How California Rerouted its Rivers Hundreds of Miles to Water the Desert 

whenever you drive down I-5, you repeatedly drive along/over the california aqueduct, and I can't help but marvel at the sheer willpower and engineering behind the aqueduct everytime I see it.

this channel is gonna take off it's seriously great content, well presented, insightful, well grounded in facts, not sensationalist, able to extrapolate accurate trends and identify tendencies, yet NOT jumping to conclusion. Liked commented and already subscribed, great video!

It feels like as soon as a drought ends there’s a new one next year

Thank you you have a great channel I'm a 12 th generation California out of San Juan Capistrano California Indian/Spanish family owns Rios Adobe..Thank you again I hope to send more to your channel your very informative on California.. salutations to you..

You just earned another subscriber. Love your videos about California

You are doing a really good job with your videos. I hope you find cause to keep it up. Thanks!-)

Great job, Carter. I learned a lot.

I started watching your Channel last week about each state........so interesting..... I love Geography Corner Brook NL Canada💯📈

In the two years since this video was made, California has had 2 epic years of rain, effectively refilling all the lakes and Colorado river to full or near full status. I’m a third generation Southern Californian now 70 years old. my father built 1000 homes in Southern California and I did a paper on southern California water and wastewater systems in school. There’s so much more to be said about Southern California’s water. Southern California thanks to the San Gabriel mountains has a huge aquifer underneath it that modern drilling techniques over the last century have only increased the supply. It is also replenished by impressive sewage treatment plants, which process the water to drinkable before letting it percolate back down into the water table or flow down the Santa Ana river to the sea. Back in the 1930s Kaiser steel and Fontana built a wastewater system which takes under drinkable and poisonous water all the way to 5 miles offshore. This is to protect Southern California’s natural aquifer. Also so much rainwater is being captured in reservoirs as well as percolation lakes. There’s plenty of water to wash the mouths of all the haters!

Missed the most impt fact, that most of colorado river water goes to growing feed for cattle cattle and exported offshore !!!

Super quality content. Very informative. Thank you for sharing.

Good job man, I live a little bit away from castaic lake. Always wondered about the water systems in California

I wouldn't say they watered the desert so much as they watered Los Angeles. The first LA aquaduct drained a lake next to the town I live in and we ARE IN THE DESERT. Not only did they drain our lake, they didn't make supplies available for our local towns for fresh water. We have drilled wells. In the desert.

What California needs to do is to ban any and all watering of decorative landscaping. That means no lawns, no golf courses. Water should be allocated for agricultural use and drinking water and bathing.

The Delta Mendota Canal does NOT discharge into the San Joaquin River! Your facts are wrong.

might wanna make an update on this. the recent storm, these past couple of months have changed the situation here in California and we now have a good abundance of WATER.

Populations are shrinking almost everywhere, not just Cali fornia.

Wow! Tons of work on this...nice job!

We need pump more ocean water to clean water all water locked states should have that.

Your video was very inspiring… and as they say, that “ Necessity is the Mother of Invention “… so let’s hope there will be a solution soon…

Great job! Do you happen to know if California's portion of Lake Mead comes from pre or post dam release?

Why do deserts get cold at night? Low H20 vapour levels. Surely deserts would stay warm at night if CO2 was driving climate?

Great video.

Great stuff so interesting

Great videos but i think the Los Angeles Aqueduct should also be mentioned tjat diverses the Owens River

I don't understand how such a dry state can be a agricultural powerhouse. Is it naturally good to farm or does forcing the water there make it good to farm?

And now Newsom is ruining it all.

Save some material for the 'California - The US Explained' video ;)

Beautiful!

This was awesome

Not a popular enough topic. Literally everyone I know just writes it off when I bring it up.

Good video 👍 lots of information. Now subscriber here.

Crops in the eastern U.S. are more commonly corn and soybeans, rather than wheat.

I don't think the water problem is because of a lack of water, I think the ground may of lost its water retention abilities. From creating natural ponds I would see every time a pool dries, it's alge becomes a new layer of membrane and each time it dries, the ground becomes for water resistant from the layers. This makes oil too, and also gas, and if our world's water problems tend to be near oil extraction, maybe this is way. The water just sinks lower into the earth.

We'll have to order some of those floating nuclear-powered desalination plants from Russia and pipe in fresh water from the Pacific Ocean.

Many of the orchards near me in the Central Valley have started using drip irrigation. The Owens River and Hetch Hetchy Valleys are examples of big CA cities living off of what they would oppose now. It is sad to visit these areas and realize with was stolen. The big CA cities need to do away with green manufactured lawns, universities and golf courses. The water needs to be used to grow food more than water lawns. The state also needs to do better at retaining water from snow melt. It often flows directly into the ocean.

Instead of high speed rail California needs a high speed water pipeline. Shoot that water down here at 200 mph. We’ll use it to grown more food then we could all eat

Just imagine if all those sprinkler farms switched to dripfeeding water methods. That would be a start.

Save water lake Powell is almost dry!!!!!!!

California is a big state. In fact, if you laid Calif. horizontally across the midwest, it would stretch from Wisconsin to Western Pennsylvania. And, that geographical area would have the biggest GDP, the most population and by far the biggest Agricultural output…so state boundaries matter when stating statistics. Just saying 😊

Gee wonder whyvthe reservoirs are all drying up?! 🤨

simply amazing content...the narrative form flows...keep it up...

This after drying up the giant lakes it had in The Valley. Lol To plant cotton

It would be interesting to see how much all this water re routing and overpopulation has lead to the fires that California sees now.

lol @ img 13:51

Fact Check Homowood California Think !

39 million people is not a huge number. Any normal slum city like Mumbai or dhaka or karachi have that many people. You must say 39 million smart and wealthy people.

Dedilt the lakes and rivers. Build cent per cent rooftop solar

And screw it all.

Wave energy needs to be tapped into it is producing power 24 hours a day

UAE relies on desalination plants for 42% their water.

California needs to limit the amount of lawns and the ownership of private pools. People with them need a luxury tax for an incentive to conserve water. Homeowner Associations need to be banned from demanding lawns.

This is how we broke the world, ...not because it needed fixing, but because we thought it did. We "Forget" our place ...which is to WITNESS. Instead "We" accept such an illusion as is "SELF", which lends "US" a sense of ENTITLEMENT, which is DEZTRUCTIVE, when compared to something as simple as "OFFSPRING",......WHAT REMAINS FOR THEM AFTER SELF HAS BEEN SERVED? (Little more than FALLOUT for which THEY, Our CHILDREN, will be held ACCOUNTABLE for)

Never understood why California does not get water from the Columbia River. The water can be picked just before it mixes with seawater, after having transported the fish back and forth.

Or how California drained the Colorado River.

Turn your mic up >.>

My daughter and her family just moved out of San Diego. They referred to all of Southern California as “Disney Land” or not real. This is because they know how dependent it is on “stolen” water. Climate change is bringing reality to Southern California.

I hurt for the folks that are doing their best to take care of the crops they are growing. The hit to the rest of the folks .... is a shit fest. They know they live in a huge population area and electricity and water will be a problem. Why people choose to live there is beyond my understanding. I pray for rain for this part of the country ...

America should extend the Inter coastal water canal to join Texas with California so California and all those on the way can get water as far as Boston flowing in. Also, would do a lot to start new ports along the root, like a new coast for the nation.

The fact of the matter is California over Farms the vast amount of farmable land they have with crops that aren't native nor are they essential and at the same time these crops such as almonds and some of the other Exotics require vast amounts of water California doesn't have to begin with causing them to pull resources from areas quite a distance away usually having a negative impact on the area that they're pulling from all in an attempt to appease landowners growing High profit crops while leaving essential farmers to fend for themselves. The other problem with the year-round farming practices is the deterioration of the soil due to the continual draw of nutrients and never planting buffer crops that would replenish the soil because it wouldn't be cost-effective to water vast amounts of field just to replenish nutrients in the soil instead they'd rather Farm land until it's absolutely barren. The worst part is they do this knowing the detrimental effect that they have on farmers utilizing the land where they're pulling all their water from. It's not hard to see the damage being done in the Southwest most people are becoming very aware of it with all the coverage that the dropping levels of Lake Mead have gotten. Fact of the matter is California's farming industry serves a niche purpose and I wouldn't consider it the number one producer of crops only because their crops are mostly unnecessary and damaging to the environment while responsible farming practices in the Midwest produce millions of bushels of grain and corn and soybeans that are actually utilized to feed millions of people while the bulk of California's production serves mainly Rich snobs at Whole Foods and the almond milk crowd

Shut off the sprinklers and it will turn back into a desert!!!

LMFAO. I thought this was "Half as Interesting". Im thinking.... "Uhhhh, where's Wendover? 🤷" 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

I can tell you a few things. # 1 the people of Shasta county (Lake Shasta area) and Trinity County ( Trinity & Lewiston Lakes) are mad AF about the area water being sent to So Cal. What the video failed to mention was Whiskey Town Lake, which is where the water from Trinity Lake (which joins with water from Shasta) is first pumped to , is CONTINUALLY FULL!!! LAKE SHASTA is usually down 100ft from crest by July and Trinity Lake is down by at least as much, making them both nearly unusable, especially when Whiskey Town Lake gets less than half the visitors!! Why ,you ask? Good question, the answer! Whiskey Town Lake has been declared a "National Recreation " site!!! Quite unfair to steal water from most lakes while keeping their pet projects FULL TO THE BRIM!!!!

It’s become a 3rd world 🌎 country.

Greed

Your audio sucks. Thought of a better mic?

In the past year or two they have proposed building a new water system like this across the central Plains states. It would divert water from the Missouri River to Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and north Texas. This huge agricultural area has been dependent on the Ogallala Aquifer, which is like a huge underground freshwater ocean. More than 150 years of farming and ranching has almost drained the aquifer.

It would be interesting if as a part 2 to this you could go over Arizona’s water system and it’s conservation of water, as it is similar to californias system, but also vastly different

Fun fact: not only is Los Angeles or any part of coastal Southern California not naturally a desert, but Los Angeles was actually _artificially dried out_ in the early 20th century, channelizing the numerous streams, lakes, and waterways in order to clear land for real estate development! Essentially, the re-routing of water into Los Angeles is meant to counterbalance the re-routing of water _out_ of Los Angeles. The main reason for this is that the city in the 1910s imposed a height limit on buildings, forcing developers to build out instead of up- they believed that tall buildings would cause road traffic... Furthermore, the growth of Los Angeles into a major city actually predates the rise of the "Sunbelt" by quite a few decades and is in fact a very industrial city, with most of the growth taking place between the opening of the Southern Pacific transcontinental railroad in 1876 and the outbreak of World War II.

Completely PROBLEMATIC. Long term FAILURE is EMINENT.

5th largest GDP not 6th. Yeah, California passed the UK a little while ago. Think about that. California has a larger GDP than the UK and India, and more than twice that of Russia.

This makes me wanna see a video on the Utah Great Salt Lake, the lake alone provides 45% of the worlds Brine Shrimp, and 13% of the worlds magnesium

San Diego's desalination plants are working wonders for the area. There reservoirs are so high right now, that the picnic tables around it are under water.

Just another example of man trying to control nature and nature finding a way to win. What I found so interesting is that the most ecologically-minded state in the US has single-handedly mucked up the ecosystem by trying to "fix" it so it was habitable the way they wanted to live, rather than live with what nature provided. Many other situations in the US and abroad where man should have left well enough alone, but instead created ecological disasters (or ones on the brink of happening). Invasive species (Asian Carp dangerously close to the Great Lakes), Lake Mead drying up, Salton Sea, just to name a few. Would love to hear more about these and other man-made disasters caused by good intentions gone bad.

California put restrictions on water for farmers but not on their damn golf courses

Great video all around and very interesting. Even so, we may truly be on the brink of a substantial desalination breakthrough even so if the research from May at the University of Tokyo's teflon-like fluoride ring filters gain traction in the commercial space any as it is expected to increase the speed of filtration by 2400% and while not directly not speculated probably to reduce energy consumption in the process by at least 80% by not needing the water to be pumped at 800-1000PSI through filter membrane inherently. It may unfortunately be 4-12 years away even so which doesn't help the current situation at all.

So like where do most of the 39M people live if ... and when the tap dries up. The distribution system is so 20th C. (Talk about "unsustainable".) 🤠

You really love callifornia long time dont you?

all wrong at the end, wildfires always been happening, just more hype, and people are leaving mostly due to financial reasons, ex; taxes, no dense housing

For such a progressive nation USA is very bad in water conservation and management of water in general.

The Ken Burns documentary on the national parks tells the story of Hetch hetchy valley. I would highly recommend it.

Having lived in Stockton CA for about 50 years, I knew most of this already. But it was still a great summary of CA's water and the need we have to develop more water sources to supply our population and agriculture.

Carter, you’re an excellent host and I’ve enjoyed all your videos thus far. Truly interesting! Thanks again.

Spent 30 years in Cali, am a 4th generation Californian. One thing I never got enough of growing up was rain. The landscape gets so parched by summer, never got used to it. I now live in the Northwest where it's green year round and we got more water than we know what to do with. Much more conducive to human life up here but I get the allure of warm sunny weather. Gotta make hard choices in life.

Great video. And THANK YOU for not having annoying background music! Can't count how many times I've had to give up on a video because of the background noise.

I am barely 100% sure half of people here are playing Timberborn XD

That was interesting.

thats why we need to stop people from moving to California and Nevada and Arizona they are important to grow food

california needs to create large condensers on the coast to capture all the cool humid air from the pacific ocean, no electricity needed once its built

Looking like mother nature is sick of being played with,, lol

California did not water The west California store water for the rest of the west

interesting vid

Awesome Video - should be a requirement for all schools in Ca to understand our water systems 👍

Never going to seel that lake full again in my life time .. bummer

They need to stop building with wreckless abandon, the build first,then figure out logistics mentality, is having adverse effects on many more than it's own inhabitants.

How come they talk about global warming but along that stretch how come they’re not trying to grow trees and terraform it to try to bring back water if they can do it it in a desert in Saudi Arabia and other countries where is the green people out there planting trees

There is a simple way they could do a desalinization plant. They can use the power of the Sun through a system of mirrors without using any electricity and other places in that harvest salt can stop harvesting salt instead use the desalinization plants salt.

You don’t get more water by robing Peter to pay Paul. Rerouting only dries out that area. Only Mother Nature can bring you water. We just don’t know how to get her to work with us.

If California put the nets like Morocco , They could sell Utah the extra .

No trees? I can see why califorina is poor. You breached the wilderness laws