Recovery at California's most beleaguered reservoir | Hacker News Reader

Recovery at California's most beleaguered reservoir

cnn.com

44 pointsthrill34 comments

I feel like the photos are always dramatic, but it's really hard to interpret. For one thing its not clear the photos are from the same time of year. But even with photos from the same time of year, we visualize surface area and visibility of "bathtub ring", not volume.

Actual data is here: https://cdec.water.ca.gov/resapp/RescondMain. It seems Lake Oroville, the resevoir featured in the article, and Cachuma are the only ones that are well above historical average.

Also https://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/products/rescond.pdf

I find this* graph most helpful. In one graph it displays all of Californias reservoirs with their current level, their historical average, and their level 1 year ago vs their capacity. It also shows the relative sizes to one another.

The reservoir from the article (Oroville) is one of the only ones to have made such a recovery.

* - https://engaging-data.com/ca-reservoir-dashboard/

What a beautiful and rich data visualization!

I second this. Thank you for sharing!

I wonder if this is a custom visualization pattern, or if there is general a name for this type of visualization. Does any one know?

The author talks about them a bit below the chart in that link. Apparently it’s called a marimekko visualization or a mosaic plot:

https://datavizcatalogue.com/methods/marimekko_chart.html

This one shows reservoirs + snowpack (which I think is ultimately what matters most):

https://engaging-data.com/california-reservoirs-and-snowpack...

It seems Lake Oroville, the resevoir featured in the article, and Cachuma are the only ones that are well above historical average.

Lake Oroville is at 115%. New Bullards is at 120%, Pine Flat is at 121%, Folsom and Camanche at 111%.

If Oroville Dam sounds familiar, it’s the one that nearly overtopped, then nearly undermined itself, in the 2017 floods

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville_Dam_crisis

This Imgur collection of animated gifs capturing the 2017 Oroville Spillway crisis is an amazing work of journalism:

https://imgur.io/gallery/mpUge

https://imgur.io/gallery/6IyCi

https://imgur.com/gallery/YgatJ

Dayum those are amazing, thanks a ton for posting them. Bookmarked for posterity

Those definitely look dramatic, but huge amounts of CA water come from aquifers which aren’t being refilled, and these reservoirs are wider at the top than the bottom, so the height increase of the water may oversell how much of the reservoir volume has been filled.

It's also important to note that underground aquifers that are drained compact/settle, and when they do so, that aquifer will never regain that capacity.

The huge draw-downs caused by industry and especially agriculture trying to grow things in areas that don't have nearly the water to support such crops, is doing irreparable harm to the planet. Shrinking aquifers dramatically reduces that area's resiliency to drought.

Yeah but this problem is solvable with technology. We don’t need to rely on underground aquifers like we used to.

What technology can store large volumes of water and provide it as cheaply as using existing aquifers and drilling wells for access?

blockchain! /s :D

Dams and reservoirs

About 1/3 of Santa Clara county's water comes from underground aquifers. Most of the reservoirs in Santa Clara county are recharge reservoirs - simply to allow water to percolate down to refill the underwater aquifers, there are many small ponds scattered around the county to assist in this effort. There are parts of the other states (Texas,Kansas off top of my head) that rely on underground aquifers for a much higher percentage of their water.

This kind of blind techno-utopianism is exactly how we got into this predicament.

Not Utopianism. Technology simply solves problems which are inevitable. It’s problems and solutions forever my friend.

Deciding "we will find a solution before it's too late" is optimism. Operating with that as a default assumption is utopianism.

I am surprised I have to spell this out, HN doesn't seem to represent the levels of rigor I have come to expect.

What a condescending thing to say.

I am surprised I have to explain good faith discussion to you, something I assumed was part of our culture here.

The thing I believe you're missing is that new knowledge gained by solving one problem also solves many other future problems. But because some problems are so big (massive suffering and extinction), and there are infinitely many of them, the only game in town is to make progress as quickly as possible. Otherwise we're just waiting around to be obliterated.

Anyhow, maybe you will find this point of view enlightening. If you have 30 minutes it just might broaden your perspective. I would welcome your thoughts in response: https://youtu.be/01C3a4fL1m0

Why do they let boats operate in reservoirs? Shouldn't those be left empty so that water doesn't get contaminated?

Animals operate on the reservoir too, plus there’s mud at the bottom. Kinda have to process the water no matter what.

Oddly enough the reservoirs near where I grew up in California would allow boats, but not swimming. Their excuse was to keep the water clean, as if people are dirtier than both motorboats and deer.

I lived near a reservoir in rural Maine with similar rules. The reasoning (as I heard it) was that the water-treatment system could deal with some pollutants but wasn't necessarily equipped to adequately filter out viruses like the one that causes hepatitis, which could be spread by people swimming.

I dunno, I see more pontoon boats in the 2023 shots. Seems like a downgrade.

Why are there so many boats? is it normal?

Yes. Reservoirs are popular locations for fishing and recreation.

Would the water be fit for human consumption after this sort of use, or is this reservoir only used for almond watering?

Edit: @bitxbitxbitcoin: Thank you for the quick info, much appreciated. The questions are genuine, not a water system expert here.

Assuming these are serious questions… there are water treatment centers that water from reservoirs go through before they enter the pipes that go to your tap.

Also, no reservoir anywhere is only used for almond watering. That’s hyperbolic. Almond farmers get thirsty too.

Yeah, most water is fit for consumption. It takes as a pretty huge amount of pollution to have a meaningful impact on humans and dilution is a powerful mitigation.

The pipes taking it to your tap and added chemicals are a much higher risk.

Homeopathy in reverse

More water plz.

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