Two water storage projects in Kern and Tulare counties received $34 million in federal grants through the Bureau of Reclamation’s Small Storage Grant Program, according to an announcement Thursday.
The lion’s share of that funding, about $25 million, will go to the Kern Fan Project, a 1,300-acre groundwater banking project with an environmental “twist” that has been under construction since 2024.
Specifically, this latest federal grant will help pay for a canal within the Kern Fan Project to bring excess water off the California Aqueduct in wet years into the bank. The canal is also expected to help make up for restricted flows caused by subsidence on the aqueduct, according to Dan Bartel, General Manager of the Rosedale-Rio Bravo Water Storage District…