the removal of dams and other flood control measures in the interest of restoring salmon runs is likely going to add to the problems.
The main one is the San Joaquin river in central california, that has just recently been "restored", but removing dams and then letting the water run free down channelized levee systems is a recipe for adding to flooding of the sacramento delta to incredible levels.
I understand the desire to restore extinct salmon runs, but the flood plains are populated in most of california now, and not having had a flood for several years sort of made it politically easy to remove flood control devices in the name of fish. I hope that the Natural Resources Defense Council will be as involved in disaster relief as they are in fish "restoration", since they are contributing to the hazard in a very direct manner.
I like salmon, and restoring habitat above dams is totally well-intentioned ecologically, but sometimes the risk factor from major events are pooh-poohed and the way things are going, weather events are probably going to be more erratic and/or severe for the next who knows how long.
The Sacramento River, which flows southward to the delta and drains much of the northstate, floods often enough that the primary flood plains have not been allowed to be inhabited for the most part, and they are used for growing rice. Shasta Dam impounds an incredible amount of water and produces much of our electricity, and can easily capture and store much the runoff from a series of storms such as is happening now.
One of the odder claims in that article is that the elevation has dropped up to 30 feet in almond orchards due to pumping... i beg to differ, except in maybe an anomalous case. What has changed is that pumping for irrigation has lowered the water level of the aquifers in many areas. And almonds are not grown in areas that flood, as they don't respond well to wet feet.
Over on the desert side of the mountains, irrigation pumping has lowered the water level in wells from about 20 feet in the 1950's to the present 350 feet. The ranchers and farmers here have had to re-drill wells deeper... they are using up fossil water. It is a result of an agriculture deal made when bonneville dam was created that the farmers here get electricity for .5 cent per kilowatt hour for irrigation. So it makes drawing the aquifer dry economical for them. In the great basin, we could quadruple our rainfall and would still have a hard time recharging the aquifer.
I tend to look at it in that now the big alkali lakes in surprise valley are all dry, when they used to have a few inches of water on occasional years, so now it is easy to drive out on the lakebeds and find really good old bottles and other artifacts. Okay, done rambling.
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