Water

What is the Delta, and Why Should You Care?

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The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: ground zero for fights over water, fish and farms

The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is a key to the water supply for 25 million Caliornians.

California’s Delta, where the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers meet, is the heart of the state’s complex water infrastructure. Where water from the north gets funneled to the south, wetlands have been turned into farmland, and native fish are in decline. Millions of Californians use water from the Delta, but in a poll conducted earlier this year, 78% of respondents didn’t know anything about it.

KQED’s Lauren Sommer is producing a series about the Delta, beginning today with a story introducing the architecture of the Delta, the battles being fought there and possible solutions–all made more complicated by climate change.


There are other online extras, including a timeline and q&a’s with experts representing different perspectives on the Delta. The radio series will continue next week, with a story about a project to reconstruct what the Delta looked like 200 years ago.

What is the Delta, and Why Should You Care? 25 May,2023Molly Samuel
Explore: Government & Business, The Science, Water,

Author

Molly Samuel

Molly Samuel joined KQED as an intern in 2007, and since then has worked here as a reporter, producer, director and blogger. Before becoming KQED Science’s Multimedia Producer, she was a producer for Climate Watch. Molly has also reported for NPR, KALW and High Country News, and has produced audio stories for The Encyclopedia of Life and the Oakland Museum of California. She was a fellow with the Middlebury Fellowships in Environmental Journalism and a journalist-in-residence at the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center. Molly has a degree in Ancient Greek from Oberlin College and is a co-founder of the record label True Panther Sounds.

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