That doesn’t mean the reservoirs are full, though. Lake Oroville — the largest reservoir on the State Water Project, which sends water south to farms and cities — and Lake Shasta — critical to growers and other water users reliant on the federal Central Valley Project — are at about two-thirds of their total capacity.
That’s because with reservoirs that serve the dual purpose of flood control and water storage, water managers must release water to keep space empty to wrangle possible floods during the wet season, Jones said.
The water that flows into rivers and streams and out to the ocean is often bemoaned as water wasted. But waste is in the eye of the beholder, said Jay Lund, vice-director of the Center for Watershed Sciences at UC Davis.
“Water that’s ‘wasted’ is always water used by somebody else,” Lund said.
The list of benefits for fishing, conservation, Delta farmers, water quality and healthy shorelines is lengthy. Water allowed to flow out into the San Francisco Bay, for instance, washes away salts and pollutants, transports sediment and sand necessary to maintain marshes and restore eroding beaches, assists salmon in migrations and helps maintain healthy ecosystems.
Still, the Public Policy Institute of California reports that California could have socked away more water last year, had there been better ways to ferry water from full rivers to groundwater recharge sites, and better coordination among landowners, local agencies, and others.
“I tend to think that there is room for capturing more surface water … if you could afford the cost of capturing it,” agreed Lund. “That, to me, is the biggest problem.”
The controversial Sites Reservoir project, for instance, is projected to cost more than $4.4 billion. The reservoir, planned in the western Sacramento Valley, would store as much as 1.5 million acre-feet of Sacramento River water, alarming environmental groups that say drawing more water from the river will imperil its already-struggling fish.
In early November, Gov. Gavin Newsom cleared the project to be fast-tracked “to the extent feasible” through any litigation challenging it under the landmark California Environmental Quality Act. That move was made possible with new legislation. Even so, the project is not expected to be completed before 2030 or 2031.