and (3) water shortages put additional pressure to extract unsustainable supplies from the natural environment, where extinction of some fish species is a real possibility.

As we struggle to protect our rivers and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, it is essential that we manage our developed water efficiently. All business people respond to price signals. Allowing and indeed encouraging those farmers with superior water rights to market a larger portion of their supplies will provide incentives to irrigate as efficiently as possible, producing more food and reducing the conflict with our rivers and streams.

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

Anybody reading newspapers or watching television news over the last two months has heard frightening stories of water shortages that threaten the viability of agriculture in the San Joaquin Valley. But information compiled by the California Department of Water Resources reveals that in 2009 water supply in most parts of the valley will be in excess of 80% of average.

Central Valley Project deliveries to Westlands Water District, for example, were forecast to be zero as recently as March. Westlands now projects they expect to use 86% of average annual supplies this year. Their total supply is a combination of deliveries from the Delta, water banked last year, groundwater pumping and purchases.

The data, compiled last month by the Department of Water Resources and based on a series of interviews with staff from each of the districts, was attached to a letter from DWR Director Lester Snow to U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein on May 15 . As the table notes, the information is subject to change.

The information paints a very different picture for agriculture this year than we have seen reported this spring. The water shortages are much lower than previously reported. This year's supplies do, of course, rely on levels of groundwater pumping that would not be possible every year. Still, one can only conclude that the water supply situation is not as dire as previously reported and that San Joaquin Valley farms will still be able to grow food for our kitchen tables this year.