H2 Uh Oh: Climatic drought is just one of several worries for California’s water future

By: Rick Bishop
Date: March 3rd, 2009
Source: WRCOG

Ednote: The very sad part about human beings is that they don’t act on a “potential threat” until they are confronted by the impacts in real time. We have a climate crisis, oil crisis and an even more critical water crisis. The climate crisis is like we’re in a pan of water and the temperature is getting hotter, but we can still bear it. It will be too late when we are aware that the temp is going to kill us. At some point in the very near future we are going to have to increase everybody’s taxes to pay for moving entire civilizations away from the rising seas.

The water shortage is cyclical, yes, but right now it is about to impact California and many southwest regions with water rationing. Heavy fines for washing your car or watering your lawn, lawns will go bye-bye. California’s governator has made a “call to arms” to combat water shortages…

In the throes of a third consecutive year of below-average rainfall and low snowmelt runoff, Governor Schwarzenegger recently declared a statewide drought emergency.  As part of his declaration, the Governor urged Californians to cut water use by 20 percent, directed state agencies to cut back on landscape irrigation, and ordered the state to streamline permitting for water projects, including recycling and desalination operations.  The Governor stated that conditions are such that “…some local governments are rationing water, developments can’t proceed and agricultural fields are sitting idle.”

The impacts of water shortages on the State’s economy are significant.  One estimate is that nearly $3 billion in economic losses have occurred this year alone from below-average rainfall. As many as 95,000 agricultural jobs will be lost, and more than 100,000 acres of farmland have gone unplanted due to lack of water. Absent reliable future supplies, the prospect of delaying or even denying approvals for new development projects or industry expansion looms, adding another blow to the State’s already struggling economic circumstances.

Neither the prospect nor reality of climatic drought is a new issue for Californians, who for almost two decades have demonstrated the ability to conserve water. This is evidenced by the fact that overall water consumption of imported water provided by Metropolitan Water District to communities in the six Southern California counties has actually declined from 1990 levels, despite population growth of 3.77 million since then. In addition to water conservation, use of recycled water, capture of storm water, and expanded groundwater cleanup /recharge of local aquifers have made the difference.

With concerted effort, water users in California can conserve an additional 20 percent as called for by the Governor in his declaration.  The Western Municipal Water District (WMWD) is working with its partner agencies in the Santa Ana Watershed to develop state legislation (SB 261 – Dutton/Ducheny) guiding comprehensive water use efficiency across the state. SB 261 is unique in the way it encourages interagency cooperation to maximize efficiency and multiple benefits – an approach that local governments in Western Riverside County perform exceedingly well. The Eastern Municipal Water District (EMWD) launched a regionally coordinated conservation effort years ago that led to the countywide landscape Ordinance 859. This water-saving ordinance is being updated by the Riverside County Water Task Force to allow county land use agencies to become compliant with statewide outdoor landscape law AB 1881. This regional approach pioneered in WRCOG’s region has no equal in the state.  Finally, the implementation of tiered water rates by agencies throughout the state, including EMWD and WMWD, will most certainly result in additional water use efficiency while bringing revenue stability to water providers.  Eastern has approved tiered rates and is educating customers for three months for implementation to follow in April.  Western is converting its billing system and will implement phase-in of tiered rates after August. Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District and Rancho California Water District are examining rate tiering as well.

Climatic drought, however, isn’t the only issue that will impact Southern California’s water supply.  We are in the midst of regulatory drought as well.  A December 2008 biological opinion issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service requires protection for dwindling smelt populations in Delta waterways.  As a result, Southern California stands to lose up to 50 percent of its water normally transmitted from the Delta.  Retail customers of WMWD receive up to 100 percent of their water from the Delta, and the EMWD receives 50 percent overall.  Since the opinion was issued, the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) has indicated a stronger likelihood that its Water Supply Allocation Plan (WSAP), which details how much MWD water will be available to MWD member agencies at given levels of drought, will need to be implemented.  The Department of Water Resources has projected that MWD will receive only 15 percent of its normal allocation of Delta-source water for 2009.  Additionally, on March 4, the California Department of Fish and Game listed the long fin smelt as a threatened species under the California Endangered Species Act; the listing could result in further reductions in water allocated from the State Water Project.  These regulatory restrictions do not bode well for our water situation, even during times of normal or above-normal precipitation.

California also suffers from an infrastructure drought. The State’s water delivery and storage systems are largely antiquated, and will not be able to serve a population that will swell from 38 million to 60 million people by 2050.  While the Governor has called for nearly $12 billion in bond funds to pay for a range of future water management investments including additional storage, creating sustainable resource management plans for the Delta, river restoration, and additional conservation efforts, this amount is a proverbial drop in the bucket compared to future needs and costs.  As was the case almost three decades ago, the Delta is again the nadir of today’s discussions about California’s water future.  Although the proposed “Peripheral Canal” was soundly trampled by California voters in 1982, so much has changed since then that objective research institutions, such as the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC), are now calling for construction of a peripheral canal as a means to satisfy both water demand AND improve environmental conditions.  PPIC’s report concludes that sending water through the Delta for export purposes is worse for fish than previously thought.  Well-respected environmental organizations such as the Nature Conservancy agree, recently publishing public statements of support for “alternative conveyance” solutions in the Delta. Further, the Delta’s levees, and the water supplies and land uses that depend on them, are highly vulnerable to failure.  PPIC contends that the establishment of legal and regulatory tools can provide safeguards around the use of a future canal, including the constitutional protection of water export limits and creating proper partnerships to manage it.

Time is of the essence if we are to secure a water future for California’s long term.  Nature is best suited for addressing our current climatic drought.  But the State’s elected officials, water leaders, and the public are squarely in charge of finding solutions to the regulatory and infrastructure droughts that we have imposed upon ourselves.  As one local water official recently stated, “We can’t simply conserve our way out of” California’s water crisis.

Rick Bishop is the Executive Director of the Western Region Council of Governments.