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California Drought—Regulatory and Natural— Requires Water Agencies To Conserve and Reuse

A lack of rainfall only tells part of the story of California’s drought, now in its third year. Regulatory and policy decisions have also put unprecedented strain on the state’s water supply and delivery systems, requiring water suppliers and utilities to make drastic cuts in water usage. With those conditions in mind TPR/MIR presents the following interview with Inland Empire Utilities Agency Executive Manager for Policy Development Martha Davis and Professor Daniel Mazmanian of the USC Bedrosian Institute, who discuss the long term program and system changes needed in the state to deal with a drought without an end in sight.

Published Friday March 5, 2010

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Martha Davis

Daniel Mazmanian

This article originally appeared in the June 2009 issue of TPR/MIR

The Governor declared a drought in California. What has that declaration meant for the Inland Empire Utilities Agency (IEUA) in terms of policy, planning, and activities?

Martha Davis: It is a serious situation. The Metropolitan Water District (MWD) has asked all of us in Southern California to conserve and use water more efficiently, and reduce our imported water supply usage by 10 percent. We have been working with the MWD over the last two years because this is actually the third year of our drought. We have been watching the problem unfold and anticipated that we would have to take action to be more reliant on our local water supplies as part of addressing the drought. That is exactly what we have been preparing for.

We have a three year business plan to step up the development of our recycled water, which is high quality treated water that we are using, and encouraging people to use, for outdoor landscaping and industrial processing. That stretches our potable water supply so it is a really significant water efficiency measure. We are also stepping up the amount of water that is being defaulted in the groundwater basin and the Chino basin. Those additional water supplies are flowing to the cities of Chino, Chino Hills, and Ontario. We have been encouraging people to conserve through a number of really easy steps. Probably the most important one, in the long run, will be changing landscaping. We use about 60 percent to 70 percent of the water supply for outdoor landscaping. When people take out lawns and put in plant materials that are adapted to this climate, they get beautiful gardens that don’t use very much water. That can make a huge difference to all of us throughout Southern California.