Water Education Foundation
This is just one post in the Water Agency News Category
Click here to view all posts

Westlands Water District statement on the NAS Report

Posted by: Maven on March 19, 2010 at 1:04 pm

From Business Wire, this press release from Westlands Water District:

“FRESNO, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Upon this morning’s release of the National Academy of Science’s scientific assessment of the biological opinions concerning operations of the Central Valley Project and the State Water Project, Westlands Water District general manager Thomas Birmingham issues the following statement:

“No scientific study has demonstrated that pumping in the south delta is the most important or the only factor accounting for the delta-smelt population decline.”

Everyone involved in the debate over California’s water crisis will be looking for aspects of this report that support their side. But the members of the panel are not umpires – calling fouls and strikes. They are scientists who have given a fair-minded assessment of the state of the science on these critical issues and there is very little in this report that we would disagree with.

The panelists focused their review on the two critical areas of concern with the biological opinions: the impacts they are having on public water supplies and the areas of the government’s regulations where the science is weak. That is exactly what concerns us most as well. And like the members of the panel, we want less of both.

We agree as well that high levels of pumping can affect the mortality of fish. But as the panel points out, there is still “substantial uncertainty” of how much pumping is safe and wether the mortality of the fish at the pumps really has any effect on their overall abundance. The report points out, for example, that the evidence suggests the smelt have moved to the north, where they now reside in Cache Slough, far away from the pumps. The loss of the few smelt that do find their way into the pumps, therefore, may have nothing to do with that larger population. … “

Continue reading this press release at Business Wire by clicking here.

March 19, 2010 · Filed Under Water Agency News

Comments

Leave a Reply