Site News

The Putah Creek Accord was signed May 23, 2000, during a ceremony at the Putah Diversion Dam.

Most people in California receive some of their drinking water supply from the State Water Project (SWP). The SWP also supplies water to over 10% of California’s irrigated agriculture.

Following recent NorCal rains, a dramatic shift to hot/dry conditions

California isn't running out of water," says Richard Luthy. "It's running out of cheap water. But the state can't keep doing what it's been doing for the past 100 years."

Foothill Yellow-legged Frogs have begun to spawn, as with many amphibians, they have precipitously declined in many parts of their range due to river regulation, habitat loss, and disease.

Increased frequency and severity of droughts threatens California’s endangered salmon population—but pools that serve as drought refuges could make the difference between life and death for these vulnerable fish, according to a study by researchers from UC Berkeley and California Sea Grant. The research could help resource managers strategically protect and restore salmon habitat.

As forests in California and the Western U.S. are hit by rising numbers of fires and disease outbreaks related to climate change, some experts argue that using dead and diseased trees to produce biomass energy will help to restore forests and reduce CO2 emissions.

This is the first analysis to measure the pandemic-driven global drop in carbon dioxide emissions. 2020 is still on track to be one of the five hottest years on record. In the U.S., California and Washington saw the biggest decline in emissions.

A study by the Department of Water Resources (DWR) investigating the growth rate of juvenile Chinook salmon raised in the Suisun Marsh area of Solano County was forced to conclude early due to the ongoing COVID-19 health emergency.

The March through May steelhead and salmon monitoring season is quickly coming to an end. This winter was exceptionally dry, and low flow conditions made it difficult (often impossible) to catch fish using our rotary screw trap, as we have for the past 12 years.

The gifts of headwater forests – trees in abundance, water supplies, wildlife habitat, recreational assets and more – benefit not only those who live nearby but people throughout California. As a new report by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) explains, the state urgently needs to accelerate forest management practices that can protect those benefits in the face of increasing wildfires and other threats.

A water budget is an accounting of the rates of the inflows, outflows, and changes in water storage in a specific area; however, as simple as that might sound, developing an accurate water budget can be a difficult and challenging endeavor.