California WaterBlog

By Brett Milligan

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Managing salinity in the Delta is a wicked problem. It’s far from any simple solution. It’s inseparable from many interacting phenomena and becoming more challenging with climate change impacts. And the definition of the problem varies across a diverse range of values and conflicting concerns (Luoma et al, 2015).  How one understands and encounters Delta salinity depends on one’s experience and knowledge, as well as who one is – be it a fish, a clam, a scientist, a regulator, a city dweller, a recreational boater, or a Delta resident.

When we asked a number of people if they thought planning and decision making for salinity management in the Delta is currently just or equitable, nearly 85% of respondents said they felt it was not. The term Just Transitions is utilized in the domains of climate, energy, and environmental justice and refers to efforts to reduce inequity in modern society and shift towards more sustainable economies, practices and lifeways. What might this be for the Delta and how its waters are managed? What might a just transition be?

Just Transitions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: Drought Salinity and Sea Level Rise (“Just Transitions”) is a four campus UC research project, which over the past four years has sought to address salinity management and climate adaptation in the Delta through a collaborative and inclusive process of designing and assessing a broad range of future adaptation scenarios, which we will be sharing in an upcoming event.

Saltier Deltas

Like many other urbanized and reclaimed Deltas around the world, California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (Delta) is increasingly vulnerable to salinization of its waters. Many factors contribute to this concern, including tidal forces, upstream water use and reservoir operations, the amount of water exported to other regions of the state, and the increasing effects of climate change, which include warmer temperatures, sea level rise, more extreme precipitation patterns and more intense droughts (Dettinger et al. 2016).

If salinity increases in the Delta, it can impact fresh water supplies, Bay-Delta Estuary ecology, recreation, local communities, and many economic sectors. Current conditions are also complicated by how radically altered the Delta’s waterways and landscapes are due to the legacies of gold mining, land reclamation, and the Delta’s central role in the state’s vast water infrastructure (SFEI-ASC 2014; Milligan and Kraus Polk 2017), and conditions in the Delta are changing faster than science, planning and governance can understand and effectively keep pace with what’s happening (Norgaard et al. 2021).

Transdisciplinary Research and Scenario Planning

The Just Transitions project used a transdisciplinary scenario planning approach to explore future salinity adaptation scenarios for the Delta. Generally speaking, transdisciplinary research entails collaboration across disciplines as well as collaboration with publics and communities beyond the confines of academia. Often the publics and communities engaged in such processes are those who may be affected by the outcomes of research or planning efforts. Scenario Planning is a method for developing and comparing multiple potential future scenarios focused on a particular place and set of shared concerns. Scenario planning is often used to investigate complex and contested issues, since it allows for consideration of  multiple future possibilities and courses of action in parallel, which can reveal assumptions and foster co-learning through observing how benefits and impacts vary in type and distribution across different scenarios and groups. One of the Just Transitions project’s goals (and tested hypothesis) has been to see if trust, collective learning, and adaptive capacity can be generated through this inclusive planning process.

Over the past four years, the Just Transitions team and many project participants have co-created a diverse set of adaptation scenarios for the Delta. These scenarios were developed and iteratively refined through interviews, surveys, a series of public workshops and interactive exhibitions, and expert forums. The six scenarios explore a wide range of adaptation options and include habitat restoration and green infrastructure approaches (both within the delta as well its larger watershed); the implementation of operable gates, barriers, levee improvements and other in-Delta grey infrastructure investments; changes in reservoir operations to affect the timing and amount of water releases; changes in total Delta outflows through use reduction, the Delta Conveyance Project, and a Business as Usual Scenario wherein the current status quo is carried into the future to see how it fares in comparison to the other scenarios

A Last Invitation to Participate in the Project

The Just Transitions team is hosting the project’s final public workshop and interactive exhibition at the Jean Harvie Community Center in Walnut Grove, CA, in early November. We cordially invite you to attend to see for yourself what the future of the Delta could be, and to consider what you think it should be.

Both the exhibition and workshop will focus on sharing the final outcomes from the project’s co-designed research: the six Delta adaptation scenarios and how those scenarios have been modeled and comparatively evaluated according to criteria developed by project participants: water quality, ecology, ecocultural restoration and Indigenous sovereignty, recreation, and economy. All attendees will have an opportunity to actively participate and cast their vote for their preferred scenario. Please join us for the exhibition, the workshop, or both!

Open House Exhibition: Daily, Tuesday November 3rd – Saturday November 7th, 11:00am – 3:00pm

All project content and research findings will be on display in an open gallery setting with opportunities to immerse yourself in the future visions of the Delta at your own pace. The exhibit will consist of detailed scenario visualizations as well as interactive digital models and dashboards that reveal how scenarios compare across a range of diverse criteria. All participants will be encouraged to cast their vote for their most preferred scenario (or scenarios) through how they allocate the freshwater provided to them at the exhibition.

Public Workshop: Thursday November 5th, 9:00am – 4:00pm (open gallery and reception from 9-10am)

This more structured event will include presentations by the project team, breakout sessions on focused topics, and group discussions. All activities will be aimed at sharing and reviewing the results of the project’s scenario planning process, with time for reflection on what was learned by all who have participated in the project and thoughts on future research directions. Morning refreshments and lunch will be provided.

Please register for the workshop HERE so we can best plan and cater for the event.

For more information on the project, click HERE.

For directions to the Jean Harvie Center, click HERE.

About the Author

Brett Milligan is professor of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design in the Department of Human Ecology at the University of California, Davis and principal investigator for the Just Transitions Project. He directs the Metamorphic Landscapes Lab, dedicated to advancing multi-benefit adaptations to accelerated climate and landscape change through transdisciplinary design and scenario planning. Much of his work is based in California, addressing legacies and challenges of land reclamation, water infrastructure and fire suppression.

About the Just Transitions Team

The Just Transitions In the Delta team consists of faculty and researchers across four UC campuses and other outside UC collaborators that include (or have included): Ashley DePew, John Durand, Maggie Gallagher, Ana Maria Zepeda, Justin Marsh, Lynette Williams, Elsie Platzer, Jay Lund, Kwan-Liu Ma, Yuya Kawakami, Sam (YuTee) Lee, Yun-Hsin, Jeff Jenkins, Isaac Sanchez, Josue Medellin, Yu Cai, Dan Cayan, Morgan Levy, Sarah Giddings, Lu Su, Jenna Israel, Laurel Larsen, Steve Culberson and Jess Rudnick.

Further Reading & Viewing:

Just Transitions in the Delta project website: https://delta-just-transitions-ucdavis.hub.arcgis.com/

Jon Gorey, Planning for a Just Transition in the California Delta, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2025, https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/land-lines-magazine/articles/planning-for-a-just-transition-in-the-california-delta/

Dettinger, Michael, Jamie Anderson, Michael Anderson, Larry R. Brown, Daniel Cayan, and Edwin Maurer. “Climate change and the Delta.” San Francisco Estuary and Watershed Science 14, no. 3 (2016).

Galang, Elson Ian Nyl Ebreo, Elena M. Bennett, Gordon M. Hickey, Julia Baird, Blane Harvey, and Kate Sherren. “Participatory scenario planning: A social learning approach to build systems thinking and trust for sustainable environmental governance.” Environmental Science & Policy 164 (2025): 103997.

Heffron, Raphael J. Achieving a just transition to a low-carbon economy. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.

Luoma, Samuel N., Clifford N. Dahm, Michael Healey, and Johnnie N. Moore. “Challenges facing the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta: Complex, chaotic, or simply cantankerous?.” San Francisco Estuary and Watershed Science 13, no. 3 (2015).

Milligan, Brett, and Alejo Kraus-Polk. “Evolving the Evolving: Infrastructure, Place and Rewilding in the California Delta.” Urban Planning 2, no. 4 (2017): 93-115.

Norgaard, Richard B., John A. Wiens, Stephen B. Brandt, Elizabeth A. Canuel, Tracy K. Collier, Virginia H. Dale, Harindra JS Fernando, Thomas L. Holzer, Samuel N. Luoma, and Vincent H. Resh. “Preparing scientists, policy-makers, and managers for a fast-forward future.” San Francisco Estuary and Watershed Science 19, no. 2 (2021).

San Francisco Estuary Institute-Aquatic Science Center (SFEI-ASC). 2014. A Delta Transformed: Ecological Functions, Spatial Metrics, and Landscape Change in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Prepared for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and Ecosystem Restoration Program. A Report of SFEI-ASC’s Resilient Landscapes Program, Publication #729, San Francisco Estuary Institute-Aquatic Science Center, Richmond, CA.

Stark, Anthony, Fred Gale, and Hannah Murphy-Gregory. “Just transitions’ meanings: a systematic review.” Society & Natural Resources 36, no. 10 (2023): 1277-1297.

Swilling, Mark, and Eve Annecke. Just transitions. University of Cape Town P, 2010.

Wang, Xinxin, and Kevin Lo. “Just transition: A conceptual review.” Energy research & social science 82 (2021): 102291.