Heavy rains from flooding storms allow California to boost water supply

A week of historic rain in California won’t be enough to end a severe drought, but it will provide state water utilities serving 27 million people with much more water than suppliers were told a month ago, state officials said Thursday.

The Department of Water Resources said state water agencies would now receive 30% of what they asked for, up from the 5% officials announced earlier in December. That’s because in the first three weeks of January, nine atmospheric rivers poured about 32 trillion gallons of rain and snow onto California. There was enough water to increase storage at the state’s two largest reservoirs by 66%.

“We haven’t gotten rid of the California drought, but it certainly does significant damage,” said Carla Nemeth, director of the California Department of Water Resources.

California pumps water from its main rivers and streams and stores it in several reservoirs known as the State Water Project. State officials then deliver this water to 29 government agencies, which provide potable water to key communities in the state and irrigate 1,151 square miles of farmland.

Years of drought have drained many of these reservoirs to dangerously low levels, forcing water agencies across the state to cut costs. Many agencies have introduced mandatory limits for customers, and Gov. Gavin Newsom called on people and businesses to voluntarily reduce their water use by 15%.

The Southern California Metropolitan Water District, which includes major communities like Los Angeles and San Diego counties, declared a drought emergency last month for all of its 19 million customers. He has imposed mandatory restrictions on 7 million customers, which means they can only water their lawns one day a week.

Thursday’s announcement did not automatically remove those restrictions. Adel Hagehalil, the area’s general manager, said the additional water “will undoubtedly help the communities most affected by this drought.” But he warned that “Southern California’s water problems are far from solved.”

The area receives about a third of its water from the State Water Project, a third from the Colorado River, and a third from other sources. The Colorado River system has benefited from recent storms, but not to the same extent as the California water system. Hagehalil warned that Southern California could “see a significant shrinkage” of the Colorado River starting next year.

“To replenish local supplies and reduce dependence on imports, we all need to use water as efficiently as possible,” he said.

The U.S. Drought Management Administration said Thursday that a severe drought has turned into a moderate drought across much of the San Joaquin Valley, with the lowest category, abnormal drought, replacing a moderate drought across the entire central coast, including Monterey Bay.

However, most of the state still suffers from moderate to severe drought, with only a portion on the far north coast completely free from drought.

The worst drought categories – exceptional and extreme – were eliminated in California earlier this month.

Recent hurricanes have shown how difficult it is to manage water in the West, where long dry spells are often punctuated by intense spells of rain and snow, leaving officials scrambling to collect it all before it leaks into the Pacific Ocean. Environmental regulations limit the amount of water government officials can withdraw from rivers, protecting the habitat of endangered fish species.

But when severe storms hit like the ones that hit the state in January, state officials say they are more constrained by outdated infrastructure than by environmental regulations. In the last few weeks, the State Water Project has been operating at maximum capacity, pumping water at a rate of 9,500 cubic feet per second. Meanwhile, Nemeth said that water flows into the ocean at 150,000 cubic feet per second.

California is trying to build seven new water storage projects partially paid by voters in a $7.5 billion bond approved in 2014. But it took almost a decade for these projects to get going, amid a lengthy process of obtaining permits and approvals.

Meanwhile, 17 years have passed since the State Water Project completed 100% of water allocation. State officials say part of the problem is climate change, which is causing more rain to evaporate into warmer air and seep into drier ground rather than the state’s rivers and streams.

State officials said Thursday they are cautiously optimistic about the rest of this year. In California, the Sierra Nevada has more than twice as much snow as its historical average, and Thursday’s water announcement did not include the amount of water it would generate when it melts in the spring.

Intense rains have soaked the ground, meaning that when snow melts in the Sierra Nevada this spring, less water will be absorbed into the dry ground, and more will flow into the state’s reservoirs.

However, even with a number of intense rainfall, it’s possible that California’s water year, which runs from October 1 to September 30, will be average.

“We can have intense dry and intense wet conditions in the same year,” Nemeth said.

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