How Would More Delta Water Pumping Affect Fish?

Here’s a good report from New Deeply’s Water Deeply website on the potential impact on the Sacramento-San Joaquain Delta’s fish population as the Trump administration suggests more water will be distributed to farmers.

Here’s some of Alastair Bland‘s piece:

While the state’s agricultural community has welcomed the proposal, issued by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation on December 29, fishery advocates have not. They warn that pumping more water out of the Delta will threaten the survival of imperiled salmon runs, as well as the critically endangered Delta smelt.

“Chinook salmon and other fish and wildlife species native to California are already teetering on the brink of extinction because too much water is being diverted from the Delta,” said John McManus, executive director of the Golden Gate Salmon Association, which lobbies to protect rivers, salmon and fishers. He said further reducing the amount of water flowing through the Delta could directly reduce the survival of young salmon, which are born in the upper reaches of the Central Valley’s rivers and depend on strong outflows to safely reach the sea.

Erin Curtis, a spokesperson for the Bureau of Reclamation, says her agency will collaborate with federal and state fishery agencies to ensure that endangered species are not harmed by changes to pumping operations in the federally run Central Valley Project, which she says could occur within a year.

In its late-December “Notice of Intent,” the bureau described a plan “to maximize water deliveries and optimize marketable power generation.” Following this would require “potential modifications to the operation of the Central Valley Project, in coordination with California’s State Water Project.” The Central Valley Project is a system of pumps and canals that handle about half of the water that is diverted from the Delta. The State Water Project, operated by the California Department of Water Resources, also exports Delta water and sends it mostly to cities.

The Trump administration’s bid to take more water from the Delta, which would mostly benefit farmers on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley, could cause friction between different regulating agencies. The State Water Resources Control Board has considered reducing total pumping by updating its Water Quality Control Plan, a document aimed in part at protecting salmon and other fish. In 2015, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service discussed taking formal action to boost struggling salmon populations.

It’s a good full read.