Peripheral canal is best strategy for Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta waters, report says

A peripheral canal to carry water around the Sacramento-San Jaoquin Delta is the best potential strategy to revive a threatened ecosystem and maintain quality water for Californians, according to a report released today by the Public Policy Institute of California.

Currently, water is drawn from the Sacramento River and funneled south through the Delta to pumps that deliver water to people throughout the state. This method disrupts natural water flow, threatens native fish (five of which are listed as threatened or endangered), among other problems, according to the report.

Recently, court rulings have restricted water exports from the Delta because of this. And earlier this month officials said the Delta smelt could join the endangered species list.

The report concluded that because of sea level rise, land subsidence, changing runoff patterns and earthquakes, "change is inevitable for the Delta" and that the current policy was "risky and unsustainable."

Delta water levels are expected to increase by one to three feet, perhaps more, over the coming century. Without large investments to raise Delta levees, this rise in sea level will cause many levees to fail, pushing seawater into the Delta. Even if levees could be sustained, sea level rise will increase the salinity of Delta waters.

Researchers examined nine strategies for managing the Delta and considered their environmental, economic and water supply performance. The methods considered included continuing to pump exports through the Delta, diverting water upstream and conveying it around the Delta through a peripheral canal, combining the current pump-through-Delta policy with the peripheral canal (dual conveyance), or ending exports altogether.

The present strategy of responding to emergencies only as they happen puts California in the position of making Delta policy by default rather than by deliberate consideration of the best long-term alternatives.

Read on...

The researchers concluded that the peripheral canal method was the most cost efficient as well as the most viable and sustainable method long-term, according to the report.

But they also qualified their conclusion.

Selecting an export strategy does not, in itself, solve the Delta's problems...many technical regulatory, financial, governance, and policy decisions must accompany the implementation of a long-term strategy. In particular, no matter which export strategy is selected, there will have to be investment in improvements of aquatic habitats within the Delta to increase the likelihood of fish recovery.

-- Tami Abdollah

Photo: Part of the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta in Isleton, Calif. Credit: Lance Iversen / Associated Press

Comments

[smi2le]

Another very good idea that was derailed by crack pot so-called environmentalists in the 70s and 80s, like nuclear power and off shore drilling.

[Andy Taylor]

Presently, I reside near Sacramento. I'm a native Angleno who moved north in the wake of 9-11 and will someday likely return. With the present situation as it is, why are L.A. homeowners still washing down their driveways with potable water? And some of them don't stop there and proceed to wash down the
street gutter along the front of their property. One can witness this absurdity on any late afternoon or early evening in the more afluent areas of the city. Geez; get a rake and a push-broom already!

Before the construction of any peripheral canal, cut grass (mown) lawns, hosing of driveways, sidewalks and gutters should all be outlawed throughout southern California. Or at least those areas supplied with water from the central valley aqueduct. Drip irrigation should become mandatory for all new residential construction and for all existing residences within a set time period. The flushing of the delta provided by the Sacramento River watershed has become critical in light of diversion and daming that has so affected the flow of the San Joaquin River. The lessening of the winter snowpack in the High Sierra due to global warming will accentuate this critical aspect.

[bob]

The real water problem in California isn't the urban use in the Southland per se (that accounts for only a small percentage of what is exported from the Delta.)

The much bigger problem is industrial cotton in Kern County and welfare farms in the Westlands district who depend on Farm Bill subsidies and subsidized federal and state water.

Here is a great article about the history of industrial ag's water grab.
http://www.sunmt.org/carterwater.html

[dina]

Why not convert ocean water to good water?

Why tap into the Delta and harm farmers' supply of water to irrigate the crops?

Farmers will be forced to stop farming if their supply of water is compromised. The peripheral levee will greatly compromise their water supply.

It seems the farmers in California are being contually ignored, pushed out of business and/or harmed in some way. Farmers don't get treated fairly when it comes to the sale of food grown on their land. The farmer gets blamed for the high prices of food in the stores, when the high prices are due to the economy and other factors running our economy into the ground.

There has to be other options besides tapping into the Delta's water source. Maintaining and improving the levees is a wiser choice, because if we ignore those problems and make a peripheral canal, I believe the current rivers and levees will be deteriorate and be completely abandoned. Then what is left? Empty streams and rivers? I don't believe the peripheral levee is the answer. I belive it's the easy way out and people arent' working hard enough to come up with better options, just creating more problems for us to deal with in the future.

dina

[Peter Chu]

The problem with the report released by the Public Policy Institute of California was that it had a reconceived result prior to the study. There has NEVER been a levee colapse due to an earthquake. Most of the water sent south is used to irrigate permanent crops in violation of the farmers water contracts. The water contracts state that the state water should be used to irrigate row crops. If there is a drought, they will not receive their water allotments. The farmers planted avocados, oranges, grape vines, and other crops that require water annually to survive. They will not receive any sympathy for violating the water contracts.

Never has an ecosystem florished by reducing water flow. Trinity River? San Joaquin River? Owens Valley? Mono Lake? And probably one of the most beautiful, the Colorado River Delta - a windswept dust plain today. The Delta is a complex issue of water pressure that maintains the fresh water eco system. There are several alternatives available that should be explored.