What can we do about the Water Level in the Lake?

It is no secret that our lake in Big Bear is hurting. Current estimates have the water level down about 18 feet from capacity. With only one good snow in December and no snow in January, so far mother nature isn’t doing her part. Currently the lake doesn’t have any outside sources for water so we can’t import water. And all the scientist are telling us that with global warming less rain and snow is going to be the new normal for Southern California. And don’t forget we get all our drinking water from ground water that needs to be replenished every year. Let’s just say this is a concern that needs to be addressed.

And it is. At least some aspects are going to be taken care of starting in 2026. This will be through, Replenish Big Bear, a water reclamation plan. I have written about it a little bit, but now we need to take a closer look at it. (There is a 26 page pdf that I have loaded on to the end of this post.) The plan has 5 areas that it will cover, let’s go over those 5 areas.

First area is to set up “A Proven Water Treatment Process”. This will be done at the pump house with several levels of filtration and treatment to make the water better than drinking water standards.

Second Area is to pump 80 AF (acre feet) of water to Shay Pond. This will help protect the endangered Stickleback Fish.

Third Area is to construct the pipeline to the lake. This will be a 12 inch pipeline about 20,000 ft. long. This could supply the lake with approximately 4.5 feet of annual water to the lake.

Fourth and Fifth Area are combined. They will build a new pump station and pipeline to the golf course and Sand Canyon area to replenish ground water. The golf course will get 120 Acre Feet and the Sand Canyon area will get 380 Acre Feet.

So we are still short on filling the lake because the lake looses about 4 feet a year through evaporation. But what I have seen before is that we have one good year of rain and it fills up the lake. This has happened when we had that year where we had a 100 year rain. We won’t need a 100 year rain. Let’s just get that once every 25 year rain. Or we have an El Nino year. I have seen the lake down before and sooner or later we have a year or two that fills it up. Once that happens we will have the “Replenish Big Bear” project starting in 2026 to make up for the evaporation we get every year and then our lake level stays at a constant high or full level. So hopefully we can add Mother Nature to a $40 Million project and fix the lake water level.