With heavy rain and snow in the Greater Sacramento region, what does it mean for reservoirs?
SACRAMENTO -- The Sacramento Valley received much-needed rain over the last week that has boosted the state's water storage in the snowpack, reservoirs and groundwater.
Capturing water is a critical part of putting a dent in California's three-year-long severe drought. But it will take more than a solid snowpack and precipitation to pull the state out of the drought.
"There are two issues: storage and the amount of water that we have and demand, that is the amount of water that we actually need to do the things that we want," said Peter Gleick, co-founder and senior fellow of the Pacific Institute.
Gleick said California is facing the realities of a human-caused climate crisis. This means there are more extreme weather events, longer droughts, and more intense precipitation.
"We're going from one extreme to the other, typically," said Helen Dahlke, an assistant professor in integrated hydrologic sciences at UC Davis.
The state's water storage, while extensive, was built before the extreme weather events that have played out over the last decade.
"We're in a new world now. The system that we built was built for yesterday's climate, not for today's or tomorrow's climate," said Gleick.
Some climate scientists refer to the extremes as "climate whiplash."