The water in California’s mountain snowpack is just shy of average as spring begins, but a winter storm set to hit the Sierra Nevada in the coming days will offer a boost.
Nearly all of the state’s reservoirs are above their historic capacity and the biggest ones, including Shasta and Oroville in the north, are more than 80% full, state data shows. Three storms are poised to hit Northern California this week and next after an already wet winter and the state also has been able to count on water stored up during the past two years of ample rain and snow, experts said.
“Because the last few years were reasonably good, the state’s major reservoirs started off with a decent amount of water and today are all starting the dry season with stored water at, or above, normal for this time of year,” said Peter Gleick, co-founder of the Oakland-based Pacific Institutes.
The state’s relatively benign outlook comes after a punishing drought several years ago that forced severe cutbacks in water usage in cities and on farms.
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Most of Southern California is once again in moderate to extreme drought after a winter with little rain and snow, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. But thanks to abundant precipitation up north, the state has ample water in reservoirs and a strong snowpack.
The Trump administration has taken a keen interest in California’s water situation, vowing to ensure farmers can tap what they need from a federally run water system in order to continue growing much of the country’s fresh fruit and vegetables.
California began this year with a solid start to the winter snowpack, which measured about 89% of average this week, according to the state’s Department of Water Resources.
California
There has been abundant precipitation in the northern part of the state, while Southern California has had a dry winter. In anticipation of more winter weather up north, state officials expedited plans to Friday to conduct an annual survey of the April snowpack in the Sierra Nevada.
The snowpack, which provides about a third of the water used each year in California, melts in the spring and runs off into rivers and streams. California has built a complex state-run system of canals and dams to capture and store the water in reservoirs for the hot, dry months when it doesn’t rain or snow.
Allocations from the State Water Project, which provides water to 27 million people and 750,000 acres (303,514 hectares) of farmland, are currently at 40% of requested supplies, much like last year. Users received a full allocation during rainy 2023 and just 5% amid drought a year earlier.
Jennifer Pierre, general manager of the State Water Contractors, said she thinks California officials could have released more water this year and wants to see more nimble decision-making in response to rapidly changing conditions.
“We do have this mismatch between hydrology and the allocation, and what are the different physical and policy changes that need to be made to address that,” Pierre said.
Gleick, of the Pacific Institute, said California farmers always want more water than the environment can provide.
“We should never let a good water year let us become complacent,” Gleick said. “We never have enough water to waste.”
