Over-pumping Aquifers in Central Valley Of all the states in our great nation , California uses more water from the ground than any other, and up to 80 percent of that water is used for agriculture. This mainly happens as a result of the depletion of the Shasta and Oroville Lakes; the federal government’s main source of water for the Central Valley. Since the drought began four years ago, the farms around the central valley have not been getting the provisions they’ve requested form the state, and as a result, have turned to pumping water out of the reservoirs in the ground. These underground reservoirs are called aquifers, and are among the most valuable resources in California.…
The Ukiah Valley Groundwater Basin is located in the North Coast hydrologic region in Mendocino County, California. In 2009, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) launched the California Statewide Groundwater Elevation Monitoring (CASGEM) Program to monitor groundwater basins (groundwater table elevations) throughout California. DWR developed the CASGEM Groundwater Basin Prioritization process to classify groundwater basins and sub-basins as high, medium, low, or very low priority by using the following criteria: overlying population, projected growth of overlying population, the number public supply wells, the number of total wells, overlying irrigated acreage, reliance on groundwater as the primary source of water, and any impacts the groundwater basin has experienced from overdraft, subsidence, saline intrusion, and or other water quality degradation problems.…
What would happen if California were to run out of water completely, just because the government did not do anything to stop it from happening? Farmers and regular citizens are drilling the ground in search of groundwater. Currently there are no laws restricting or monitoring the amount of groundwater we can use, and without these laws we could run out of water. In order to conserve and save water legislation needs create regulations to monitor and control both citizens and farmers use of groundwater. Due to a lack of regulations regarding groundwater farmers are drilling the ground and taking other people's water.…
California Water Crisis How would you feel if you didn’t have enough water to use the restroom everyday, or if you couldn’t shower for over 6 months? Being that California has been in a gargantuan drought for the past 4 to 5 years, water has been in short supply in more places than not. Farmers claim that they should be allowed unlimited access to the state’s supply of groundwater, solely in view of money crops. Ironically, while farmers are making these claims there are people in these towns, traveling 3 to 6 hours to get a gallon of water to last their families a week. Many believe that there should be regulations and water control considering farmers are complaining that they grow crops to sell,…
In fact, the Central Valley Project is expected to stop distribution this year. Poor resource management has created a bigger issue in addition to the lack of rain. California has been over-distributing water. More water is being assured than nature can supply.…
Water shortage has been a concern especially in the Southwest for many years. We have experienced droughts and shortages throughout American history but, what is causing it and how can we make it better? According to the video “American Southwest: Are We Running Dry?” the main reason for the droughts is that the subtropical dry zone is enlarging and moving towards the north (Thebaut, J. 2008).…
I found Dr. Kurt Schwabe talk on water conservation to be very insightful. The drought is a hot topic all throughout California right now and Dr. Schwabe presented a new perspective that I had not heard before. I occasionally read literature on California drought, so I had some knowledge on this issue already. What I really enjoyed was that he went into detail explaining how municipalities are attempting to handle the water crisis.…
The Study of California’s newest Drought Determining when drought develops is a function of drought impacts and water users. Drought is best sought as a period of dry weather, and extended shortage of water, especially a long one that is injurious to crops. This is a dangerous hydrologic condition that not only concerns water users in the affected area but also in some other locations some water users exempt but not all the way safe. Drought is a abnormal circumstance if it is insistent. Drought is a gradual emergency.…
Consistently, the Mojave Desert faces the many hardships brought on by drought. Drought is a severe shortage of water lasting for a substantial period of time. Drought is one of the results of minimal rainfall. In the Mojave Desert, drought causes issues pertaining to the survival and overall health of native plants and animals. Drought poses as a threat to native wildlife due to the fact that all life requires the presence of water in some form.…
Water is an important part of our lives ,even though it is not the first thing to come to mind, it will always remain our number one necessity. The scarce water source not only puts Texans at war against each other, but it also made people's everyday lives difficult. Water is every living thing's number one necessity, we humans cannot live without it, yet we take advantage of it. Jenna Craig states how in 2007 Texas had a severe drought and how it had its effect on farmers, businesses, communities, and the environment. "The ongoing drought has created real conflicts among water users" (page 1.)…
The Ogallala Aquifer is a reservoir that many farmers have tapped into so that they can water their crops. One fifth of the total US agricultural harvest is grown from the water in the aquifer. With this being said more than 20 billion worth of food and fiber will vanish if the Ogallala Aquifer keeps drying up. Southern Kansas was hit the hardest from the decline of water. It has dropped 150 feet or more forcing farmers to abandon their wells.…
After each basin obtained a rank value, the basin rankings were divided into four ranges to identify the threshold under which a basin would be identified as very low, low, medium, or high priority. The resulting thresholds (Figure 5) were used to classify each basin into very low, low, medium, or high priority. Figure 5. Table used to classify each groundwater basin and subbasin as high, medium, low or very low priority (DWR 2014b). From the CASGEM Groundwater Basin Prioritization Process it was determined that 43 groundwater basins are in high priority, 84 basins in medium priority, 27 basins in low priority, and the remaining basins from the 515 that exist were classified as low priority as of May 2014 (DWR 2014b).…
4. In addition to their water crisis the states infrastructure has long been since allowed to decay and the American society of civil engineers estimates that over the next 20 years California 's drinking water infrastructure will require a 44.5 billion dollar investment while there wastewater infrastructure will demand 22.9 billion dollars to remain functional. 5. California 's water comes a married of places such as aquifers, groundwater, reservoirs, dams and irrigation systems where 80% of that water goes towards agriculture and 20% to urban/residential use.…
The deeper the aquifer, the less ability it has to refill with a portion of them lacking the capability to refill ever "potentially changing how and where we can live and grow food, among other things" (Dimick pg. 3). A report from Stanford University reveals that 60 percent of the water needs from California are coming from Aquifers during years of drought and approximately 40 percent during non-drought years (Dimick pg. 4). Aquifers can predominantly be slowly replenished excluding the occasions these resources are drained. In the instances where the aquifers are drained, they can collapse and cause many ground collapsing events. Brian Howard describes how the water table, level of ground water, has dramatically deteriorated from 500 feet to 1000 feet in Central Valley, and the rate for drilling the wells is at a costly rate of 300,000 dollars per well.(Dimick pg 4).…
A disputed rule initially approved by water regulators in 2013 will get its day in New Mexico Supreme Court on Sept. 28 when the court will hear oral arguments on the so-called Copper Rule. The New Mexico Environment Department says the regulations are among the highest of any copper-producing state in the west, and is balanced between health and economic prosperity. Environmental groups say the regulations violate the Water Quality Control Act and allow mining companies to pollute groundwater, and are asking the courts to require the state to set new regulations to prevent water…