Mike Marshall of Restore Hetch-Hetchy

   

Situated inside Yosemite National Park, the Hetch Hetchy Valley was described by John Muir as “one of nature’s rarest and most precious mountain temples.” The pristine Tuolumne River flowed along the valley floor, surrounded by flowered meadows and ancient forests which teemed with bears and bobcats, rushes and eagles. Indeed, Hetch Hetchy Valley was considered one of the most unique and diverse ecosystems in the world.

Initially protected by the establishment of Yosemite National Park, in 1913 the city of San Francisco won congressional approval to build the O’Shaughnessy Dam which buried this extraordinary wilderness valley under 300 feet of water. Although John Muir was unsuccessful in preventing this from happening, his rigorous campaign resulted in the creation of an international environmental conservation movement.

Modern engineering advances afford us the opportunity to remove the reservoir and create one of the most ambitious and exciting environmental restoration projects in human history. As a living laboratory, Hetch Hetchy will advance the science of restoration by providing biologists, ecologists and botanists from all over the world with the chance to apply cutting-edge science to re-establishing lost habitats.

Learn more about how you can help us restore Hetch Hetchy today! http://www.hetchhetchy.org/

Publications Catalog 2011

Publications Catalog 2011 for Water and Wastewater Utility Managers

"Iran's largest lake turning to salt"

photos: yahoo

"How did this disaster develop?

Official reports blame the drying mainly on a decade-long drought, and peripherally on consumption of water of the feeding rivers for farming. They put 5 percent of the blame on construction of dams and 3 percent on other factors. Others disagree about the relative blame." Source: yahoo 

Over irrigation is true, but I believe mostly is as a result of climate change, and also the new bridge that has divided the lake in almost two parts. Therefore, water currents have disrupted. In the southern part the evaporation is higher than the northern and the new bridge has severed the evaporation in the southern, where there is a limit in water current replacement. So, the government ignore the bridge construction affect, since it was one of the shameful project.

American Water Works Assoiciation Conference 12-12 June 2011

Join thousands of water professionals who will gather at ACE11, the American Water Works Association’s  130th Annual Conference & Exposition, June 12 -16,2011, in Washington, D.C. It’s the water community’s forum to tackle a growing number of challenges, from infrastructure management to water resources protection to advanced treatment technologies.

Current and Future trends and Impacts of Khansar Dam (1)

Introduction:

Khansar is a  city garden located in the Central Zagros Range in Iran. Due to frequent droughts and floods, the County decided to build a dam in the upper river to control periodic floods and to reduce the effect of the droughts by collecting runoff water during the wet seasons. The dam is designed and constructed using a fast-track approach to meet water needs of the city of Khansar and its gardens during dry periods. This dam is an earthfill embankment with clay core that has 35.5 meter height from the river bed, 722 meter length, and 10 meter width on the top with the maximum capacity of 6 million cubic meters. The dam’s watershed is about 40 square kilometers, and the longest water way is 4.5 kilometer. The aim is to pump up the water from the downstream springs and creeks into the reservoir during the wet seasons, when there is no need of water for farms and gardens. Therefore, since January of 2011, pumping water from the downstream springs and river has started. Five pumps in different period of time have been put in work and have taken up water from the downstream springs. Currently, the total discharge of five pumps is 503 liter per second. By late April, the accumulated water will be about 1.5 million cubic meters, which is 20% of the reservoir capacity. This water used to travel 150 kilometer downstream and discharge into Panzdaheh Khordad Reservoir. Now is being held behind the dam for agricultural and drinking water purposes.

The following study shows Khansar Dam will provide huge amount of water to the city and its gardens, but there are many essential issues that needed to be addressed. These issues are recognized and some solutions are put forward. For instance, some of the key factors such as watershed management, erosion protection, and the dam’s safety haven’t completely been implemented. After a brief summary of the watershed management issues, several perspectives and solutions are put forward.

Below Photo: A.K