(April 22, 2009, The Portland Tribune)
“We have very good water,” Jon Hanken the city manager said. “But it isn’t cheap.”
Other charges on city water bills include a $15.70 meter charge plus 33 cents per every 100,000 gallons of water that is used or .0033 per gallon.
These charges pay for the management and maintenance of the [...]
(March 21, 2009, Treehugger)
Last summer I posted on Tampa Bay Florida’s new desalination plant, an expensive technology that was needed to cope with the growing demand for potable water, amidst falling supplies (due to extended drought). See Tampa Bay Florida Area Drinks Oil-Fired Water for details. Since then, surface water supplies have fallen off further [...]
(March 19, 2009, The Los Angeles Times)
State officials announced Wednesday they will deliver more water to Southern California this year than previously predicted but cautioned that shipments will remain well below normal.
State water resources director Lester Snow said “a series of very beneficial storms in February and early March” prompted his department to increase allocations [...]
(March 8, 2009, The Fresno Bee)
It is China’s latest grand attempt to tame nature. Three canals will bring water hundreds of miles to Beijing and other thirsty cities in the north. More than 350,000 people in the way will be forced to move.
For many in Zhangyigang, a village of 942 people in brick and mud [...]
(March 8, 2009, David Curran, The San Francisco Chronicle)
I experienced the Bay Area droughts of the 1970s. I vaguely recall taking navy showers and reciting, “If it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down.” And I remember the dry times of the late 1980s when I was always in short sleeves and [...]
(Feb. 28, 2009, Kelly Zito, The San Francisco Chronicle)
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a statewide drought emergency Friday, urging cities to cut their use of water 20 percent and paving the way for projects such as desalination plants and water recycling projects to bypass standard environmental reviews.
Despite heavy rainstorms this month, state officials say California’s water [...]
(Feb. 26, 2009, The Mercury News)
In March, after a series of cold winter storms, the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada was above normal. That seemed to be good news for California’s water supply, which relies heavily on Sierra Nevada snow.
But after a record heat wave in the early spring, it was as if the winter’s [...]
(Feb. 27, 2009, The Los Angeles Times)
With California’s budget crisis resolved for the moment, state lawmakers Thursday turned their attention to another emergency: a three-year drought that has left key reservoirs at 35% of capacity.
Legislators stepped forward with plans to ask voters to borrow as much as $15 billion for projects to expand and improve [...]
(Feb. 12, 2009, The Salt Lake Tribune)
Utah enjoyed healthy precipitation in January, allowing the National Weather Service to issue an optimistic report about this spring’s runoff.
Hydrologist Brian McInerney, who issues his reports via the Web to make science more available, says this water year is “looking very good.”
As of Feb. 11, his prediction for water [...]
