this wasnt such an issue before landowners and farmers put in permanent crops in the southern San Joaquin vally. if you plant permant crops in a waterless desert you may experience a drought year.

There is the hypothesis that the Delta has too much water at times that causes floods and levee failures. I agree that it is certainly better to send that excess water southward where it will be productive. The problem with the Pyke plan as I see it is that it is too dependent on climate and rain cycles. What farmers and cities need is a reliable and regular allocation of water that they can take to the bank and invest in crops, water intensive industries, and real estate development where done wisely. Waiting for the water level to rise to some intake stand pipe in the Western Delta will not provide a steady flow of water for a modern society. Letting all of that water flow to the ocean is not good stewardship. Homeowners typically use 70% of their water for landscape irrigation which is often mischaracterized as waste. But that landscaping water also supports urban flora and fauna, urban wildlife, pets, untold number of butterflies, bees, and other wildlife. All the ecological resources in the state are not in raw, pristine areas. CEQA just considers loss of vegetation and wildlife in some remote watershed not the transfer ecological value to urban ecology.

That statement vies with “California will fall into the ocean” for the number one position on the All-Time California Canard list.

They also share similar levels of scientific accuracy.

The core concept of sending more water in wet years and during the rainy winter season and banking in reservoirs more than we currently do makes sense, though. Let’s not “waste” excess water, let’s send it south. The author of this article clearly reflect a southern California bias, but if this water transport capacity is additional to the current capacity, how is SoCal hurt, even if water only flows some parts of the year? It’s still more water, right? There just needs to be a place to put it.

There’s enough water to go around if we are smart about it(and if the Delta Smelt can share). Some crops and agricultural techniques may be too water hungry for the region, and some southern California water conservation may be in order–the world won’t end if there are a few brown lawns in LA. It’s a desert, after all.