Drought

The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) has announced an increase in 2020 State Water Project (SWP) allocations to 15 percent of requested supplies, up from the year’s initial 10 percent allocation announced on December 2. The Statewide snowpack is 76 percent of normal for this time of year and …

A more efficient water system that will improve the city of Wheatland’s drinking water supply is in the works with the help of a grant from Yuba Water Agency. The $700,000 grant, approved by the agency board, provides funds for the city to replace its aging water distribution system equipment, …

The University of Arizona recently announced results from a study that studied the annual growth rings of trees to reconstruct a long-term climate history and examine the duration and frequency of “perfect droughts” in Southern California’s main water sources. According to the research, severe droughts happened simultaneously in the regions …

Last week state agencies released a draft water resilience portfolio with recommended actions to help California cope with more extreme droughts and floods, rising temperatures, declining fish populations, aging infrastructure and other challenges. The California Natural Resources Agency, California Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Food and Agriculture developed the …

The Yuba Water Agency (YWA) and the U.C. San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography previously launched of the first of several weather balloons to study atmospheric rivers and develop new tools specific to the Yuba and Feather River watersheds. Atmospheric rivers, which have been studied for nearly two decades, are …

The first snowpack survey of 2020 by the Department of Water Resources (DWR) at Phillips Station provided encouraging news. The manual survey recorded 33.5 inches of snow depth and a snow water equivalent (SWE) of 11 inches, which is 97 percent of average for this location. “While the series of cold …