Monday, August 12, 2019

August 27th WRP Natural Resources Committee webinar on 2019


You are cordially invited to the August 27th WRP Natural Resources Committee webinar on 2019 Water Strategies and Collaboration. This webinar will run from 10 am to 12 noon Pacific. Please provide your RSVP through the link below.
Speakers from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Bureau of Reclamation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Western States Water Council will provide their thoughts on key water policy issues and actions to address 2018 Presidential Memo directives, achieve greater water resilience (with focus on the West), and improve Federal permitting.
This webinar will feature directives from the Presidential Memorandum on Promoting the Reliable Supply and Delivery of Water in the West (October 19, 2018) and related Federal and State efforts.  This Presidential Memo notes that during the 20th Century, the Federal Government invested enormous resources in water infrastructure, but decades of uncoordinated, piecemeal funding and regulatory actions have diminished the ability to deliver water and power in an efficient, cost‑effective way. Unless addressed, fragmented regulation of water infrastructure and underfunded maintenance and replacement needs will continue to produce inefficiencies, unnecessary burdens, and conflict among the Federal Government, States, tribes, and local public agencies. Several other actions are addressed in this Presidential Memo.
This webinar will highlight the following:
  • Streamlining Western Water Infrastructure Regulatory Processes and Removing Unnecessary Burdens
  • Improving Forecasts of Water Availability
  • Improving Use of Technology to Increase Water Reliability
  • Activities in the Colorado River Basin
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Water will provide an update on the President’s 2017 Executive Order to review the “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) Rule.  EPA and the Department of the Army using a two-step process: 1. Repeal and temporarily recodify the regulation that was in place prior to issuance of the 2015 Rule, which is being implemented consistent with court orders enjoining that rule and with the agencies’ final rule. 2. Rewrite the regulations consistent with the Executive Order and provide a new definition of navigable waters based on the principles Justice Scalia outlined in the Rapanos plurality opinion.
The EPA will also provide an update on the development of a National Water Reuse Action Plan that was announced on February 27, 2019, by EPA Assistant Administrator for Water, Dave Ross.  The National Water Reuse Action Plan will identify actions to better integrate federal policy and leverage the expertise of both industry and government to ensure the effective use of the Nation's water resources. The National Water Reuse Action Plan will seek to foster water reuse as an important component of integrated water resources management.
Bureau of Reclamation
Ms. Avra Morgan, Office of Program and Policy Services for the Bureau of Reclamation, will address Reclamation’s activities in support of the October 19, 2018, Presidential Memorandum on Promoting the Reliable Supply and Delivery of Water in the West. Mr. Malcolm Wilson and Ms. Carly Jerla, with Reclamation’s Upper and Lower Colorado Regions, will provide a brief background history of Reclamation, and an overview of the Colorado River System, including recently completed Colorado River Drought Contingency Plans – designed to reduce risks from ongoing drought and protect the single most important water resource in the western United States.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Forrest Melton, Program Scientist, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Western Water Applications Office, will discuss remote sensing applications for water resoures management. The NASA Western Water Applications Office (WWAO) was established by NASA to work with federal, state, and local agency partners to develop applications of remote sensing to help solve important and pressing water-resource problems in the western U.S. He will describe ongoing work supported by NASA to use satellite and airborne data to support advances in monitoring and management of snow water resources, groundwater, harmful algal blooms, and evapotranspiration and consumptive use of water for irrigation and agricultural production.
Western States Water Council
Mr. Tony Willardson, Executive Director of the Western States Water Council, will highlight state efforts to promote improvements in funding aging and inadequate infrastructure needs, forecasting skill on subseasonal to seasonal time scales, adoption of forecast informed reservoir operations, addressing resiliency related to extreme weather events, as well as raise questions related to an expanded 5G spectrum and interference with frequencies monitoring water vapor for weather forecasting.  He will also explain state authority under Clean Water Act Section 401 to certify federal actions are consistent with state water quality standards.
Please note that this webinar is limited to the first 100 people who provide a RSVP. 
Thank you.
Amy Duffy, amyduffy@westernregionalpartnership.org




If you'd like to send this invitation to a colleague or provide a RSVP for another person, please click here to access the generic RSVP.
Sent by Amy Duffy
Please respond by Aug 23, 2019 10:38 PT
RSVP