Just need to install a big drain at the low point of the valley …
It already exists. See picture in the link.
This is the Central Valley aquifer.
https://revealnews.org/article/9-sobering-facts-about-califo…
Mike
The scale of changes needed to protect property against this threat is hard to imagine. Move Sacramento? Obviously not making it onto the agenda, lol. More realistically, California should be developing a plan for education of their population about the risk / early warning and progressively more intense warnings as the event develops / robust evacuation plans to minimize deaths, etc …
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Sacramento was already raised 10 feet because of constant floods in the 1860s:
SACRAMENTO ONCE STOOD 10 FEET lower than it does today, and as such was very prone to flooding. No wonder then that in the mid-19th century, residents fought back and raised the old city to higher grounds. All but one small section, which is still holding out at the original elevation.
Just as you cross into the Old Sacramento tourist shopping and eating area, just opposite the entrance to the California State Railroad Museum, there is a sunken courtyard. A sign on the balustrade around this 10-foot-deep depression indicates that the courtyard’s floor level is the original level of pre-1860s Sacramento.
After many incidents of serious flooding throughout the 19th century, the owners of the two-, three-, and four-story buildings in Sacramento simply abandoned the ground floors and constructed raised sidewalks level with the first floor. Over the years the roadways were also raised to just below the new sidewalk level, effectively elevating the entire town.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-original-street-leve…
Jaak
1 Like
California’s State Water Project (SWP) was constructed in the 1960s and 1970s to supply water to more than 27 million people and 750,000 acres of farmland. Planned, constructed, and operated by DWR, it is one of the world’s most extensive systems of dams, reservoirs, power plants, pumping plants and aqueducts and remains key to California’s economy.
Oh. Looks like my idea is a bit too late.
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The CA State Water Project was not built for flood control. It was built to supply water to Southern California. It does very little for flood protection - especially megafloods.
Jaak
So, which will happen first, The Big Quake or The Big Flood?
The Big Gov?
The Captain
1 Like
Maybe, anyone who moved to California after 1960 should go back to where it’s safer.
That might help relieve the housing shortage.
DB2
More realistically, California should be developing a plan for education of their population about the risk / early warning and progressively more intense warnings as the event develops / robust evacuation plans to minimize deaths, etc
That was the thought in my head as I was writing. Clearly, I didn’t get that down very well. Thanks for making that clear.
—Peter
Stop the idiotic suburban sprawl in the lowlands of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, homes built and still being built that will certainly flood even with “normal” flooding.
Start buying up lowland low density neighborhoods all over the state that are the most likely to be super disasters and are “low hanging fruit” in terms of costs. E.g., much of Harbor City and environs near the lower Los Angeles River and similar neighborhoods up river from downtown Los Angeles. Most of these should be converted back into the wetlands they once were, giving a huge help to retaining rainwater in local aquifer rather than dumping it in the ocean, enormously increasing recreational “green space”, and could pay back significantly by building within them “archipelagos” of flood proof high rise high density mixed use residential “islands”, with premium priced view units.
Within the central valley and a few other critically threatened areas, give localities and property owners incentives (TBD very politically and that’s life) to plan for a Big Flood, and to create survival islands for humans and animals, as well as emergency storage areas for equipment.
You cannot stop disasters and disasters are inevitably disastrous, but as California has shown with earthquakes, if you do good planning and building regulations you can provide huge savings of life and treasure.
david fb
9 Likes
That’s not correct. By far, the largest dam in the state water project is the Oroville dam (of recent fame for its failed spillway). It is a multipurpose dam for water storage, power generation, and flood control.
And the state water project is just one of many water projects in the state. There is lots of flood control going on.
Not enough for a mega flood, of course. Which I never claimed anyway.
—Peter
By far, the largest dam in the state water project is the Oroville dam
Oroville dam is the highest dam. Lake Mead is the largest reservoir in the U.S.
2 Likes
That’s not correct. By far, the largest dam in the state water project is the Oroville dam (of recent fame for its failed spillway). It is a multipurpose dam for water storage, power generation, and flood control.
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The main purpose of the Oroville Dam by far is to feed Feather River water into the California Aqueduct. Power generation and flood control are there to increase the usefulness of the Oroville Dam for the whole water system.
If the dam’s main purpose had been flood control, then it would not have been built as a large reservoir that it is.
Jaak
Lake Mead is the largest reservoir in the U.S.
Lake Mead is not in California, and not part of the California water project.
I said that Oroville was the largest in the Ca water project. Which is just one part of California’s water management system.
—Peter
3 Likes
I do expect big earthquakes will continue with greater frequency than big floods in California…So, do we need to do a lot more thinking about the future? Nah, let the kids take care of it.
Risk of volcano catastrophe ‘a roll of the dice’
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/08/220817135557.htm
The world is “woefully underprepared” for a massive volcanic eruption and the likely repercussions on global supply chains, climate and food, according to experts from the University of Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER), and the University of Birmingham…
However, the researchers argue that steps can be taken to protect against volcanic devastation – from improved surveillance to increased public education and magma manipulation – and the resources needed to do so are long overdue.
“Data gathered from ice cores on the frequency of eruptions over deep time suggests there is a one-in-six chance of a magnitude seven explosion in the next one hundred years. That’s a roll of the dice,” said article co-author and CSER researcher Dr Lara Mani, an expert in global risk.
DB2
1 Like