Posts From Wayne Lusvardi
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Smelt suit threatens water markets
On June 11, 2014, a coalition of sports fishermen and Northern California groundwater users filed a lawsuit to stop a water transfer from Shasta Lake to California’s parched Central Valley. The basis of the suit is to protect the
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Feinstein backfills some water for Central California
Sen. Dianne Feinstein is coming through with her promise to backfill Central Valley farmers water they lost as part of her San Joaquin River Restoration Act of 2009. Replacement farm water should have been provided before any diversions of farm
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Independence Day from foreign energy?
As today we celebrate America’s independence from Great Britain, it might also be time to celebrate our independence from foreign energy. Alas, California isn’t playing its part. During the 1973 Arab Oil Embargo and the 1979 Iranian Revolution, there were
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CA Dems balk at Cap and Trade cost
With gas prices soaring again, consumers are rebelling. And even liberal Democrats in California are seeking to help their constituents. Assemblyman Henry Perea, D-Fresno, spearheaded the writing of a June 16 letter signed by 16 Democratic assembly members to California
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Water shortage could bring electricity grid failure
California’s Big Three energy regulating agencies just warned in a joint letter to the California Water Resources Control Board that planned water curtailments for 2014 would present a danger to grid reliability and create “substantial potential for serious public health and
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Water bond drowns in Legislature
A $10.5 billion water bond apparently drowned in the California Senate this past week for the third time since 2010, even though the Central Valley faces a dire drought this summer. But the Legislature still might perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and waive the
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Brown cuts down size, scope of water bond
Would half a water bond sell better to voters than the full $11 billion bond scheduled to be on the ballot in November? That’s what’s now before the California Legislature in a new proposal from Gov. Jerry Brown. In 2009
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GOP wants water conveyance in bond
Will Gov. Jerry Brown’s Twin Tunnels project for the California Delta still make it into the $11 billion water bond projected for the November election? It’s still possible. The bond has been postponed twice already because legislators didn’t think it would
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CA hydropower advances
To service California’s electricity market, hydropower finally is advancing. Currently, California needs to import cheap, water-based electricity hydropower from nearby states to bail out its power grid when solar power fades out at the sunset hours of each day. So
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CA added just 5 dams since 1959
Has California built any dams in the past 55 years as its population has more than doubled – and as a drought rages? Yes – but not by the state. Peter Gleick of the Pacific Water Institute recently stirred the
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