With California in a yet another phase of below average precipitation –experts predict that the amount of rainfall in the western USA overall will fall by 15-20% by the middle of the century – and with the state faced with the constant threat of seismic activity affecting water resources and delivery, dramatic but essential action needs to be taken to ensure long-term water supplies to households, agriculture and industry
US states have begun appointing water police – in Las Vegas, Nevada there are now 14 “Water Patrols” continuously checking how water is being used and reporting leakage of the smallest amount. Concerns over the future availability of this most precious of resources is high on the agenda of both state and federal legislators. Water management has always been an essential focus in California’s resource delivery and over the past 150 years, innovation has been at the heart of decision making.
Background
A full and detailed investigation into California’s water resources, utilisation and future needs was conducted in 1945. This state-wide investigation by the Division of Water Resources (DWR)produced three conclusive reports containing not only data on precipitation, stream flows, frequency and water quality, but the state’s total water utilisation and requirements, including forecasts of ‘ultimate’ water needs. Most importantly, the reports highlighted plans for full practical development of California’s water resources to meet the state’s ultimate long term needs.
Since then, state water authorities have continued to update and plan for California’s future water requirements. There are challenges: climatic differences – hot dry deserts to snow-peaked mountains and foggy coastlines (rainfall can be less than one inch per year in Death Valley and 56 inches along the North Coast) – can result in floods and droughts occurring in the same year. Add to this the political vagaries and the ever-strengthening environmental lobby and water management becomes even more challenging.
While California may be blessed with a plethora of water resources – the northern part of the state has abundant rainfall and mountain snow-pack run off – most of the state’s population lives in the south, and the bulk of farmland lies in central California. Some regions are mostly arid and are therefore highly dependent on imported water from other areas. Shortages in dry seasons are and will continue to be a problem as populations increase.
Precipitation (approximately 35% of the state’s annual 200 million acre-feet) is captured and stored both in reservoirs and in groundwater basins. These underground aquifers are capable of holding six to ten times the amount of surface water reservoirs. However many are over-pumped and some are contaminated by toxins such as MTBE, an ingredient in gasoline or arsine, a naturally occurring substance. Other aquifers are too deep to reach economically.
In its ‘Final State Water Project Delivery Reliability Report, 2007’ the California DWR highlighted the possible future decline in water availability over the next 20 years and actions that need to be taken to ensure consistency of supplies.
The report shows that future State Water Project (SWP) deliveries will be impacted by two significant factors. The first is climate change, which is altering hydrologic conditions in the State; the second is significant restrictions on SWP and Central Valley Project (CVP) pumping in accordance with a December 2007 federal court imposed (interim) rule to protect the delta. The report incorporates future impacts on water deliveries to communities due to these factors. It also shows a continued eroding of SWP water delivery reliability under the current method of moving water through the Delta. The initial 2009 SWP allocation to its 28 contractors (water agencies and irrigation districts) is just 15% of their requests. Central Valley farmers who rely on the SWP and the federal Central Valley Project are suffering. Lake Oroville, the main reservoir in the SWP system, is at only 28% of its total capacity, the lowest it has ever been at this time of year. Other northern California reservoirs are in a similar condition.
“Climate change is also a concern among many Division Water analysts,” says Don Strickland of the California State Water Project, “but predicting exactly what the consequences will be is impossible. California’s population continues to increase at the rate of about 600,000 people per year that will result in a 50% increase by 2030. So, one can only deduce that water demand will also increase.”
“Earthquakes are another concern here in the Golden State, especially in the Delta where fragile levees are likely to fail if a major seismic event should occur. When a delta basin is flooded because of levee breaks, salt water incursion from the San Francisco/San Pablo bays increases. When the salinity level near delta pumps surpasses an acceptable level, pumping must cease.” Strickland added: “We are all keeping an eye on this winter’s precipitation output… particularly Sierra Nevada snowfall. Another below normal winter, like the last two will, very likely, lead to widespread mandatory water conservation this summer.”
California’s DWR has issued, for broad review and comment, a draft of the California Water Plan Update 2009: Integrated Water Management. Says Strickland: “This will form the basis of the state’s future strategy which is already benefiting from the first interagency Steering Committee representing 21 state government agencies with jurisdictions over different aspects of water resources.
Groundwater resources have become so scarce of late that some western states have been ‘buying’ supplies from their neighbours. San Diego farmers are already facing a 30% cutback in water supplies. Almost all of the San Diego region’s water is received from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California from a deal that allows the county to purchase some of the Imperial Irrigation District’s share of the Colorado River. This means it will no longer be necessary to import around 50 million gallons of water a day from Northern California – a facility that was affected by a court decision to restrict water flows from Northern California through the California Aqueduct. Currently, 85% of fresh water in San Diego is imported from outside of Southern California. Roughly 40% of this comes from Northern California through the State Water Project and the remaining comes from the Colorado River.
With drought conditions worsening, states further west and along the coast, it’s becoming a case of “all change” in the way people use water and the methods introduced by water companies to provide on demand services.
What are the solutions?
Desalination
Desalination has become a major force in the technological battle to come up with answers. One prime example of this is the construction of a US$300 million desalination plant that will provide San Diego County with a reliable and efficient water supply of up to 50 million gallons a day. The Carlsbad plant, being built by the Poseidon Resources Corp. of Stamford, Connecticut, will provide a locally-controlled, drought-proof supply of high-quality water that meets or exceeds all state and federal drinking water standards.
Located in Encina, in the city of Carlsbad, the plant will break ground this summer with construction taking 24-30 months with the intention of supplying some 9% of the county’s annual water needs. By 2011 it will be the first of several desalination plants proposed at Southern California sites, including San Onofre and Dana Point. Desalination may be relatively new to California, but there are 22,000 such plants in 120 countries world-wide, including the Middle East, the Mediterranean and the Caribbean, converting seawater to produce some three billion gallons of drinking water a day.
Says Scott Maloni of Poseidon Resources Corp.: “The California Department of Water Resources has identified the need for 500,000 acre feet of desalinated water by the year 2030. The Governor recently proposed to triple this figure. To put this number into perspective, California will need the Carlsbad Desalination Plant and eight more plants of the same size just to meet the current goal.”
Irrigation
Irrigation of arable land is a top priority in south-central Oregon and north-central California and here the Klamath River Project (which has its origins back as far as 1882 with construction starting in 1906) is key to the farming industry, providing full service water to around 240,000 acres of farmland producing barley, oats, potatoes, wheat, alfalfa hay and other hay. Klamath River Project covers territory in Klamath County, Oregon, and Siskiyou and Modoc Counties in northern California, and its reservoirs also offer numerous recreational activities, including boating, water skiing, fishing, hunting, camping, and picnicking.
The Upper Klamath Lake and the Klamath River, the Clear Lake Reservoir, Gerber Reservoir and the Lost River are the main sources of water for the project, covering some 5,700 square miles. There are areas of substantial water resources in the Upper Klamath River Basin that have not as yet been fully developed and the project plan includes the construction of facilities to divert and distribute water for irrigation of basin lands and flood control.
Table 1: Facilities in operation – Klamath River Project
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Storage dams
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3
|
|
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Diversion dams
|
4
|
|
|
Canals
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185 miles
|
|
|
Laterals
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532 miles
|
|
|
Pumping plants
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28
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|
|
Drains
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728.2 miles
|
|
|
Tunnels
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1.9 miles
|
|
The Klamath Project agreement between the Bureau of Reclamation and California-Oregon Power, led to the construction of the Link River Dam. The project was a major factor in the ongoing quest for water in the American west, meeting increasing demands for irrigation. Facilities on the Klamath Project continue to provide a large population with a variety of services.
Changing times
Over the past 40 years, a myriad of environmental issues and regulations have seriously affected California’s SWP operations in a number of ways. For example, the migration of listed native fish populations now has the power to halt pumping operations and the potential degradation of wildlife habitat has, says the SWP, “virtually put an end to the construction of new storage facilities”. It appears that a ‘possible’ decline in fish populations has become a priority and somehow has placed more emphasis on water needed for environmental purposes than on human consumption.
Today, more than ever before, the reliability of water supply and water quality are high among the critical issues facing California’s DWR and SWP planners and contractors and these will be the issues determining the future development of service delivery. Population growth, increasing agricultural needs, concerns about the rising water costs and depleting groundwater basins means that existing state water supplies will be shared with increasing environmental needs.
Earlier this year, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said “California is headed toward one of the worst water crises in its history, underscoring the need to upgrade our water infrastructure by increasing water storage, improving conveyance, protecting the Delta’s ecosystem and promoting greater water conservation.”
Appropriation of some $842 million of state funding for two initiatives will help water agencies address the current state-wide drought and provide a first step toward investing in water supply reliability. The Governor said that a much more comprehensive plan is needed in order to update California’s water system, which urgently needs increased storage, improved conveyance, a restored and better protected Delta ecosystem and greater water conservation.
In July 2008 the Governor and Senator Dianne Feinstein proposed a compromise US$9.3 billion plan which they believed would “move California toward a reliable water future” This plan aims to:
· Increase water storage to ensure water supply is more reliable year-to-year, capturing excess water in wet years to use in dry years;
· Improved water conveyance to reduce water shortages;
· Restored Delta ecosystem to allow California to take control of its own water systems;
· Increased conservation and tools to use water more efficiently.
It is clear that whatever future plans are adopted, SWP contracting agencies will, in the future be required to micro-manage their water resources alongside such new strategies that include water recycling, water conservation, groundwater recharge and banking, conjunctive management of surface and groundwater resources, treatment of contaminated groundwater basins, water transfers/marketing, and brackish and ocean water desalination.
According to the SWP: “With reduced opportunities for building new surface storage facilities, these strategies and technologies will play increasing roles in providing water for the projected 53 million people living in California by the year 2030.”
Earthquake threat
Geological fault lines straddle California and render this state susceptible to earthquakes such as though in San Francisco in 1906, Long Beach in 1933, south of San Francisco in 1989, and in the Los Angeles suburb of Northridge five years later. Updating the aging water delivery systems has been of paramount importance to ensure seismic reliability.
The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) says: “People, businesses, and the economy in the Bay Area depend on a reliable water system. That’s why we are rapidly moving forward with the Water System Improvement Program (WSIP) to create long-lasting improvements to our aging water infrastructure and thereby sustain the quality of life for our 2.5 million residential, commercial, and industrial customers in the San Francisco Bay Area.”
Around 33% of delivered water goes to retail customers in San Francisco, while wholesale deliveries to 27 suburban agencies in Alameda, Santa Clara, and San Mateo counties comprise the other 67%.
Many parts of the water delivery system were constructed in the early to mid-1900s and, according to the SFPUC, are “nearing the end of their working life, with crucial portions crossing over or near to three major earthquake faults”.
In 2002, SFPUC launched its $4.4 billion WSIP – one of the largest water infrastructure programmes in the US, and the largest of its kind ever undertaken by the city of San Francisco – to repair, replace, and seismically upgrade the system’s deteriorating pipelines, tunnels, reservoirs, pump stations, storage tanks, and dams. The program includes more than 80 projects throughout the service area – from San Francisco to Hetch Hetchy – to be completed by the end of 2014.
Among the objectives of the WSIP were the need to improve the high quality of water, reduce the vulnerability of water systems to damage from earthquakes, increase system reliability, improve drought protectionand optimise protection of the natural and human environment.
Hetch Hetchy project
Millions of people in the San Francisco Bay area are served by three main water sources (all managed by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission) including the Hetch Hetchy reservoir. Not only does HH provide valuable water supplies, it also allows locals and visitors access to unrivalled beauty including the Yosemite National Park.
Hetch HetchyReservoir, which is located in Yosemite within the 459-square-mile Tuolumne River watershed, receives the bulk of its water from snowmelt flows from the Sierra Nevada mountains. It supplies almost 85% of the drinking water provided by the SFPUC in this area and is also devoted to power generation.
Colorado River
The Colorado River, once described as “the most political river in the west”is a major and life-sustaining source of water for irrigation, drinking, and other uses by people living in the arid American southwest.
It is one of the largest systems managed and operated by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation and includes a series of dams, power plants, reservoirs and canal systems that provide 25 million residents with vital water and power supplies.
Allocation of the river’s water is governed by the Colorado River Compact, an agreement first signed by seven Colorado River Basin states
in 1922 and known as the “Law of the River”. However the allocation of the river’s water supply has long dominated seminars, symposiums and in a number of cases, the US courts.
Several dams have been built along the Colorado River, including the Glen Canyon Dam near the Utah-Arizona border, the massive Hoover Dam, Parker Dam, Davis Dam, Palo Verde Diversion Dam, and Imperial Dam. Since the completion of the dams and associated major facilities such as the Lake Powell reservoir (behind Glen Canyon Dam) and the Lake Mead reservoir (behind Hoover Dam), 90% of the river water is diverted for agricultural and municipal water supply.
Towards the end of 2007 an historic decision was made by the seven basin states to implement innovative strategies for management of the river, the sharing of water during times of drought and charting a course for the future. What resulted was a legal agreement that would commit them to addressing future controversies on the river through consultation before initiating any litigation – a significant problem in the past.