With a third dry year in a row, the California drought highlights the serious challenges we face in sustainable water use in the western United States as a whole. It is dry by all measures: the amount of precipitation, of snow in the mountains, in reservoirs, in soil moisture, even in groundwater depth. Impacts are already being felt in cutbacks of water deliveries to agricultural users; impacts on ecosystems, particularly fisheries; urban mandatory and voluntary cutbacks; some small systems literally running out of water from their single source. We know we can do the things we want to do with a lot less water, and at the same time save money, ecosystems, energy, and water. Responding to the drought is responding to a “new normal” water future with climate change, and an opportunity to move to more sustainable water use and water policy for California. Learn more about the drought.