Looks Like Help For Friant Water Supply
February 6,2015
Friant Water District’s General Manager Ron Jacobsma is cautious despite the fact an impressive series of storms pushing into Northern California today is expected to migrate south dropping good amounts of rain and snow in the Southern Sierra – the watershed for the irrigation-starved Friant Water District.
“The forecasters told us that January would be wet along with February and March and January was one of the driest months ever.”
Jacobsma adds ”it seems we have lot to learn about the weather.”
The district irrigates a million acres of farms between Madera and Kern County each year except for 2014 when they were severely restricted on water deliveries from Friant Dam.
That restriction came primarily because there was not sufficient water in Northern California’s huge Shasta Dam to deliver the usual amount of water to the water contractors just north of Friant as is done each year since the Friant Dam was built.These so-called Exchange Contractors were forced to take Friant’s water to irrigate their farms leaving farms in Tulare County and elsewhere – high and dry.
In 2014 Shasta filled only to 2.4 million acre/ft, half its capacity as the entire state experienced a severe drought.
Shasta region could get 13.8 inches over next 7 days while the Central Sierra could see 11 inches says NOAA. That total is north of the San Joaquin River watershed
That’s why it is particularly good news that a second Atmospheric River parade of storms is punishing northern California this weekend likely to drop 10 to 14 inches or more of rain around Shasta Lake over the next 7 days( refer to map) A similar storm in December doubled the storage in Shasta in a matter of weeks adding about 900,000 af.
Jacobsma says while there are other regulatory factors “if Shasta could fill to at least 300,000af we’d feel more comfortable that the Exchange Contractors would likely get their water this year.”
That would be a major improvement over last year.
“We just can’t stand another year of zero allocation” says Jacobsma adding that “tens of thousands of acres of trees and vines will go out” if it happens again.
Ask anyone in Tulare County and they will tell you without adequate rain this year there is virtually no chance the economy here will recover in 2015. Not just farms but rural residences have suffered with more than 1000 dry wells being reported since last summer.
But if the Exchange Contractors don’t make a call on Friant water this year Friant Water District will have access to water stored in a series of reservoirs and in the San Joaquin River region snowpack itself. But of course there has to be something there to store!
So far this water year it has been tough going with rain falling at one key station – Huntington Lake measured at 8.58 inches – far behind the 15 inch average for this date.
“It looks a lot like last year” worries Jacobsma.
The Central Sierra water content is just 21% of average for this date and 14% of April 1 average says the state.
“We have a long way to go” shrugs Jacobsma.
Impressive Forecast
As for this weekends storms “we don’t care if we get rain or snow – we got plenty of storage.” Indeed the storms are warm,but wet, with snow levels at 8000 ft.
click to enlarge
The latest forecast says this weekend storms will move south from Sacramento with up to 11 inches of snow at China Peak (next to Huntington) on Sunday and rainfall totals of 4 to 5 inches Friday through Monday in Huntington area and a little more on Yosemite’s floor says NWS meteorologist Brian Ochs.
That would move the needle closer to average( 13 inches compared to 15 in) for this time of the year at Huntington if it follows through.
The 7-day total is really impressive at 11 inches in the Central Sierra (see map) clearly north of Huntington but well south of Tahoe (see map).
Long ranges forecasts predict around Feb 17-21 another wet series of storms may slam into Central California from a southern trajectory.
If so – even skeptic Ron Jacobsma may turn into a believer.
