NORTH BAY WATER SUPPLY UPDATE. ALSO, MORE STORMS POSSIBLE EARLY FEBRUARY

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WATER SUPPLY – RAINFALL UPDATE FOR THE NORTH BAY

It has been a strange winter so far across California. Although we have a strong El Nino in place, storms have been fairly weak and have not delivered quite the amount of rain we expected.

Overall however, North Bay is doing pretty well in terms of water supply and storage.

A look at Lake Sonoma, the main source of water for the North Bay, shows the impact of the recent storms, with significant rises in the lake level over just the past week.

In fact, due to the big water year in 2022-2023 and the rain we’ve received so far this winter, the water supply portion of the reservoir is full, and the flood control pool has been reached. The other two smaller reservoirs show similar gains.

In case you’re wondering, the North Bay is running at somewhat below average rainfall totals for this date. Here are the water year-to-date totals at selected locations.

And the percentage of a normal water year.

So, not bad, but we could use more rain. For the state as a whole, much of California is running at 50-90 percent of normal precipitation for the date.

Here’s what that graphical presentation looks like for the North Bay. Most of the region is between 70-100% of normal.

MORE STORMS TO COME?

We should be brushed by a couple of weak systems this weekend. This will bring some showers and light rainfall totals.

The next significant rainmaker looks to arrive in about a week, on or near the 31st of January.

This storm is associated with another “extension” of the jet stream toward California that is forecast for this coming week.

This jet stream setup certainly looks promising for bringing California a good dose of rain. But, a similar jet extension at the end of December didn’t quite deliver the drenching some were forecasting. So, we’ll hope for the best. The arrival of potentially significant rains is still a week away.

For their part, all of the ensemble models are suggesting a wet period from about the 31st of January through around the 4th of February.

If we do get a wet period it may be shortlived, as the models also hint that the focus of heavy rains may shift toward Southern California as we approach the 2nd week of February.