Monday June 12, 2023
The Press —
The Delta Protection Commission has recently discovered that the draft environmental impact statement on the Delta Conveyance Project has failed to adequately describe the potential effects of the planned twin water tunnels.
According to recent comments the Delta Protection Commission sent to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on March 15, the Commission has recommended that the Corps adopt a “No Action” alternative as opposed to approving permits necessary for the tunnels due to the project’s potential significant and unmitigated damage to cultural and historic resources in its path. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is a federal regulator that decides whether to authorize the project. The recent environmental report was developed under the National Environmental Policy Act to evaluate the environmental impacts on the planned Delta tunnels if they are constructed. The Delta Protection Commission’s mission is to protect the health of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in California.
The Delta Tunnels project, along with variations of a third canal-like structure to reallocate water from Northern California to major population centers elsewhere in the state, has been controversial since its inception. Pushed for and championed by previous governors Jerry Brown, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and current governor Gavin Newsom, the proposed, $16 billion project would construct two 40-feet-wide, 30-mile-long tunnels 150 feet underground through the center of the Delta. According to the California Department of Water Resources (DWR), the primary proponent of the project, much of the infrastructure consisting of hundreds of miles of aqueducts, channels, and dams was constructed more than 50 years ago, and they need to be modernized to withstand seismic activity and potential uncertainty and unpredictability of extreme weather.