Drought? What drought? So Cal by watering ordinance
The drought affects all of us, but the reactions to it by cities throughout Southern California could not be more different. A linked guide of how different cities and water districts from San Diego to Ventura are tackling it might exist somewhere else, but now it exists here. So far, kudos to Long Beach for having its head furthest out of the sand. For additions, please blog or e-mail me at emily.green [at] mac.com.…
Blow hard, blow now, just don’t mow and blow: Second Comment Period opens on Modified AB 1881
California landscapers and other interested parties have until 5pm on May 26 to submit comments on an updated and modified version of the Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance AB 1881.
High Good, Low Bad: Lake Mead Elevations
Source: US Bureau of Reclamation
HOPEFULLY there is more water than silt in the main Colorado River reservoir holding water supplies for California, Arizona, Nevada and Mexico. The maximum elevation for Lake Mead is 1,229 feet. Below, gleaned from US Bureau of Reclamation records, is the first of what will be monthly elevation reports for Lake Mead on this blog, with year on year contrasts going back to 2004. Above, for those who prefer pictures to numbers, also borrowed from Reclamation, is a nifty graphic published on Friday, May 8, 2009 showing April and May 2009 elevations, including predictions (in yellow) throughout the month.
April 30, 2009 1,101.26 ft
April 30, 2008 1,110.61 ft
April 30, 2007 1,120.69 ft
April 30, 2006 1,135.94 ft
April 30, 2005 1,144.45 ft
April 30, 2004 1,134.98 ft
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Turn off the sprinklers and put down the hose, unless you are fighting a fire
Highlights from March 31, 2009 testimony before the US Congress Natural Resources Committee by US Bureau of Reclamation Acting Commissioner J. William McDonald on Interior’s preparedness plan for dealing with California drought.
FIRE: “The Interior bureaus and our land management partners are preparing to deal with the potential for widespread and intense fires in California this year as a result of multiple successive years of drought.”
NATIONAL PARKS AND CAMPING: “Conservation measures will be put in place in parks where campground water supplies are expected to be limited, including several sites in Yosemite National Park.”
CENTRAL VALLEY: “As of March 30, Central Valley Project agricultural water service contractors north of the Delta will be allocated 5 percent, or 19 thousand acre-feet, of contract water supplies under their CVP contracts. CVP agricultural water service contractors south of the Delta will likely receive no allocation.”
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Why the West Hates Southern California
THE FIRST thing one learns when leaving Los Angeles and California to travel Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada and Arizona is that the rest of the West hates Californians.
The reason can be summed up in one word: Water.
Legal division of Western water more or less started with the Gold Rush and the first come, first serve law pertaining to gold came to apply to water, no matter how crazy the allocations became as the West was settled.
California was greedy early and has proved positively Roman in its ability to build aqueducts and storage reservoirs. Well endowed with water, it has proved unsurpassed at wasting it, even as the rest of the West shriveled in drought, and even as in the past decade the crisis has reached all three of Southern California’s water sources in the Sacramento Delta, Owens Valley and the Colorado River.
To sum up
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