Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

California declared drought free for first time in seven years

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 242 posts

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#81

Post by bdamm »

SovietDissident wrote: post #68

Yes, but have the bozos in Sac learned anything? Have we built new water infrastructure to support a population 3x the size vs. when the original, now-ageing infrastructure was built? Was there a cessation of 40% of freshwater being drained into the oceans to preserve the habitats of baitfish and other environmentalist causes? No---we told farmers they were evil because they grow almonds, told people they need to con…

There have been many, many dams built since Hetch Hetchy. The region of Hetch Hetchy alone has been expanded threefold with two newer dams that feed into the same bay-area penstocks.

Almonds are exceptionally water intensive, which is why the almond king has been spending so much on Sacramento lobbyists to tilt water rights. California is on it’s way to Arizona so maybe depending on water intensive crops is not the way to go. I don’t care much for baitfish but there should be room for ecology in the overall water plan. Otherwise there won’t be a drop left downstream. Heck maybe we should just let the tree farmers have all the water, after all they’re closer to the main sources!

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#82

Post by pfdietz »

To first order, California's water problem is agricultural. And that's because there's no market in that water that would curtail what is a very low value use of it.

Fix that, or resort to fractional measures that just paper over the underlying dysfunction.

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#83

Post by partiallypro »

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #17

Can't wait for all the climate change deniers to have a field day with this.

Climate change is real, and humans are evolved...but so far the hysteria has been just that, hysteria. Climate models have been historically inaccurate, and it's actually really difficult to even know what the "ideal" global temperature is.

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#84

Post by c_r_w »

0xffff2 wrote: post #67
c_r_w wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. I personally know folks with a small ranch outside of Sacramento who had to dig down 90 feet to find water for their well. Hard to imagine that being replenished by a few rainy seasons.

Even in places where water is more plentiful that's not a particularly deep well.

Hmm maybe it was deeper. I remember being shocked at the time, but my memory of the scale may be significantly off. It was discussed in the context of "there is barely any water in this aquifer these days."

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#85

Post by zobzu »

its funny how no matter what happens climate wise "its terrible and wrong" when it's reported.

What drought.gov calls abnormally-dry is not actually abnormal. What they really mean is "its non-ideal", as if the climate was always ideal pre-2011.

Anything that is lower than D2 ("severe drought") is normal, and of course its better to thrive toward ideal and maintaining better conditions. But it doesn't mean that somehow weather was ideal all the time before 2011 and now its never good enough.

Let the downvotes flow...

https://www.drought.gov/drought/states/california

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#86

Post by komali2 »

SovietDissident wrote: post #68

Yes, but have the bozos in Sac learned anything? Have we built new water infrastructure to support a population 3x the size vs. when the original, now-ageing infrastructure was built? Was there a cessation of 40% of freshwater being drained into the oceans to preserve the habitats of baitfish and other environmentalist causes? No---we told farmers they were evil because they grow almonds, told people they need to con…

>though nowhere near as bad as giving gov't workers collective bargaining "rights" in the 70s, fleecing taxpayers till the end of time)

Bargaining rights are... Bad?

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#87

Post by cjensen »

OrgNet wrote: post #77
whymsicalburito wrote: post #18

Tell that to my water bill, the drought surcharge is still over 50% of the bill...

is it legal to get rain barrels and other types of rain collection systems?

Yes. They are not as useful as you might hope since California's dry season lasts six months, so they will go empty when you need them the most.

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#88

Post by whalesalad »

mrfusion wrote: post #75
whalesalad wrote: post #27

The experience here in Orange County over the last few months has been nuts. Being able to hang out down near the ocean and see the San Gabriel mountains just decked out in snow is surreal: https://i.redd.it/kueaye5p6si21.jpg Another photo: https://i.redd.it/vy7dlavrh0f21.jpg Anaheim hills, an area that rarely gets snowed on: https://i.redd.it/trbf198kb6i21.jpg Then we roll right into the poppy/wildflower superbloom…

I thought California. Has the best climate in the country?

It does and it doesn't. It's a huge state... parts of it are lush redwood forests, other parts are literally some of the lowest/hottest/dryest places on earth (death valley). Depends on where you are and what time of the year it is.

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#89

Post by bdamm »

OrgNet wrote: post #77
whymsicalburito wrote: post #18

Tell that to my water bill, the drought surcharge is still over 50% of the bill...

is it legal to get rain barrels and other types of rain collection systems?

Of course it is generally legal to collect rain from your roof, assuming local HOA rules allow it. But you won’t likely get much quality water from that. Better would be greywater collection and recycling.

Re: California declared drought free for first time in seven years

#90

Post by cjensen »

jcranmer wrote: post #21
djrogers wrote: post #16

And yet we won't be building any more water storage. As a result, we have about the same water capacity to survice the next drought as we had in the 1970s. There were half as many residents then, and climate change wasn't a concern...

Building more water storage doesn't address the fundamental problem that California uses more water than is actually provided by nature (on average).

Just to emphasize this: the southern San Joaquin valley drains to the ocean only during extreme El Niño events. So basically there is no water left to be captured there. The only water left is north of Sacramento, and is needed to keep the SF Bay alive. Sure, the Bay could survive if a little more water was taken, but that wouldn't be enough to solve the problem.
Post reply on HN