California city aims to 'recharge water' to fight drought
STORY: This is the Arroyo Pasajero Creek - halfway between Sacramento and Los Angeles.
It's parched from California's historic drought - but in other years, it's been dangerously flooded.
Climate change has exacerbated both extremes.
But what if you could use the floods - to recharge the land when it's dry?
A group of local farmers and a nearby city are trying to do just that.
The idea is simple: turn unused fields into giant ponds that can hold water in wet years and recharge the groundwater below.
California's agricultural economy is one of the largest in the world.
It relies largely on irrigation, which further taxes an already over-tapped system.
Dams and reservoirs are a more traditional way to store water - but they can damage the environment.
In the state’s Central Valley, water was so scarce this year that the city of Huron had to buy it on the open market.
That led to a bill hike for the city’s 7,000 residents.
And that’s in a city that Mayor Rey Leon says is already one of the state’s poorest.
“To have such a high cost on something that's so critical for life is just mind boggling." [FLASH]
"The climate crisis is real, the science is real, and the solutions should be innovative and implementable. And that's what we're doing right now."
The nearby pond project - known as a recharge system - aims to harness floodwater that would otherwise go out to sea or cause damage to towns, cities and crops.
Sarah Woolf is a water consultant whose family owns some of the farmland being used for the project.
“We're in the third year of a drought and very challenging water supply issues." [FLASH]
"When there's excess supplies, we want to put it onto the land and recharge it into the groundwater."
As the water percolates from unused fields into the earth below, it builds up an aquifer.
There’s enough room to store about 326 billion gallons of water - which can serve 2 million households for a year.
Huron is building a new well that will be fed from that aquifer.
The city isn’t alone.
The Huron project is one of about 340 that have been proposed by water agencies in California.
Storing water underground isn’t a new idea, but a recent state law regulating its use has sparked a number of projects.
The state’s Department of Water Resources says - if they’re built by 2030 - they would provide enough water for 4.4 million households a year.
相關影片推薦
2:02
民眾被盜刷10幾萬要買單! 銀行:有走完正常綁卡程序民視影音25,275 次觀看・9 小時前4:34
華為開發者大會自嗨 鴻蒙星河版HarmonyOS NEXT應用程式少安卓700倍 標榜「一個系統」走蘋果過去的路 中國網友質疑鴻蒙不可能「純血」|全球聊天室 #鏡新聞鏡新聞11,913 次觀看・1 天前2:09
看成人片危險? 沈伯洋:恐被中國「蒐集個資抓立場」華視影音45,311 次觀看・13 小時前1:57
自助餐「鱈魚+2菜」要120元 記者回店買變200元更貴!東森新聞影音63,873 次觀看・1 天前1:11
孫安佐轉戰成人平台! 將和陳沂合體SWAG證實了娛樂星聞8,316 次觀看・3 天前1:22
國道遭逼車.砸雞蛋! 女駕駛擋風玻璃視線模糊民視影音77,343 次觀看・18 小時前1:34
暑假天氣炎熱 大里潑水節登場 親子玩水消暑民視影音2,214 次觀看・18 小時前4:41
躺平不盛行了? 中高齡就業 轉投入顧問.餐飲業多TVBS新聞網影音7,383 次觀看・8 小時前1:53
「膝蓋想都知不可能」 小野駁自審「天安門」TVBS新聞網影音6,075 次觀看・8 小時前2:01
台中彩虹眷村走味?夾雜動漫風 遊客再訪意願低華視影音4,207 次觀看・1 天前