11 Jun COMMENTARY: California’s water crisis is a question of infrastructure: It’s time for the Delta Conveyance Project
Maven’s Notebook – June 10, 2025 | Commentary by Charley Wilson, Executive Director of the Southern California Water Coalition, and Richard Lambros, the Executive Director of the Secure Water Alliance
California has often positioned itself as a leader in responding to the dangers of climate change. From pioneering clean energy initiatives to enforcing some of the strictest emissions regulations in the nation, the state has consistently taken bold steps to prepare for the future.
Yet when it comes to water infrastructure, which is also an important part of our response to climate change, we are falling dangerously behind.
For decades, California has relied on the Sierra Nevada snowpack to store water through the winter, gradually replenishing reservoirs as it melts in the spring and summer. But with climate change, more of California’s precipitation is now falling as rain instead of snow, and the Department of Water Resources projects that climate change could reduce the state’s water supply by up to 23% over the next 20 years.
Last spring’s storms, while offering a temporary boost to our water reserves, provided a stark preview of the challenges ahead. Our existing infrastructure simply isn’t equipped to capture and store water under California’s new precipitation reality. Without major upgrades, California will continue to lose millions of acre-feet of water—water we desperately need for future droughts.
A recent report by the Public Policy Institute of California estimates that in early February alone, nearly 5.4 million acre-feet of water flowed into the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta during the storms. After accounting for the flows needed to maintain habitats in the Delta, over 2 million acre-feet flowed out to the Pacific Ocean.
The good news is Governor Newsom’s Delta Conveyance Project was designed to help us prepare and improve the state’s water security in the face of our changing climate. It will enable California’s water managers to capture water during intense rain events so we can move it and save it for the next drought.
Had the Delta Conveyance Project been operational during this past year’s storms, it could have captured over 700,000 acre-feet of that additional water—enough to supply more than 7 million people and nearly 2.5 million households for a year.
We should be improving our state’s water storage infrastructure as well. Projects like Sites Reservoir could have captured 1.5-million acre feet of this lost water. And smart, well-structured groundwater recharge in the Central and Southern California will be an important opportunity for additional storage.
Investments in developing local supplies through wastewater recycling, stormwater recharge, and desalination are helping as well, but these projects can’t match the Delta Conveyance Project’s advantage of delivering additional volumes of water more affordably than other sources.
The good news is the DCP has made major progress over the past few months. In the past year, more than one dozen water agencies voted to continue funding the design and planning process for the Project.
The state also recently obtained a key permit to mitigate impacts on fish in the Delta. We are finally making progress, but more work must be done before the project can move forward.
California has never been afraid to lead. Now, it’s time to bring that same bold vision to our water infrastructure. Smart investments in water infrastructure are how California can maintain its position as a leader in innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing issues. Moving the DCP forward will help create a more climate resilient, secure future for all Californians.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Maven’s Notebook.