Calif.’s Department of Water Resources (DWR) has launched a new website, California Water Watch, that helps Californians easily access information on current local and statewide water conditions — down to their own region and even neighborhood.
“The variability of California’s climate and current water conditions we are experiencing now make this data more important than ever,” said DWR Director Karla Nemeth. “Climate whiplash is our new reality living in this State, and we are innovating and developing new tools like California Water Watch to provide water managers, researchers, and policymakers with the data necessary to make better informed decisions about our limited water supply,”
The website brings together data from DWR and other sources to provide dynamic real-time information on precipitation, temperature, reservoirs, snowpack, groundwater, streamflow, soil moisture, and vegetation conditions. Users can enter an address to see local conditions, including daily precipitation and temperature statistics, for their area and links to water supplier information. The website also allows users to compare data on local conditions by year and by region.
The website was developed in response to Governor Newsom’s call for a California-centric version of the U.S. Drought Monitor website in his drought state of emergency proclamation. The website was also recommended in the California Natural Resources Agency’s report to the Legislature on lessons learned from the 2012-2016 drought.
California Water Watch also includes precipitation forecast maps and links to other forecasting products, all from one web page. Regular hydroclimate summaries developed by California State Climatologist Mike Anderson will also be posted to the California Water Watch website. These summaries will succinctly describe what current water conditions look like in California and their impacts on the current drought.
California Water Watch is just one of many tools being leveraged and developed by DWR to improve water supply forecasting.
