Plan for large state reservoir gets big boost

[Auggie]

The effort to build California’s largest new reservoir in decades has received a welcome commitment of cash — nearly $220 million — which will help keep the project on track to break ground as soon as next year.

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The California Water Commission, a state advisory board, decided on the bond allocations at its regular monthly meeting Wednesday. Two other water projects, a groundwater banking program in Kern County and a combined water treatment-groundwater facility in the Inland Empire, were awarded lesser amounts of the bond funds.

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The 13-mile-long Sites Reservoir, if built, would be the biggest reservoir constructed in California since New Melones Lake in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties in 1978. The project would expand water storage in preparation for a potentially hotter, drier future.

The new facility would hold up to 1.5 million acre-feet of water, enough to supply more than 3 million households annually. Perched across a sparsely populated valley where cattle now graze, it would be the eighth largest reservoir in California.

Story (paywall): https://www.sfchronicle.com/california/article/sites-reservoir-funds-20823190.php

According to the link, the biggest beneficiaries of the new reservoir look to be as follow:

• The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which is providing most of the funding

• Tri-Valley’s Zone 7 Water Agency (Bay Area)

• Santa Clara Valley Water District

• The federal government

Several groups and tribes oppose granting the water rights, saying the project could potentially hurt salmon runs and degrade water quality downstream.