California gets money for wildfire, drought as Congress temporarily funds government again [Fresno Bee]
Congress passed a government funding bill in a down-to-the-wire vote on Thursday in the face of a looming shutdown. The continuing resolution bill, a short-term spending resolution that will keep the government funded through early December, delegates $28.6 billion to disaster relief efforts, including for wildfire prevention and response and the consequences of drought. Burnt crops: $10 billion will go to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildfire Hurricane Indemnity Program to help agricultural producers affected by wildfires and smoke. $200 million will go to the Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water resource management, for projects to address drought in the West. $238 million will go to improving California’s water infrastructure, including $205 million for storage projects, $21 million for nine water recycling projects in California and $12 million for four desalination projects.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article254655777.html
How Dixie Fire got so big, what that means for future blazes [San Francisco Chronicle]
The Dixie Fire is only the second wildfire in California history to approach 1 million acres. Its monumental sweep across the northern Sierra ravaged Gold Rush towns, sacred Native American sites and thick conifer forests. The size of the fire is a testament to both the harrowing conditions this year, including the drought, and a long-term trend of bigger, hotter fires, largely caused by global warming. The past decade has seen 14 of the state’s 20 biggest fires, including last year’s record-setting 1,032,648-acre August Complex in Northern California’s Coast Range. Two years of drought has left much of California ripe for fire. But few places have experienced a dip in rain and snow like the northern Sierra. “The fuel bed is drier than kindling. It’s drier than wood you buy at the lumber store,” said Bill Stewart, a forestry specialist at UC Berkeley.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2021/maps-dixie-fire-1-million-acres/
California regulators warn of dry reservoirs, restrictions [The Associated Press]
California’s reservoirs are so dry from a historic drought that regulators warned Thursday it’s possible the state’s water agencies won’t get anything from them next year, a frightening possibility that could force mandatory restrictions for residents. California has a system of giant lakes called reservoirs that store water during the state’s rainy and snowy winter months. Most of the water comes from snow that melts in the Sierra Nevada mountains and fills rivers and streams in the spring. Regulators then release the water during the dry summer months for drinking, farming and environmental purposes, including keeping streams cold enough for endangered species of salmon to spawn. This year, unusually hot, dry conditions caused nearly 80% of that water to either evaporate or be absorbed into the parched soil — part of a larger drought that has emptied reservoirs and led to cuts for farmers across the western United States. It caught sate officials by surprise as California now enters the rainy season with reservoirs at their lowest level ever.
Already unrecognizable at only 24% full, Lake Shasta still falling in 2nd-worst year on record
The drought has dropped Lake Shasta to its second worst level since the last bucket of concrete was poured for Shasta Dam in December 1945.
“We got a couple hundredths of an inch (of rain) and it made no impact at all,” said Donald Bader, the Bureau of Reclamation’s area manager for the Northern California Area Office at Shasta Dam. As of Tuesday, the lake was 24% full and about 175 feet down from the top of the dam, Bader said. The lake’s historic lowest level was in the summer of 1977 when it was down 230 feet and “far and away the worst year,” he said. As the shoreline has receded and boat docks left high and dry, the lake still isn’t done dropping.
California will consider mandatory water restrictions if dryness continues this winter [Los Angeles Times]
With California’s extreme drought persisting and reservoirs declining to new lows, state officials said they will consider imposing mandatory water restrictions if dryness continues this winter. Gov. Gavin Newsom called on Californians in July to voluntarily reduce water use by 15%, saying state water regulators would track progress toward that target and decide whether additional measures would be necessary. Natural Resources Secretary Wade Crowfoot said Thursday that bigger steps may be needed if the drought doesn’t ease this winter, and turning to statewide mandatory conservation measures will be an option. “We’re going to be watching very closely here in the coming couple few months how that voluntary water conservation goes,” Crowfoot said in a call with reporters.
Summer 2021: Best Bay Area Wineries to Visit [San francisco Chronicle]
After many months of pandemic uncertainty, the Bay Area’s various wine countries are beginning to look like themselves again. This Top 25 Wineries list features places that are especially well suited to the warm weather and the sense of almost-back-to-normal celebration that many of us are feeling right now. That includes producers of thirst-quenching whites and rosés, like Joseph Swan in Forestville, and wineries with fun outdoor activities or board games, as is the case at Berkeley’s Donkey & Goat. And, of course, this list is extra-heavy on the scenic views, with wineries like Antica, at the top of Napa’s Atlas Peak, and Abbot’s Passage in Glen Ellen, where you might be seated in the shadow of a craggy, vigorous, 80-year-old Zinfandel vine.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/best-wineries-napa-sonoma-bay-area-wine-country/
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