Sacramento River

Land Use/Water Supply Analysis Guidebook

Northern California Water Association | November 13th, 2008

The primary objective of the Land Use/ Water Supply Guidebook (Guidebook) is to provide members of the Northern California Water Association (NCWA) with practical inform

The primary objective of the Land Use/ Water Supply Guidebook (Guidebook) is to provide members of the Northern California Water Association (NCWA) with practical information to assist them with review or preparation of water supply and demand analyses as part of local land use planning processes. Through a broader understanding of the statutory requirements and relevant analytical methods, NCWA members can help ensure that Sacramento Valley land use planning efforts effectively consider water resources management issues. The Guidebook builds upon the successful efforts of the participants in the Sacramento Valley Integrated Regional Water Management Plan (IRWMP), which recognize that rapidly changing water use patterns in the Sacramento Valley are impacting business decisions. At the center of this change in Sacramento Valley water use patterns are the changes in land use in a historically agricultural region, driven primarily by urban development that is relying almost exclusively upon groundwater resources to meet new demands. Additionally, changing cropping patterns and managed wetlands may require additional water supplies. The Guidebook will highlight opportunities to maximize Sacramento Valley water resources and to avoid conflict by identifying the primary processes in California for linking water supply planning and land use planning at the local government level. The Guidebook focuses upon the water supply planning components in relevant land use planning documents, the assumptions used to develop the data and the conclusions, and considerations of the typical scope and depth of the required elements. By clearly identifying the range of reasonable assumptions, water managers, land use planners, special district board members, and local government staff and officials may effectively coordinate their efforts as part of the IRWMP and continue practicing integrated regional water management.

LandFlex Grant Program Guidelines

California Department of Water Resources (DWR) | January 14th, 2023

The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) is administering the LandFlex Grant Program (LandFlex) through DWR’s Sustainable Groundwater Management (SGM) Grant P

The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) is administering the LandFlex Grant Program (LandFlex) through DWR’s Sustainable Groundwater Management (SGM) Grant Program. LandFlex (referred to as Ag Drought Relief) will award funds authorized by the California Budget Act of 2021 (Stats. 2021, ch. 44, § 25). This document contains DWR’s Guidelines and scoring criteria (Guidelines) for LandFlex. Climate change means that California needs to plan for a hotter, drier future. Long-term drought, fueled by climate change, has adversely affected the State’s water supplies, which includes groundwater availbility. In response to the Governor’s California’s Water Supply Strategy, Adapting to a Hotter, Drier Future, DWR will launch the LandFlex Program as a new and innovative tool to protect vulnerable drinking water wells. LandFlex will provide incentives to farmers to limit groundwater pumping in areas near communities reliant on vulnerable drinking water wells before they go dry. LandFlex combines traditional short-term fallowing incentives with the elimination of long-term unsustainable groundwater pumping, a unique approach to groundwater resilience. LandFlex is a program that will provide $25 million in block grants to local government agencies to grant to farmers who limit agricultural water use. Local government agencies will work directly with farmers in critically overdrafted (COD) basins (as identified in Bulletin 118) to identify lands that would reduce pumping impacts to nearby drinking water wells. Through financial incentives to farmers, LandFlex will provide multiple community benefits such as drinking water well relief, groundwater overdraft prevention, and climate resilience.

Landflex Grant Program Guidelines (revised)

California Department of Water Resources (DWR) | October 31st, 2024

LandFlex Program’s Guidelines

California Department of Water Resources (DWR) | December 8th, 2022

LandFlex is a program that will provide $25 million in block grants to local government agencies to grant to farmers who limit agricultural water use. Local government ag

LandFlex is a program that will provide $25 million in block grants to local government agencies to grant to farmers who limit agricultural water use. Local government agencies will work directly with farmers in critically overdrafted (COD) basins to identify lands that would reduce pumping impacts to nearby drinking water wells. Through financial incentives to farmers LandFlex will provide multiple community benefits such as drinking water well relief, groundwater overdraft prevention, and climate resilience. 

Landscape Patterns and Processes of the McCormack-Williamson Tract and Surrounding Area: A framework for restoring a resilient and functional landscape

San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) | March 25th, 2013

This report uses a reconstruction of the historical (early 19th century) Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta landscape in concert with contemporary data to elucidate restoration

This report uses a reconstruction of the historical (early 19th century) Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta landscape in concert with contemporary data to elucidate restoration opportunities and constraints at the McCormack-Williamson Tract and within the surrounding Delta setting. Historical ecology encourages a landscape-level perspective of restoration through improved understanding of how physical processes created and maintained habitat mosaics in the recent past. This perception of landscapes can be used to evaluate current conditions and develop future restoration scenarios. We used the recently completed study of the historical Delta landscape (Whipple et al. 2012) to explore opportunities for the McCormack-Williamson Tract (MWT), a 1,645 acre (6.6 km2) tract along the Mokelumne River (Figure 1 and Figure 2). This site exemplifies the need to balance contemporary constraints to restoration (including existing infrastructure and flood protection concerns) with the goals of landscape-scale restoration. To explore some of the strategies and opportunities available to advance the landscape-scale restoration in the MWT area, three general concepts emerged: increasing landscape complexity, connectivity, and resilience. To understand how to interpret and improve these attributes, we developed conceptual models that placed the site within the larger landscapes of the historical Delta, relating local habitat features to regional controlling physical gradients. This aided interpretation of the contemporary physical landscape and allowed identification of opportunities and constraints to both short-term and long-term landscape-scale restoration. The historical record reveals features such as floodplain lakes, forests on natural river levees, and tidal channels in the study area. These and other features could be strategically incorporated into a restoration vision, or an “operational landscape unit” for this part of the Delta (Verhoeven et al. 2008). This type of perspective can help focus restoration targets, including the relative proportion and placement of different habitat types and landscape elements within project design constraints, maximizing the site’s ecological potential. The landscape-scale approach also identifies opportunities to improve ecological connectivity and long-term adaptability to sea level rise and other environmental changes. Some of these opportunities may be critical to the ecological function and resilience of the area, but may not be able to be addressed in the immediate MWT project design. Thus, a central component of translating a historical landscape perspective to site-scale design is envisioning an adaptable restoration process that spans short-term restoration actions that are possible within the site’s bounds, while maintaining a longer-term vision of what is needed at the landscape scale.

Late Cenozoic Tectonism of the Sacramento Valley, California

U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) | July 15th, 1987

Left Out in Drought: California Fish Impacts of the California Drought on Freshwater Ecosystems

Pacific Institute | September 7th, 2022

California is deep into the third year of another major drought. Rural and urban areas again face water use restrictions and financial losses. Less water and hotter tempe

California is deep into the third year of another major drought. Rural and urban areas again face water use restrictions and financial losses. Less water and hotter temperatures also stress ecosystems, increasing the prevalence of wildfires, air pollution, dry streambeds, and loss of wildlife. Impacts to rural and urban areas frequently mask the disproportionate ecological impacts of the drought and the related policy and management responses that have exacerbated those impacts. The lack of acknowledgement and de- prioritization of ecosystem water needs during drought has led to insufficient actions taken to protect the natural systems on which we all depend.

Lessons from California’s 2012–2016 Drought

American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) | October 1st, 2018

California’s 5-year drought has ended, even as its aftermath lingers. From 2012–2016 much or all of California was under severe drought conditions, with gre

California’s 5-year drought has ended, even as its aftermath lingers. From 2012–2016 much or all of California was under severe drought conditions, with greatly diminished precipitation, snowpack, and streamflow and higher temperatures. Water shortages to forests, aquatic ecosystems, hydroelectric power plants, rural drinking water supplies, agriculture, and cities caused billions of dollars in economic losses, killed millions of forest trees, brought several fish species closer to extinction, and caused inconvenience and some expense to millions of households and businesses. The drought also brought innovations and improvements in water management, some of which will better prepare California for future droughts. This paper summarizes the magnitude and impacts of the 2012–2016 California drought. The paper then reviews innovations arising from the drought in the larger historical context of water management in California. Lessons for California and for modern drought management are then discussed. Droughts in modern, well-managed water systems serving globalized economies need not be economically catastrophic, but will always have impacts and challenges, particularly for native ecosystems. In California and every other water system, droughts usefully expose weaknesses and inadequate preparation in water management. In this regard for California, managers of ecosystems and small rural water supplies had the most to learn.

Lessons from the Oroville dam

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) | March 17th, 2017

California has experienced tremendous amounts of precipitation in the past few months, leading to the wettest year on record (as of mid-rainy season) immediately afte

California has experienced tremendous amounts of precipitation in the past few months, leading to the wettest year on record (as of mid-rainy season) immediately after a 5-year record-setting drought over the region. On 7 February 2017, the Oroville dam, the tallest dam in North America, suffered damage when unexpected sediments, intensified by floods in a drought-stricken area, can substantially affect the operation of hundreds of dams and levees in California.

Letter from National Marine Fisheries Service: Re: Proposed Modification to the Annual Review Schedule Required as Part of the Reasonable and Prudent Alternative in the National Marine Fisheries Service’s 2009 Biological Opinion on the Coordinated Long-term Operation of the Central Valley Project and State Water Project (June 30, 2016)

Delta Stewardship Council (Delta Council) | June 30th, 2016