Klamath water year looks promising

The meeting is from 1 to 3 p.m. at Klamath County Fairgrounds.

“We’re just trying to get information out to particularly the water users, for their planning purposes and so on, but also the tribes and everyone else,” said Jeff Nettleton, BOR office manager. “Anybody that wants to come is welcome.

On Friday, officials from U.S. Fish and Wildlife and National Marine Fisheries Services, as well as Ernest Conant, new regional director for the Mid-Pacific Region, will attend.

“We will be doing a presentation that will run through the hydrology, where we’re at currently,” Nettleton said. “It will help to paint a picture because thankfully, our hydrology is changing daily right now.

“It could be a little different by the end of this week than it is today if we get some rain that is forecast.”

Reclamation officials are projecting they could release an estimated 320,000 acre feet of water to the Klamath Project this year. A concrete water allocation amount for the water year will be released on April 8, the same day as the annual water meeting planned at Reames country club.

“If the inflow forecasts for May 1 and June 1 over that April 1 inflow forecast, Project supply can go up,” said Jared Bottcher, acting water division chief.

“If the forecast decreases, then the lake makes up that difference, basically,” Nettleton said.

Precipitation levels currently sit at 101 percent of average and the snow-water equivalent sits at 121 percent of average.

“We’ve certainly been blessed with some good snow this year, and part of the good news there is that it’s been cold enough and that snowpack has kind of consolidated to where, hopefully, as it begins to thaw, it will come off more slowly and continue to provide more cold water in-flow as we go a little bit later into the season,” Nettleton, said.

“The only precautions I could see could be relative to the timing of delivery of water,” he added.

2019 biological opinion: What’s in it?

Reclamation meets its obligations under the Endangered Species Act by operating the Klamath Project in accordance with the Biological opinion.

Nettleton said the 2019 biological opinion aims to meet the needs of both the Klamath Tribes and agriculture producers.

“One of the key things to their (ag producers) operation is being able to have some certainty, both with regards to a start date when they could start irrigating so that they knew when they could get their crops in the ground and with regards to how much water are we going to get this year,” Nettleton said.

“Another function of the central tendency logic is it does allow some flexibility to manage whatever water supply they are allocated and one of the tenets in the new proposed action is that once we commit to a Project supply on April 1, that Project supply won’t be reduced after that. So they do have more certainty than they used to have.”

Under the new biological opinion, the federal agency will also not have to meet end-of-month “thresholds” in Upper Klamath Lake until a new opinion is finalized.

“Once we do transition to the new bi-op, the Project has water available out of both Klamath Straits drain and Lost River Diversion Channel,” Nettleton said.

“We’re estimating that volume of water, in a year like this, to be somewhere between 50,000 and 60,000 acre feet.”

All told, projections for the water year could rise to upwards of 385,000 acre feet, which is close to a historically full, 390,000-acre feet delivery of water.

“From that perspective, I think we’re probably sitting a little better than we were for the 2017 irrigation season, which was a little tighter than that,” Nettleton said.

Under the new biological opinion, the federal agency will also not have to meet end-of-month “thresholds” in Upper Klamath Lake until a new opinion is finalized.

“Once we do transition to the new bi-op, the Project has water available out of both Klamath Straits drain and Lost River Diversion Channel,” Nettleton said.

“We’re estimating that volume of water, in a year like this, to be somewhere between 50,000 and 60,000 acre feet.”

The central tendency logic is designed to where the critical elevations in Upper Klamath Lake for the suckers are met at the right times of year, Nettleton said.

“The philosophy there was to come up with a logic that helped balance the water supply in a way that was easier to manage for all the interests and met the needs of the fish in the lake and the needs of the fish in the river and allowed more flexibility for Project deliveries when the farmers need water,” Nettleton said.

Meeting date prompted by snow pack

Better conditions in the snowpack has removed the need for Reclamation officials to plan their meeting earlier in the year, and that’s welcomed by officials, too.

“Last year we knew in February that we were having potentially a very dry year,” Nettleton said.

“So we just anticipated a lot of challenges for the farmers with that. The reason that we had several public meetings was that we were just trying to constantly give them the latest updated information we had.”

The 2018 irrigation season yielded an allocation of 234,000 acre feet, compared to this year’s estimated 320,000 acre feet. The latter number is pending a final allocation number, which cannot be reduced but can be increased, according to Reclamation officials.

Another storm system potentially bringing snow to higher elevations is anticipated in the next seven to 14 days, according to forecasts.

“We’re certainly looking like we’re in much better shape this year,” Nettleton said.