To meet demand, locally and around the world, California farmers have covered some 1,600,000 acres in almond trees (if all in one place, the orchard would be a square 50 with sides measuring 50 miles).
An almond croissant with a cappuccino can be an irresistible combination.
Many have criticized growing almonds in California for using too much water in a semi-arid state. After all, it take a gallon to grow a single nut.
It’s important to realize, however, that it simply takes a lot of water to grow food (albeit some foods more than others). Most of us consume far more water through the food we eat than we use in our homes. Agricultural water use in California is roughly 4 times as high as urban use.
In recent decades, California farmers have increasingly turned to almonds and other nuts. Trees do need to be watered every year, so many farmers will plant some acreage in row crops, such as tomatoes, which can be fallowed in dry years. That’s the life of the California farmer, at least many of them.
Noted Arizona State hydrologist Jay Famiglietti puts it mildly, possibly with a bit of sarcasm: “To knowingly go into a region like that and drill deeper wells really tests the limits of corporate ethics. This is coming at us at 100 miles an hour.”
It’s inexcusable.
There ought to be a law. Well, there is, but California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act does not require sustainability until 2040. That’s “the best the legislature could do” when it passed the law in 2014. Sadly, by the time 2040 rolls around, some of the damage will be irreversible.
As Bloomberg points out, the average depth of wells drilled by institutional investors is over 1000 feet. They are sucking the land dry.
Note also, the 110,000 acres planted by the investors in Bloomberg’s article use more water than all the customers in San Francisco’s regional water system.
It’s hard to imagine any elected official defending this abuse of California’s groundwater basins. Yet, collectively, it’s a problem our legislature has been unable to solve.
Hetch Hetchy is a similar example. No one would defend damming a national park today. Many politicians know restoration is the right thing, but are reluctant to take action. Restore Hetch Hetchy is looking for elected officials with the courage to do what we all know is right.
Imagine the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi River, between Fresno and Bakersfield but along the west side of the Central Valley. At 690 square miles, Tulare Lakewas 3 1/2 times the size of Lake Tahoe. Many believe the largest population of native people in what is now the United States lived along the Tulare lake, supported by its plants, fisheries and wildlife.
The Kings, Kaweah, Tule and Kern are the principal Tulare Basin rivers that drain the southern Sierra, historically flowing into terminal lakes. Principal central Sierra rivers such as the San Joaquin, Merced, Tuolumne and Stanislaus flow north toward the Delta, albeit after being mostly diverted for agriculture or direct human consumption. Currently flooded areas are shown in purple.
Beginning around 1870, Americans began to control the waters feeding Tulare lake and to irrigate the productive land, pushing native peoples out. Today, the former lake bed is mostly farms and ranches, but also includes some small towns.
In most years, the rivers feeding Tulare Lake are fully controlled upstream. For the first time in 26 years, however, heavy March rains reached Tulare Lake, breaking levees and flooding farms and homes. People are even more worried, however, about what will happen when the record southern Sierra snowpack melts. (The town of Corcoran, for example, with a population of 22,0000 is taking emergency action to raise its levees.)
Renowned journalist Lois Henry reports that the J.G. Boswell Company has broken levees to flood other farmers and protect is own land, raising additional questions and no small amount of suspicion in advance of the impending snowmelt. (Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America, John M Barry, is a fascinating book which tells a story of breaking levees to divert floodwaters, helping to elect Huey Long as Governor then Senator, Herbert Hoover as President as well as reinvigorate Ku Klux Klan.)
There is concern further north as well. The “capacity” of the Tuolumne River through Modesto, is only about 11,000 cubic feet per second. There is still space in Don Pedro, Cherry and Hetch Hetchy Reservoirs, to absorb some of the spring snowmelt, but a sudden prolonged hot spell, or worse yet a substantial warm rain, could cause flooding along the Tuolumne. (Hetch Hetchy Reservoir does not need to leave space for flood control as that “space” was transferred to New Don Pedro in 1970.)
California is a semi-arid state (well, maybe not this year), always facing challenges to support its population, agricultural sector and natural environment. For most of us, 2023 is a welcome relief and it feels good to be wet again. But the winter’s storms have come at a cost which we will not fully understand until the snow melts.
Hard rain brings Yosemite’s waterfalls to life. Warm rain on snow can cause especially rapid runoff, and severe flooding. Yosemite Valley dodged a bullet last week when the increase in Merced River flow was relatively moderate.
Further south, residents in the Kern River canyon were not so lucky – more below.
Yosemite National Park remains closed, but photos Tueeulala (left) and Wapama Falls were captured through the mist. (unknown source)
Rain and melting low elevation snow feed numerous intermittent waterfalls on the north wall at Hetch Hetchy.
Rainfall amounts were similar March 9th and 10th throughout the southern Sierra, sharply increasing runoff everywhere. But slightly different temperatures at similar elevations in Yosemite Valley, at Hetch Hetchy, and on the Kern River led to very different results.
In Yosemite Valley, the average temperature was 35 degrees. The Merced River at Happy Isles (just down from Vernal Falls) increased fivefold from 140 cubic feet per second (CFS) on March 9 to 724 CFS on March 10.
At 39 degrees, Hetch Hetchy was a bit warmer. Falls Creek at Hetch Hetchy (Wapama Falls) increased tenfold, from 57 cubic feet per second on March 9 to 579 CFS on March 10.
Temperatures on the Kern River were higher – averaging 42 degrees. Flows at Kernville increased more than 34-fold, from 561 CFS on March 9 to an average of more than 19,185 CFS on March 10 (flows exceeded the rating table maximum of 41,400 CFS between 10 am and 6 pm). Homes were destroyed, but sensible residents got out of the river’s way. See video below.
Most of the time, flows on the Kern are smaller than those on the Merced. Many of us recall the devastating 1997 New Year’s Day flood in Yosemite Valley when flows reached 24,600 CFS. Had weather been a few degrees warmer last week, the flooding Yosemite Valley might have been more damaging than it was in 1997.
Let’s keep our fingers crossed that the large storm forecast for this week doesn’t flood Yosemite, the Kern River canyon or, for that matter, anywhere.
Last week, I paid a visit to Hetch Hetchy. I recently joined the team with Restore Hetch Hetchy as Engagement & Development Director. Feeling I needed to speak to the Valley before I could truly begin this work, I drove up from the Bay Area for the day to say hello. I’ve shared the vision of restoration for quite some time, and I’m honored to be on board making it a reality. It was important to me to spend some time with Hetch Hetchy as I step into this new position.
I visited on President’s Day, one of the busiest times for Yosemite National Park. The drive up from the Bay Area was crowded. I was in a line of cars from the moment I got on Highway 120 – up until the moment I pulled off onto the road to Hetch Hetchy.
I anticipated this area of the park to be quiet. It usually is. It was a pleasant surprise that the day-use parking lot had a few more cars than I anticipated. Despite the draw of Yosemite Valley, others shared my desire to spend at least part of their holiday in this underappreciated area of the park! I was encouraged as I began my hike, which would only be a short 5-mile roundtrip to Wapama Falls. Though I would have loved to spend more time with Hetch Hetchy, I was constrained by the limited access hours. I needed to be out of the area before the gate was closed at 5 PM.
The small crowd would dwindle the further out I walked. Many of these visitors would walk onto O’Shaughnessy Dam, gaze out into the reservoir, and leave. A few walked through the tunnel and out to what is considered the trailhead. Fewer still would continue on to Wapama Falls.
There is no trailhead signage or hiking information until you walk through a rather long, dimly lit tunnel at the opposite end of the dam. I wondered how many people were even aware that the hike to Wapama Falls would only take a couple of hours of their time. From the viewpoint of the dam, it seems far away. How would you know otherwise, when there is no obvious trail information in the small part of this area that most visitors stop?
Restore Hetch Hetchy believes that improving the limited recreational access to the area will inspire others to embrace the vision of restoration. By building deeper connection with Hetch Hetchy for people, we are confident that more will understand that a reservoir should not exist in this special place.
We can imagine what Hetch Hetchy used to look like. There are a few photos and paintings from a time before O’Shaughnessy Dam. It was much like its southern twin. The Tuolumne River ran through like the Merced River runs through Yosemite Valley. Its meadows were full of wildlife. The granite walls would have seemed to tower even higher above.
With these things in mind, I walked the trail that lines the reservoir. The effects of the storms that touched California in early January were still evident. Even weeks later, unnamed waterfalls cascaded down the walls of Hetch Hetchy. Streams crossed the trail, flowing down the granite before tumbling off the rocks into the water below.
Before the flooding of Hetch Hetchy, this water would have flowed down to the valley floor. It may have met with the Tuolumne River as it ran through. Instead, I watched it quietly disappear into the reservoir.
After a bit of time, I reached Wapama Falls, where I was only joined by a handful of other hikers. Wapama is as beautiful as the more highly visited waterfalls in the park, such as Yosemite, Vernal, and Nevada Falls. Despite that, it was quiet; enjoyed by just a few even on a holiday. I hope that this can change; that many more people will come to realize an incredible valley much like Yosemite Valley has been lost for a century; that even still, pieces of its beauty remain and can be enjoyed.
At the time of writing this blog, Yosemite National Park is closed due to a winter storm. The 4000 ft. elevation Yosemite Valley is anticipating 55 to 84 inches of snow between today and Wednesday. Hetch Hetchy is forecast to receive only slightly less. This adds onto the above-average snow year the Sierra Nevada has experienced so far.
As I watch the weather forecast for Yosemite, my mind can’t help but wander to the Tuolumne River. My heart has a familiarity with the river, knowing it from much time spent in the high country of the Sierra. It begins with the snow on some of the highest peaks in the park and crosses down through Tuolumne Meadows. Thousands of hikers have come to meet it as the Pacific Crest Trail winds around its path. Many – maybe most – have never seen where it is dammed.
Restore Hetch Hetchy continues towards our goal of increasing access to Hetch Hetchy, encouraging people to discover, re-discover, and enjoy the area. We hope that visitors will imagine the valley restored. Hetch Hetchy can be brought back to its natural state. There are other options for San Francisco’s water storage outside of Yosemite National Park. The Tuolumne River can flow unimpeded if we work for change. It will certainly be an incredible future.
If you’d like to get involved to improve recreational access to Hetch Hetchy, you can sign our letter to Yosemite National Park’s Superintendent here. To learn more, check out Keeping Promises, our document outlining this need for change. Read about recently introduced legislation to improve access here. Hetch Hetchy is currently accessible from 8 AM to 5 PM. Overnight camping is only allowed with a wilderness permit. Boating and swimming in the reservoir are prohibited.
Restore Hetch Hetchy remains primarily focused on restoring Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park while keeping San Francisco and its customers whole with respect to water supply.
There are over one million Californians, however, primarily in agricultural areas, who rely on groundwater that has been contaminated by arsenic, nitrates and other pollutants. RHH supports NGO and governmental efforts to address this unacceptable problem, and we applaud the work that Community Water Center continues to do to make clean drinking water a reality for all communities in the state.
This past Wednesday, Restore Hetch Hetchy, along with other environmental organizations, selected water agencies and elected officials, attended the Water Justice Leadership Awards reception hosted by Community Water Center in Sacramento. Collectively, we celebrated “leaders who have worked tirelessly, often against great odds, to ensure the human right to safe drinking water in California.”
At the awards ceremony, the CWC honored the following for their efforts in the fight for clean water:
Eufemia Hernandez, community leader from North of Moss Landing in Monterey County
La Asociación de Gente Unida por el Agua (AGUA) Coalition
Vecinos Unidos, community leaders from East Orosi in Tulare County
California Environmental Voters
State Senator Bill Dodd, District 3
State Assembly Speaker-Designee Robert Rivas, District 29
The Community Water Center is a grassroots organization that has taken the lead in advocating for solutions to improve drinking water quality. As they state on their website, these contaminants are linked to a myriad of health issues, including cancer.
In 2012, California adopted legislation to recognize the human right to water. The legislation states that “every human being has the right to safe, clean, affordable, and accessible water adequate for human consumption, cooking, and sanitary purposes.” However, even with this recognition, many still do not have drinkable tap water.
The Community Water Center has helped to accomplish numerous projects for these communities – through water treatment, sustainable groundwater management, drought preparedness, water affordability, and contaminant regulation. The CWC has also engaged successfully with policy makers and legislators to work together towards a future where clean water is accessible to everyone in California.
Kudos to the Community Water Center for their hard work and congratulations on their successes to date.
Yosemite National Park is in McClintock’s District
Congressman Tom McClintock has re-introduced the Yosemite National Park Equal Access and Fairness Act, a bill that would allow non-motorized boating, swimming and camping at Hetch Hetchy as well as increase San Francisco’s “rent” for use of the national park.
McClintock’s bill presents an exciting opportunity. Restore Hetch Hetchy is prepared to help build bipartisan support for increased access to the glacier-carved Hetch Hetchy canyon. The bill would provide substantial benefits in the near term as well as inspire visitors to support relocation of the reservoir and restoration of the extraordinary valley.
The bill would also increase San Francisco’s “rent” immediately from $30,000 per year to $2,000,000 per year. A subsequent increase could be much greater as the proposal directs the Department of Interior to consider an increase in rent by the value of foregone recreation had the valley never been flooded.
Many of the recommendations from Restore Hetch Hetchy’s 2021 report – Keeping Promises: Providing Public Access to Hetch Hetchy Valley, Yosemite National Park – are embodied in the bill.
(In addition to $30,000 in rent, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission currently pays Yosemite National Park about $8,000,000 per year in watershed protection and security costs out of its $1,300,000,000 operating budget.)
It’s rewarding to see that research by Restore Hetch Hetchy and others has paid off. The legislation reflects findings of at least three recent reports:
Restore Hetch Hetchy hopes to see a robust discussion of the merits of the proposed legislation and that we will be able to play a helpful and meaningful role in the months ahead.
Restore Hetch Hetchy is not naïve. We understand that this proposed legislation will be embroiled in a larger political debate. We will, as we always have, stay focused on the merits. Hetch Hetchy, Yosemite, and all our national parks, are too important to do otherwise.
The proposed legislation will not deter us from working cooperatively with the National Park Service, so we are still collecting signatures on our letter to Superintendent Muldoon with an updated list of signatories (without addresses and emails), and we expect to meet again with Muldoon and staff in a few months. In addition, we plan to in coming months to file a petition for increased access with the Department of Interior.
If you have not signed the letter to Superintendent Muldoon, please do so now by clicking on the letter below.
Our vision – returning to the people Yosemite Valley’s lost twin, Hetch Hetchy – a majestic glacier-carved valley with towering cliffs and waterfalls, an untamed place where river and wildlife run free, a new kind of national park – remains the same. Increasing access and recreation is an important and necessary step toward restoration.
After a bit of time, I reached Wapama Falls, where I was only joined by a handful of other hikers. Wapama is as beautiful as the more highly visited waterfalls in the park, such as Yosemite, Vernal, and Nevada Falls. Despite that, it was quiet; enjoyed by just a few even on a holiday. I hope that this can change; that many more people will come to realize an incredible valley much like Yosemite Valley has been lost for a century; that even still, pieces of its beauty remain and can be enjoyed.
