Focus
THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE - Oct 10 After years of negotiations, California, Arizona, and Nevada, three of the states that divert water from the lower Colorado River, are nearing an agreement on how to share reductions in water delivery if a shortage is formally declared for the river, which is experiencing drought conditions. Diversions from the river are regulated by a complex system of compacts and water rights that grant priority to California, which has the oldest diversion rights and a 4.4 million-acre-foot per year share, the largest among the three states. In shortage conditions, Arizona and Nevada would normally take the first cuts. Under the proposed pact, California would reduce its diversions earlier in a shortage situation than it would under the existing priorities and agreements. Its diversions would be reduced from 4.5 percent to 8 percent as a shortage progresses.
ASSOCIATED PRESS - Oct 10 Congress has approved a comprehensive bill authorizing funding to improve the nation’s ports, dams, and harbors, protect against floods, restore shorelines, and support other water-related projects. If signed by President Trump, America’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018 would authorize more than $6 billion in spending over 10 years for projects nationwide, including a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) fund that provides states with money to improve drinking water infrastructure. The bill also extends a federal program aimed at improving the drinking water in Flint, Michigan and establishes a new framework for large water projects run by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The changes are intended to increase local input and improve transparency.
THE SACRAMENTO BEE - Oct 5 The U.S. EPA announced last Thursday that it has reached a settlement agreement with University of California-Davis that requires the university to spend $14 million to clean up a 25-acre landfill adjacent to the former Laboratory for Energy-Related Health Research, a cluster of buildings where scientists had studied the impact of radiation on dogs. The research activities ended in 1988, as the Cold War was winding down, and the entire area was placed on the EPA’s Superfund list in the mid-1990s. UC Davis was left to clean up the adjacent landfill. The radioactive materials were cleared away and the laboratory buildings were cleaned years ago, but the site still is contaminated with pesticides, lead, chloroform, and other toxic materials, according to an EPA spokesperson.
THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE - Oct 10 The city of Hemet in Riverside County has filed a federal lawsuit against Dow Chemical and Shell Oil seeking reimbursement for the cost of removing a cancer-causing chemical from the city’s water wells. According to the lawsuit, the contaminated wells have been tainted by 1,2,3-trichloropropane (TCP), a chemical used until the 1980s to fumigate soil where crops were grown. According to a 2017 report on TCP contamination by the national advocacy group Environmental Working Group, the chemical was used in Dow’s Telone pesticide and Shell’s D-D pesticides from the 1950s into the 1980s. Hemet contends that Dow Chemical and Shell Oil were aware that TCP could migrate from the soil and contaminate groundwater.
