05/18/2026
Chief Caleen Sisk:
Finally they are going to do that project the Winnemem Wintu Tribe has suggested decades ago......did science catch up??? Now, the second part of that Winnemem Wintu Tribe suggestion is to also put hydro-generators in the canal too....nothing in the that moving water to harm. What kind of studies do you need for water that dies before it reaches the people who need it???
Then maybe they can take out the PGE McCloud-Pit Hydro-dam off the Winnemem Waywaket (McCloud River). This will help the ecosystem repair and clean, and this will help cold water supplies from river to aquifer, so it will flow like normal. Then build the volitional fish passage and allow cold, clean nutrition filled water to enter the Sacramento River which will feed Nur and allow Nur (salmon) to swim to the high mountain cold water where their natural foods are to stay healthy. They are the Creator's Mountain Climbers and Climate Changers. Trust Traditional Knowledge...... look at what science has done...what a mess for every living thing!!!! Couldn't you give TEK the rightful respect over science? We didn't kill every thing.
California has two resource crises running simultaneously that have each demanded separate expensive solutions: a water shortage driven by persistent drought that is depleting reservoirs at rates no natural recovery process is keeping pace with, and a clean energy transition requiring significant new solar infrastructure on land that agriculture, development, and conservation interests are competing to control. The world's largest solar canal project addresses both crises from the same infrastructure by installing solar panels above 4,000 miles of existing waterways across the state, generating clean electricity from the corridor above while the shade created by those panels reduces the water evaporation that has been silently removing billions of gallons from the system every year without any intervention capable of stopping it.
The canal network already crosses California. The land above it was already committed to water transport. Installing solar panels above that existing linear infrastructure produces electricity from space that was never available for any other purpose while simultaneously preserving the water supply that the panels now shade from direct sun exposure. Studies conducted on pilot sections of the project confirmed that the combination delivers more electricity than equivalent ground based panels in the same climate because water keeps the solar cells cooler and improves their efficiency above what land based installations achieve in the same heat. California did not find a new place to put 4,000 miles of solar panels. It found that the infrastructure already crossing the state was carrying unutilized space above it that could solve two problems at once and the world's largest solar canal project is the result of that recognition being taken seriously at scale.
