If only we built reservoirs to keep the water for the drought years it would be great news.
The problem isn't storage capacity. It's wasteful consumption growing water-intensive crops in the desert.
crops are kind of important though
California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
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Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#102And is the only state with no drought right now. Although they way they figure it is a bit biased -- it's based on how much water there is compared to historical values, so it's easier to be "drought free" if you've been in a drought for a while.
Yeah hey but for real. The news is focused on California droughts all the time, but my part of flyover country is very, very dry. Like ponds that have never been empty are dry, sort of thing. It's getting bad. . . And we grow all your food. Between this and all the political nonsense that's happening right now, I feel like a passenger that's noticed the car is out of control while the driver is still opening his beer…
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Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#103The dams in california were built years ago for a smaller population and since then they've only removed them. If we simply built like the people who first came to california did we would never have water shortages again. Any water shortage is a 1:1 failure of the state to do the clear and obvious task needed.
dams have trade offs that they stop sediment outflows which can cause faster erosion. this is a big reason many california beaches have gone from mostly sandy to mostly rocky
Yeah, and with California's typical topography (relatively younger mountains), there's a lot of sediment at the ready than can fill dams and render them worse than useless -- i.e., costs money, loses capacity fast, alters river and coast.
E.g.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matilija_Dam#History
> Almost immediately after construction, the dam began silting up. The dam traps about 30% of the total sediment in the Ventura River system, depriving ocean beaches of replenishing sediment. Initially, engineers had estimated it would take 39 years for the reservoir to fill with silt, but within a few years it was clear that the siltation rate was much faster than anticipated.
There are similar sites all over the state. If you happen to live in the LA area, the Devil's Gate Dam above Pasadena is another such (but originally built for flood control, not for storage).
It's just not as easy as GP comment imagines.
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#104Yeah cause Trump made them stop dumping the water into the ocean
Or maybe the 6th greatest year of rainfall in the last hundred years.
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#105Went to Badwater Basin in Death Valley last week and there's miles of (bad) water. Unfortunately the Park Service but the kibosh on paddle boarding, etc. Should be a good bloom this spring.
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#106The dams in california were built years ago for a smaller population and since then they've only removed them. If we simply built like the people who first came to california did we would never have water shortages again. Any water shortage is a 1:1 failure of the state to do the clear and obvious task needed.
Water policy isn't as simple as you might think. Dams aren't a magical fix, they cause a lot of issues (like crashing the salmon populations, etc.). They're expensive to build and maintain, and the water you store in a big reservoir doesn't magically stay in place - you lose a lot to evaporation and you lose a lot that ends up going into the groundwater system. A much bigger part of the problem is western water law,…
Thanks for contributing these insights. Having worked with hydrologists for 15 years or so -- water is complicated, and people who say there are simple solutions generally do not know the domain.
A moment's reflection should make this clear. It's such a fundamental resource, touching everything we do. We just tend to take it for granted.
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#107In other arid areas, people use terracing on hills so the water runoff is slowed and the water can soak into the aquifers. Also, dikes are built around fields to hold the water and also let it soak into the ground.
Are these done in California?
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#108Makes for a catchy headline, but you only have to go back to Jan 9, 2024* to find a similarly 'drought free' California:
https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Maps/CompareTwoWeeks.aspx
(*Technically slivers of the state in the far north/south were 'abnormally dry' in 2024, a small difference from 2026)
Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#109Re: California is free of drought for the first time in 25 years
#110I hope no one takes his headline as good news. Because it really signals dramatic changes in moisture in the atmosphere due to climate change.