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Fed Opens Spigot for California03-24-10 | News

Fed Opens Spigot for California




Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced a sharp increase in federal water supplies for California's Central Valley, further easing drought concerns in a state where El Ni?????????o rains have raised the mountain snowpack after three severely dry years. Lake Oroville, seen here, has suffered severe water loss as have other bodies of water in California.
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Mr. Salazar said water allocations from the Central Valley Project in California, a system of aqueducts and reservoirs managed by the federal Bureau of Reclamation primarily for farmers in the region, would be increased this year to between 25 percent and 50 percent of the maximum amount allowed under ideal circumstances, based on conservative forecasts by his agency. That’s up from a previous estimate of just 5 percent for the system’s junior users.

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