The Central Valley Project Slideshow: Building California

An exclusive production of Maven’s Notebook, Page 1
a California water news, science and policy blog

The Central Valley Project is a complex operation with facilities that reach
from the rugged Cascade Range north of Redding 400 miles south to the
semi-arid plains surrounding Bakersfield at the foot of the Tehachapi
Mountains. The project is the largest in the state, delivering on average 7
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million acre-feet of water – about 20% of the state’s supply.

Water from the CVP irrigates 3 million
acres of farmland in the Sacramento and
San Joaquin valleys,
as well as provides drinking water
for 1 million households.

Central Valley Project
facilities span 35 of the
state’s 58 counties and
harnesses the state’s two
main rivers, the
Sacramento River and the
San Joaquin River.

facilities consist of …
18 dams …
11 power plants …
3 fish hatcheries …
… and 500 miles
of aqueducts.

Shasta Dam and reservoir mark the start of the Central Valley Project
infrastructure. Located at the north end of the Sacramento Valley just north of
Redding, the dam gathers water from the 6665-square mile drainage area that
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includes the Sacramento, Pit and McCloud rivers.
Photo by Bureau of Reclamation

At 602-feet high, Shasta Dam is the ninth tallest dam in the United States. Shasta
Reservoir has a capacity of 4.5 million acre-feet and is California’s largest reservoir.
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Besides providing storage for
about 64% of the CVP supply,
Shasta Dam also provides flood
protection for downstream
communities, maintains
navigation flows and provides
flows for salmon and other native
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species.
Photo source: Wikimedia

Construction on Shasta Dam began in 1938, and despite floods and difficulties with
supplies due to WW II, the dam was completed by 1945 – twenty six months ahead
Photos by Bureau of Reclamation
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of schedule.
For a historical photo tour of Shasta dam, click here: https://www.usbr.gov/mp/ncao/shasta/virtual_tour.pdf

At the base of the dam is the 710 MW Shasta Dam power plant. The power
plant is operated as a peaking plant with releases varying hourly, daily, and
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seasonally as water and power demands fluctuate.

Five penstocks at the base of the dam, each 15-feet in diameter,
deliver water to the five generators below. The Shasta Power Plant
accounts for 42% of the CVP’s total hydropower production.
How is hydropower generated?
Photo by Bureau of Reclamation Click here to find out.

The Shasta Power plant stands 156-feet tall, equivalent to a fifteen story
building, and is one of the largest hydropower plants in California. The
power plant has been in operation since 1944, producing power for the war
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effort even before the dam was officially completed.

Just to the northwest, Trinity Dam forms Trinity Lake. At more than 2.4 MAF, it is the
second largest storage reservoir in the Central Valley Project system with about half
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the capacity of Shasta Lake.

Releases from
Trinity Dam flow
downstream to
Lewiston Dam,
where water is
diverted through a
series of tunnels
to meet with the
Sacramento River
at Keswick
Reservoir.

The 23,800 acre-foot
Keswick Reservoir is located
9 miles downstream from
Shasta and serves as an
afterbay for the releases
from Shasta’s power plant,
as well as the receiving
reservoir for the waters from
the Trinity River.
An afterbay is a body of water, such
as a pond or a reservoir, located at
the outlet of a hydroelectric power
plant that is used to regulate (or
smooth out) downstream releases.
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From Keswick Reservoir, the Sacramento River, now boosted with the flows from the
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Trinity River, continues south.

Further downstream on the
Sacramento River, the Sacramento
Canals Unit of the CVP diverts water
from the river for the irrigation over
100,000 acres in Tehama, Glenn,
and Colusa counties.
Photo by NCRS
Photo by NCRS

The Red Bluff Diversion Dam is located two miles southeast of Red Bluff.
The dam has a number of gates that when lowered, would raise the level of the river
to use gravity to divert water from into the Tehama-Colusa and Corning canals.
However, the dam was an impediment to upstream and downstream fish migration.
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The gates of the diversion dam
have been permanently placed
in the open position.
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So in 2012, the diversion dam was replaced
with a pumping facility with state of the art fish
screens nearly 1200 feet long.
Fish screens under construction

From there, the Sacramento River flows south to meet with the Feather River
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at Verona, about 5 miles north of the Sacramento Airport.
Photo by DWR

Over to the east, the headwaters of the American River originate in the
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peaks of the Sierra Nevada and flow west towards Sacramento.
North fork of the American River, photo by Greg Keene

Twenty five miles east of Sacramento, Folsom Dam catches the flow of the American
River, providing flood protection for the Sacramento area. The dam also provides
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water for agricultural and urban use, as well as hydropower.

Folsom Dam,
completed in 1955, was
built by the Army Corps
of Engineers and
turned over to the
Bureau of Reclamation
upon completion.

Seven miles downstream of Folsom Dam is Nimbus Dam, the afterbay for
Folsom Dam power plant as well as the diversion structure for the Folsom
South Canal. The dam also produces a small amount of hydropower.
PhotPo bayg Vein c2e4

The American River joins the Sacramento River at Discovery Park near downtown
Sacramento, and from there, the rivers flow into the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
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Photo by Chris Austin

Releases from Shasta Lake, together with downstream flows on the
American River and other tributaries provide protection against salinity in
the Delta and supplies for export through the Delta.

At Walnut Grove, the Cross Channel moves a portion of the waters from the
Sacramento River south through the to the Central Valley Project export facilities
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at the southern edge of the Delta.

In the Delta, the Contra Costa Canal conveys water from either Rock Slough in
Eastern Contra Costa County or Old River near Discovery Bay, conveying the water
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48 miles to a terminal reservoir in Martinez.

Water flows through the channels, heading south to the pumping
facilities located in the south Delta.

When the water arrives at the
pumping facilities, it first goes
through the Tracy Fish Collection
Facility, which collects the fish
before they enter the pumps.

The facility was built in the
1950s as mitigation for the
mortality of fish who were being
caught in the intake pumps.
Best available technology in
the 50s were louvers which
direct fish towards collection
tanks, which are emptied
several times a day and the
fish taken by tanker truck to be
released in the north Delta.
Reclamation has been working
on upgrading the facilities.
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From the Tracy Fish Facility, the
water then flows on to the Bill
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Jones Pumping Plant.

At the pumping plant, six 22,500 horsepower motors lift the water up about 200-feet
through 15-foot diameter pipes to put the water in the Delta Mendota Canal. The
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pumping plant is capable of moving 8500 acre-feet per day.

From the Bill Jones Pumping Plant, the Delta Mendota Canal then
begins its journey 117 miles south.

Seventy miles downstream from the Delta is the San Luis Joint-Use Complex, a facility
that serves both the Central Valley Project and the State Water Project. Joint facilities
here consist of O’Niell Dam and Forebay, Sisk Dam and San Luis Reservoir, Gianelli
Pumping/Generating Plant, the Dos Amigos Pumping Plant Facility, and a 103-mile
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portion of the California Aqueduct referred to as the San Luis Canal.

President Kennedy was on hand with Governor Brown in August of 1962 for the
reservoir’s groundbreaking ceremonies, setting off a blast of multicolored smoke
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grenades along the axis of the future dam.
Click here to view President Kennedy’s speech on YouTube.

Water from the Delta
Mendota Canal
enters O’Niell
Forebay through an
intake channel at the
base of O’Niell Dam.
Photo by DWR

Water in the Delta Mendota
Canal that is not diverted into
the facilities at San Luis
continues on for about 47
miles to terminate at the
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Mendota Pool.
Located at the confluence of
the San Joaquin River, the
Delta Mendota Canal, and
the Fresno Slough, the
Mendota Pool is a small
reservoir that is used to
redistribute water conveyed
by the Delta Mendota Canal
to the various water users.

From the O’Niell Forebay, water is lifted into San Luis Reservoir by the Giannelli
Pumping & Generating Plant. When water is released from the reservoir, the
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Giannelli facility then generates hydropower.
Photo by DWR

The San Luis Reservoir has a capacity of 2 million acre-feet; it is the largest off-stream
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reservoir in the United States.

The federal portion of the water stored at San Luis Reservoir,1.25 million acre-feet,
is used to supply supplemental irrigation water to irrigation water for 600,000 acres
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on the west side of the Valley.

CVP facilities located on the west side of San Luis Reservoir convey water through
the Pacheco Conduit to irrigate 63,500 acres of farmland in San Benito County …
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… as well as provide a portion for urban use in the Santa Clara Valley.
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The state-owned California Aqueduct flows directly into O’Niell
Forebay. Water not being diverted into San Luis Reservoir from the
California Aqueduct flows through the forebay into the San Luis Canal.

Water for irrigation is released from O’Niell Forebay into the San Luis Canal.
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The water then flows by gravity
to Dos Amigos Pumping Plant
where it is lifted more than 100
feet to continue flowing south to
Coalinga.
Photo by DWR

The federal portion
of the canal
terminates at
Kettleman City, and
the canal then
continues on as the
state-operated
California Aqueduct,
conveying State
Water Project to
Kern County, the
Central Coast, and
Southern California.
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Photo by DWR

Further south on the west side, Friant Dam on the San Joaquin River creates the
520,000 AF Millerton Lake, and provides flood control as well as irrigation water for
one million acres of farmland in Fresno, Kern, Madera and Tulare counties.
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Friant Dam was built
between 1939 and 1942.
Photos by Bureau of Reclamation

Water from Friant Dam can either be sent northward through the 36-mile Madera Canal
to Madera County, or south 152 miles through the Friant-Kern Canal to Bakersfield.
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On the east side of the San Joaquin Valley, lies the New Melones Dam on
the Stanislaus River. It is one of the more controversial water projects in
California history, and in many ways, the difficulties around its construction
signaled that the end of large dam construction had finally come to an end.
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The dam was fiercely opposed by the Sierra Club and other groups who felt that
the Stanislaus River itself – and the whitewater rapids through the deepest
limestone canyon in the western U.S. – were more important than the reservoir
itself. The controversy raged on for decades even after its construction with
extreme tactics employed until 1983 when record floods filled the reservoir
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enough to overflow the spillway.

At 2.4 million acre-feet, New Melones Lake rivals Trinity Lake as the second largest
reservoir in the CVP system, but the reservoir stores on average 1.4 MAF and is only
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filled in the wettest of years.
As it turns out,
estimates of the
amount of water
that would be made
available by
construction of the
dam were later
found to be
significantly off.
Contracts made
based on these
original estimates
have resulted in
lawsuits.

In addition, the New Melones dam submerged the old Melones Dam, built in
1926. When the level of the lake gets below 350,000 acre-feet, the old disused
dam prevents cold water from reaching the outlet works, making the water
temperatures too high for the fish downstream. So when the lake level drops,
power operations are suspended – a temporary solution only that results in
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reduced revenues from hydropower generation.

Due to the controversy, the mis-estimated water yields, and other problems, the Bureau
of Reclamation has called it "a case study of all that can go wrong with a project."
Photo by Keith Werner.
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Coordination with the
State Water Project
Photo by DWR

Both the Central Valley Project and the State Water Project
both export water from the Delta as well as operate
multiple facilities statewide . The operations of the two
water projects are coordinated through a Coordinated
Operating Agreement.
The agreement is both an operations agreement and a
water rights settlement, whose purpose is to ensure that
each project obtains its share of water as well as bears its
share of obligation to protect beneficial uses and meet
water quality standards.
The COA contains the procedures for coordination of
operations, specifies formulas for sharing joint
responsibilities for meeting Delta water quality standards
and other legal uses of water, identifies how unstored flow
will be shared, and sets up a framework for exchange of
water and services between the SWP and CVP.

The Delta Mendota Canal and the California Aqueduct are connected by way of an
intertie which connects the two aqueducts with two 108-feet diameter pipes 500 feet
long. The project, a joint state and federal improvement, was completed in 2012. The
intertie addresses conveyance conditions which restricted the use of the Jones Pumping
Plant, restoring as much as 35,000 AF of Central Valley Supplies. The intertie also
makes it possible to fill CVP San Luis earlier and more frequently, as well as providing
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flexibility during CVP or SWP maintenance activities or emergencies.
Photo by DWR

Benefits and Impacts
The Central Valley Project is not only the California’s largest water project, but
also perhaps its most controversial.
Certainly, the benefits of the Central Valley Project to the state and to the
nation have been incalculable. The construction of the Central Valley Project
helped propel California to the top as the largest agricultural state in the
country, providing inexpensive food and fiber to the nation and to the world.

California has led the nation in agricultural and dairy
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production for the last 50 years …
The Central Valley and the
Delta produce 25% of the
nation’s table food on only 1%
of the country’s farmland …
Fresno County is the most productive
county in the nation, growing 350 crops
worth more than $1 billion …
… and six of the state’s top
ten agricultural counties are
in the San Joaquin Valley.

In addition, the availability of water and power from the
Central Valley Project and other water development projects
brought manufacturing and commerce to the state and
created millions of jobs in the process.
Central Valley Project facilities have prevented billions of
dollars of damage from floods, and allowed cities and farms
to grow and prosper on the valley floor.

However these benefits have not come
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without a heavy price.
In Northern California, the filling of the reservoirs
inundated traditional Native American lands and
the diversion of up to 90% of the flow of the
Trinity River water into the Sacramento River
basin has decimated salmon and steelhead
populations on the Trinity River, creating intense
conflict between the United States and Native
American tribes in the area.
Photo by Vivienna Orcutt, Hoopa Valley Tribe
Photo by Dan Bacher
Photo by Dan Bacher

The construction of Shasta, Friant
and other dams did not include fish
ladders, and so the dams blocked
access to much of the spawning
grounds on the upper Sacramento
and San Joaquin rivers and
tributaries.
Attempts to offset the losses through
using hatcheries have essentially
failed. Many native species,
including several runs of salmon,
have been listed as endangered.
Source: Public Policy Institute of California
Managing California’s Water, 2011

Further downstream, freshwater
wetlands that once provided habitat
for a myriad of fish, migratory birds,
and terrestrial species were drained
and reclaimed for farming.
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Source: Public Policy Institute of California
Managing California’s Water, 2011

The San Joaquin River has paid a heavy price when the entire flow of the river
was diverted at Friant Dam, leaving an intermittently dry riverbed for 150 miles.
Since construction of the dam, the riverbed below Friant Dam has functioned
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primarily as a regional drain and flood control channel.
The 1992 passage of the
Improvement Act, the San
Joaquin River Restoration
Program and Trinity River
Restoration Program have
attempted to address these
impacts, but have met with
limited success.

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The construction of the Central
Valley Project was a major factor in
propelling California to the
agricultural and economic
powerhouse that it is today;
however, it has come at
considerable cost to the
environment.
Today, California still struggles to
find the balance between water
that is needed to sustain our
economy and our population while
at the same time, leaving enough
water behind to sustain our
environment and native species.
Photo by Dan Bacher

For more information on the
For more history, information, and resources
Click here to visit the Notebook page on the Central Valley Project.
See also:
•About the Central Valley Project, from the Bureau of Reclamation: Details
on Central Valley Project facilities and their history
•Central Valley Project Operations Office: Bureau of Reclamation webpage
with the latest water operations, reservoir reports, and more.

The Central Valley Project may be the
largest in state, but it is only one of
several of water systems in the state.
Learn more about California’s other
water infrastructure systems here:
California’s Water Systems
For up-to-the-minute and detailed
coverage of California water news,
meetings, and events, visit:
www.MavensNotebook.com
Page 68

This has been an exclusive presentation by Chris Austin
Maven’s Notebook
www.MavensNotebook.com
Thank you for looking!

The Central Valley Project Slideshow: Building California

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