Delta Tunnel Doings
Aerial view of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, a great natural treasure with more than 500 species and spanning five counties in Northern California. Courtesy of CA DWR, May 6, 2009.
Friends of the River, along with a coalition of environmental groups have been beating on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to recognize that the federal draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was fundamentally flawed because it only considered Delta tunnel construction/physical facility impacts and not operations. This may prove to be a persuasive argument during this administration — or not. It certainly seemed strong to the EPA in their letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Friends of the River and other groups had requested a federal EIS that considered the operational impacts on Delta tunnel operations and had asked EPA to make a similar request.
The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) is expected to release its final EIR for the Delta Tunnel at the end of this year — although this might be delayed if EPA requests that a joint state/federal EIR/EIS be prepared instead of separate documents covering different subjects.
