Climate change and its impact on water supplies is obviously a hot topic in today’s news, especially as agencies look again towards mandatory water conservation measures and cutbacks in water deliveries for a broad range of uses. One of the most hotly debated topics is the subject of water storage. We hear a lot about the potential for new dams, and that is certainly worth discussing, but we are only recently looking at opportunities to manage our existing dams and reservoirs differently in order to maximize their water storage capabilities. 

We are looking at a paradigm shift in the way things have been done over the last hundred years or more, and now water managers are looking at applying technology (such as the newly coined “Forecast Informed Reservoir Operations” or “FIRO” programs), or through changes in operations, such as the restoration of the water storage capacity of the existing dams that has been lost through sedimentation.  Fortunately, there are now examples throughout the state of initial efforts to address this challenge.

This presentation provides several examples of how communities are preparing (or not) for the anticipated effects climate change and the “new normal” of expected water supplies and storage. We will consider the environmental and social impacts, as well as potential impacts to flood protection and hydropower energy production that might result from a paradigm shift in future reservoir and water storage operations.