by Patrick Ruckert
www.californiadroughtupdate.org/20220616-California-Water-and-Infrastructure-Report.pdf
A Note to Readers
If panic and hysteria have not yet been expressed by political leaders and water managers in California and along the Colorado River as yet, it is not so much their calmness under pressure, but their determination to maintain the policy of crisis management, since they have no commitment to actually solving the crisis.
While wells are going dry for thousands of people in California, and an estimated 690,000 acres of the state’s agricultural fields will be fallowed this year, and with more forecasts of further cuts to water for agriculture, the commitment to merely managing the crisis demonstrates the necessity of an aroused citizenry finally rising up and demanding new leadership with vision and determination. A leadership not beholden to this Federal Reserve system of gambling and globalization, and one not subservient to the insanity of “zero carbon,” renewables and other virtually useless, if not destructive beliefs.
It is true that short-term actions are limited to crisis alleviation (as when a small town’s wells go dry), and given the current political culture, even actions that can make a difference in just two or three years, are difficult if not impossible. Yet, such potential options do exist, and one of them can be found in the Feature this week beginning on page 14: “How 1,500 Nuclear-Powered Water Desalination Plants Could Save The World From Desertification.”
One may complain that it is impossible, given the environmentalist dominance that the state is under. But, to just give two examples of how, even in California, large projects can be completed very quickly, I cite the replacement of the Oroville Dam spillway in 2017, and the one year construction time, after the final permit was obtained, for building the Carlsbad desalination plant.
In the case of the Oroville Dam spillway, which disintegrated in a near overflow of the the reservoir, the contract for the work was signed within two weeks of its destruction, and work began a few days later. Seven day weeks and 24 hour days ensured that what would have taken years just for the permitting process, was completed in one year.
With that in mind here is what else is in the report this week:
We begin with a couple of absurdities, which, of course, have been to often characteristic of the world we live in today. The first is this headline: “Kamala Harris emerges as Team Biden’s water warrior.” If you think nothing can outdo that, the second will dispel that thought: “Only in California could bees be considered fish under the law.” The article is a hilarious satire you will enjoy reading, though it is true that a California court just recently made such a ruling.
Underlining the headline of one article, included below,”More than 65 million Americans are experiencing ‘severe to exceptional drought,’ “ the U.S. Drought Monitor continues to record the spreading of the drought eastward across the country. Two short articles from Kansas highlight this spread. The first is the death of 2,000 cattle from the heat, and the second on the destructive impact of drought on the farmers.
Ensuring that the present drought does not come to an end soon, the La Nina climate phenomenon is not forecast to stick around for an infrequent third year.
Some Consequences is the headline of the next section, which includes this report, “Land Fallowing Could Reach More Than 690,000 Acres Due to Drought” That is followed by articles on the drastic and unprecedented restrictions recently imposed in California.
On the Colorado River, top federal water officials are warning Western states that there will be cuts to their access to Colorado River water next year. “The cuts could be drastic, she warned, reducing Colorado River water access by between 2 and 4 million acre-feet across seven states that rely on it—close to the 4.4 million acre-feet of Colorado River water California is entitled to annually. Arizona, by contrast, is entitled to 2.8 million acre-feet of Colorado River water every year.”
