The giant water supplier in Southern California has taken the unprecedented step of demanding about 6 million people reduce outdoor irrigation to one day a week as the drought continues to plague the state.
By ROBERT JABLON ASSOCIATED PRESS
April 27, 2022, 02:44
• 4 minutes reading
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LOS ANGELES – The giant water supplier in Southern California took an unprecedented step on Tuesday, demanding about 6 million people reduce outdoor irrigation to one day a week as the drought continues to plague the state.
The Southern California Water District Board has declared a state of emergency in the face of water shortages and has asked the cities and water agencies it supplies to implement the June 1 cut and impose it or face huge fines.
“We do not currently have enough water supplies to meet normal demand. The water is not there, “said Metropolitan Water District spokeswoman Rebecca Kimic. “This is an unprecedented area. We’ve never done anything like this before. “
The Metropolitan Water District uses water from the Colorado River and the State Water Project to supply 26 public water agencies, which provide it to 19 million people, or 40 percent of the state’s population.
But record dry conditions have strained the system, lowering reservoir levels, and the State Water Project, which draws its water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, estimates it will be able to deliver only about 5% of its normal distribution this year.
January, February and March this year were the driest three months in the state’s history in terms of rainfall and snowfall, Kimic said.
The Sofia water region said that in 2020 and 2021 the water years had the least rainfall in history for two consecutive years. In addition, Lake Oroville, the main reservoir of the State Water Project, reached its lowest point last year since it was filled in the 1970s.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has asked people to voluntarily reduce their water consumption by 15 percent, but so far residents have been slowly achieving that goal.
Several water areas have introduced water protection measures. On Tuesday, the East Gulf Municipal District Board voted to reduce water consumption by 10 percent and limit daily use to about 1.4 million customers in Contra Costa and Alameda counties, including Auckland and Berkeley. Households will be allowed to use 1,646 gallons (6,231 liters) per day – well above the average household consumption of about 200 gallons (757 liters) per day – and the agency expects only 1% to 2% of customers to exceed the limit. This was reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.
The restrictions of the Metropolitan Water District apply to areas of Los Angeles, Ventura and San Bernardino counties that rely primarily on state water supplied through the area, including parts of the city of Los Angeles. Mostly urban areas are affected.
MWD’s water customer agencies must either impose a limit on outdoor use for one day a week or find other ways to equivalently reduce water demand, Kimic said.
Although water agencies support the water conservation move, it remains to be seen whether the public will do so, Kimic said.
The capital’s water area will monitor water use, and if the restrictions do not work, it could impose a total ban on outdoor watering as early as September, she said.
Meanwhile, state lawmakers have taken the first step toward lowering the standard for how much water people use in their homes.
The current standard in California for indoor water use is 55 gallons (208 liters) per person per day. The rule does not apply to customers, which means that regulators do not write tickets to people to use more water than they are allowed to. Instead, the state requires water agencies to meet this standard for all their customers.
But the U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly last week to lower the standard to 47 gallons (178 liters) per person per day starting in 2025 and 42 gallons (159 liters) per person per day from 2030.
The bill has not yet been adopted by the Assembly, which means that there are still several months after its adoption.
The western United States is in the midst of a severe drought just years after record rains and snowfalls filled the reservoirs to full capacity. Scientists say this boom and bust cycle is due to climate change, which will be marked by longer and more severe droughts. A study earlier this year found that the Western United States is in the middle of a megadush, which is now the driest in at least 1,200 years.
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