The News Review:

- Water managers told: Plan now for crisis
- Scientists warn of looming water supply crisis
- Sierra snowpack good – drought fears lessen
- Ordinance to check water theft

Water managers told: Plan now for crisis
San Francisco Chronicle – Feb 1, 2008
“Patterns of change are complex, uncertainties are large; and the knowledge base changes rapidly. Another report on climate change by a group of researchers headed by Tim P. Barnett of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla warns of “a coming crisis in water supply for the western U. ,” largely due to what the scientists call human-caused climate changes. This report is published Friday in the online version of Science. Those changes, according to Barnett’s team, have been altering the West’s river flows, water temperatures and snowpacks for 50 years, according to records the team has analyzed…
“So with more rain in coming years, a diminishing snowpack and more danger of floods, you’ll have your work cut out to start planning now. Gleick, a leading water resources expert and president of Oakland’s Pacific Institute, was not part of either research group but said both teams are correct in warning that planners of dams, canals and systems for controlling floods and runoff must consider even more strongly than ever “the undeniable prospect of global warming as they design new facilities. Jonathan Loiacono, an engineer at San Francisco’s Public Utilities Commission and project manager of the city’s master plan for upgrading its ancient and crumbling sewer system, agreed. “Our sewers are 70 years old on average, and we have 60 to 70 miles of brick sewers that were built in the 1890s and are leaking badly,” he said. “The system is falling apart. To meet the problems that are bound to come with more frequent and intense storms the scientists predict from global warming – that calls for imaginative solutions, like capturing storm waters for irrigation and other green uses.

Scientists warn of looming water supply crisis
Economic Times – Feb 1, 2008
They argue that radical watercycle changes will be widespread and that past trends can no longer be reliedupon when planning future water management. “Our best current estimatesare that water availability will increase substantially in northern Eurasia,Alaska, Canada and some tropical regions, and decrease substantially in southernEurope, the Middle East, southern Africa and southwestern North America,” saidlead author Christopher Milly, a research hydrologist with the US GeologicalSurvey. More frequent droughtscan also be expected in drying areas, he added. “Even with aggressivemitigation, continued warming is very likely given the residence time ofatmospheric carbon dioxide and the thermal inertia of the Earth system,” theauthors concluded.

Sierra snowpack good – drought fears lessen
San Francisco Chronicle – Feb 1, 2008
The measurements Thursday at historic Phillips Station, next to the Sierra-at-Tahoe resort, were too good for real words, especially after last year’s meager results prompted fears of drought. The Sierra Nevada snowpack, which, to hydrologists, is a better holding tank than the biggest man-made reservoir, is 13 percentage points above normal for this time of year. That, to a man who makes a living off a good water supply, can make a cold day in the middle of a quickly intensifying storm feel like a summer jaunt. “This is practically picnic weather,” joked Hart, as he stood there in wool pants and a giant parka, blinking as white flakes speckled his head. The snowpack will grow as the storm continues to dump on Northern California this weekend, meteorologists said Thursday. But then they predict an extended stretch of blue skies. The winter snowpack in the Sierra is not only important to skiers and snowboarders, it is an essential part of the state’s water supply.

Ordinance to check water theft
Hindu – Feb 1, 2008
The KWA can assess and collect charges in cases of unauthorised use of water supply and evict encroachments on pipeline roads. The cost of eviction can be collected from the encroacher. The ordinance has provisions for regulating water supply to multi-storeyed buildings and flats and ensuring quality of plumbing works. Water Resources Minister N. Premachandran told journalists here on Thursday that the KWA produced 1,866 million litres of drinking water a day, but billed only 1,493 million litres a day. The balance is being lost through theft, leakage and failure of meters including that from manipulation.