A Fresno nonprofit linked to the largest agricultural water district in the country filed a federal lawsuit alleging San Francisco and other Bay Area communities are unfairly exempted from water cutbacks meant to protect endangered species. The Center for Environmental Science, Accuracy and Reliability alleges that freshwater diversions from the Tuolumne River are jeopardizing endangered
In what is believed to be a first, the Department of Water Resources and U.S. Bureau of Reclamation are asking the state board that oversees water rights to investigate water diversion practices by farmers in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The two powerful water agencies say they suspect farmers are taking water released from upstream dams and intended for consumers in
World food production is undergoing a sweeping transformation in California -- the nation’s biggest agricultural state by value -- driven by a three-year drought that climate scientists say is a glimpse of a drier future. The result will affect everything from the price of milk in China to the source of cherries eaten by Americans. It
Grocery Manufacturers Launch Sustainability Public Affairs Initiative http://www.gmaonline.org/file-manager/Sustainability/GMAEnvironmentalSuccessStories2014_FINAL.pdf
A little less than half of Americans, 45%, actively try to include organic foods in their diets, while 15% actively avoid them. More than a third, 38%, say they "don't think either way" about organic foods. http://www.gallup.com/poll/174524/forty-five-percent-americans-seek-organic-foods.aspx
Once-teeming Lake Mead marinas are idle as a 14-year drought steadily drops water levels to historic lows. Officials from nearby Las Vegas are pushing conservation, but are also drilling a new pipeline to keep drawing water from the lake. Hundreds of miles away, farmers who receive water from the lake behind Hoover Dam are preparing
Farmers use water to grow our food, a basic need. No water, no farming, no food. Farmers have been stewards of our natural resources for generations, and have provided jobs and commerce. Despite California’s extensive aqueduct system, the current drought has severely strained surface water supplies. As a result, groundwater is being pumped out at
In exchange for blocking flows, the government gave the Miller and Lux group, which was renamed the San Joaquin River Exchange Contractors, a guaranteed supply from the delta and, if that wasn't available, first dibs on the water held back by the dam. Jonas Minton, a water policy adviser for the Planning and Conservation League,
Three years before the California drought became a crisis, national berry giant Driscoll’s, on the Central Coast, knew it had a major problem with water. It was disappearing. Water rights lawsuits had become commonplace, water rates were rising again and the precious liquid seemed to be vanishing before growers’ eyes. Groundwater, which provides all of
This is a desalination plant -- a pilot project, started up this summer and doing what no similar plant has been able to do yet on the Valley's west side. It's filtering crop drainage water laden with enough contamination to sterilize the ground or foul a river. Underwritten by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the