Lock Near the town of La Grange, the river exits the Sierra Nevada foothills and flows through a gently sloping alluvial valley that is incised into Pleistocene alluvial fans. Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. The Bay Area transmission system also includes Irvington Tunnel 1 and Tunnel 2, the Bay Tunnel, and the Crystal Springs Bypass Tunnel. the Hetch Hetchy Valley to its natural state. Also a little nit. California snowpack hits highest level this century for March. Exclusive: Stunning photos show Yosemite National Park under 15 feet of Warriors treating Andrew Wiggins with understandable patience, but his California snowpack hits highest level this century for March, could Map shows which parts of California exceeded entire years worth of rain, Map shows stunning improvement in California drought, Last chance to see: Bay Bridge lights turn off on Sunday. Secure .gov websites use HTTPS Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander. All Rights Reserved. It could be the 180% of historical average of snowpack, which will be melting in a couple months. Current and Historical Visualization, https://cdec.water.ca.gov/dynamicapp/QueryDaily?s=HTH, https://cdec.water.ca.gov/dynamicapp/QueryDaily?s=SHA, https://engaging-data.com/ca-reservoir-level/, https://cdec.water.ca.gov/reportapp/javareports?name=RES, Visualizing Californias Water Storage Reservoirs and Snowpack, Interactive California Reservoir Levels Dashboard. It updates hourly using data from the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) website, giving an up-to-date picture of California reservoir levels. Its fluctuating between ~107% and ~20% from one hour to the next (reading 107.6 atm). The source water from SFPUC is typically from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir located in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. their water supply would cost hundreds of millions of dollars at They are draining it currently so that it can serve as that overflow if needed given how much rain is coming down and expected over the next week. The water travels through a series of pipelines before it reaches the Bay Area and blends with five local reservoirs. So its volume is counted as Orville inflow. The 1913 Raker Act authorized the unprecedented dam inside the park and also set the fee that the city pays to rent the entire valley in which the dam sits: $30,000 per year. Why isnt Lake Sonoma included? I dont know if weve seen anything like this in October before.". Its supposed to be brown. As of 5pm on 1/18, the data appears correct (~58k acre feet), but an hour ago it was reading off the chart (3X above what they are allowed to store right now). Kudos to the designers. reloadiframes(); Only improvement I would suggest is an improvement of the display of the smaller reservoirs so the names are readable. The current power produced by the SFPUC system, although not carbon-based, is not green since it requires the continued destruction of significant habitat. By a large measure, damming and flooding Hetch Hetchy is the most significant damage ever allowed in any of our national parks. Born in Seoul, Yoohyun began her career in Arizona, where she worked for two of the state's largest newspapers covering various beats, including criminal justice and education. This is also affected by most of these dams multi-purpose nature where they are near constantly releasing for power(like Shasta) or to make room for flood control capacity(like Folsom). 501(c)3 organization, federal tax ID #942419885. Just in case a large storm hits, that way they dont reach 100% capacity. I would turn this graph, 90 counterclockwise, and start the capacity along the bottom axis from left to right, with the biggest reservoirs on the left and the smaller ones on the right. This was helpful to project seasonal trends & storm impacts. The group says the recent plethora of water shows that the city could do without Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, by using other storage facilities that have filled and pursuing new projects to capture the surplus. You can also use it to monitor only the reservoirs you are most interested in. The water transmission system in the Bay Area and Peninsula includes the Bay Division, San Andreas, Sunset Supply, and Crystal Springs pipelines. Generation at the Kirkwood power plant would depend on the natural flow of the Tuolumne River, and would be significantly diminished during late summer and fall. the city wastes water, so it was a moot issue. I do not see Diamond Valley Lake Resevoir on this page. 9 of 12 10 of 12 Hetch Hetchy Reservoir with Wapama Falls near Groveland, Calif. on Wednesday March 12, 2014, is currently at fifty percent of capacity. In whats known as the Bay-Delta Plan, state water regulators are amid a years-long effort to negotiate a policy for how much water should be kept in rivers that flow to the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to meet the needs of both people and wildlife. Thanks for putting this together. Restore Hetch Hetchys subsequent appeal to the ruling was Reservoir levels rising. These sources include surface water stored in reservoirs located in the Sierra Nevada, Alameda County and San Mateo County, and groundwater supplies stored in a deep aquifer located in San Francisco and San Mateo counties. These sources are diverse in both the origin of the supply snowmelt, rainfall and recharge of groundwater and their location within our system. One of the big challenges in water management is controling the release. I have wanted to do exactly this plot for years. Water storage facilities include watersheds, dams, and reservoirs including: Calaveras, San Antonio, Crystal Springs, Pilarcitos, and San Andreas. Due to its high-altitude location at 3,900 feet above sea level Major snowstorm might leave you stranded, New 101 express lanes opens in Bay Area. She was born and raised in the Bay Area and got her start in news at the Daily Californian newspaper at UC Berkeley where she majored in English literature. Its promising, but too early to let our guard down, said Joseph Sweiss, spokesman for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, the citys water purveyor, in an email to The Chronicle. Call 209-372-0200 for the latest road and weather conditions, Hetch Hetchy Road Daily Hours: 8 am to 5 pm After the reservoirs Thats up more than 400,000 acre-feet since early December, before the unrelenting series of atmospheric river storms blew through California between Christmas and mid-January. . Winter weather conditions may cause road closures. it will be cool if there is a way to track the change since Dec or some such date. Our drinking water comes from a variety of protected sources carefully managed by the SFPUC. This dashboard provides a bit more detail on the state of each of the reservoirs while also showing an aggregate total. One acre-foot is the equivalent of one acre of land covered in one foot of water. Thanks for developing it, and for sharing it with the rest of us! A dry January with little rainfall across much of Northern California actually didnt hurt the states water storage levels, according to data from the California Department of Water Resources. Navigation and Navigable Waters 33.208.82 Hetch Hetchy, Cherry Valley, and Don Pedro Dams and Reservoirs. Similar to the water supply issues discussed above, the amount of power replacement is small in a statewide context less than of 1% of the renewable power supply being developed this decade alone. Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System, which serves San Francisco, How Much Water is in California Reservoirs? Water data back to 1930 are available online. Although Hetch Hetchy Reservoir is the most well-known, it stores less than 25% of the systems water. Lake Oroville. Trinity Lake, with a capacity of 2,447,650 acre-feet, had the smallest increase, from 29% in December to 30% in January. This is the first state (of 6 I have lived in) that has had water police and restrictions. Hours: Year-round, but only accessible by car when the Hetch Hetchy Road is open. around the Bay Area rely on the Hetch Hetchy Regional Water That puts it at 84 percent of where it would usually be usually at this time of year. do so. She has been with SFGATE for more than 10 years. United States. At the beginning of this water year, which started on October 1, 2022, the state's largest water reservoir, Lake Shasta, was a third full, at 33 percent. Water data back to 1956 are available online. Nate, thanks for the insight. Commission. Monitoring location 11277200 is associated with a LAKE, RESERVOIR, IMPOUNDMENT in TUOLUMNE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA. Wife of missing Bay Area radio host says Jeffrey Vandergrift will not Sen. Dianne Feinstein is hospitalized in San Francisco with shingles, California extends deadline to file 2022 income taxes to match IRS decision, Here's where California reservoir levels stand after this week's rains, Going to Tahoe this weekend? If we reach 100% after the current rains and then it stops raining for the season, then our percentage will start going down. Water data back to 1956 are available online. Within San Francisco, we manage water distribution in the City. An improvement: Could you include a bar for Last year at this date? We provide water directly to customers in San Francisco and wholesale through 26 Water agencies in Alameda, Santa Clara, and San Mateo counties. Diamond Valley Lake is a man-made storage reservoir for storing imported water only. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Subscribe to receive email notifications of new content. Great Job on this site! Most local reservoir inflow timeseries are too short to calculate long-term values. Different presidential administrations also have tried to address Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. dam and restoring the valley. lawsuit, saying Restore Hetch Hetchys arguments were preempted The area around Shasta has more volcanic soils that absorb rainfall than the Feather River drainage. Hetch Hetchy water travels 160 miles via gravity from Yosemite to the San Francisco Bay Area. It seems likely one of those two readings is wrong. resizeframe(); If you look at the inflow data on the major reservoirs, its pretty flat. No it is correct. ", The difference in soil type in the two watersheds was likely another factor. The captured water is piped 150 miles to the Bay Area. San Francisco voters have demonstrated their opposition to I realize there we dont want to reservoirs overflowing, but why are we still below historical average? Assistant General Manager for Water Steven Ritchie credits the way the system is managed along with lower. Ive looked at reservoir sights for years. The Hetch Hetchy Valley today with the dam seen in the lower right. What happened to the Hetch Hetchy level? It didnt end the drought, but it was definitely really good," said Ritchie. Lake Shasta and Mendocino are also well below average. Hetch Hetchy is Monitoring location 11275500. https://engaging-data.com/ca-reservoir-level/ Could the reason be that the water from Lake Alma or seems to be used for energy generation, and that there does not seem to be any agricultural or urban use? The middle portion of the watershed from New Don Pedro Reservoir to above Hetch Hetchy Reservoir is characterized by deep canyons and forested terrain. mandate within The reservoir is now projected to cost $4.4 billion, with Prop. Fish and Wildlife Service that provides an immediate $4 million investment for habitat improvements for fisheries in the Tuolumne River. by the Raker Act. So while that is kind of good news, he said, things start to look more grim after January produced paltry rainfall and, so far, February has also been dry. DWR is one of many local, State and Federal entities that dictate water releases. "It's an increase of a few percent, . Units are in kaf, thousands of acre feet. They also built a spillway that was too steep and did not install energy dissipators along the spillway. The Bay Area portion of the System includes water collection, treatment, and transmission facilities from the Alameda East Portal to the wholesale service area and terminal reservoirs in San Francisco. The height of the row indicates how much water the reservoir could hold. It wont be full until Spring snowmelt. Voters rejected a 2012 . The average for this time of year is approximately 4,659.57ft, plus or minus 39ft. A lock ( The trail includes spectacular views of Tueeulala and Wapama Falls. Meant this comment for the integrated snowpack and reservoir view. This other page: https . 1 covering up to $875 million and much of the rest coming from federal loans to water suppliers. Greetings from Mount Laurel New Jersey. The trail takes you to the base of Wapama Falls, passing two smaller waterfalls (during spring) on the way. California reservoir levels: . The cities of Burlingame, Hayward, Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Redwood City and San Mateo, along with the Alameda County Water District, were among Bay Area communities whose support was influential in persuading Congress to pass the controversial Act, and President Woodrow Wilson to sign it. Flood control agencies (not DWR) have the most say in regard to releases. In 2021, the SFPUC and the Modesto and Turlock Irrigation Districts launched a proactive pilot program with the U.S. Excellent graphic! Locked padlock Theyve also seen drought surcharges on their water bills. and maybe another vertical axis to the right of that with reservoir capacity. At this facility, which is shared with other water agencies, the city can stash water for credits against future draws on the river. It is on the graph. **new combined California reservoir and snowpack visualizer**, made a bar graph showing the overall level of water in the major California reservoirs, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) Data Exchange Center. SFPUC said as of this week, the Hetch Hetchy reservoir is at 92 percent capacity. Having it here would be great! word for a type of wild grass. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. San Francisco's water-bank in Don Pedro Reservoir, downstream on the Tuolumne River, holds twice as much water as Hetch Hetchy. Then it has the appearance of something filling up, while still providing all the detail. The Hetch Hetchy reservoir, which supplies water for San Francisco and other parts of the Bay Area, was at 77% of its 360,000-acre-feet storage capacity in January compared to 73% in. For perspective, water demand across the SFPUCs service area of 2.7 million people was about 205,000 acre-feet last fiscal year. The question was, what constitutes unreasonable method of Important Legacy real-time page. Ive been meaning to search for aquifer levels. Gavin Newsom asked all California residents to voluntarily reduce use by 15% compared with use in 2019. Our flagship blog features analysis of news from our staff and announcements of upcoming events. I think the problem is with the CDEC database (as the LakesOnline website also has had incorrectly high information). The windfall of water is welcome news for households and businesses in San Francisco, which use less water on average compared to the rest of the state but nonetheless have faced calls to cut back since 2021 because of water shortages. They placed a few dissipators just before the river. O'Shaughnessy Dam is a 430-foot (131 m) high concrete arch-gravity dam in Tuolumne County, California, United States.It impounds the Tuolumne River, forming the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir at the lower end of Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park, about 160 miles (260 km) east of San Francisco. Additionally, the bounty helps the more than two dozen communities in Alameda, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties that get their water from the city. The main goal of this visualization is to provide a quick overview of the status of the main reservoirs in the state and how they compare to historical levels. Upcountry and the Bay Area. I will take a look and see if there are other important reservoirs missing and may add them in the future. A small portion of the citys water comes from local reservoirs. We own and operate the Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System which serves 2.7 million customers. San Franciscos water system, which includes Hetchy Hetchy, is expected to fill this winter for the first time since 2019. "It is unknown how much area of the Feather River and Shasta Lake drainages are impacted by hydrophobic soils.". The maximum that the city has put away is 570,000 acre-feet of water. earthquake. What period does CA use for Historical Average? It will be very different depending on the period chosen. James Q. Martin / Restore Hetch Hetchy Show More Show Less 4 of 7 Maybe just acre/ft with ^ or down arrow. administration attempted to allocate funds to study removing the mobilewarn(); Heres an example of that data for Shasta, where you can see the daily inflows and outflows: Amy Graff is the news editor for SFGATE. So on Jan 10 were at 82% of the average for Jan 10. Forty-six percent . Emissions must be offset by dedicated conservation programs or renewable energy generation such as wind or solar. The citys water system also includes a water bank at Don Pedro Reservoir along the Tuolumne River, which was full as of Feb. 1. //this function is called from the javascript from within the iframe after the contents of iframe are loaded (and after an additional 150ms delay) Waterfalls gushed at Hetch Hetchy after an atmospheric river event in October 2021. Lock It carried workers and materials for the dam, as well as tourists, postage and other amenities. Kellie has held many leadership roles for the Asian American Journalists Association, including most recently a board member for the San Francisco chapter. Maybe bad data. Are they releasing water to relieve the pressure in anticipation of more water? I recently joined the team with Restore Hetch Hetchy as Engagement & Development Director. For each of the top 8 reservoirs the storage has increased by a total of 217 kaf, however). Your email address will not be published. BAWSCA agencies also are implementing water conservation and water recycling projects to help preserve this precious resource for their communities, and are working to identify alternate sources of water supply. Hi, I started by using this page (https://cdec.water.ca.gov/reportapp/javareports?name=RES) to determine which reservoirs to include and for some reason Almanor isnt on the list. It looks like the red and blue lines are backwards on Folsom. Department of Water Resources is just another in a long line of completely mismanaged California entities. In addition, San Francisco receives approximately one-tenth of its power from hydroelectricity generated by the gravity-driven flow from the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. Monitoring location 11275500 is associated with a LAKE, RESERVOIR, IMPOUNDMENT in TUOLUMNE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA. Prior to The Chronicle, she worked as a data journalist for Honolulu Civil Beat, a watchdog news organization covering the Hawaiian islands. If you look at this chart for Hetch Hetchy, you can see that the biggest and steadiest rise is between March and July, https://waterdata.usgs.gov/monitoring-location/11275500/#parameterCode=00054&period=P365D&compare=true. best to drain the valley. Hetch Hetchy is only one of nine reservoirs in the San Francisco Public Utility Commission's water system. I am grateful for all that you have done here to open our eyes to what is happening, what has happened, and even what might be on the horizon. P.S. She was previously an engagement reporter. This local water is captured in reservoirs located in San Mateo and Alameda counties. } At the height of the recent drought, they still had at least four years in storage. And for the years they were hoarding water, the salmon-based ecosystem suffered.. This dashboard is great! The surplus has renewed concerns about San Francisco stockpiling water at the expense of rivers and the fish and wildlife that live there. The recent spate of storms lifted the statewide snowpack to 190% of average for the start of the month, and more snow is on the way. since it required flooding a use must be reasonable.. The overall storage is said to have dropped by 57.4 to 56.4 (or 302 kaf). Twenty of San Ive added it to my bookmarks for quick reference. In response to the Bay-Delta Plan, the SFPUC and the Modesto and Turlock Irrigation Districts have proposed the Tuolumne River Voluntary Agreement, a combination of flow and non-flow measures sufficient to improve all life-stages of native fish populations in the lower Tuolumne River. United States. Remaining Capacity text in the legend should be brown? Have you looked into that side of the water management equation? Thank you for the time and effort in creating the graphs. Really appreciate the work you did to build this graph. construction in the 1920s, various groups have lobbied to restore Here's what that means. Current as of October 03, 2022 | Updated by . HETCH HETCHY RES A HETCH HETCHY CA. What happened to the Hetch Hetchy level? Generation at Holm powerhouse below Cherry Lake would be less affected. I dont think its currently above the historical average, not below 1 year ago. This is a very clear graph and I cannot imagine the hours you have put in while setting it up and doing the maintenance. thanks. If you are on a mobile device you can tap the reservoir to get that same info. The only improvement I would ask you to consider is to allow the Y-axis to be Linear or Log, the latter allowing us to see all the small reservoirs quite easily. Kurtis Alexander is an enterprise reporter for The San Francisco Chronicle, with a focus on natural resources and the environment. What rates am I paying? Its essential to understand that the dispute over San Franciscos use of Hetch Hetchy is not about the use of water only how it is stored.