The Bureau of Reclamation recently announced that they had selected two projects to receive US$2 million total in Agricultural Water Conservation and Efficiency (AWCE) grants for the fiscal year 2017. When combined with local cost-share contributions, the projects are expected to be granted approximately US$14 million in order to implement agricultural water management improvement projects over the next 2 years.
The AWCE grants program is a joint effort with the Natural Resources Conservation Service to promote district level water conservation improvements that facilitate on-farm water use efficiency and conservation.
The Calloway Canal Lining and Water Delivery Improvements Project at the North Kern Water Storage District will receive US$1 million, and will line 2,631 feet (801 metres) of the canal with metering, water level and quality sensors, as well as modernise methods to determine the water requirement of crops for scheduled irrigations. The project is expected to save 1,346 acre-feet (1,660 megalitres) of water every year over the project’s 50-year lifetime.
The North San Joaquin Water Conservation District project will receive the other US$1 million, and will line 7 miles (11.2 kilometres) of concrete pipe with polyvinyl chloride (PVC) pipes, replace 103 turnouts with modern flow meters and pressure controlled connections, and incorporate an automated scheduling and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system. The project is expected to save 2,780 acre-feet (3,729 megalitres0 of water annually over the project’s lifespan.
