Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - Printable Version
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RE: Palo Alto Flooding - 82lsju - 01-11-2023
more on water management in Lake Lag, it's not just about the tiger salamander....
https://stanforddaily.com/2023/01/10/salamanders-trout-or-drought-why-isnt-lake-lagunita-always-filled/?utm_content=Jan-10-2023%3Futm_campaign%3Ddigest&utm_content=Jan-10-2023
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - Mick - 01-11-2023
(01-02-2023, 11:09 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 09:22 AM)81alum Wrote: 2017 was our last really wet winter. I'm interested to see what it looks like today, and whether it fills up this winter. Anyone with eyes on the lake?
I think this is going to be a really wet winter. Next two weeks promise lots of statewide precipitation. The larger (500k AF+) California lakes and reservoirs have plenty of capacity. Shasta, Oroville, San Luis and Folsom are about 1/3rd full; Pine Flat, McClure, New Melones and Trinity are 1/4th full; Don Pedro, Berryessa and Almanor are about half full. Some of the others have lesser capacity; Diamond Valley, New Bullards and Friant are around 2/3rds full. Isabella's only 9% full.
RESSW.pdf (ca.gov)
Oroville is at 47%, Folsom and Shasta's increased to 42%, San Luis is up to 39%.
Pine Flat is at 36%, McClure is at 42%, New Melones is at 33%. Trinity still at 26%.
Don Pedro (67%), Berryessa (57%) and Almanor (60%) are filling up.
Diamond Valley (61%), New Bullards (72%) and Friant (78%) are filling up fast.
Isabella is at 12%
Locally; Lexington, in Los Gatos, is at 76%; Stevens Creek is at 69%, Lower Crystal Springs (San Mateo) is at 90%, San Andreas is at 92%, Uvas is at 104%Q, Clifton Court Forebay is at 58%.
Lots of SF Bay reservoirs at 100%+ capacity, including Lake Hennessey, San Antonio, U San Leandro, Chabot, Coyote Reservoir. Calaveras at 96%.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - M T - 01-11-2023
I haven't been tracking rainfall amounts at other locations, but at two home weather stations near me (about 8 mi SE of Stanford, between El Camino Hospital and Loyola Corners), the rain fall totals for December and January(so far) are 9.68+7.10=16.78" and 9.63+8.00=17.10", about 3x average for that interval. Average yearly rainfall is about 18.1". Even if the rain stopped today, the lake levels will continue to rise as the water drains into them.
A WeatherUnderground station on Stanford campus indicates the rain there has been 5.73(Dec)+4.09(Jan) = 9.82. Another one more in downtown Palo Alto shows 10.0+4.23 = 14.23
Using data from weather.gov for "San Jose Area", here are the seasonal year totals for the San Jose Area, 1894-2022. (2021-2022 is labelled 2022)
![[Image: San-Jose-Area-Rain1893-2022season.jpg]](https://i.ibb.co/82X9KPq/San-Jose-Area-Rain1893-2022season.jpg)
The only caution I see is that this weather has all been relatively warm, so more precipitation is in the form of rain, with less as snow.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - 82lsju - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 02:54 PM)M T Wrote: I haven't been tracking rainfall amounts at other locations, but at two home weather stations near me (about 8 mi SE of Stanford, between El Camino Hospital and Loyola Corners), the rain fall totals for December and January(so far) are 9.68+7.10=16.78" and 9.63+8.00=17.10", about 3x average for that interval. Average yearly rainfall is about 18.1". Even if the rain stopped today, the lake levels will continue to rise as the water drains into them.
A WeatherUnderground station on Stanford campus indicates the rain there has been 5.73(Dec)+4.09(Jan) = 9.82. Another one more in downtown Palo Alto shows 10.0+4.23 = 14.23
Using data from weather.gov for "San Jose Area", here are the seasonal year totals for the San Jose Area, 1894-2022. (2021-2022 is labelled 2022)
The only caution I see is that this weather has all been relatively warm, so more precipitation is in the form of rain, with less as snow.
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/snowapp/sweq.action
says statewide snowpack to date is 211% of normal and 102% of the April 1 average
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/snowapp/sweq.action
which is a good start on the snow year
Palisades at Tahoe says they have gotten 300 inches of snow at mid-mountain so far this season
https://www.palisadestahoe.com/mountain-information/snow-and-weather
and for the coming weekend forecast
Quote:In total that would be 2-4 feet of new snow over the holiday weekend period. Great for continuing to bring fresh snow, but difficult for weekend travel and stormy skiing conditions expected up on the mountain for most of the weekend.
https://blog.palisadestahoe.com/weather/snow-wednesday-a-snowy-weekend-ahead/
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - Softball Fan - 01-11-2023
This is currently my favorite thread here. Thanks for the info on rainfall around the state. In Ventura county there were some measuring stations that recorded over 18 inches the past five days.
I follow the water level of Lake Mead in Nevada/Arizona. It has risen only about one foot since the rainy season started.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - Bampa - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 03:31 PM)paloalto Wrote: This is currently my favorite thread here. Thanks for the info on rainfall around the state. In Ventura county there were some measuring stations that recorded over 18 inches the past five days.
I follow the water level of Lake Mead in Nevada/Arizona. It has risen only about one foot since the rainy season started.
Lake Sonoma was the lowest I have seen it since I moved up here in 2005.
It recently went from 39% to 72.6%...amazing
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - 81alum - 01-11-2023
Here are the major reservoirs in California. Shasta and Oroville and Trinity are an enormous part of our state's water storage--located in the far north-- and they have a ways to go. While the little local reservoirs filled first--they are too small to show on this chart. The far north, strangely, has gotten less precip than the rest of the state.
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/resapp/RescondMain
And here is an overview of the state snowpack, which has pretty much reached normal for April 1, meaning if the faucet shuts off we will have a normal year. Pay attention to the first number--not the second so much.
But more snow is coming, so it is almost certain that we will be above normal now, but how far above? It is possible that the drought could end in one year, but also possible that even this wet winter won't quite do it. What we need is a lot of snow in the far north of the state, and we need it to stay cold until April 1 and not melt before then. That would break the drought.
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/snowapp/sweq.action
RE: Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - cardcrimson - 01-11-2023
And the long range forecast from NOAA, issued in December.
January has a 40-60% chance of being wetter than normal for California:
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/30day/off15_prcp.gif
The first quarter has a 0-50% probability to be dryer than normal for much of the state:
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/long_range/lead01/off01_prcp.gif
Haven't been able to find a good long range forecast, but accuweather seems to predict a fairly wet February for No Cal, too.
RE: Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - TonyLima - 01-11-2023
Just in time. My look at the Bay Area rainfall situation . Here's a preview.
![[Image: Season-to-date-season-normal.jpg]](http://gonzoecon.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Season-to-date-season-normal.jpg)
RE: Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - cardcrimson - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 05:38 PM)TonyLima Wrote: Just in time. My look at the Bay Area rainfall situation . Here's a preview.
Interesting info, thanks for sharing. Curious at how it is collected for each location. Some incongruities seem to pop up, like Martinez is way above normal, while Benicia is at normal. Similarly Danville is slightly up, yet Walnut Creek and Dublin are both way up. . . .I'd imagine taken as a whole, the data averages out and shows that overall, we've had a ton of rain.
RE: Palo Alto Flood Warning until 2:45 - TonyLima - 01-11-2023
(12-31-2022, 01:27 PM)PalmTree Wrote: Jeez - I hope these two are OK....
Palo Alto's newest residents
Otherwise, on a more serious note, a couple of friends got flooded out in 1998 - one house in east Menlo and another in midtown PA. A bunch of us split resources to help them evacuate and clean up afterward - what a mess. Really hoping for the best here.
What better place to organize help than right here? I leave it to the admins to decide whether this is a good idea.
(01-11-2023, 06:06 PM)cardcrimson Wrote:(01-11-2023, 05:38 PM)TonyLima Wrote: Just in time. My look at the Bay Area rainfall situation . Here's a preview.
Interesting info, thanks for sharing. Curious at how it is collected for each location. Some incongruities seem to pop up, like Martinez is way above normal, while Benicia is at normal. Similarly Danville is slightly up, yet Walnut Creek and Dublin are both way up. . . .I'd imagine taken as a whole, the data averages out and shows that overall, we've had a ton of rain.
Beats me. The original data is from the weather page of the Merc. Captured as jpg, converted to pdf, then exported to Excel. Like you, I am skeptical about individual city reports. But the overall picture looks good.
(01-11-2023, 04:35 PM)81alum Wrote: Here are the major reservoirs in California. Shasta and Oroville and Trinity are an enormous part of our state's water storage--located in the far north-- and they have a ways to go. While the little local reservoirs filled first--they are too small to show on this chart. The far north, strangely, has gotten less precip than the rest of the state.
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/resapp/RescondMain
And here is an overview of the state snowpack, which has pretty much reached normal for April 1, meaning if the faucet shuts off we will have a normal year. Pay attention to the first number--not the second so much.
But more snow is coming, so it is almost certain that we will be above normal now, but how far above? It is possible that the drought could end in one year, but also possible that even this wet winter won't quite do it. What we need is a lot of snow in the far north of the state, and we need it to stay cold until April 1 and not melt before then. That would break the drought.
https://cdec.water.ca.gov/snowapp/sweq.action
Re the highlighted statement above, don’t bet on that. If the rest of the season is dry and sunny, sublimation will occur. That means no runoff.
(01-11-2023, 04:28 PM)Bampa Wrote:(01-11-2023, 03:31 PM)paloalto Wrote: This is currently my favorite thread here. Thanks for the info on rainfall around the state. In Ventura county there were some measuring stations that recorded over 18 inches the past five days.
I follow the water level of Lake Mead in Nevada/Arizona. It has risen only about one foot since the rainy season started.
Lake Sonoma was the lowest I have seen it since I moved up here in 2005.
It recently went from 39% to 72.6%...amazing
Somebof us remember Feb. 1992 aka the month it rained. Nonstop.
(01-11-2023, 08:42 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 11:09 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 09:22 AM)81alum Wrote: 2017 was our last really wet winter. I'm interested to see what it looks like today, and whether it fills up this winter. Anyone with eyes on the lake?
I think this is going to be a really wet winter. Next two weeks promise lots of statewide precipitation. The larger (500k AF+) California lakes and reservoirs have plenty of capacity. Shasta, Oroville, San Luis and Folsom are about 1/3rd full; Pine Flat, McClure, New Melones and Trinity are 1/4th full; Don Pedro, Berryessa and Almanor are about half full. Some of the others have lesser capacity; Diamond Valley, New Bullards and Friant are around 2/3rds full. Isabella's only 9% full.
RESSW.pdf (ca.gov)
Oroville is at 47%, Folsom and Shasta's increased to 42%, San Luis is up to 39%.
Pine Flat is at 36%, McClure is at 42%, New Melones is at 33%. Trinity still at 26%.
Don Pedro (67%), Berryessa (57%) and Almanor (60%) are filling up.
Diamond Valley (61%), New Bullards (72%) and Friant (78%) are filling up fast.
Isabella is at 12%
Locally; Lexington, in Los Gatos, is at 76%; Stevens Creek is at 69%, Lower Crystal Springs (San Mateo) is at 90%, San Andreas is at 92%, Uvas is at 104%Q, Clifton Court Forebay is at 58%.
Lots of SF Bay reservoirs at 100%+ capacity, including Lake Hennessey, San Antonio, U San Leandro, Chabot, Coyote Reservoir. Calaveras at 96%.
How full is Sites? Temperance Flats?
(01-04-2023, 11:29 PM)winflop Wrote: I'm up in Napa right now. The city and county have poured tons of money into improving flood control both in the city of Napa and upriver. It looks like its working. No flooding last week and predictions are the Napa River will get close to flooding tonight and again on Sunday but will fall a couple feet short.
My heavens. Local government fixes local problems. Outstanding.
RE: Palo Alto Flood Warning until 2:45 - TonyLima - 01-11-2023
(12-31-2022, 08:30 PM)jacket3ree Wrote: This may be the most on topic thread for me in history. I've worked on and around San Francisquito, Matadero, Barron, and Adobe Creeks and the Palo Alto Flood Basin for 36 years now. First, I sincerely wish safety for life, limb, and property and hope the next week of rain on top of wet soils does not result in a repeat of history, although I'm afraid it might.
My PE stamp is on the report/workmap that became the FEMA flood hazard maps that cover Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Los Altos. It is also on the basis of design that became the Matadero and Barron Creek improvements of the late 1990s. The person living near Barron Creek might appreciate that with a series of planned diversions into Matadero Creek, Barron Creek should have 100-year flow capacity. So should Matadero Creek. I know every inch of those systems and have walked the creeks from Foothill Expressway under El Camino in the bypass and on into the flood basin. That leaves San Francisquito Creek.
Without getting into the political reasons it may never be "fixed" completely, San Francisquito remains a problem child. Today's flow provisionally peaked at roughly 4,300 cubic feet per second (cfs) at the USGS gage at Stanford (golf course). That is equivalent to a 10-year return period based on the available record. The Pope-Chaucer Bridge is the first capacity-limiting hydraulic bottleneck and as evidenced by reports of limited overflow today, San Francisquito Creek has about a 10-year capacity. At East Bayshore, water was on the new floodwalls, and it looks like the tide was up. It is of course poor form to say "I told you so" to the people who objected to those floodwalls during their public vetting. Our pump station that sits next to Yeaman Auto Body was cranking away, only needing one of its four large capacity pumps to keep up. This storm is also the first "shake down" for two large storm water pump stations we just finished near Coyote Point, so this has been a busy week. There are some control issues at one of them we need to button down on Tuesday. Fortunately the bat signal didn't go out today. Tomorrow should be a break in the precipitation.
By contrast, February 2-3, 1998 was the flood of record on San Francisquito Creek and essentially a 100-year flow as measured at the gage. Flows leave the alluvial/perched creek channel and flow through Menlo Park, Palo Alto, and East Palo Alto never to return. The most severe flooding in 1998 was south of Colorado Avenue where water is trapped against the Matadero Creek floodwalls. That risk remains.
Every possible solution under the sun has been proposed, but none have met the public, environmental, and financial approval to move forward. Kevin Murray at the SF Creek JPA works tirelessly to get something done, so I'm sure these are anxious days for him. He does have a plan that would improve hydraulics at the Chaucer Bridge and then the next bottlenecks on the system that would then control capacity. The downstream reach is ready to handle the extra flow and additional capacity was recently added at the 101 bridge. The JPA will do what they can, but my understanding is that 100-year protection will simply remain out of reach for a host of reasons.
Stay safe everyone and remember that California is shaped by floods as much as drought.
A minor, but important, reason I hang out here. Stanford grads have actual expertise. Thank you.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - martyup - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 02:54 PM)M T Wrote:
I graduated from Stanford in '83. Now I know why my memory is that it was alway raining. It was!
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - jacket3ree - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 08:42 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 11:09 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 09:22 AM)81alum Wrote: 2017 was our last really wet winter. I'm interested to see what it looks like today, and whether it fills up this winter. Anyone with eyes on the lake?
I think this is going to be a really wet winter. Next two weeks promise lots of statewide precipitation. The larger (500k AF+) California lakes and reservoirs have plenty of capacity. Shasta, Oroville, San Luis and Folsom are about 1/3rd full; Pine Flat, McClure, New Melones and Trinity are 1/4th full; Don Pedro, Berryessa and Almanor are about half full. Some of the others have lesser capacity; Diamond Valley, New Bullards and Friant are around 2/3rds full. Isabella's only 9% full.
RESSW.pdf (ca.gov)
Oroville is at 47%, Folsom and Shasta's increased to 42%, San Luis is up to 39%.
Pine Flat is at 36%, McClure is at 42%, New Melones is at 33%. Trinity still at 26%.
Don Pedro (67%), Berryessa (57%) and Almanor (60%) are filling up.
Diamond Valley (61%), New Bullards (72%) and Friant (78%) are filling up fast.
Isabella is at 12%
Locally; Lexington, in Los Gatos, is at 76%; Stevens Creek is at 69%, Lower Crystal Springs (San Mateo) is at 90%, San Andreas is at 92%, Uvas is at 104%Q, Clifton Court Forebay is at 58%.
Lots of SF Bay reservoirs at 100%+ capacity, including Lake Hennessey, San Antonio, U San Leandro, Chabot, Coyote Reservoir. Calaveras at 96%.
The bolded describes half of my professional life at the moment in a nutshell. This weekend might be bad. Lake Lag will be the least of our worries. (In the biz, we call golf courses "detention basins".) Stay safe everyone.
(01-11-2023, 02:54 PM)M T Wrote: I haven't been tracking rainfall amounts at other locations, but at two home weather stations near me (about 8 mi SE of Stanford, between El Camino Hospital and Loyola Corners), the rain fall totals for December and January(so far) are 9.68+7.10=16.78" and 9.63+8.00=17.10", about 3x average for that interval. Average yearly rainfall is about 18.1". Even if the rain stopped today, the lake levels will continue to rise as the water drains into them.
A WeatherUnderground station on Stanford campus indicates the rain there has been 5.73(Dec)+4.09(Jan) = 9.82. Another one more in downtown Palo Alto shows 10.0+4.23 = 14.23
Using data from weather.gov for "San Jose Area", here are the seasonal year totals for the San Jose Area, 1894-2022. (2021-2022 is labelled 2022)
The only caution I see is that this weather has all been relatively warm, so more precipitation is in the form of rain, with less as snow.
Right, snow is more important for the State's overall water supply; rain for the local supplies that are not tied to State Water, like Marin and Sonoma Counties. With Anderson drained as we do the seismic retrofit, Santa Clara County has lost most of its local supply. Really need San Luis to fill up and support import. Some of the deeper coastal groundwater basins (e.g. Castroville-Salinas) where people have been forced to find freshwater that is not intruded with saltwater take thousands of years to recharge with "connate" water, so not much help there, ever.
This graph is illustrative. There is a mean value, but look at the variability and lack of persistence from year to year. Random City! I'm still in the process of stochastically generating 100,000 years of record for the work at Anderson (Rev. 13 of the report on my desktop now), so I'll thank David Freyberg and his Stochastic Hydrology course circa 1985. But starting to blow cover here, so I'll stop.
RE: Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - martyup - 01-11-2023
I grew up in the Santa Ynez Valley, home of Solvang. Our local lake is Cachuma. It rose over 33 feet overnight, going from 40% to 71%.
https://keyt.com/news/santa-maria-north-county/2023/01/10/cachuma-lake-reservoir-raises-over-30-feet-overnight/
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - CompSci87 - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 07:17 PM)martyup Wrote:(01-11-2023, 02:54 PM)M T Wrote:
I graduated from Stanford in '83. Now I know why my memory is that it was alway raining. It was!
Similar experience for me. I started grad school at Stanford in 1981, moving here from Milwaukee, so my first impression of the NorCal rainy season was that it meant rain almost every day.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - cardcrimson - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 07:19 PM)jacket3ree Wrote: Right, snow is more important for the State's overall water supply; rain for the local supplies that are not tied to State Water, like Marin and Sonoma Counties. With Anderson drained as we do the seismic retrofit, Santa Clara County has lost most of its local supply. Really need San Luis to fill up and support import. Some of the deeper coastal groundwater basins (e.g. Castroville-Salinas) where people have been forced to find freshwater that is not intruded with saltwater take thousands of years to recharge with "connate" water, so not much help there, ever.
This graph is illustrative. There is a mean value, but look at the variability and lack of persistence from year to year. Random City! I'm still in the process of stochastically generating 100,000 years of record for the work at Anderson (Rev. 13 of the report on my desktop now), so I'll thank David Freyberg and his Stochastic Hydrology course circa 1985. But starting to blow cover here, so I'll stop.
A friend with whom I've worked on a salt marsh restoration project in the East Bay is an expert on flood control. A few years back, he pointed me to the Great Flood of 1862 and its impact to California in general and to Contra Costa in particular. Pretty stunning, especially as that flood wasn't the "big one", and had been bettered by many floods over the last couple of millennia. Looking at the last 100k years must show a pretty impressive series of floods that shaped California as we see it today. Don't think we're headed for a mega flood this year, but we're knocking on the door of one. . ..
RE: Flooding, Lake Lag, California Water situation - BostonCard - 01-11-2023
The meteorologist who works for the Palisades/Tahoe blog (Bryan Allegretto) is pretty good. For long range forecasts, this is what he has:
Quote:We could see a break in the storms for Tuesday the 17th. Then a final storm in the series is possible for the 18th-19th. Then a drier pattern is still forecast to kick in starting on the 20th into the last week of January.
https://blog.palisadestahoe.com/weather/snow-wednesday-a-snowy-weekend-ahead/
Of course that doesn't tell us about Feb/March, but getting even a one week respite will be welcome.
BC
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - threepointer - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 08:42 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 11:09 AM)Mick Wrote:% of Average shown in red 90% after % of Capacity.(01-02-2023, 09:22 AM)81alum Wrote: 2017 was our last really wet winter. I'm interested to see what it looks like today, and whether it fills up this winter. Anyone with eyes on the lake?
I think this is going to be a really wet winter. Next two weeks promise lots of statewide precipitation. The larger (500k AF+) California lakes and reservoirs have plenty of capacity. Shasta, Oroville, San Luis and Folsom are about 1/3rd full; Pine Flat, McClure, New Melones and Trinity are 1/4th full; Don Pedro, Berryessa and Almanor are about half full. Some of the others have lesser capacity; Diamond Valley, New Bullards and Friant are around 2/3rds full. Isabella's only 9% full.
RESSW.pdf (ca.gov)
Oroville is at 47% / 90%, Folsom 72% and Shasta's increased to 42% 71%, San Luis is up to 39% 60%.
Pine Flat is at 36% 113%, McClure is at 42% 102%, New Melones is at 33% 61%. Trinity still at 26% 88%.
Don Pedro (67%) 101%, Berryessa (57%) 79% and Almanor (60%) are filling up.
Diamond Valley (61%), New Bullards (72%) 117% and Friant (78%) 115% are filling up fast.
Isabella is at 12% 59%
Locally; Lexington, in Los Gatos, is at 76%; Stevens Creek is at 69%, Lower Crystal Springs (San Mateo) is at 90%, San Andreas is at 92%, Uvas is at 104%Q, Clifton Court Forebay is at 58%.
Lots of SF Bay reservoirs at 100%+ capacity, including Lake Hennessey, San Antonio, U San Leandro, Chabot, Coyote Reservoir. Calaveras at 96%.
I've been monitoring water levels on the CDEC site for over 10 years. I started doing this when I noticed the spectacular claims in the media were separated from reality.
% of Capacity at this time of the year is interesting, but less important than % of Average for this date. I have added those percentages to Mick's table (shown in red). Keep in mind that when the snow pack starts to melt the high elevation reservoirs will fill up rapidly and put pressure on the downstream reservoirs. Folsom, the state's 10 largest reservoir is a good example of this type of reservoir - it is at 404 feet above sea level. It's purpose is to catch the snow melt and the massive amount of water flowing through the American river to prevent the historical flooding of the Sacramento basin. Trinity is higher up at 2200 feet. It is mostly filled with snow melt. That is why it is at a low level of capacity in early January.
In 2017 the spillways of Oroville Dam failed and almost inundated Oroville. it cost $1 billion to repair the damage. In 2017 I started warning people that Oroville was filling up too fast - 3 weeks before the spillway failed. At the rate Oroville was filling there was no way to release enough water fast enough. They should have started earlier in the year. For smaller reservoirs nearing or exceeding capacity is not such a big deal. They can release a high % of their storage very quickly. Oroville is a different story. It is the second largest reservoir in California after Shasta with a capacity of 3.5 million acre fee. That's 1.152 TRILLION gallons.
I have a fancy excel spreadsheet that I have crafted over the years with colorful conditional logic and macros. I am quite proud of the output because you can tell at a glance where the system might be in trouble (over/under average and capacity). I would post an image, but apparently you can't do it on this site.
As of this evening, the top 20 reservoirs were at 47% of Capacity and 81% of Average. My bet is that 100% of average will be exceeded in a few days.
RE: Palo Alto Flooding - TonyLima - 01-11-2023
(01-11-2023, 09:25 PM)threepointer Wrote:(01-11-2023, 08:42 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 11:09 AM)Mick Wrote:(01-02-2023, 09:22 AM)81alum Wrote: 2017 was our last really wet winter. I'm interested to see what it looks like today, and whether it fills up this winter. Anyone with eyes on the lake?
I think this is going to be a really wet winter. Next two weeks promise lots of statewide precipitation. The larger (500k AF+) California lakes and reservoirs have plenty of capacity. Shasta, Oroville, San Luis and Folsom are about 1/3rd full; Pine Flat, McClure, New Melones and Trinity are 1/4th full; Don Pedro, Berryessa and Almanor are about half full. Some of the others have lesser capacity; Diamond Valley, New Bullards and Friant are around 2/3rds full. Isabella's only 9% full.
RESSW.pdf (ca.gov)
Oroville is at 47% / 90%, Folsom 72% and Shasta's increased to 42% 71%, San Luis is up to 39% 60%.
Pine Flat is at 36% 113%, McClure is at 42% 102%, New Melones is at 33% 61%. Trinity still at 26% 88%.
Don Pedro (67%) 101%, Berryessa (57%) 79% and Almanor (60%) are filling up.
Diamond Valley (61%), New Bullards (72%) 117% and Friant (78%) 115% are filling up fast.
Isabella is at 12% 59%
Locally; Lexington, in Los Gatos, is at 76%; Stevens Creek is at 69%, Lower Crystal Springs (San Mateo) is at 90%, San Andreas is at 92%, Uvas is at 104%Q, Clifton Court Forebay is at 58%.
Lots of SF Bay reservoirs at 100%+ capacity, including Lake Hennessey, San Antonio, U San Leandro, Chabot, Coyote Reservoir. Calaveras at 96%.
I've been monitoring water levels on the CDEC site for over 10 years. I started doing this when I noticed the spectacular claims in the media were separated from reality.
Focusing on % of Capacity at this time of the year is interesting, but less important than % of Average for this date. I have added those percentages to Mick's table (shown in red). Keep in mind that when the snow pack starts to melt the high elevation reservoirs will fill up rapidly and put pressure on the downstream reservoirs. Folsom, the state's 10 largest reservoir is a good example - it is at 404 feet above sea level. It's purpose is to catch the snow melt and the massive amount of water flowing through the American river to prevent the historical flooding of the Sacramento basin.
In 2017 I started warning people that Oroville was filling up too fast. For smaller reservoirs this is not a big deal. They can release a high % of their storage very quickly. Oroville is a different story. It is the second largest reservoir in California after Shasta with a capacity of 3.5 million acre feet. That's 1.152 TRILLION gallons. In 2017 the spillways of Oroville Dam failed and almost inundated Oroville. it cost $1 billion to repair the damage.
I have a fancy/dancy excel spreadsheet with colorful conditional logic and macros. I am quite proud of the output because you can tell at a glance where the system might be in trouble (over/under average and capacity). I would post an image, but apparently you can't do it on this site.
I post Excel workbooks on my blog all the time. Figure out a way to get it to me.