News Keyword: SGMA Implementation

New Report Addresses Findings That Most California Groundwater Sustainability Plans Fail to Protect Vulnerable Communities and the Environment

A new report, authored by experts from organizations including The Nature Conservancy, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Audubon California, and Clean Water Action, provides a set of recommendations on how California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act can better protect vulnerable communities and the environment. The recommendations are based on findings from a study published this week in Nature Communications, which found that the majority of local groundwater plans developed under California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) overlook the state’s most vulnerable groundwater users.

More than 100 groundwater sustainability plans submitted to the State of California and required under SGMA in 2020 and 2022 were rigorously reviewed to assess the degree to which each plan integrates diverse stakeholder groups into the planning process.

In response to the study’s findings, the report released recommends that large data gaps from insufficient groundwater monitoring be closed in order to decrease the risk that unsustainable groundwater use will harm underrepresented communities and the environment.

The report also makes recommendations to address the study’s finding that groundwater sustainability plans lack information about climate change impacts on water resources.

For more information:

Read the Summary Report: Achieving Groundwater Access for All: A new report was released, authored by experts from organizations including TNC, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Audubon California, and Clean Water Action. Based on the study published in Nature Communications, the report outlines a robust set of recommendations on how Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) can better protect vulnerable communities and the environment.  Click here for the summary report.

 

Access the Interactive Story Map: Drawing from the summary report and article, journalist Geoff McGhee has created this online piece to provide a visual storytelling of how most California Groundwater Sustainability Plans (GSPs) fail to protect vulnerable communities and the environment. This interactive story map allows readers to engage in the findings and take a close look at how their groundwater sustainability agency’s plans compare to others in the state.  Click here to access the interactive story map.

Attend the webinar to hear an overview of the analysis of the plans and information about how the plans fail to protect groundwater for many.  The webinar includes brief presentations, a live demonstration of an interactive visual data tool, and will follow with a Question and Answer session.  Click here to register.

Read the Article in Nature Communications:  TNC-CA partners published a recent study ‘Stakeholder integration predicts better outcomes from groundwater sustainability policy’ in Nature Communications which found that the majority of local groundwater plans developed under California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) overlook the state’s most vulnerable groundwater users. More than 100 groundwater sustainability plans submitted to the State of California and required under SGMA in 2020 and 2022 were rigorously reviewed to assess the degree to which each plan integrates diverse stakeholder groups into the planning process.  Click here to read the research article.

RESEARCH ARTICLE: From Drought to Deluge: Designing Groundwater Pricing Policies to Cope With California’s Water Woes

Groundwater pricing presents a promising tool for managing groundwater demand under California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act.

We use data from an agricultural region on the Central Coast to examine how farmers respond to an increase in price over a five-year period. We find that farmers are increasingly responsive to price over time.

Click here to read this research article.

RESEARCH ARTICLE: How Is Demand Management Developing in SGMA Groundwater Sustainability Plans

Demand management will play a critical role in both reaching groundwater sustainability under SGMA and determining the economic costs of groundwater regulation.

Here, we provide an update on the approval process of 116 submitted groundwater sustainability plans. We detail demand management proposals and compare how these differ between plans that have been approved and those deemed incomplete or inadequate.

Click here to read this article from the UC Gianinni Foundation of Agricultural Economics.

NGOs release evaluation of DWR’s determinations on 2020 Groundwater Sustainability Plans in Critically Overdrafted Basins

From the Groundwater Leadership Forum:

“Of the 46 GSPs submitted in January 2020, the Department of Water Resources (DWR) determined eight GSPs to be adequate and 34 GSPs to be incomplete.

In this paper we evaluate to what extent DWR’s determinations provide oversight on the key issues of drinking water, disadvantaged communities, the environment, stakeholder involvement, and climate change. We summarize the corrective actions that DWR is recommending or requiring, as well as compare DWR’s determinations to the assessment of 31 GSPs that we conducted in 2020.

We also reviewed the 11 comment letters submitted by the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB), 25 comment letters submitted by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), and seven comment letters submitted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to compare deficiencies identified in GSPs across agencies.” 

Read the report at the Groundwater Exchange here: Groundwater sustainability assessments: A review of DWR’s determinations on groundwater sustainability plans in critically overdrafted basins

RELATED: California can’t waver on water regulation, commentary at Cal Matters

PPIC: Is SGMA Compatible with Farmland Preservation?

From the Public Policy Institute of California:

As implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) gets underway, questions are emerging about what it will mean for lands protected under the Williamson Act, California’s chief farmland preservation policy. For nearly 60 years, the Williamson Act has helped protect 16 million acres—roughly half of the state’s crop- and rangelands—from development.

But as SGMA’s limitations on groundwater extraction go into effect—and as warmer, more intense droughts begin to push land out of irrigation–the context within which the program operates is shifting. In July, we gathered a group of agriculture, solar, and county stakeholders to explore the interplay between the Williamson Act and SGMA in the San Joaquin Valley. Here is what we learned.

Click here to read more from the Public Policy Institute of California.