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Unstable Delta levees pose potential threat to Tehachapi
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Posted by editor Mon Apr 3, 2006 15:42:49 PDT
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0 responses 0 comments With so many issues to deal with right here at home, including the accelerating pace of residential and commercial development, the potential for collapse of levees in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta 300 miles to the north would seem like something that could be shoved onto the back burner.

Think again. The delta, where the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers and their tributaries come together before flowing to the ocean by way of San Francisco Bay, is a vital source of water for the Tehachapi area as well as a large part of Central and Southern California. The California Aqueduct of the State Water Project, through which the Tehachapi area receives its necessary supply of supplemental water, has its intake in the delta. Any serious collapse of the levees that channel water through the delta could have devastating and long-lasting effects here in our own community.

State and local water officials are keeping their fingers crossed that the delta levees, nearly all of them more than a century old and poorly constructed by modern standards, will continue to hold up until a massive reconstruction effort can be launched. From the standpoint of possible economic losses to the State of California, the crumbling of key levees in the delta would most likely cost more than damages to New Orleans due to Hurricane Katrina, water experts agree.

The delta, located generally in a triangle bounded by Sacramento, Stockton and San Francisco, is mostly the creation of man. When the first pioneers arrived in California the delta was a gigantic swamp. Then following the construction of the transcontinental railroad in the latter part of the 1800s, large numbers of workers who had labored to build the Central Pacific over the Sierra Mountains turned their attention to taming the delta with levees that have created big tracts of fertile farmland, most of which actually lie below sea level. Since then, a shifting consortium of private landowners and government agencies have maintained the levees in what is conceded to have been a patchwork fashion.

The fragile nature of delta levees was recognized when the State Water Project was conceived more than 50 years ago. Largely to circumvent this threat, the original project plan envisioned a channel around the delta known as the peripheral canal. For a variety of reasons, mostly political, the peripheral canal remains on the drawing board. If it were in place, the southern half of the state could accommodate serious delta levee breaks. But as it is, state project water has to be brought through the heart of the delta to California Aqueduct pumps near Tracy.

This makes the State Water Project vulnerable to intrusion of saltwater which is now held at bay due to the outflow of the delta’s constructed channels. Even a small amount of saltwater intrusion could make delta water unusable to State Water Project customers for years, not just one season. It’s sobering to think what this would mean to residents of Tehachapi and millions of other Californians who depend on fresh water from the delta. At the least, it would result in billions of dollars in economic losses along with great privations.

Like all Americans, Californians have been sympathetic and generous toward the victims of New Orleans flooding that resulted from levee failures. It’s ironic that here in the Golden State we face the prospect of an even worse catastrophe.

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