Years of low rainfall and snow cover and more intense heat waves have directly fed the state’s perennial, relentless drought conditions, rapidly draining reservoirs across the state. And according to this week’s report from the US Drought Monitor, the two main reservoirs are at “critically low levels” at the point in the year when they should be at their highest. This week, Lake Shasta is only 40% of its total capacity, the lowest ever since early May since recordings began in 1977. Meanwhile, further south, Lake Oroville is 55% of its capacity, which is 70% of the place where it should be average at that time. Lake Shasta is the state’s largest reservoir and the cornerstone of the Central Valley Project in California, a complex water system consisting of 19 dams and reservoirs, as well as more than 500 miles of canals stretching from Reading north to south to the victims. from bakersfield land landscapes.
The water level in Lake Shasta is now less than half the historical average. According to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, only agricultural customers who are senior water rights holders and some irrigation areas in the eastern San Joaquin Valley will receive water supplies from the Central Valley project this year.
“We expect more than 350,000 acres of farmland in the Sacramento Valley alone to be scorched,” Mary Lee Knecht, a public relations officer in the Bureau’s California Basin region, told CNN. For perspective, this is an area larger than Los Angeles. “Cities and towns that receive [Central Valley Project] water supply, including Silicon Valley communities, is limited to health and safety needs. “
Much is at stake with falling supply, said Jessica Gable of Food & Water Watch, a non-profit advocacy group focused on food and water security and climate change. The upcoming summer heat and water shortages, she said, will hit the most vulnerable groups in California, especially those in rural communities.
“Communities in California will suffer this year during the drought, and it’s just a matter of how much more they suffer,” Gable told CNN. “Usually the most vulnerable communities will suffer the most, so I usually think of the Central Valley, because it’s already a dry part of the country with most of the agriculture and most of the country’s energy development, which is both water-bearing industries. “
“Only 5%” of water to be delivered
Lake Oroville is the largest reservoir in the California State Water Project system, separate from the Central Valley Project, managed by the California Department of Water Resources (DWR). It provides water to 27 million Californians and 750,000 acres of farmland.
Oroville suffered a major blow last year after water levels fell to just 24% of total capacity, forcing a major California hydroelectric plant to shut down for the first time since it opened in 1967. The lake’s water level was well below boat ramps. , and open suction pipes, which usually sent water to supply the dam.
Although strong storms by the end of 2021 have eased record lows in the lake by resuming operation at the power plant, water officials are wary of another dire situation as the drought worsens this summer.
“The fact that this facility was closed last August; “This has never happened before and the prospect of it happening again is very real,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom told a news conference in April as he toured the Oroville Dam, noting the climate crisis is changing the way water is delivered to the region.
According to DWR, the low levels in Oroville’s reservoirs are forcing water agencies relying on the state project to “receive only 5% of their declared deliveries in 2022,” RW Endin, a DWR spokesman, told CNN. “These water agencies are called upon to introduce mandatory restrictions on water use in order to extend their available supplies in the summer and autumn.
The Bureau of Reclamation and DWR, along with federal and state agencies, are also taking unprecedented steps to protect endangered Chinook winter salmon for the third year in a row on land. Reclamation staff are in the process of providing temporary cooling units to cool the water in one of their fish hatcheries.
Both reservoirs are a vital part of the country’s larger water system, interconnected by canals and rivers. So even if the smaller reservoirs were filled by winter rainfall, falling water levels in Shasta and Oroville could still affect and drain the rest of the water system.
Lake Folsom’s water level, for example, reached nearly 450 feet above sea level this week, which is 108% of its historical average at this time of year. But with low water levels in Shasta and Oroville, annual releases from Lake Folsom this summer may need to be higher than normal to make up for the significant shortage of other reservoirs.
California is dependent on storms and winter rainfall to accumulate snow cover in the Sierra Nevada, which then gradually melts in the spring and fills the reservoirs.
Faced with successive dry years and record-breaking heat waves pushing drought into historic territory, California tasted the rain it was looking for in October, when the first major storm of the season pushed it ashore. Then, in late December, more than 17 feet of snow fell in the Sierra Nevada, which researchers say is enough to break decades-old records. But rainfall fell in January and the state’s water content this year was only 4% of normal by the end of winter. from businesses and residents in parts of Los Angeles, Ventura and San Bernardino counties to reduce outdoor watering to one day a week starting June 1
Gable said that as California enters the future, much hotter and drier than anyone has experienced before, employees and residents need to rethink the way water is managed everywhere, otherwise the state will remain unprepared .
“Water must be a human right,” Gable said. “But we don’t think about it, and I think that until that changes, then, unfortunately, water scarcity will continue to be a symptom of the worsening climate crisis.”
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