Follow-Up: Sites Reservoir Permit Terms Published — Diversions Limited to November to Mid-June, Surplus Water Only
The California State Water Resources Control Board has issued its formal press release publishing the environmental conditions of the Sites Reservoir water right permit approved on November 4: the project may divert water only between November and mid-June each year, and only when water is surplus to the needs of senior water right holders, Delta water quality and fish.
The approval covers only diversions from the Sacramento River. Whether the project may also capture water from Funks Creek and Stone Corral Creek, two local streams at the reservoir site, will be decided in a separate hearing that begins in January 2027.
Sites Reservoir, located about 65 miles northwest of Sacramento and 10 miles west of Maxwell, is an off-stream storage project with a planned capacity of 1.5 million acre-feet. It will use new and existing infrastructure to transfer water from the river near Red Bluff and Hamilton City. The permit allows diversions of up to 986,000 acre-feet per year, enough to supply about 8.4 million people annually, and the reservoir would be the largest surface water storage infrastructure built in California in more than 50 years.
The permit requires compliance with the newly updated Bay-Delta Plan, and lists a series of environmentally protective measures: bypass flow requirements so water is diverted only during relatively high flows, restrictions on diversions during periods of fish migration, authorization for a portion of the stored water to be used for wildlife refuges, screens that prevent fish from being drawn into diversion facilities, new studies to confirm that minimum bypass flow requirements will prevent unreasonable harm to fish, and water quality requirements on reservoir releases to protect the river and Delta from harmful algal blooms, high temperatures and elevated mercury levels.
"Climate change is here, and we must lean into new ways of managing water to adapt to it. Expanding opportunities to increase supplies through storage makes sense, with robust environmental protections in place," said Board Chair E. Joaquin Esquivel. He added that the adoption of last week's Bay-Delta Plan update established a durable framework that enables projects like Sites to operate in a way that protects important river systems while remaining flexible enough for new water supplies.
Once completed, the project will deliver water through canals or the river system to its proponents, which include state and federal agencies, public irrigation districts in the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys and urban water suppliers serving the Bay Area and Southern California. The decision is the culmination of proceedings conducted by the board's Administrative Hearings Office over two years: hearings on 32 separate days, 41 parties, 60 witnesses and more than 2,100 evidentiary documents, with the board adopting the final decision after two public comment periods on drafts released in March and September.
(Source: California State Water Resources Control Board)
Source: California State Water Resources Control Board
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：Sacramento River 上的 Red Bluff 分水坝航拍，该坝向 Tehama-Colusa Canal 与 Corning Canal 分水，是 Sites 水库引水所用既有设施之一。照片由美国垦务局拍摄，CC BY-SA 2.0，来源 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: Aerial view of the Red Bluff Diversion Dam on the Sacramento River, which diverts water into the Tehama-Colusa and Corning canals, part of the existing infrastructure the Sites project will use. Photo by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- 2026-11-04California Approves Water Right Permit for Sites Reservoir, a 1.5 Million-Acre-Foot Project
- 2026-11-04Follow-Up: Sites Reservoir Permit Terms Published — Diversions Limited to November to Mid-June, Surplus Water OnlyThis story
