Water.....

[Not DJSapp]

Perspective and magnitude. Here's a satellite photo of how the snowpack looks today.

That's Los Angeles at the bottom. ~350 miles up along the coast is San Francisco (about 2/3's of the way up the picture). For scale you can clearly see Lake Tahoe and Mono Lake. The top half of SF bay and the Sacramento River are brown due to the massive amount of run off happening.

That massive 600+ mile long (it extends well above the top of the photo), 90+ mile wide streak of white? That's our snowpack, 1' to 30' deep. That's the volume of water we're talking about, and that's the area that it's spread out across. This is why the 'bUiLD MaoR DamNS aN sTorAgE!' argument is laughed at. Every major watershed on the Sierra already has dams on it, but their primary function is flood control, not storage. Storage is a secondary function. If you're really hell bent on storage, dam the Golden Gate, or dam the Carquinez straight. Flood the entire Central Valley to elevation 100. Suffer the environmental disaster that would follow. But that is the size of what we're talking about here.

Another data point, if you don't like Lake Mead or Winnipeasauke as a unit of measurement, the storm dropped approximately 75% of Lake Ontario on us. So if you want to envision what it might look like, cut and paste that right on over.

[paulster2626]

the storm dropped approximately 75% of Lake Ontario on us.

Wow. I've been sailing on Lake Ontario for 40 years. That is an unimaginable amount of water. Like, I cannot wrap my head around it whatsoever.

[Danno]

thanks DJSapp for bringing the sanity.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

I'm all for draining Hetch Hetchy and rebuilding the terminal moraine in Yosemite valley.

[SumJongGuy]

Perhaps we could build some canals and pumps to The Grand Canyon? Ya, I get that's harder than curing cancer but why not start digging anyway? Wasn't that where an unbelievable amount of water from parts north and west ended up at one time?

[Danno]

Perhaps we could build some canals and pumps to The Grand Canyon? Ya, I get that's harder than curing cancer but why not start digging anyway? Wasn't that where an unbelievable amount of water from parts north and west ended up at one time?

would you please just STFU.

[old goat]

What are the major financial and logistical barriers to digging/damming some massive new man made lakes to capture all this flooding for dryer times ahead each season? Talking mostly about Cali but if Nevada and NM have similar winter flooding why not there too?

We all know there will be less snowpack and more rain instead ahead.. Build dirt based storage since the snowpack doesn't seem to be as viable, especially 50 years from now.

There are 1400 named dams in California. Pretty much any place you could put dam that's seismically sound, and a bunch of places that aren't, already has one. It makes no sense to put a dam on an already dammed river if the original dam isn't filling.

It was sobering to see the test bores in the walls of the Grand Canyon and realize how close it came to being dammed.

BTW, even if we could dam our way out of this the extra supply would just bring more people to drink it all up.

[bodywhomper]

I have heard Congressman McClintock describe the need to dam the Sac Delta, build Auburn Dam, and begin the planning and design for Marysville Dam. Currently, homeboy sits on the Natural Resources Committee, the Federal Lands Subcommittee, and the Water and Power Subcommittee. He also pushes for forestry practices to revert back to 1950.

[PB]

You might enjoy the Dune series of books. Water and Spice. It's all that matters.

Cracka puleeeze ..... you are not wrong, but I read Dune before you were born.

Maybe.

[PB]

I have heard Congressman McClintock describe the need to dam the Sac Delta, build Auburn Dam, and begin the planning and design for Marysville Dam. Currently, homeboy sits on the Natural Resources Committee, the Federal Lands Subcommittee, and the Water and Power Subcommittee. He also pushes for forestry practices to revert back to 1950.

Way to ruin a spectacular day at the 'Bowl.

[Buster Highmen]

There are 1400 named dams in California. Pretty much any place you could put dam that's seismically sound, and a bunch of places that aren't, already has one. It makes no sense to put a dam on an already dammed river if the original dam isn't filling.

It was sobering to see the test bores in the walls of the Grand Canyon and realize how close it came to being dammed.

BTW, even if we could dam our way out of this the extra supply would just bring more golf courses and almond trees to drink it all up.

fify

[John_B]

Perhaps we could build some canals and pumps to The Grand Canyon? Ya, I get that's harder than curing cancer but why not start digging anyway? Wasn't that where an unbelievable amount of water from parts north and west ended up at one time?

That's a good idea.... while you're at it why doesn't Southern California dam all the rivers in Northern California and divert water from the Columbia River. Those three "ideas" make up the triumvirate of stupidity that gets brought up as a solution to SC's water woes.

[Buster Highmen]

That's a good idea.... while you're at it why doesn't Southern California dam all the rivers in Northern California and divert water from the Columbia River. Those three "ideas" make up the triumvirate of stupidity that gets brought up as a solution to SC's water woes.

New proposals involve a transcontinental pipeline from the Mississippi.

[Meadow Skipper]

I remember a (serious) proposal back in the 80s or 90s to pipe water from Alaska to the west coast.

[muted reborn]

Perhaps we could build some canals and pumps to The Grand Canyon? Ya, I get that's harder than curing cancer but why not start digging anyway? Wasn't that where an unbelievable amount of water from parts north and west ended up at one time?

The Great Salt lake is going to be dry in 5 years, why don't we fill it back up with freshwater after that? Then we just gotta dig a canal from the lake and go across Nevada to reach California!

[ötzi]

An icy and mosquito infested swamp? God no.

A muskeg swamp no less.

[ötzi]

The Great Salt lake is going to be dry in 5 years, why don't we fill it back up with freshwater after that? Then we just gotta dig a canal from the lake and go across Nevada to reach California!

Pretty crazy that 40 years ago it was overflowing and they couldn't figure out what to do with the excess water so they built this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newfou...poration_Basin

It's almost like a pilot project for these "save the water" ideas.

[SumJongGuy]

would you please just STFU.

Sure, while I go take a long shower while washing clothes and watering my lawn and washing my car. because we have plenty of water here. End of the day we need to figure out how to get excess water to places a thousand plus miles away that are in deep fucking trouble. Either that or you'll have to fucking move where the fucking water is amirite??

Time for some ridiculous out of the box ideas that will probably never work. Like I said, if you don't start digging somewhere you'll still never have any more water. .. and the fire seasons are also getting worse..

[oldnew_guy]

Spending billions of dollars moving water to hot and dry places (deserts) that are going to get hotter and drier is the stupidest thing in the world.

[ötzi]

Well we don't want those people to move back, it's worth it.

[bodywhomper]

Way to ruin a spectacular day at the 'Bowl.

Must not have been that good :P (I was there on Sunday)

Tommy’s comments are laughable. But I did find a 1950’s era report about the marysville dam a few years ago, ~11,000 long dam crest of the lower Yuba river. Yeah right! Also, remove the listing status of all federally listed salmonids in California except for those in the Eel River watershed.

[MagnificentUnicorn]

Spending billions of dollars moving water to hot and dry places (deserts) that are going to get hotter and drier is the stupidest thing in the world.

Consider the source


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[neufox47]

I can almost see the site of the proposed Auburn Dam from my house. It would have been 45 ft shorter than the Hoover Dam, 4 times as wide and hold 2.3 million acre feet of water. While that sounds impressive Lake Meade holds 28 million.

One crazy thing about it is that they were / are worried that the reservoir could cause an earthquake of up to a 7.0 due to pressing on fault lines. Which is mostly what killed the project.


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[old goat]

So if McClintock dams the Delta does that mean flooding the entire central valley. In which case we wouldn't need the water, with all the people and agriculture gone. Kinda like that O Henry story "Gift of the Magi" everyone used to have to read in school. Or Catch 22. (My inner English major is coming out.)

I believe the prediction was it would take 100 years to fill the Auburn dam. And that was before we started having more frequent, longer droughts.

[bodywhomper]

Tommy is such a piece of shit.

I don’t understand the delta dam concept at all.