Forgot your password?
New user?
Document Actions
Tapping the Sierra Nevada Reservoir
This article describes some history and limitations pertaining to California's surface water supply that originates from the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
California's present population of 34.5 million is expected to climb to 47.5 million by 2020. Today, every suitable site for a major dam has been developed in the Sierra Nevada river canyons. Rivers have been transformed into reservoirs, with much of their water now traveling through irrigation ditches and city pipes, rather than along wetland corridors to coastal estuaries and out to the sea. Such shifting of water across California to serve human needs has consequences at each end of the pipe. Plants and animals that are equally dependent on water have had to settle for whatever people were willing to share with the environment. Most of California's wetlands and river canyons and many of its native species have been diminished or exterminated in the face of that competition.
water supply, Central Valley Project, State Water Project, water conservation, map, Los Angeles Aqueduct, San Francisco Bay Project, population growth
Carle, David. "Tapping the Sierra Nevada Reservoir." Sierra Nature Notes, Volume 2, November 2002.
October 31, 2002 10:00 PM
Publication
Complete
None planned
Websites
Articles
Web Page / Link
Public
No Restrictions
Hetch Hetchy, San Francisco, Owens Valley, Los Angeles