"The projects we manage and the people and species they affect are all one, and we must recognize and work through the complexities. It will take much more than measures of acreage, elevation, and access to sustain California’s ecosystems and residents in the future."
– Caitlin Sweeney, Director
"We need more investment in creative ways to use and restore flows for environmental health, to expand and build resilient shorelines with rising land elevations, and to weave considerations of social equity more strongly into efforts to improve environmental health."
– Letitia Grenier, Lead Scientist
The embedded PDF to the left offers a view of the Executive Summary. The full report is also available for circulation.
Freshwater flows in the Estuary have been highly altered, causing reductions in inter-annual and seasonal variability, and peak-flows. Freshwater flows into the Estuary in recent years reflect chronic artificial drought conditions, in sharp contrast to unimpaired flows.
Tidal marsh acreage throughout the Estuary has declined significantly from the historical amount, but restoration efforts are bringing back this critical ecosystem and associated benefits. Projects in the Bay are making extensive contributions to tidal marsh area, while efforts in the Delta are beginning to make progress towards regional goals.
See Clips from an interview with Letitia Grenier, PhD (San Francisco Estuary Institute), science lead and co-author of the updated indicator on tidal marsh for the 2019 State of the Estuary Report.
The condition of fish communities varies across the Estuary. In the lower Estuary, fish communities are abundant, diverse, and dominated by native species. However, in the brackish and freshwater upper Estuary, native fish communities are in poor condition. Based on long-term monitoring data, native fish communities across the Bay are declining. In San Francisco and San Pablo Bays, this long-term data set is from sampling only the offshore areas of the Bay and may not reflect benefits to fish populations from recent wetland restoration.
See Clips from interviews with Christina Swanson, PhD (Natural Resources Defense Council) and Jon Rosenfield, PhD (San Francisco Baykeeper), co-authors of the updated indicator on Bay and Delta fish for the 2019 State of the Estuary Report.
The frequency, magnitude, and duration of floodplain inundation in both the Bay and the Delta are too low to support healthy estuarine habitats and sustain important ecological processes. While conditions have been variable over time, they have, in general, remained poor in the Delta and have declined in the Bay.
In both the Bay and Delta, total and per-capita urban water use have declined over the last several decades, despite growing populations. More efficient urban water use means that both regions met and exceeded benchmarks for per-capita use and drought-reduction targets. The regions have modestly increased water use since the end of the drought but still maintained improvements over their 2020 benchmarks for reductions in per-capita use.
See Clips from an interview with Peter Vorster (The Bay Institute), co-author of the updated indicator on urban water use for the 2019 State of the Estuary Report.
Significant portions of previously tidal areas in the Bay and Delta have been diked off and disconnected from tidal action to accommodate agriculture, urban development, duck ponds, salt ponds, and a diverse set of other land uses. The low elevation of these areas places them at increased risk of flooding as sea level rises and intense rainstorms become more common. In addition, many of these former tidal marshes and mudflats have subsided significantly below sea level as a result of sediment oxidation and compaction. Subsidence and these accompanying processes exacerbate flood risk, contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, and reduce the potential for restoring important intertidal habitat types.
Levees and seawalls line many miles of the shorelines of San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. By hardening the Estuary’s once soft and absorbent shores, early developers intended to keep people and property safe from flooding. These engineered structures do not provide good habitat for native species, however. Nor are they designed to accommodate the kind of flooding projected for our future, flooding produced by a combination of rapid sea level rise, higher groundwater tables, storm surge, and more rainfall over shorter periods.
Open spaces within urban areas provide a diverse set of benefits for wild animals, plants, and people that live nearby. Green spaces decrease urban runoff, improve downstream water quality, and provide habitat for native wildlife, while also benefiting human health and wellbeing. Urban parks improve local air quality and reduce local temperatures, contributing to lowered rates of childhood asthma and heat-related deaths in nearby areas. Exposure to urban parks is also associated with improved mood, increased physical activity, lower heart rate, and additional human health benefits.
April Robinson,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
J. Letitia Grenier,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Christina Swanson,
Natural Resources Defense Council
Christina Swanson,
Natural Resources Defense Council
Emily Clark,
Sam Safran,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Christina Swanson,
Natural Resources Defense Council
Jon Rosenfield,
The Bay Institute/Bay Keeper
Bill Bennett,
The Bay Institute
Peter Vorster,
Greg Reis,
The Bay Institute
Matt Benjamin,
Sam Safran,
Erica Spotswood,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Katie McKnight,
Sam Safran,
Julie Beagle,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Matt Benjamin,
Sam Safran,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Caitlin Sweeney,
Liz Juvera,
San Francisco Estuary Partnership
Martina Koller,
John Callaway
Delta Stewardship Council
Luisa Valiela,
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Ariel Rubissow Okamoto,
Lisa Owens Viani
VOICES sections draw from ESTUARY News Magazine stories with additional research by Aleta George and Audrey Mei Yi Brown.
Miguel A. Osorio, Layout Design
Peter Beeler, Estuary Map
Metropolitan Transportation Commission
JT Litho,
Oakland, California
Printed on Recycled Paper
Tony Hale,
San Francisco Estuary Institute
Left to right: Shira Bezalel; Don Yee; Shira Bezalel; Ken James
Andy Miller,
Plus M Productions
This report was funded by the San Francisco Estuary Partnership and the Delta Stewardship Council.
We would like to thank the many people who contributed to the development and review of this report, including: Ruth Askevold, Josh Bradt, Gary Bobker, Amanda Bohl, Josh Collins, Will Dominie, Liz Duffy, Cristina Grosso, Kathy Hieb, Nahal Ipakchi, Jessica Law, Jeremy Lowe, Darcie Luce, Ron Melcer, Thomas Mumley, Heidi Nutters, Ellen Plane, Sandra Scoggin, Tim Smith, and Christina Toms.
By Ariel Rubissow Okamoto
Nothing could be stranger than sitting in the dark with thousands of suits and heels, watching a parade of promises to decarbonize from companies and countries large and small, reeling from the beauties of big screen rainforests and indigenous necklaces, and getting all choked up.
It was day two of the September 2018 Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco when I felt it.
At first I wondered if I was simply starstruck. Most of us labor away trying to fix one small corner of the planet or another without seeing the likes of Harrison Ford, Al Gore, Michael Bloomberg, Van Jones, Jerry Brown – or the ministers or mayors of dozens of cities and countries – in person, on stage and at times angry enough to spit. And between these luminaries a steady stream of CEOs, corporate sustainability officers, and pension fund managers promising percentages of renewables and profits in their portfolios dedicated to the climate cause by 2020-2050.
I tried to give every speaker my full attention: the young man of Vuntut Gwichin heritage from the edge of the Yukon’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge who pleaded with us not to enter his sacred lands with our drills and dependencies; all the women – swathed in bright patterns and head-scarfs – who kept punching their hearts. “My uncle in Uganda would take 129 years to emit the same amount of carbon as an American would in one year,” said Oxfam’s Winnie Byanyima.
“Our janitors are shutting off the lights you leave on,” said Aida Cardenas, speaking about the frontline workers she trains, mostly immigrants, who are excited to be part of climate change solutions in their new country.
The men on the stage, strutting about in feathers and pinstripes, spoke of hopes and dreams, money and power. “The notion that you can either do good or do well is a myth we have to collectively bust,” said New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy whose state is investing heavily in offshore wind farms.
“Climate change isn’t just about risks, it’s about opportunities,” said Blackrock sustainable investment manager Brian Deese.
But it wasn’t all these fine speeches that started the butterflies. Halfway through the second day of testimonials, it was a slight white-haired woman wrapped in an azure pashmina that pricked my tears. One minute she was on the silver screen with Alec Baldwin and the next she taking a seat on stage. She talked about trees. How trees can solve 30% of our carbon reduction problem. How we have to stop whacking them back in the Amazon and start planting them everywhere else. I couldn’t help thinking of Dr. Suess and his truffala trees. Jane Goodall, over 80, is as fierce as my Lorax. Or my daughter’s Avatar.
Analyzing my take home feeling from the event I realized it wasn’t the usual fear – killer storms, tidal waves, no food for my kids to eat on a half-baked planet – nor a newfound sense of hope – I’ve always thought nature will get along just fine without us. What I felt was relief. People were actually doing something. Doing a lot. And there was so much more we could do.
As we all pumped fists in the dark, as the presentations went on and on and on because so many people and businesses and countries wanted to STEP UP, I realized how swayed I had let myself be by the doomsday news mill.
“We must be like the river, “ said a boy from Bangladesh named Risalat Khan, who had noticed our Sierra watersheds from the plane. “We must cut through the mountain of obstacles. Let’s be the river!”
Or as Harrison Ford less poetically put it: “Let’s turn off our phones and roll up our sleeves and kick this monster’s ass.”
by Isaac Pearlman
Since California’s last state-led climate change assessment in 2012, the Golden State has experienced a litany of natural disasters. This includes four years of severe drought from 2012 to 2016, an almost non-existent Sierra Nevada snowpack in 2014-2015 costing $2.1 billion in economic losses, widespread Bay Area flooding from winter 2017 storms, and extremely large and damaging wildfires culminating with this year’s Mendocino Complex fire achieving the dubious distinction of the largest in state history. California’s most recent climate assessment, released August 27th, predicts that for the state and the Bay Area, we can expect even more in the future.
The California state government first began assessing climate impacts formally in 2006, due to an executive order by Governor Schwarzenegger. California’s latest iteration and its fourth overall, includes a dizzying array of 44 technical reports; three topical studies on climate justice, tribal and indigenous communities, and the coast and ocean; as well as nine region-specific analyses.
The results are alarming for our state’s future: an estimated four to five feet of sea level rise and loss of one to two-thirds of Southern California beaches by 2100, a 50 percent increase in wildfires over 25,000 acres, stronger and longer heat waves, and infrastructure like airports, wastewater treatment plants, rail and roadways increasingly likely to suffer flooding.
For the first time, California’s latest assessment dives into climate consequences on a regional level. Academics representing nine California regions spearheaded research and summarized the best available science on the variable heat, rain, flooding and extreme event consequences for their areas. For example, the highest local rate of sea level rise in the state is at the rapidly subsiding Humboldt Bay. In San Diego county, the most biodiverse in all of California, preserving its many fragile and endangered species is an urgent priority. Francesca Hopkins from UC Riverside found that the highest rate of childhood asthma in the state isn’t an urban smog-filled city but in the Imperial Valley, where toxic dust from Salton Sea disaster chokes communities – and will only become worse as higher temperatures and less water due to climate change dry and brittle the area.
According to the Bay Area Regional Report, since 1950 the Bay Area has already increased in temperature by 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit and local sea level is eight inches higher than it was one hundred years ago. Future climate will render the Bay Area less suitable for our evergreen redwood and fir forests, and more favorable for tolerant chaparral shrub land. The region’s seven million people and $750 billion economy (almost one-third of California’s total) is predicted to be increasingly beset by more “boom and bust” irregular wet and very dry years, punctuated by increasingly intense and damaging storms.
Unsurprisingly, according to the report the Bay Area’s intensifying housing and equity problems have a multiplier affect with climate change. As Bay Area housing spreads further north, south, and inland the result is higher transportation and energy needs for those with the fewest resources available to afford them; and acute disparity in climate vulnerability across Bay Area communities and populations.
“All Californians will likely endure more illness and be at greater risk of early death because of climate change,” bluntly states the statewide summary brochure for California’s climate assessment. “[However] vulnerable populations that already experience the greatest adverse health impacts will be disproportionately affected.”
“We’re much better at being reactive to a disaster than planning ahead,” said UC Berkeley professor and contributing author David Ackerly at a California Adaptation Forum panel in Sacramento on August 27th. “And it is vulnerable communities that suffer from those disasters. How much human suffering has to happen before it triggers the next round of activity?”
The assessment’s data is publicly available online at “Cal-adapt,” where Californians can explore projected impacts for their neighborhoods, towns, and regions.