Santa Clara Valley Water District (Valley Water District) has voted to contribute $9.7m toward planning and geotechnical studies for the Delta Conveyance Project (DCP), a water tunnel project in California, US.
The project is a $20bn plan proposed by Governor Gavin Newsom to build a 45-mile (72km) tunnel to take water from Northern to Southern California.
Valley Water District is one of 18 agencies participating in the proposed water tunnel project.
The government plans to build a concrete tunnel under the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, to take water from the Sacramento River, near the town of Courtland.
It would move water for 45 miles under the marshes and sloughs of the Delta to the massive State Water Project pumps near Tracy, to serve cities and farms in the south.
Valley Water District, in its statement, said: “The Delta Conveyance Project aims to modernise California’s water delivery system, echoing the justification for the project by Governor Gavin Newsom and the Department of Water Resources.
“The project will protect against future water supply losses caused by climate-driven weather extremes, sea level rise, levee failures and earthquakes.
“It will modernise the water distribution system to capture and move water from big but infrequent storms so we can save more water to use during extended dry periods. The project could start providing water supply benefits as early as 2045.”
The water tunnel is being opposed by tribes, fishing groups, conservation organisations, Delta residents, Delta counties and water districts, scientists, and water ratepayers.
Recently, courts ordered the pumps to shut off at certain times of the year, when salmon, Delta smelt and other endangered fish swim near them.
People opposing the tunnel argue that diverting Sacramento River water before it reaches the Delta would bring certain fish species to extinction and affect tribals, fishing, and farming.
Delta smelt, longfin smelt, Sacramento winter-run and spring-run Chinook salmon, Central Valley steelhead, green sturgeon and other fish species would be affected by the tunnel.
Supporters argue that a tunnel below Delta mud would help easily move water during very wet winters, as climate change makes wet storms wetter and drought years more severe.
California Department of Water Resources director Karla Nemeth said: “With our changing hydrology, the stakes are higher for us to need to move water when we get these big events.”
“In the spring of 2023 when California was being drenched with atmospheric river storms, 156,000 cubic feet of water per second, an enormous amount similar to the flow of the Columbia River, was flowing through the Delta and under the Golden Gate Bridge out to the sea.
“Had the tunnel been in place last spring during atmospheric river storms, it would have moved 941,000 acre-feet of water, adequate for 9.8 million people, which otherwise flowed out to sea.”
