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Title: Impacts of the California Drought from 2007-2009

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2011

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Abstract: Droughts can produce a wide range of adverse impacts on diverse economic sectors and environmental conditions depending on their intensity, duration, and location and on the actions taken by those affected. Often, the overall consequences of a drought are not fully understood until some time has passed and comprehensive data are collected and analyzed. A good example is the recent multi-year drought in California from 2007 through 2009. During the drought, there was considerable concern and controversy throughout the state about the nature and severity of water shortfalls, and the impacts on individual communities. Here, we present updated information on impacts of the recent drought on Californias economy and environment, and, where possible, its costs. We also assess what this drought tells us about Californias vulnerability to future droughts. The states growing population, the declining health of ecosystems, and climate change all contribute to rising pressure on water resources. It will be increasingly important to have robust and resilient strategies to cope with these pressures. The recent drought provides a unique opportunity to retrospectively examine how the drought affected different sectors and how those sectors responded, in turn. This information can helpimprove drought planning and management and, ultimately, help minimize negative impacts of future droughts.According to the California Department of Water Resources, water years 2007-2009 were the 12th driest three-year period in recorded climatic history (DWR 2010). From a purelyhydrological perspective, droughts in the late 1920s, 1970s, and 1980s were more severe. The 2007-2009 drought, however, coincided with a period of increased demands for freshwater, changes in operating rules at reservoirs, and environmental protections that reduced pumping of water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to state and federal water users south of the Delta (DWR 2010). Among the sectors affected by reduced water availability were agriculture, ecosystem health, and hydropower production. We discuss each in this assessment. During the drought, there was considerable controversy around the role that environmental protections, and in particular, the Endangered Species Act (ESA), played in the reduced exports to south-of-Delta water users. Some critics contended that environmental protections forced dramatic reductions in water supply that hurt agricultural sector production and employment in the Central Valley. Yet, data and analyses from the California Department of Water Resources and the Congressional Research Service now estimate that legal environmental protections accounted for less than a quarter of the overall reductions in 2009 (Cody et al. 2009). The remaining reductions were related to precipitation and runoff. In addition, the Commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation and the Congressional Research Service have found that these reductions were not due to the ESA alone but to a wide range of federal and state policies, including the Clean Water Act, the state Porter-Cologne Act, the state Fish and Game Code, and the Central Valley Project Improvement Act. Finally, local differences in water-supply impacts also resulted from the priority of use: some federal water project users settlement and exchange contractors received 100% of their desired supplies throughout the drought, while others received only 10% (USBR 2009). As a result, contract priority was a critical factor in the disparity in water deliveries during the drought.

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Authors: Levy, Morgan C.; Gleick, Peter H.; Christian-Smith, Juliet

Publisher: Pacific Institute, Oakland, CA

Data Collections: IPUMS NHGIS

Topics: Health, Other

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