Imagine having two bank accounts with money for your everyday needs, only one of them – the one you draw from when the primary account runs low – is a virtual black box. You really have no idea what the balance is, and there is no record of deposits and withdrawals.
This is how water is managed in California, with 38mn people and the world’s eighth largest economy. In years of “normal” precipitation, the semi-arid state gets most of its water supply from winter rain and spring snowmelt. However, when this “primary account” of surface water supply dwindles during droughts, farms and communities rely heavily on a mystery account called groundwater, which truly is out of sight and, unfortunately, out of mind…
News
This page features excerpts from news about environmental justice advocacy in the San Joaquin Valley and links to their original sources. Use the features on the right to sort by topic, news source, date, key word or author. You may also subscribe to receive the news by e-mail or through an rss reader. Please note that links to original sources may expire over time.
Once upon a time, local orchard farmers taking out trees piled them up in large heaps and struck a match, sending huge plumes of smoke into the air.
More recently, the waste has gone to biomass power plants that crank out electricity, meet stricter air pollution requirements and provide a renewable energy component.
But now that the whole biomass industry in California is threatened with extinction, the issue has become a hot topic in the ag industry…
More than half a dozen East Porterville residents drove to Sacramento last month to testify before the Assembly Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials Committee. These residents told stories about life without water — of being unable to wash clothes, take showers, or even flush the toilet without first walking outside to fill a bucket with water from a temporary water tank. They also shared stories that left the room inspired by their determination and leadership in working toward a lasting drinking water solution for their community…
The Division of Oil, Gas, and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) recently released a draft of its environmental impact report on fracking and other well stimulation–and it comes up shockingly short on various fronts. We reviewed that draft with our partners at the Center for Biological Diversity, LA Waterkeeper, and the Sierra Club. Together we submitted a 107-page comment letter in response, along with two expert reports–one on the significant air pollution impacts and another discrediting claims about the economic impacts of well stimulation…
The emergency drought relief bill that California lawmakers will begin voting on Wednesday would create a new state office. That might sound fairly mundane. But as Amy Quinton reports from Sacramento, supporters say it could help disadvantaged communities…
San Joaquin Valley residents can’t choose whether or not to grapple with climate change. Its threats are real, and its impacts felt. The Valley is at a crossroads as water becomes more scarce, precipitation patterns change, temperatures increase, in turn impacting air quality, energy costs, water availability, health and employment options.
Fortunately, there’s a growing climate for opportunity in our region as California confronts the complementary challenges of climate change and dependence on petroleum…
Hazmat suit-wearing demonstrators with Californians Against Fracking will protest today outside a state-run “aquifer exemption” workshop in Long Beach aimed at helping oil companies get federal permission to dump oil waste into California’s underground water. The protest starts at noon at the Holiday Inn Long Beach Airport, 2640 N. Lakewood Blvd., Long Beach.
“Instead of this ‘Toxic Dumping for Dummies’ class, Gov. Jerry Brown’s regulators should protect our water from oil waste,” said Ash Lauth of Californians Against Fracking. “During this devastating drought, oil companies shouldn’t be allowed to use our aquifers as trash dumps for fracking flowback and other dangerous fluids.”…
The emergency drought relief bill proposed for California would create a new state office. That might sound fairly mundane. But it could go a long way to help disadvantaged communities.
Clean water advocates will tell you that it can sometimes take decades for small or poor communities to get clean drinking water…
Members of several organizations in the California Environmental Justice Coalition (CEJC), including VIP, met on Thursday with Barbara Lee, the newly appointed Director of Cal EPA’s Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) to discuss the detailed list of recommendations for improving DTSC that CEJC recently submitted. After discussing the recommendations, DTSC’s recent permit denial to Exide Technologies in East LA, and their decision to allow the toxic landfill expansion in Kettleman City, members of El Pueblo Para El Aire y Agua Limpia de Kettleman City (People for Clean Air & Water) and Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice hand delivered a copy of the federal and state civil rights complaint filed against Cal EPA and DTSC to Director Lee…