I live in the middle of California, in the great Sacramento Valley about 20 miles north of Sacramento, the state’s capitol. I am surrounded on all sides by miles of flat, arid land dedicated to a vast agricultural economy. Because of this situation, the needs of my community are quite different from those in the urban areas of the county. During a recent county election, there was a change in the membership to the Yolo County Board of Supervisors, including the person that represents the rural portions of the county. The new supervisor has been holding “town hall” meetings in an effort to better understand the needs and desires of her constitutes – but has been doing so by holding meetings in town, without notifying or inviting the folks from the rural areas. Because of this, she is finding out what folks from urban districts think about the needs of the rural areas instead of finding out what her constitutes think. Because of this, a number of us in rural areas have made attempts to express our views to her in writing, with the hopes that she will periodically reach out and hold town hall meetings with us. I posting my letter in this blog in an effort to share my views, for whatever they may be worth.

My letter:

Dear Madam Supervisor,

I have been discussing what we observe as being important in our area with my wife and a few friends. We have identified a few issues that are currently on our list of “most important problems”. This in no way means that they are the only concerns, or that they will remain the “most important” – but for now they are as follows (in order of importance):

1) Ensure a dependable, affordable, source of water for domestic purposes.

Without this there is a great risk that the property values of the residences in rural Yolo County will crash and people will be forced to give up their homes, losing most or all of the value of their investments in their homes.  Therefore, in many ways this is an existential, top level, concern.  Without water there is no life.  Currently many of the residential wells are either going dry, being ruined by sand intrusion, or failing for other reasons.  It is my understanding that part of this is caused by the lack of recharge during the current drought, and some is being caused by a massive increase in the use of subsurface water to support recent changes in crops.

2) Stop the current high rate of subsidence in the area.

Currently there is a very high, and accelerating, problem with subsidence in the Zamora area (and perhaps the entire rural region of northern Yolo County).  The folks that seem to know about such this point to the recent increase in use of subsurface water in the lower aquifer as being the primary cause.  Once this aquifer compresses because of removal of water it cannot be “pumped back up” – it is permanent.  This subsidence is already destroying local infrastructures, such as houses developing new cracks in walls and foundations.  We have heard that it is a significant concern to the road (and freeway) infrastructures, and is likely to turn areas “near” flood zones to being “in” flood zones.  Residences tend to be build outside of historic flood zones, but as the ground subsides relative to the river beds the boundaries of those areas changes to include the homes and other facilities.
The likely outcome of increasing subsidence is similar to a lack of water because frequent flooding will make the area unlivable.

3) Replace the slow, poor and sporadic internet connections in rural Yolo County with modern high-speed, affordable solutions.

As Society moves toward more and more dependence upon the internet, good affordable high speed connections are becoming a necessity instead of a luxury.  Many of the people in the rural areas are in the category of “low income” and therefore can’t afford expensive, slow solutions such as satellite internet or similar solutions.  The best solution would be to “wire” the rural areas with fiber optics that serve the community are low (or free) rates so that everyone can benefit from on-line training and access to medical care and other important benefits (especially in times of possible continuing pandemics). 

4) Fix and/or replace the roads, bridges and drainage systems in the rural parts of Yolo County.

The rural roads are being torn up by a combination of age, heavy usage and neglected maintenance.  Currently, many (perhaps most) of the roads “worn out”, either being patched periodically or closed.  The patches fill potholes, but leave a terrible road surface that quickly degrades into new potholes.  The edges of the roads are crumbling, encroaching on the travel lanes, narrowing the width of the lanes resulting in most people illegally traveling straddling the center divide and destroying shoulders and drainage ditches. It is time to repair or replace the roads, not just keep attempting to put on many layers of band-aids. Roads, bridges and culverts need to be fixed, replaced and/or carefully inspected for damage and wear.

5) Re-engineer and upgrade drainage systems.

New agricultural practices have negatively impacted county maintained drainage. The vast new almond orchards have resulted in major changes to the patterns and quantify of storm runoff across the County.  Land has been “leveled”, denuded, and shaped to ensure maximum runoff from the orchards during storm events (in order to prevent damage to the trees).  This has resulted in greatly increased runoff volumes that now overwhelm what used to be adequate drainage systems.  All parts of the drainage system needs to be re-evaluated, re-engineered  and upgraded sop that it is sufficient to contain storm water.  Due to the increased levels of runoff created by new agricultural practices, local flooding of previously “safe” residences and other facilities are becoming common, as are road closures during storm events.

Other issues: In addition to these problems, there is an over-arching issue concerning allocation of water.  Currently there are almost no region-wide monitoring or limitations on water use in the rural regions.  Therefore, the only “costs” associated with the use of subsurface water drawn from “the commons” (aquifers that we all share and depend upon) are those associated with drilling and maintenance of wells, and the highly subsidized cost of power to run the pumps.  This results in the current situation that appears to be a “run on water use” that is typical of California.  It is our opinion (and the opinion of those scientists that study such things), that this approach of laissez-faire water management of subsurface water sources (wells) is a recipe for disaster.  We believe that given the obvious near and long term impacts of global warming and increased populations this management approach needs to change into a much more sustainable, and equitable, allocation of water allowing the demand to follow the availability of the resource instead of over using resources in an attempt to meet demand.  The use of shared resources such as water needs to mirror the ability to sustain the resource rather than the current approach of creating a need and then “mining” available resources to meet that artificially creating need. 

In a previous posting I discussed some issues that I am concerned about with regard to the relicensing of the Upper North Fork Feather River Hydoelectric Project, FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) Project 2105. Based upon those concerns, I wrote a letter to the commission in the hopes of applying some tiny pressure to reconsider some of the demands for re-licensing. I wrote the letter a month ago, but perhaps it is appropriate to share it here.

Ms. Kimberly D. Bose, Secretary

FEDERAL ENERGY REGULATORY COMMISSION 888 —

1^st Street, N.E. Washington, D.C. 20426-0001

Subject: Upper North Fork Feather River Hydroelectric Project, FERC Project No. 2105; California SWRCB proposed Certification and Water Quality Conditions

Your honorable Kimberly D. Bose,

This letter is in response to the plan to use water from Lake Almanor to cool water in downstream sections of the Upper North Fork of the Feather River (UNFFR).  The State Water Resource Control Board (SWRCB) proposed three alternatives to complying with Condition 6 – Water Temperature Management – of the water quality certification in order to approve licensing of FERC Project No. 2105.  Each of the alternatives is intended to add cold water to the UNFFR with the goal of improving cold freshwater habitat (i.e., rainbow trout habitat) by reducing river water temperatures to below 20°C. 

Alternative 1 is to release supplemental results of up to 250 cfs from Canyon Dam from June 16 through September 15 and the installation of thermal curtains at the Prattville intake and the Butt Valley Reservoir.  Alternative 2 is to install thermal curtains without supplemental releases from Canyon Dam.  Alternative 3 consists of stand-alone releases from Canyon Dam of 250 cfs from June 16 through September 15. One of the main problems with these proposals is that there is very little scientific evidence indicating that achieving that goal will achieve any improvement to the rainbow trout habitat, or the health of the cold water species in the river.

 It is far better to fix the things that are causing the problem of insufficient cold freshwater habitat (primarily rainbow trout) in the river rather than change things that are not causing the problem.  Wasted resources spent in an attempt to slightly modify the river temperature could much better be used to improve the habitat in the tributaries and river basin. The regulations require “reasonable” accommodations to reduce negative environmental impacts of actions.  The “action” under consideration is the re-licensing of an existing project.  Spending a lot of money, and putting a healthy lake at risk, is not a “reasonable” because it is unlikely to have a significant positive impact on an unknown problem. 

 After studying the various documents provided by the SWRCB I conclude that there are several major problems with the modeling and hence the development of the three alternatives.  In addition, according to top scientists in the field, issues with the rainbow trout populations in the river (if any issues exist) are far more likely to be the result of problems in the tributaries and the river basin itself than the slightly elevated average river temperature during a couple of months in the summer. 

The following discussions summarize a few important concerns with the proposed alternatives imposed by the SWRCB as conditions for re-licensing project 2015:

1. It is not at all clear that reducing the water temperature in the river by approximately 1 or 2 degrees during the summer months will significantly improve fish habitat for fish or other organisms.  The stated goal is to improve cold water fish habitat (represented by Rainbow trout) in the UNFFR enough to cause a “rebound” in fish populations as might have existed prior to the installation of the dams and associated power plants on the river. (The population size is a conjecture; there is no substantiated evidence of what those populations might have been.)

• Studies have shown that the optimal temperature environment to achieve maximum growth and vigor for rainbow trout isn’t one that is constantly below 20°C but rather one with daily fluctuations between approximately 17°C and approximately 24°C.  Spending some time in “warm” water (up to approximately 24°C) appears to be beneficial to trout.   A single cutoff temperature, such as 20°C has very little value for determining the best environment.  (The single value appears to have come from an old source that was very likely based more upon a “hunch” than solid scientific studies.)

• The health and abundance of rainbow trout in the UNFFR is determined to a large extent by the habitat within the many tributaries to the river.  These tributaries are the locations where spawning occurs and where fish grow to adult size.  Once fish grow sufficiently, they enter the river proper, but spend much of their time congregating around the many underwater streams providing “pools” of cold, fresh water. 

The key to improving rainbow trout habitat is to focus on the many tributaries that act as nurseries for the fish.  Once the trout are mature enough to enter the river proper they are capable of finding “micro-environments” suitable to their needs. Changing the average temperature of the river by a degree or degree and a half is unlikely to have any significant impact up the suitability of the river for cold water fish, including rainbow trout. 

• The target temperature of less than 20°C does not appear to be based upon any consideration of the habitat, the fish or the environment.  The target appears to be based upon meeting a requirement in a regulation. There is no evidence that the fish population is stressed, endangered or smaller than it should be to maintain a healthy balance within the river system.

• The studies sited in the EIR don’t indicate that there is a degraded or damage fish population, but do indicate that if there is such a degradation that it could be caused by a number of causes including lack of adequate gravel beds for spawning, the introduction of non-native predatory fish, the lack of sufficient shading opportunities, warm water, etc.  There is no evidence provided concerning whether or not any of these possible issues exist, or if they actually degrade the fish environment. The only evidence provided is that the average water temperature is higher than the regulation for a few weeks a year.

High water temperatures during the months of July and August are identified as possible contributing factors, but no evidence is provided to indicate which of the possible factors are most important or which factors should be improved for the most cost effective, and environmentally sound, solution. 

• It is well known that the biggest impact upon the health and success of rainbow trout in the UNFFR depends upon the conditions of the many small tributaries.   Several simple, relatively low cost solutions have been proposed by the American Indians native to that area.  PG&E has offered financial (five million dollars) and other support to assist them in implementing those proposed solutions.  However, the State Water Board (SWRCB) turned those solutions down, apparently because they are not in the SWRCB’s jurisdiction.  The SWRCB appears to only be interested in solutions that they can mandate and control, not necessarily solutions that improve the ecosystems, fish habitat or the fisheries of the river.  

• The temperature studies of the impacts of removing large volumes of cold water from Lake Almanor were almost exclusively focused on the impacts to the cold water rainbow trout habitat in the lake.  The proposed “solution” to the predicted large scale rainbow trout kills is to periodically stock the lake with hatchery raised, “catchable” rainbow trout.  The studies did not address impacts upon other organisms requiring a consistent cold water habitat.  Based upon available documentation, it seems that no comprehensive studies were performed concerning the changes to the warm water portion of the lake.

 A significant concern is the potential for increased water temperatures resulting in a significant growth of algae.  The existence of algae blooms would in turn change the albedo of the water, making the water darker and therefore absorbing more solar radiation – resulting in a feedback loop of further warming the water, thereby increasing the algae…  This type of feedback loop has the potential to result in yet another lake becoming a giant green pond (similar to what has happened to Clear Lake in Clear Lake County). 

• The studies and modeling described in the EIR used to determine the impacts for the various alternatives were performed almost 20 years ago, based upon weather history up to that time.  Apparently no attempt was made to forecast future climate conditions caused by global warming. The highly optimistic proposals were based upon an assumption that each of the three alternatives could potentially lower the river temperatures to below 20°C (an approximately 1.5°C reduction in temperature).  It is my understanding that new models based upon the projected “global warming” weather regime have predicted a much lower reduction in temperature, closer to 0.25°C – which is insufficient to move the river temperatures into the “safe” zone.  If the newer projections are true, then there is little to be gained by either of the three proposed alternatives for removing cold water from Lake Almanor – none of the alternatives are worth the taking the unknown risks introduced to the Lake Almanor hydrologic system.

SUMMARY and CONCLUSIONS:

It is unlikely that decreasing the average temperature of small sections of the North Fork of the Feather River (UNFFR) by a degree or two will result in any measureable improvements to the fish habitat in those sections or in the entirety of the river. However, there is a very real and significant risk to Lake Amanor associated with changing the thermal characteristics of the lake.  Until much better, up-to-date modeling of the broader potential impacts of the proposed changes “prove” that the risks to the lake are less than the benefits to the river, then it is not appropriate to “experiment” on a functioning system. The potential for a minor improvement to the river environment do not justify the risks associated with removing the cold water from Lake Almanor, especially in light of the possibility that decreasing river water temperatures might actually result in a poorer environment for the fish.  

New information indicates that the new weather conditions associated with global warming will result in less than a 0.25°C reduction in river water at the critical locations on the UNFFR.  This is not enough to result in a significant improvement to the fish in the river, but will certainly result in significant degradation of fish habitat in Lake Almanor.  The correct approach from an environmental point of view is to focus on the habitat on the UNFFR rather than focusing on an attempt to lower the temperature of the river beyond what is feasible, reasonable or practical given the forecast global changes to weather conditions.  The lake should not be put at risk in an experiment that perhaps a slight drop in water temperatures at a few locations on the river will result in a significant (or measureable) improvement to the fish.   

As a minimum, the studies supporting the EIR should be repeated based upon new estimates of future weather conditions, using newer more accurate models.  The modeling needs to be expanded in scope to include all of the impacts to the lake environment, including impacts on the warm water environment and impacts on cold water species beyond rainbow trout.  The potential impacts upon the river cold water species should be further investigated to better determine the overall anticipated improvements due to changes in water temperature caused by the three alternatives.  In addition, additional habitat improvement alternatives (such as those proposed by the local Native American tribe) should be investigated to determine impact, cost and feasibility.

Respectively,

One of my covid projects has been to fix up a stall in our little barn to be a pottery studio for my wife. It has been a VERY slow process, giving me a project that has lasted for the biggest part of a year. I started with a rather rustic stall without doors, windows and only three walls. Over time I managed to put in another wall separating the space from my “shop” (really just the barn), insulated, sheet-rocked, changed the lighting and a few other odds and ends. I think it came out well. The MINI-Split HVAC isn’t installed yet, but it is close. Here are a couple of photos:

It turned out nice enough that I am not sure I want to “give it up.” I think it could make a pretty pleasant office or perhaps a “man cave”. I have a work bench that will be installed under the windows looking out into the back yard. The windows with small panes look into my shop area, not to the outside. I liked the old windows and didn’t have an outside wall for them, so I put them into an interior wall. It was a pretty fun project, I only worked on it an hour or two at a time to fit into my other projects. The reason for the low ceiling in the alcove is that it makes an overhead storage space in my shop.

PG&E Project 2105 is a large “project” owned and operated by PG&E that includes several electrical power plants on the North Fork of the Feather River, including Lake Almanor in Plumas County. The project of putting power plants on this portion of the Feather River began in 1910, resulting in the entire stretch of the river and lakes in this region making up a large, highly managed, power generation system. The Upper North Fork Feather River Hydroelectric Project (UNFFR Project) is located on the North Fork Feather River in Plumas County. It consists of three reservoirs with dams: Lake Almanor, Butt Valley reservoir and Belden forebay; five powerhouses; tunnels and penstocks connecting the reservoirs to the powerhouses; and transmission, operation and maintenance, and access facilities. The five powerhouses include eight hydroelectric generating units with a total nameplate capacity of 362.3 megawatts (MW).

This project came up for re-licensing in 2004, but has been stalled since that time because of a new requirement imposed by the State Water Resource Control Board (SWRCB) to draw cold water from Lake Almanor in the hopes of cooling a stretch of the Feather River located about 20 miles downstream that has been deemed to be too warm to support the native rainbow trout population. The average temperature of the river in some locations gets to approximately 23°C during the months of July and August. EPA regulations state that water temperatures above 20°C are dangerous for cold water fish, including rainbow trout.

There are many problems with those regulations, not the least of which is that they don’t actually conform with science. It turns out that for rainbow trout to achieve maximum growth rates they require a varying thermal environment shifting between about 16° C to 24°C on a daily basis. 20°C is NOT an absolute limit as it is treated in the regulations. The conditions in the UNFFR are quite varied, with deep cold pools provided by underground springs, and many small tributaries feeding the river that provide spawning and brood waters at the “nursery” for rainbow trout. The 20°C limit was set decades ago before enough studies were performed to have a good idea of the conditions necessary for a healthy fish population. It was just a guess, that was never intended to be the final answer, it was more or less just a place-holder until better information became available. Better information has become available, but the regulations have not been changed.

It is clear that if there is a problem with the rainbow trout in the river, it is almost certainly not because the average river temperature exceeds 20°C for a couple of months out of the year. The native trout are well suited to the environment in the river and congregate around the cold pools when necessary. The fish spawn and remain in the tributaries, not in the main body of the river. Decreasing the river temperature by dumping more cold water into it from Lake Almanor will have no impact on the critical spawning habitat in the tributaries. In fact, there is no evidence that increasing the water temperature will have any beneficial impact on the cold fish populations, with the available science pointing strongly to the conclusion that water temperatures are not a danger to the fish.

However, drawing cold water from Lake Almanor is a known high risk option. In fact, the SWRCB acknowledges that their plan will result in large scale fish kills to the large and robust native rainbow trout population in the lake. Their solution to these fish kills is to annually plants tens of thousands of hatchery raised trout to maintain a large enough population to satisfy the sport fishermen. They intend to plant “catchable” sized fish since they know that the environment will be unable to support the fish once they draw out the pools of cold water at the bottom of the lake.

In addition to the problem of killing the rainbow trout that current live in the cold pools at the bottom of the lake, they expect the overall water temperature of the lake to increase due to the removal of the cold water. However, they don’t know how much warmer the lake will become because they have not studied that outcome – they are focused on river temperatures, not lake temperatures. There appears to be a real, but unquantified, risk of the lake warming sufficiently to induce algae blooms that could result in a feedback loop of more algae resulting in darker water, resulting in more solar induced warming, creating more algae – etc. That would be a terrible thing to happen to the beautiful, clear waters of the lake.

An additional problem with their proposed cold water withdrawl plan is that it is in addition to the water that is currently needed for hydroelectric production and irrigation. Currently the lake is operated in a way that provides adequate flow for a massive amount of sustainable hydroelectric power production, irrigation needs in the Sacramento Valley, and maintaining a healthy ecosystem in the river – while keeping lake levels relative constant in support of other needs such as recreation and maintaining beach front for the thousands of homes and cottages surrounding the lake. Removing large amounts of additional cold water will probably result in a significant disruption to the lake levels, threatening the human uses, and also the wildlife (such as nesting grebes) that have come to depend upon the current lake levels.

I think this entire thing is a travesty with some people whose job it is to regulate things doing so without stepping back and including the entire system under study. They are focused on a single outdated target number rather than the health of the ecosystem that the number is supposed to represent. I am totally in favor of regulations, and understand that they are necessary in order to make sure that projects “do the right thing.” However, the regulations need to be implemented with a large dollop of sound science. The law being enforced specifies that reasonable measures be taken. To me, that means that the solutions to the problem do not cause more problems. It is not appropriate to move the problem from one place to another, nor is it appropriate to mandate actions just because of the existence of an unsupported number. I think the fact that the risk has been flagged as “at risk” because of water temperatures is a clue that perhaps there might be a problem. That means that it is probably worthwhile to study the problem to see if the fish are actually at risk, or actually being harmed. That study should include the other possible sources of harm that were identified along with water temperatures, include lack of proper gravel in stream beds, lack of adequate access to tributaries, the presence of introduced predatory fish, and others.

In addition to all of these problems, the studies projecting the amount of cooling that could result from these actions were performed in 2000, using engineering models that were based upon past historical data using what are now out-of-date computer models. The newer models, using current projections of water cooling with global warming indicate that the impact of the cold water releases with be on the order of 0.2°C, or less. That means that the water will be drawn from the lake but will have essentially zero impact on the temperatures of the river water. There will be a lot of costs, a lot of risks to the lake, and no resulting positive outcomes. The problem is that once a regulatory “machine” gets started, and regulators have made their pronouncements, it is extremely difficult to stop the train before the train wreck happens. The machine has a lot of momentum and just keeps rolling along.

I want to take a rare moment to brag a little. I live in the HOT part of the Sacramento Valley in California. We are in the middle of the summer heat, varying from about 98°F to 113°F at the hottest part of the day. Not like Phoenix (or Death Valley), but plenty hot enough for me. When my family bought this home in 1991 it came with a swimming pool Not my first choice, but it is here so I am attempting to live with it.

Keeping the pool algae free is a never ending battle during the hot part of the summer when the pool water is about 82°F, which seems to be the preferred temperature for things that grow in the pool water. About six weeks ago the water magically went crystal clear! It was beautiful and so inviting. However, about two days after that it turned bright chartreuse! Not an altogether ugly color, but not one you would want to step foot into. Not only was it that color, but it was so cloudy that you could only see about a foot into the water. More like someone poured paint into the pool than water.

That started my summer “chemistry project”. I checked all of the things chemicals that are normally important and found them all to be way out of wack. Ph was skyhigh, combined chlorine was off the charts, total alkalinity was crazy numbers, and cyanuric acid was through the roof. The problem is that when they are all so far out of control most of the tests are no longer valid. You can’t measure one thing accurately when another thing is crazy, so knowing how much of what to put in when is rather difficult to judge. I chased the chemistry for almost a month, at times wondering how long it would take me to fill up the hole with dirt!

Slowly the wild swings started to get smaller, and I eventually could even see the pool sweep on the bottom of the pool. I could tell that success might finally be in reach. However, success wasn’t quite so easy. I had to endure two or three more wild swings in color until it finally seems to have settled down. For the last few days the pool water has been clear, and the algae has finally gone into hiding (I don’t think it is really “gone” – it is just what might be called under control). Many of the chemicals were still out of “optimal” range, but at least they were close enough to be measurable and adjustments could be made without throwing everything else out of wack.

This morning the pool is clear, and ALL of the chemicals are almost centered in the “optimal” range! Yippy! Perhaps it will stay this way for a couple of days, as long as I fiddle with chlorine levels a couple of times a day. The blazing sun and hot temperatures seem to really chew up chlorine.

So now that it is close to good, my wife is wanting to go spend a week or so in our summer cabin in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. That sounds lovely, but I am more than a little concerned about what will happen to the pool while we are gone and there is nobody to baby it along. I am hoping to figure out how to maintain it with chlorine tablets for that period of time. I normally don’t use them because cause they are “stabilized” to minimize chlorine use (a good thing), but the stabilizer builds up over time until there is so much that the chlorine stops working (not a good thing). I think this is what started my wild chemistry project. I had been using tablets over the winter because they are easy, the water is fairly cold and the algae is easy to control. However, when summer came the stabilizer (cyanuric acid) levels were very high, preventing the chlorine from working now matter how much I used, until all the rest went out of control. I am hesitant to add more stabilizer – but don’t know of another solution. I guess I will just keep my fingers crossed in hopes of only a small disaster, and be prepared for another month or so of chemistry adventures.

Now that California has almost “opened” after the covid restrictions, the health department is once again “strongly” recommending that fully vaccinated oldsters and at risk folks go back to masking indoors. They aren’t exactly clear about the details of why this is so, but my guess is that while the vaccines are very effective, they are not totally effected. They are claiming 95% effective at keeping a person from getting so sick as to go to the hospital, but some much lower effectiveness at keeping people from catching it. So, it sounds like 1 out of 20 (5%) are at risk of getting pretty sick even with vaccines. The State’s population is about 32 million people, so that leaves about 1.5 million vulnerable people assuming everyone is vaccinated. Since there are less than 50% vaccinated, that leaves about 16 million totally vulnerable to the full on illness, and about 3/4 million that are likely to get a mild version. While this is better than a few months ago, it still leaves us with the most “at risk” people in the country.

Since there appears to still be no solid evidence that vaccinations prevent a person from contracting it, and therefore being able to spread it, there is still a huge risk. My assumption remains that if after all of this time, and all of the vaccinations worldwide, they “don’t know” if it protects from spreading – it doesn’t. I suppose I am a skeptic, but I think they would really like to state that it stops spreading – but since they haven’t I think it doesn’t. Perhaps it changes the rate of spreading somewhat, but we haven’t yet heard data on that point either.

The point of all of this isn’t to scare anyone, or to harangue on the topic. The point is to once again try to update people’s perception of where we stand with this pandemic. We are to the point that was considered to be terrible, huge, massive (or whatever terms you like) before it got even worse. Not only that, but there is every suggestion that it will get much worse again as the weather changes and new variants become “popular.”

Another misconception that the general public seems to have is that the CDC’s (and State’s) recommendations are intended to help keep individuals (you and me) healthy. I think that is not what they are worrying about. They don’t care much about you and me as individuals, they care about the health care system and the economy. The recommendations are aimed at keeping the case rate in hospitals as high as they can without overwhelming them. The faster people get sick and then better, the quicker this whole thing will come to an end. Shorting the period of time that the pandemic lasts has many important features – not the least of which is that it allows less time for new variants to emerge. So the goal isn’t to keep us healthy as individuals, it is to moderate the rates in the entire population. So the idea that it is “your choice” whether or not you want to take the risks is totally counter to the important goal of us all working together to get past this whole thing as a large community. It is all about what is good for the Country, it is not about what risks we feel comfortable with as individuals. So when they suggest that it is “safe enough” to go unmasked indoors they don’t mean it is safe enough for you, it means that they think that it won’t overwhelm the health care system. They know that lots of people that follow that recommendation will get sick, but that is sort of the point – since many people refuse to get vaccines then it is important to make sure that many of those people contract the disease. Otherwise we are all stuck with this thing. The way to help the Country (or local community) as a whole is to either get vaccinated, or get infected. Oddly, both of these options lead to the same hoped for ending of the pandemic, but one options has a much larger number of dead people along the way (those that are willing to take the risks of not being vaccinated).

And then there is the little problem of getting the economy restarted. Clearly it is important to get people buying stuff again, and buying stuff in their local communities. This presents an immense pressure on the politicians to convince people to take the riskiest approach by interacting with each other. Not that the politicians want you to get sick, they want you to do things to get the economy rolling (spend money, get jobs, build stuff, sell stuff). If that means recommending less than optional behavior, so be it – as long as the hospitals aren’t overrun in the process. They have a delicate balancing act without having sufficient knowledge or data to know exactly what outcome is most likely. I don’t envy the decision makers who have to make decisions that are balanced on an invisible wire.

So my advice is to not depend upon CDC or government recommendations to decide your personal risk. They are making decisions for the overall group, we have to make decisions for ourselves – knowing that those decisions are important for the overall group as well. I am holding to my position that personally I got vaccinated and I mask and social distance as much as feasible. I am taking more risks now than before because of “social pressures” – but I certainly have not stopped paying attention. Being fully vaccinated I feel pretty safe for myself, but I think I still have a responsibility toward society at large.

So here we are in the middle of yet another recording breaking hot summer following a record breaking lack of winter/spring rain. I live a few miles north of Sacramento, California on the western edge of the Sacramento Valley. My house is about five miles north of the largest town in the area (with a population of less than 20 people). The closest “real” town with a population of around 60,000 is 12 miles to the south. I am surrounded on all sides by tens of thousands of acres of new almond trees. Last week our well stopped producing water, the water table had fallen below the level of the pump.

“Normally” the water table stays at around 90 feet deep. Since my pump is located 150 feet down, there is normally plenty of water above it to provide the water that we need for domestic purposes and to maintain a nice yard and small vegetable garden. However, the water table is now at 150 so our pump was trying to suck air instead of water. Not a good thing! This is the sort of thing that really gets my mind to working, wondering what is going to happen next. Do we drill a new well in the hopes of finding more water, do we try to “fix” the well we have, and if so how long with that last? Do we leave for a few months in the hopes of rains returning next year? Do we order up a big water tank that we can fill by trucking water in? What just happened to the value of our property – did we just lose the investment in our home? Do we stop watering our yard in the hopes that the water table will come up a little?

And then come all of the questions about why is this happening. Clearly the lack of rain has had a major impact. If there is no rain to recharge the aquifer it will drop, whether we use it or not. Maybe the eight nearby houses on 30 acre “subdivision” (I live on a piece of land that was subdivided into 5 acre plots 100 years ago) are using too much water and that is drawing down the water table. Or maybe the 6 new 500 HP pumps within 1/4 miles installed to irrigate the millions of new almond trees are having an impact. Maybe the 3000 HP worth of new irrigation pumps that run 24/7 are taking more water than is available. Our neighbor has stopped watering his lawn because he thinks that might help. I suppose a 2 HP pump running 30 minutes a day might be the problem, but somehow I doubt it when compared to the 3000 HP of pumps running twenty four hours a day. When I consider how much that pump removes as opposed to how much the orchards use, it feels like he is trying to stop a forest fire by peeing into it.

Then the question comes about how can it be legal for the farmers to do such a thing? That is one of the beautiful things about California, while we are drought prone, and we have an extremely limited water supply, there are almost no regulations on water use (except in cities where they limit the times and days that lawns can be watered). For example, if your property happens to border a river (such as the Sacramento River), you get what is called riperian rights – meaning that you can pump as much water out of the river as you like, without any regulations, monitoring, or cost (beyond your pumping costs). The same holds true for the big wells near my house. The assumption is that they “own” all of the water under the property and can use it however they want. There is no monitoring of use, no regulations on its use, and no cost other than pumping expenses. The laws ignore the fact that they are really drinking out of the middle of an underground lake that is shared by all. The implicit assumption is that you can pump a square hole directly below the property lines in the middle of the lake and the rest of the lake water level will remain unchanged.

An interesting feature of our local water situation is that we have two aquifers. One is located at about 100 to 500 feet deep. It is slowly recharged by rain water during wet years. I don’t know if the water flows like a river, or is stationary like a lake. In any case, it is renewable water and if managed properly represents a sustainable resource. The few homes in the area, and the “old” style farming (row crops, alfalfa, dry wheat, small orchards) drew from this water supply. However, there is another deeper aquifer starting at about 1000 feet deep. It has ancient water in it, water that literally came from Montana 12,000 years ago when the glaciers melted. The two water supplies are separated by 500 feet or so of hard rock that prevents them from interacting. There is no recharge into this lower aquifer, and since the ground compresses as the water is removed, it is not possible to recharge it artificially pumping river water into the ground. It is NOT sustainable, and in fact is being mined by the farmers which IS regulated and is illegal, but since there is no monitoring there is no “proof” that is happening (even though the State hydrologists know all about it and are tracking the impacts). The story we were told was that they were only using water out of the “wasted” ancient resource. The well drillers tell a very different story, they are drawing water from wherever they can find it, including both aquifers. It is much less expensive to pump from the shallow aquifer, so they do that as much as possible.

Most of the big new pumps are pumping from that supply, rapidly depleting the ancient supply and dropping the ground level in this area by about a foot a year from what is called “subsidence.” It is expected that the water in this aquifer will be depleted in another six or seven years, at which point the orchards will die and be torn out of the ground, the “backup” supply of deeper water will be depleted, and the ground level will be much lower resulting in increased risks from the periodic floods that visit this location. Caltrans is concerned that the subsidence will damage the freeway and the overpasses, costing hundreds of millions of dollars to repair. How can this be the case you ask? How can farmer afford to plant millions of trees knowing full well that they are going to deplete the water, resulting in their trees all dying. It is easy, all that they want to do is keep them going long enough to make a giant profit by invading a shared but unregulated resource. After that the trees will be gone, the leases will have run out and the investors can move along to a new location. This recently happened in the section of the San Joaquin Valley to the south. About 25 years ago they planted millions of almond and other nut trees. The farmers harvested them to great profit for a few years until the water ran out, then the investors left the area with ruined homes and worthless agricultural land because of the lack of water. Not only that, but they left behind damage to critical infrastructure due to subsidence that will cost the government many billions of dollars to repair, while vastly increasing the risk from floods because of the lowering of the surface of the land.

So goes the water wars in California. The State implemented a need for local communities to develop water regulations. They were given ten years to think about thinking about regulations, and an additional ten years to think about the regulations and a final ten years to write the regulations. The first ten year period is up, now they can start to think about how they might create regulations. I guess this is better than never, but it is also a lot of the reason for the push into put in millions of new trees ASAP. If the farmers wait too long, then the free water will no longer be quite so free. It is important to get ever last drop before regulations are created to manage the water supply.

Oh yes, my situation is temporarily past the critical stage. I call an well company that came out and dropped the pump 84 feet further down the pipe. Luckily my well was drilled 300 feet deep so this is possible. Several of my neighbors aren’t so lucky – they are going to drill new wells. There is a one year backlog before the drilling companies can get to them – they are too busy drilling more very large, deep wells for the new almond orchards that keep getting planted. If the orchards fail it isn’t a problem, the government will help them out with disaster relief to cover their costs.

Yesterday I listened to a really interesting interview on National Public Radio. Here is the link if you would like to dive a bit deeper into it.

https://www.npr.org/2021/06/29/1011415113/awe-appears-to-be-awfully-beneficial

The person being interviewed (Michelle Shiota) is a psychologist at Arizona State University and an expert on emotions. A few months into the isolation of the pandemic she noticed that not only were her activities being limited, but that it felt like her mind was also shutting down – and life was becoming a whole lot less “fun.” Being an expert on such things, she created a plan for herself. The plan was centered upon creating the ability to more easily experience “awe” in her daily life.

She started by taking a walk around the block every morning with the express intent of finding the feeling of awe. It sounds like it was a fun adventure — carefully exploring her environment looking for things that pulled her in that direction. The things that she found were mostly little things, things that would normally go unnoticed such as a child’s chalk drawing on the sidewalk, or the color and beauty of a beetle’s back, or the sparkle of a water-drop hanging in the sunlight.

She found that when she found that experience she felt better. Her emotions lightened up and her interest in life improved. She quickly found herself beginning to notice these things without having to hunt them down, they were just there. Her explanation about this new found ease if in finding awful things (pun intended) is that practicing activities such as this cause the brain to actually re-configure itself, laying down new neural pathways that quickly become the “default” pathways. At first you have to think you way to the experiences, but once your brain is reconfigured they are just there. Sort of like riding a bicycle. At first it is hard because you have to “think” about the details – which overwhelms our brain. But after a bit of practice, and a few night’s sleep, it all just happens. Apparently the same thing applies to finding things that are awe inspiring, and that in turn fires up parts of the brain that include happiness, contentment, and a feeling of being connected to the universe.

I find this to be an extremely hopeful message. Maybe it isn’t so darned hard to become a little bit “enlightened.” Perhaps there are simple exercises that we can all do that help us to not dwell in feeling isolated and on our own. Maybe simple things such as this open our hearts and minds to better things. One thing is for sure, it is easy, inexpensive, and can be done anywhere at any time. It also doesn’t seem like there is much danger to trying. If it works, wonderful. If it doesn’t, at least it was a fun little adventure in searching for beauty in our everyday lives.

The other day I heard that Bidden might be proposing a 15% “flat income tax” as a solution to something. I am not quite sure what that would solve, but it got me to wondering about income taxes in general. We seem to have gotten to a situation where the poor pay 10% in Federal income tax, the “middle” pay something like around 50% and the top pay next to nothing (less than 1%). If you break it at 50% of the population, the top 50% pay 97% and the bottom 50% pay 3%. That sounds pretty dramatic, and it sounds like the “rich” are paying for everyone else – except that isn’t how it works. The top 50% also owns far more than 97% of the wealth, and makes more than 90% of the “income” (discussed below).

These numbers are based upon “taxable” income. Sorting out what should be taxable is the key question. If “income” means an increase in net worth, then the very rich do very will. For example, Warren Buffett (worth about $128B) who is of the richest folks pays about 0.02% of his annual increase in wealth in income taxes. He is one of the generous ones. That compares to something like 10% at the bottom and perhaps 40% in the middle.

The reason that the “income” is so much lower than the increase in worth is that most increases are increases in value, but don’t get turned into money very often. If you own a $500,000 home as you main asset, then you are “worth” $500,000. However, if home prices raise 5% a year, then the value of your assets incomes by $25,000 a year – which is not “realized” so there are no taxes against that “income”. If you are lucky and happen to own that land in a prime location, it is possible for the value to double without creating a tax liability until you sell it. At that point in time, the income will be considered capital gains, not “income” – with a tax rate of around 20%, unless you reinvest that money in a way that it stays “hidden” as an investment and not an income. Then there is no tax.

A thing with “rich” people (those who have more than they spend) is that they can choose what “income” that would like – and therefore they can choose how much tax they want to pay. You can just keep the money invested and it just keeps growing without taxes. However, sometimes the income grows in ways that become taxable income even though it is not turned into cash. An example is with using a house as a rental creating income. The part of the rent that exceeds the expenses becomes “income” and is therefore taxable. However, instead of just owning a house for this purposes you create a business (such as a corporation). In that case the corporation would owe any taxes (at a considerably smaller tax rate), but can also do things such as purchase other rental properties – and the “excess” income goes away in business expense – along with income tax. This is a never ending cycle of needing to keep investing in more and more to keep from having taxable income show up. At a certain point that gets overwhelming so you have to start giving it away, of course giving it away to charitable organizations that generate a tax deduction (“write off”). Sometimes you can even give away stuff (perhaps art to an art museum) where you can take a deduction for the value, rather than the initial cost. If you are careful with your purchases you can buy low, give away high and make enough in the tax benefits to avoid paying any taxes – it is not really a donation, it is just another way to make money.

Considering things closer to home. Perhaps a person decides to buy a restaurant to make a living. They have a lot of business expenses such as rent, or a mortgage on the building, all of the equipment and furniture, utilities, labor, etc. Clearly all of those things are not “income”, in fact they are expenses. This person has a gross income based upon their sales receipts, but their net taxable income has very little to do with that number, the part that they can live off of is the difference. It seems reasonable for that difference to be the taxable part. However, if successful this same business starts to be worth much more than the initial value – but that extra part doesn’t get taxed until it is “realized”. It becomes an interesting exercise to determine which part of the money flow is “business expense” and which part is personal income. There are lots of rules about this, generally the smaller the business the easier it is for the IRS to figure out that you didn’t pay tax on the portion of the company car that you used for personal transportation. However, at a certain point the business expenses so overwhelm the personal spending that the “income tax” becomes negligible. That is what results in folks like Warren Buffet from paying any reasonable amount of income tax, he can only personally consume so much stuff – and that is all that he takes out of the business (which is his choice – it is not some sort of natural thing). So income tax becomes trivial. What about corporate taxes?

Corporate taxes are similar in that they only occur when realized, and there are many, many “incentives” that give huge tax breaks when they do become realized. The only reason that they would become realized is to allow the business to get into an entirely different line of business – in which case the new costs aren’t counted as on-going business expenses. One interesting thing in California is known as the “Prop 13” freeze on property tax. The deal is that property taxes are fixed (almost) at what they were when the property was purchased. That means that it increases to the new value when sold, but remains at the low rate compared to the actual value until that time. This is not a big deal with residential property because that “turns” on average about every 3.5 years – resulting in property taxes lagging inflation slightly, but not significantly. However, at the very last minutes (literally) before being voted into law the wording was changed to include business property. The thing with business property is that it seldom gets sold (because that would cause the value to be realized and therefore taxed). Since the property doesn’t get sold, the property tax remains frozen at very low rates relative to inflation. This in turn results in services, such as schools, that depend upon local property taxes go broke. That keeps teacher’s salaries extremely low, driving teachers out of the field. There are many bad results of this law, which was initially passed because people on fixed incomes were losing their homes because of property taxes that tracked the “appraised” value of their homes. The cure was a sensible one of giving them a break during their lives. But the cure brought a very negative impact by stopping the flow of business money to support local services.

So what it the solution? A flat rate won’t help unless it comes with a change in the definition of “income”. As long as people with a lot of money don’t have any income because it is all either eaten up as business expense, or “hidden” in unrealized gains, then they won’t have to pay a flat tax either. A flat tax will increase the taxes on the low income folks from 10% to 15%, won’t do anything for the upper income folks, but might help the middle income people (with their extra money coming from the low income folks). The solution isn’t in adjusting the nominal tax rates, it is in adjusting what gets taxed. What are normally called “loop holes”. It seems like the solution is in taxing based upon value – but even that is a bit questionable since much of what is owned is not actually “owned” it is borrowed. If I “own” a $500,000 home, the reality is that I probably only own $100,000 and owe $400,000. However, I am getting the use of the other $400,000. Would the bank then have to pay taxes on the part that they own? That would cause mortgage rates to skyrocket – forcing huge numbers of people to lose their homes. How about the increase portion? So if the house increases in value by 5% a year, who pays for the tax on the $25,000? Is that the homeowner who really only owns 20% of the property, or the bank? By the way, allowing taxes to follow property values like that puts us right back into the problems that created Prop 13 in the first place.

I don’t have an answer to this, and it appears that I am not alone. What is value? What is income? How do you pay for unrealized increases in value? For example, lets say that your retirement nest-egg is a $5,000,000 investment in securities (stocks and bonds). This should be able to generate about $125,000 a year in increased value at today’s rates (leaving enough in the fund to increase as inflation increases). After income taxes on the part that distributed results in an after tax income of around $70,000/yr. Enough for a nice retirement for most folks. But it also means that you were leaving $125,000 in the fund to grow – as unrealized income. This means that $125,000 of “income” (increase in worth) was tax free. Actually, even the initial tax was smaller than for someone that works for their money because comes out as capital gains (taxed at 20%) instead of regular income (taxed at 45%). All of a sudden your reasonable retirement nest egg that you saved and fought for during your working life puts you into the category of the “rich that abuse taxes”. You are now only paying 10% on your income – income that you did nothing to earn but buy some paper that you never even get to see. You are now paying less (as a percentage) than the poor kid selling hamburgers down the street.