Remember, much of the state is still in a drought and so the prudence is warranted.. This November, a group of environmental advocates will put forth a ballot measure that would require the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission to develop a plan to drain Hetch Hetchy. If we reach 100% after the current rains and then it stops raining for the season, then our percentage will start going down. This is my first year watching the levels, so maybe Im missing something. One acre-foot is the equivalent of one acre of land covered in one foot of water. This other page: https . The state's second-largest reservoir, Lake Oroville in Butte County, saw especially dramatic gains with a 30.4-foot rise in the water level and a 182,625-acre-foot increase in the total amount of water, data posted Tuesday from the California Department of Water Resources showed. Navigation and Navigable Waters 33.208.82 Hetch Hetchy, Cherry Valley, and Don Pedro Dams and Reservoirs. I will take a look and see if there are other important reservoirs missing and may add them in the future. mobilewarn(); That cant be right. System for more than 60 percent of their drinking water. I second that request. She is a University of Washington graduate. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. A wet December produced ample snowfall, which is still sitting at high elevations. Draining Hetch Hetchy without depriving Bay Area residents of Crystal Springs Reservoir, along Highway 280 in San Mateo County, was 89 percent . David Rizzardo, hydrology section manager for the California Department of Water Resources, said there are a lot of factors that affect reservoir storage. Reservoir levels rising. The remaining 15 percent of water comes from runoff in the Alameda and Peninsula watersheds. And more work is underway. United States. Compared to the historical snowpack for this time of year, the May 2021 survey shows that we are only 2 to 5 percent of normal. That includes the Tuolumne River, which provides water via Hetch Hetchy Reservoir to Bay Area customers. Previously, Kellie covered dining news and trends, visual arts, events and nightlife for the Arizona Republic, and freelanced for the former Contra Costa Times. In whats known as the Bay-Delta Plan, state water regulators are amid a years-long effort to negotiate a policy for how much water should be kept in rivers that flow to the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to meet the needs of both people and wildlife. Thats enough to supply the citys service area for perhaps seven years. Usually with warm ARs, you get a dramatic increase in inflow, which can fill even very large reservoirs relatively quickly, like Oroville in 2017. It is also the amount of water in a cube that is 352 feet per side (about the length of a football field). In 2021, the SFPUC and the Modesto and Turlock Irrigation Districts launched a proactive pilot program with the U.S. This was helpful to project seasonal trends & storm impacts. The reservoir was at 75 percent capacity as of May 5, totaling 269,963 acre-feet of water (an acre-foot is nearly 326,000 gallons). Are they releasing water to relieve the pressure in anticipation of more water? Could you also show each reservoirs level as a function of time? The source water from SFPUC is typically from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir located in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Sometimes this is well done sometimes it is poorly done. Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite National Park is seen in 2022. window.addEventListener("orientationchange", function() { The recent spate of storms lifted the statewide snowpack to 190% of average for the start of the month, and more snow is on the way. "Soils that have become hydrophobic due to wildfire can also contribute to increased runoff because the water is less able to penetrate the burned soil," the department said. A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the Generation at Holm powerhouse below Cherry Lake would be less affected. Northern California's reservoir levels continued to rise in the week after an atmospheric river slammed the state with torrential rain and high winds. In another sign that Californias drought is easing, San Francisco captured more than a years worth of water in just one months time. Yoohyun Jung is the Deputy Data Editor for The San Francisco Chronicle. Interesting. Trinity Lake, with a capacity of 2,447,650 acre-feet, had the smallest increase, from 29% in December to 30% in January. Important Legacy real-time page. The water transmission system in the Bay Area and Peninsula includes the Bay Division, San Andreas, Sunset Supply, and Crystal Springs pipelines. How Much Water is in California Reservoirs? The blue line indicates the reservoirs water level one year ago today. I like the comparisons of last year, and the historical average. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. This chart only shows reservoirs filled via natural flow/rainfall. Is the Stanley Quencher tumbler worth its TikTok hype? Since June 2011, the Water Enterprise has operated the Citys Emergency Firefighting Water System (EFWS, formerly known as the Auxiliary Water Supply System (AWSS)), an independent, high-pressure water supply system for fire suppression. I would turn this graph, 90 counterclockwise, and start the capacity along the bottom axis from left to right, with the biggest reservoirs on the left and the smaller ones on the right. it will be cool if there is a way to track the change since Dec or some such date. Its great seeing all the reservoirs in California at or near historical averages. UPDATE: Here's where California reservoir levels stand after this week's rains. I am grateful for all that you have done here to open our eyes to what is happening, what has happened, and even what might be on the horizon. This dashboard is great! The Hetch Hetchy reservoir, which supplies water for San Francisco and other parts of the Bay Area, was at 77% of its 360,000-acre-feet storage capacity in January compared to 73% in December, and on Feb. 7, it was up to 82%. It was my first time using D3 and it took me a long time to get up to speed. The Water Education Foundation is a nonprofit, tax-exempt, The data on water storage comes from the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) Data Exchange Center. She was previously an engagement reporter. environmental context. The SFPUC has voiced concerns with the Plan, as it would dramatically reduce the agencys water supply, leaving it subject to significant rationing in droughts and more extreme weather conditions brought on by climate change. Also, do they provide inflows and outflows for locations? Central Valleyfarms have installed enough drip irrigationstrips to reach the moon and back, an improvement that also enables more efficient application of fertilizer and pesticides. Folsom is like an overflow tank. What happened to the Hetch Hetchy level? Before returning to the Bay Area, she held roles as transportation reporter and trending news reporter at the IndyStar in Indianapolis. Curt, Good point re the colder weather dropping more snow instead of rain at higher elevations this year. While it may seem that Decembers production could get us through the rest of the season, Rizzardo explains that in hydrology, you need consistent water shed to keep soils happy. He fears that without more precipitation this season, well enter our third very dry year. It updates hourly using data from the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) website, giving an up-to-date picture of California reservoir levels. California reservoir levels: . But Sites would be what's called an off-channel . How can I apply to SFPUC? My guess would be that the recent systems have been cold and so they are predominantly dropping snow on the watershed. Restore Hetch Hetchys subsequent appeal to the ruling was Check out my **new combined California reservoir and snowpack visualizer** to compare to historical values, as well asthe California precipitation tracker and California snowpack visualizer. Ive looked at reservoir sights for years. earthquake. It used to be full (and beyond). Generation at the Kirkwood power plant would depend on the natural flow of the Tuolumne River, and would be significantly diminished during late summer and fall. Steve Ritchie, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission's assistant general manager for water, said the additional water amounted to roughly 11% of the reservoir's total capacity. According to the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, Hetch Your tools are awesome just hurts when you receive bad data at times! How do I contact support? Kudos to the designers. The overall storage is said to have dropped by 57.4 to 56.4 (or 302 kaf). and maybe another vertical axis to the right of that with reservoir capacity. Next feature request: wire in aquifer level data! If we reach 100% after the current rains and then it stops raining for the season, then our percentage will start going down. It was at 60 percent as of March 1 and rising, according to the Bureau of Reclamation. The valley is If you are on a computer, you can hover your cursor over a reservoir and the dashboard at the top will provide information about that individual reservoir. The 1913 Raker Act authorized the unprecedented dam inside the park and also set the fee that the city pays to rent the entire valley in which the dam sits: $30,000 per year. For detailed analysis of how San Franciscos water system will operate without Hetch Hetchy reservoir, see the Environmental Defense Funds studiesParadise RegainedandCherry Intertie Alternative. For perspective, water demand across the SFPUC's service area of 2.7 million people was about 205,000 acre-feet last fiscal year. It can take several days to see the full impact on reservoirs as water continues to run through watersheds and into streams in the days after a storm. Privacy Policy | 2011-2021 San Francisco Public Utilities Commission. Lake Almanor isnt controlled by DWR for flood/supply. Lake Oroville. Our reservoirs were alarmingly low. generates electricity for the city). The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is involved in on-going negotiations with the State on a voluntary agreement for implementation of the Bay-Delta Plan, which calls for large increases in water releases on the tributaries to the San Joaquin River, a major tributary to the Bay-Delta. Monitoring location 11275500 is associated with a LAKE, RESERVOIR, IMPOUNDMENT in TUOLUMNE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA. Hetch Hetchy Level before the storm: 3,729.68 feet Level after the storm: 3,750.99 feet Total rise: 21.31 feet Storage before the storm: 221,500 acre-feet Storage after the storm: 257,800. located in a national park and it passed the Raker Act in 1913 to River. Required fields are marked *. do so. To reach Hetch Hetchy, you have to exit Yosemite National Park and re-enter it. lawsuit, saying Restore Hetch Hetchys arguments were preempted It certainly looks dry at least until the last week in February, he said. Especially for small ones it is hard to identify them and click on them. It didnt end the drought, but it was definitely really good," said Ritchie. and its snowmelt-fed water supply, water from Hetch Hetchy Trailhead address: Evergreen Road (Hetch Hetchy Road), Yosemite National Park, CA 95321. Units are in kaf, thousands of acre feet. This is a marimekko (or mekko) graph which may take some time to understand if you arent used to seeing them. In 2016, a Tuolumne County Superior Court judge dismissed the In the year prior to Oroville reaching capacity the interactive chart showed the rate of inflow over time. ) or https:// means youve safely connected to the .gov website. For perspective, water demand across the SFPUCs service area of 2.7 million people was about 205,000 acre-feet last fiscal year. Its essential to understand that the dispute over San Franciscos use of Hetch Hetchy is not about the use of water only how it is stored. I find myself coming back to this every few days to check on our water . It could be the 180% of historical average of snowpack, which will be melting in a couple months. https://cdec.water.ca.gov/dynamicapp/QueryDaily?s=SHA . The dam and reservoir are the source for the Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct, which provides water for over . No it is correct. //this function is called from the javascript from within the iframe after the contents of iframe are loaded (and after an additional 150ms delay) required on whether to demolish OShaughnessy Dam. I have wanted to do exactly this plot for years. Awesome work!! Located in the northwest portion of Yosemite National Park, Hetch Great work. A dry January with little rainfall across much of Northern California actually didnt hurt the states water storage levels, according to data from the California Department of Water Resources. Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite was 69 percent full on Tuesday, 150 percent of normal for this time of year. Yes, and why is Twitchell Dam also not listed? Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. 2013, photo, the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir is hazy with smoke . For most of the year it will still be possible to divert the flow of the Tuolumne River into the pipeline just downstream of the National Park boundary. The height of the row indicates how much water the reservoir could hold. Its supposed to be brown. Read more about the data team and their work. https://waterdata.usgs.gov/monitoring-location/11275500/#parameterCode=00054&period=P7D. Delivery rates are 7-day average values. As the system aged, especially in an era of heightened safety awareness following the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989 and drought in the 1990s, it became evident that the system required a complete overhaul. The SFPUC hoards water in dry years when they dont need to, said Peter Drekmeier, policy director at the conservation group Tuolumne River Trust. thanks. globe.height = globe.contentWindow.document.body.scrollHeight+40+"px"; I think the problem is with the CDEC database (as the LakesOnline website also has had incorrectly high information). Thanks for the link. However, I am interested in how much we are saving. Thanks for putting this together. This is a very clear graph and I cannot imagine the hours you have put in while setting it up and doing the maintenance. The water is delivered by a gravity-based system and aqueduct to Thanks for providing it for public information. If you click on the list button in the top right of the dashboard, it will show a list of the reservoirs (in order of size from largest to smallest) and you can check which ones you would like to display. The only improvement I would ask you to consider is to allow the Y-axis to be Linear or Log, the latter allowing us to see all the small reservoirs quite easily. You dont see runoff right away, the snow is still up there, frozen, doing what we want it to do, he said. The snowpack there, which will eventually melt and flow into reservoirs, is already bigger than the average peak snowpack, which typically comes around April 1. Diamond Valley Lake is a man-made storage reservoir for storing imported water only. Twenty of San The OShaughnessy Dam, which was completed in 1938 and is 430-feet tall, impounds water in Hetch Hetchy Reservoir for communities in the Bay Area. Just in case a large storm hits, that way they dont reach 100% capacity. Ill pass it along to friends. a broad meaning that had been previously applied in an Restore Hetch Hetchy intends to undo this Great American mistake, and return the valley to Yosemite National Park and all people. She was born and raised in the Bay Area and got her start in news at the Daily Californian newspaper at UC Berkeley where she majored in English literature. Why is Lake Nacimiento and Lake San Antonio not listed? We provide water directly to customers in San Francisco and wholesale through 26 Water agencies in Alameda, Santa Clara, and San Mateo counties. . Located within the boundaries of Yosemite National Park, the reservoir saw a sizable 21.31-foot bump in its water level and gained 36,300 acre-feet, according to Tuesday data from the U.S. Geological Survey. ) or https:// means youve safely connected to the .gov website. You can also share a custom URL by clicking the Save URL button which will put the custom URL into the URL bar of your browser which you can then copy and share. Hours: Year-round, but only accessible by car when the Hetch Hetchy Road is open. Historical average is near unattainable these days. This local water is captured in reservoirs located in San Mateo and Alameda counties. BAWSCA agencies advocated for the capital improvement program that was adopted by the SFPUC in 2002, and are actively monitoring its implementation. One of the most impressive was Hetch Hetchy, which provides drinking water to 2.6 million people in San Francisco and other Bay Area communities. This system encompasses more than 1,250 miles of distribution pipelines, as well as 12 in-City reservoirs and eight water tanks with a total storage capacity of approximately 413 million gallons. For the higher elevations, more of their water comes directly from snowmelt. Park visitors walk across OShaughnessy Dam in Yosemite National Park on Sept. 1. Id love to see how much water is being / has been released from these reservoirs. Maybe just acre/ft with ^ or down arrow. The remaining 15 percent of water comes from runoff in the Alameda and Peninsula watersheds. The question was, what constitutes unreasonable method of The BAWSCA agencies are therefore key stakeholders in ensuring the system serves as a reliable source of high quality water. In addition, San Francisco receives approximately one-tenth of its power from hydroelectricity generated by the gravity-driven flow from the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. I have to agree with many people here what a great job making such a clear graph of whats happening. The citys water system also includes a water bank at Don Pedro Reservoir along the Tuolumne River, which was full as of Feb. 1. Super frustrating. Last week, I paid a visit to Hetch Hetchy. Water data back to 1930 are available online. The group says the recent plethora of water shows that the city could do without Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, by using other storage facilities that have filled and pursuing new projects to capture the surplus. This is the best one out there. Its fluctuating between ~107% and ~20% from one hour to the next (reading 107.6 atm). Over the summer, Gov. I recently joined the team with Restore Hetch Hetchy as Engagement & Development Director. If you look at the inflow data on the major reservoirs, its pretty flat. Locked padlock Californias largest water agencies, in both the urban and agricultural sectors, have invested in ambitious groundwater banking programs inKern County. ", The difference in soil type in the two watersheds was likely another factor. the city wastes water, so it was a moot issue. Great stuff. At this facility, which is shared with other water agencies, the city can stash water for credits against future draws on the river. dam and restoring the valley. Thank you for the time and effort in creating the graphs. But it has flooded nine miles of a glacier-carved valley and blocks access to the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne and other nearby areas. California boosts water deliveries to highest level in years, thanks to storms, California reservoir levels: Charts show water supply across the state, Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area. "It is unknown how much area of the Feather River and Shasta Lake drainages are impacted by hydrophobic soils.". The area around Shasta has more volcanic soils that absorb rainfall than the Feather River drainage. In response to the Bay-Delta Plan, the SFPUC and the Modesto and Turlock Irrigation Districts have proposed the Tuolumne River Voluntary Agreement, a combination of flow and non-flow measures sufficient to improve all life-stages of native fish populations in the lower Tuolumne River. Emissions must be offset by dedicated conservation programs or renewable energy generation such as wind or solar. Lake ShastaLevel before the storm on Oct. 22: 882.57 feetLevel after the storm on Nov. 1: 885.47 feetTotal rise: 2.9 feet, Storage before the storm: 970,859 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 1,001,879 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 31,020 acre-feet, Lake OrovilleLevel before the storm: 630.80 feetLevel after the storm: 661.20 feetTotal rise: 30.4 feet, Storage before the storm: 799,638 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 982,263 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 182,625 acre-feet, Hetch HetchyLevel before the storm: 3,729.68 feetLevel after the storm: 3,750.99 feetTotal rise: 21.31 feet, Storage before the storm: 221,500 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 257,800 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 36,300 acre-feet, Trinity LakeLevel before the storm: 2,209.55 feetLevel after the storm: 2,213.22 feetTotal rise: 3.67 feet, Storage before the storm: 648,675 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 672,930 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 24,255 acre-feet, Folsom LakeLevel before the storm: 370.28 feetLevel after the storm: 390.33 feetTotal rise: 20.05 feet, Storage before the storm: 214,225 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 318,577 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 104,352 acre-feet, New Melones LakeLevel before the storm: 916.28 feetLevel after the storm: 917.09 feetTotal rise: 0.81 feet, Storage before the storm: 822,619 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 827,786 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 5,167 acre-feet, Don PedroLevel before the storm: 723.96 feetLevel after the storm: 727.41 feetTotal rise: 3.45 feet, Storage before the storm: 970,226 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 995,836 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 25,610 acre-feet, McClureLevel before the storm: 663.70 feetLevel after the storm: 672.27 feetTotal rise: 8.4 feet, Storage before the storm: 180,900 acre-feetStorage after the storm: 198,467 acre-feetTotal storage increase: 17,210 acre-feet.