PPIC Water Policy Center – Page 11 – Public Policy Institute of California

Paying for Water’s “Fiscal Orphans”

California’s water system is generally well funded and adequately maintained, but there are a few areas that lack a steady funding source. The most prominent of these “fiscal orphans” are safe drinking water for disadvantaged rural communities, flood management, stormwater management, and water for the environment. We talked to Dean Misczynski, an expert in infrastructure financing and an adjunct fellow with the PPIC Water Policy Center, about how to create a more reliable funding stream to address these problems.

PPIC: Are there better ways to pay for California’s underfunded “fiscal orphans”?

Dean Misczynski: Water is one of the easier things in government to pay for, because you can sell it. Local water fees and local taxes pay for most spending on water in California. State voter-approved general obligation bonds also play a pretty big role. But our thinking about how to use state bond acts developed sometime around the Civil War, and we could do a better job using bonds to fund 21st-century realities.

We currently use bond acts to raise the capital needed to build projects. But funding for the operation and maintenance costs of those projects is expected to come from somewhere else―or nowhere. No sensible business thinks this way; capital funding and operations and maintenance should be part of a unified financing plan. In addition to authorizing borrowing money for specified purposes, a state bond act could easily include ongoing expenses by appropriating money from the General Fund to pay for the operation and maintenance needed to make the project work. This approach would offer a more business-like, coherent financing plan and give voters a more honest look at what the undertaking would really cost.

To be clear, the operations and maintenance budget would not be part of the borrowing authorized by the bond act, because that would be an expensive way to pay for ongoing costs. But the funding would be earmarked and committed for the long term. And note that this doesn’t call for a new tax or fee; it just requires an ongoing commitment to use some General Fund dollars to cover the ongoing costs. In this way it’s similar to the bond itself—repayment comes from the General Fund, which ultimately comes from existing taxes.

PPIC: What types of issues would this approach be especially appropriate for?

DM: It’s best in situations where there aren’t good ways to cover operations and maintenance for projects funded by the bond. If we were to take this idea seriously, we’d want to do some careful thinking to identify the most legitimate uses of this new authority and to caution against using it for unnecessary or unwise purposes.

So, for example, a relatively well-off community getting a bond-funded project wouldn’t need state money for ongoing expenses. But for a water system in a very poor community, this type of funding mechanism could be very useful. There are a number of small, disadvantaged communities in the Central Valley that can’t afford to upgrade or maintain parts of their water system and that lack safe drinking water as a result. They might be good candidates.

These types of appropriations could also pay for ongoing expenses for projects that are important and have political support, but are easy targets for cuts during the state’s inevitable next recession. Two examples that come to mind are maintaining watershed areas, and data collection and analysis to improve water management.

This approach wouldn’t just be useful in the context of water—it could help with the transportation sector, low-income housing, and other statewide challenges. And it could be used as a model for local bond funding as well.

A Path to Progress for the Salton Sea

The Salton Sea—created by a break in a Colorado River irrigation canal more than a century ago and for decades dependent on irrigation runoff for sustenance—has a water problem. The already-shrinking desert lake used to receive a temporary water supply as part of a Colorado River water trading agreement that sent some irrigation water to Southern California cities. But this temporary supply was cut off at the end of 2017, which has worsened environmental and health problems caused by the sea’s declining water levels.

We talked to Kurt Schwabe—a professor at UC Riverside and an adjunct fellow of the PPIC Water Policy Center—about possible solutions. Schwabe helped organize a recent symposium on the sea that explored impacts on local communities, new research, and policy solutions.

PPIC: Why does the Salton Sea need more water right now?

Kurt Schwabe: In 2003 the State Water Board allocated water to temporarily manage the dust and ecosystem problems associated with the shrinking sea. The board set a deadline of 15 years for the state and the parties in the water trading agreement to develop a plan to address these impacts. Although the state is behind in implementing solutions, the water allocation cutoff wasn’t postponed, and now the sea is shrinking at a faster pace. The increase in dust has a direct impact on respiratory illnesses and life expectancy in the region, which raises equity issues.

Another problem is that water salinity is increasing as the sea shrinks. Time is running out for the wildlife the sea supports. As explained by researchers at the symposium, fish populations have crashed and won’t recover, thereby resulting in the loss of birds that depend on the fish. We may see new populations of birds that eat brine flies, yet without an effective management plan those birds will last only about a decade until the sea becomes too salty even for brine flies. In a nutshell, the ecosystem doesn’t have 10 years for us to find a solution. More water and less saline water―similar to the water allocation provided from 2003 to 2017―would slow the decline and buy the state time to further develop or implement solutions.

So it’s time to come up with quick and cost-effective ways to mitigate the problems. Recent passage of Proposition 68 will provide around $200 million to support construction costs in the state’s 10-year plan, but this plan is a short-term and imperfect fix. There’s growing interest in finding ways to import water from elsewhere―but that could take a decade or so to implement, is extremely costly, and does not address the worsening public health and environmental impacts happening now. An obvious near-term solution would be to extend the allocation of water to the sea until the actual rollout of the management plan. It’s a reasonable and quick fix: the conveyance to move water is already in place, it’s a tried and true solution, and it’s very cost-effective.

PPIC: What role could a water market play in managing the sea’s problems?

KS: Water markets could be a longer-term fix to replace the temporary water allocation, and would allow growers to make choices about how to best get needed water to the sea. A market would let farmers choose how best to free up that water—either by installing more efficient irrigation, shifting to less water-needy crops, fallowing land, or some combination of these. From a technical standpoint, a water market could be implemented almost immediately.

PPIC: What are the key stumbling blocks to getting more water to the sea quickly?

KS: The stumbling blocks are mostly political. Water transfer schemes have been used in the region for more than 20 years and typically involve Southern California municipal water agencies leasing water from irrigation districts in Imperial County. This isn’t to say that getting such a fix approved is an easy task, since the politics surrounding California water are notoriously challenging. Yet I would argue that the dire and worsening human health consequences being borne every day by local communities near the sea justify urgent action.

A Balancing Act for the Colorado River

The Colorado River―a critically important water supply for seven western states, including California―has been in drought for nearly two decades. We talked to Bonnie Colby, a professor of natural resource economics at the University of Arizona and a member of the PPIC Water Policy Center research network, about conditions in the basin and next steps for improving shared management of the river.

PPIC: What concerns you most about the river’s condition?

Bonnie Colby: We’re in a more difficult situation than in previous droughts because the major reservoirs—Powell and Mead—are so low. It’s unprecedented in my 35 years of working on water. Low reservoir levels increase the potential for conflict and make it harder to balance supply and demand. But our collective capacity to address these kinds of conflicts is growing as well.

Regionally, groundwater levels are falling dramatically from increased pumping during drought. That strategy brings hazards over time because river flows and groundwater are intricately connected, and overdrafting groundwater reduces water flowing into rivers. California is now working on groundwater sustainability, which is promising. Arizona has done a great job managing groundwater in heavily pumped areas (known as “active management areas”), but there are other places where groundwater use is not regulated to manage overdraft.

PPIC: What are your biggest concerns about current efforts to manage the river?

BC: There’s a fundamental conflict over who’s going to cut back on water use. Cities and environmental groups hope irrigated agriculture will use various proven strategies to free up more water for cities and the environment, giving up use of some of its water for fair payment. Some farmers are willing to cut back for a few years, but many are reluctant to do that indefinitely. No one can be sure whether this drought will extend for years or decades. The overall drying trend in the basin should alert us that the future will not merely repeat past drought patterns. Once we start reducing crop water use year after year in farming regions, it’s hard to maintain the agricultural economy and related infrastructure.

Delays in the “drought contingency plan” process are another concern. These plans lay out commitments by the states regarding specific steps to cut water use and help maintain reservoir levels during drought. Water conflict is a very hard puzzle to solve. It’s difficult to decide which groups will bear the economic pain and impact to their quality of life. If there are cutbacks for multiple years in a row, how drastically should cities be asked to reduce water use? How should we deal with water for golf courses, for farms? Until the states can finalize drought contingency plans, we can’t finalize a number of important policy agreements—for example, new agreements with Mexico over sharing the river’s waters.

PPIC: What are some positive things about the state of the basin?

BC: The state of Colorado has shown a lot of leadership in making arrangements with farmers to use less water without causing significant economic disruption. These on-farm collaborative arrangements are where the basin can make substantial progress. If we put farmers’ and irrigation district managers’ knowledge and experience to use through voluntary collaborative programs, we should be able to reduce farm water 5% while only seeing a 1% drop in farm income, with only minor effects on food and fiber production. Farmers won’t, and shouldn’t have to, do this at their own expense―compensation for farm income losses is necessary.

On another hopeful note, we’ve seen the conversation start to shift so that more people in the region see the river as a connected system, from its headwaters in Wyoming and Colorado to its estuary in Mexico’s Sea of Cortez. There’s more understanding about the importance of changes in snowpack patterns, long-term water scarcity, and other key issues. A better informed constituency is a very good thing for tackling basin-wide challenges.

How Much Water Is Available for Groundwater Recharge?

The wet winter of 2017 brought an opportunity to test groundwater recharge—the intentional spreading of water on fields to percolate into the aquifer—as a tool for restoring groundwater levels and helping basins comply with the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). This is especially important in the San Joaquin Valley, which has the biggest imbalance between groundwater pumping and replenishment in the state.

A key question for many valley water managers is how much water will be available for recharge in the long term. By law, only river flows in excess of what is required for environmental purposes and to supply existing water-right holders are available for recharge. A recent report by the PPIC Water Policy Center estimated how much water would be available in the San Joaquin Valley over the long term. Two earlier studies—one by two scientists at UC Davis and the other by the Department of Water Resources—estimated a maximum of about half a million acre-feet on average, which is about a quarter of the valley’s estimated deficit. The PPIC study updated these estimates in the context of current conditions and concluded that an average of more than a million acre-feet of San Joaquin River flows may be available.

There are two big challenges to getting more water into underground storage in the valley:

Most water for recharge becomes available during short periods. These periods usually coincide with floods, when recharge infrastructure—such as canals, pipelines, and recharge basins—is already working at full capacity. In 2017, for example, more than half of the available water would need to be diverted in February and March, with diversions above 30,000 acre-feet on most days (see figure). To put that into perspective, the California Aqueduct—the state’s largest conveyance system—has a maximum capacity of 26,000 acre-feet per day. While such daily volumes are lower than the overall volume of water moved in the valley during the summer irrigation season, seasonal floods are concentrated in relatively few areas where conveyance limits are likely to be a challenge.
Most of the available flows are in the northern half of the valley, while most of the overdrafted basins are in the drier south. This highlights the need to evaluate the capacity of large system-level water conveyance systems, such as the Friant-Kern Canal and the California Aqueduct, to move more water from north to south for recharge purposes.

The State Water Board—which oversees surface water rights—has the last word on this issue. Given the nature of California’s “flashy” river systems—in which very high flows develop rapidly during the winter and spring—the board will need to develop a simple, quick way to determine when river flows exceed water required for the environment and water-right holders.

We can’t count on groundwater recharge to singlehandedly end overdraft in the valley, but efforts to expand recharge in wet years will be helpful. The most pressing issues are to determine how much water is legally available and how best to put this water into the ground. Assessing the infrastructure needed for capturing flows during floods is an essential piece of this puzzle.

Image above courtesy of Jonathan Parker, Kern Water Bank Authority

Three Water Challenges for Almonds

California is a force of nature when it comes to almonds. The state’s farmers produce virtually the entire US almond crop and dominate the international market. As the market has grown, almonds have become California’s largest single crop—now accounting for about 12% of irrigated acreage, with more than 1.2 million acres harvested in 2016. Availability of water is clearly a major issue for the industry, since the trees must be irrigated throughout the long spring and summer dry season. At a May event on water issues organized by the Almond Board of California, I was asked for some thoughts on the water realities almond growers must grapple with in coming years. Here are three key takeaways.

Growers in the San Joaquin Valley must address a long-term groundwater deficit. More than 80% of almond acreage is in the San Joaquin Valley (see map). Decades of unchecked pumping in the valley have resulted in a chronic groundwater deficit averaging nearly 2 million acre-feet per year—equivalent to about two Folsom reservoirs. Groundwater sustainability agencies must now devise plans to comply with the state’s 2014 groundwater law by bringing their water supply and use into balance over the next two decades. This means both augmenting supplies and reducing water use. Almond growers—along with others—need to be engaged in this process.
Augmenting local supplies can fill some of the gap––and almond growers can help. Up to a quarter of the San Joaquin Valley’s groundwater deficit could be eliminated by replenishing aquifers during high-flow events and wet winters like 2017. Spreading water on farmland is a cost-effective way to capture this water. Almond orchards are good candidates for such a process, given the suitability of much of the land for recharge (see map). Moreover, almond trees are dormant in winter and early spring, when extra water is most often available. Pilot projects and groundwater-recharge research are helping establish best practices and addressing ongoing questions among growers about the impact of winter flooding on almond crops. Almond growers also need to support other types of groundwater banking projects—such as recharge basins—that can help maximize available water supplies.
Managing demand will also be essential for reaching sustainability. Water use will need to fall to reduce the groundwater deficit. While this will pose some challenges, the good news is that farmers have been managing water demand for decades in this water-scarce region. Since the early 1980s, irrigated crop acreage in the San Joaquin Valley has hovered around 5 million acres, while the value of valley agriculture has roughly doubled (in today’s dollars). Farmers have responded to water scarcity by investing in crops and practices that generate more dollars per drop. The expansion of crops like almonds—and the corresponding decline in cotton and other field crops that bring in less revenue—reflects this shift. During the recent drought, farmers also used tools such as water trading and selective fallowing of less-productive lands. These same tools can help smooth the transition to balanced groundwater use, given the willingness of water users who benefit most from using scarce supplies—for instance, those who need to keep orchards thriving during droughts—to compensate others who can use less.

Almonds are expected to remain a top crop in the state, and a leading source of farm revenues, for decades to come. But water stress will be an increasingly important factor for California’s almond growers and for the San Joaquin Valley more generally. The farm sector’s water challenges can’t be addressed farm by farm, or crop by crop. Cooperative approaches—including trading and groundwater recharge—will be essential to a smooth landing for the valley’s almond industry and the regional economy overall.

Expanding Groundwater Recharge in San Joaquin Valley Cities

The San Joaquin Valley is ground zero for groundwater management challenges. While agriculture is the region’s predominant water user, its cities are more likely to rely on groundwater as their primary source of water. For this reason, the urban sector will need to play a bigger role in the regional effort to balance groundwater use and replenishment.

Our recent research indicates that cities in the valley lag behind agricultural districts in the intentional recharge of groundwater. That’s primarily because most have limited access to two things necessary for storing more water underground: extra surface water and unpaved land on which to spread it so it can percolate into the ground. But some cities have had success with recharge activities. Here are three methods that can serve as models.

Partner with nearby agricultural districts. The city of Tulare relies entirely on groundwater for its potable water supply. It has an agreement with the Tulare Irrigation District (TID) for purchasing surface water, which is delivered to a recharge basin that the city co-owns with TID. The basin’s location allows for the recharged water to flow into the city’s pumping zone, even though the basin itself is not within city boundaries. The cities of Clovis and Fresno have similar recharge partnerships with the Fresno Irrigation District.
Partner with off-site groundwater banks. The city of Tracy relies on both surface and groundwater. In years when it doesn’t use its entire surface water allocation, it stores the unused portion in one of Kern County’s formal groundwater banks. Even though Tracy and the water bank are on opposite ends of the valley, a conveyance system allows for easy exchanges of water.
Recharge within city boundaries. The city of Bakersfield has rights to Kern River water. The city uses a direct recharge basin located within city boundaries to store some of its Kern River allotment.

Some cities engage in multiple recharging strategies. For example, both Tulare and Fresno operate flood control basins to maximize recharge, and Tracy pumps surplus water directly into a nearby aquifer through an “injection well.”

While these are all innovative models, most are still small-scale in terms of volumes recharged. Given the state’s mandate to balance groundwater use with replenishment by 2040, urban efforts will need to be scaled up as much as possible. Expansion will require better water accounting and basin planning. Cities can raise funds to partner with agricultural districts and undertake recharge projects, but they will need incentives and assurances that they will have access to the stored water.

Another critical step is to map and protect undeveloped urban land that is particularly appropriate for recharge. Cities should take steps to prevent the paving over of suitable soils, and encourage recharge on open space lands not only within city boundaries but also in areas into which they are likely to grow in the future—called their “spheres of influence.” As the figure below shows, suitable soils in these areas are extensive, especially in Kern and the eastern part of the valley.

It’s also important to remember that cities won’t be able to go it alone. In addition to partnerships with agricultural districts, broader local and regional cooperation will be critical for managing groundwater resources in the long run.

The Yuba Accord: A Model for Water Management

Last week a diverse group of stakeholders celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Lower Yuba River Accord—a historic agreement to improve conditions for the river’s endangered fishes, maintain water supplies for cities and farms, and reduce conflict over competing uses for water. Here at the PPIC Water Policy Center we frequently refer to the Yuba Accord as a model for modern water management in California. Here are three reasons why.

Cooperation: The Yuba Accord happened because parties came together to develop an alternative plan in response to a state order calling for more water to support endangered salmon. By leveraging local management tools—including increased use of groundwater on farms during droughts—the accord has kept even more water in the river for fish than the state called for. This is a great example of how negotiated agreements can get broad buy-in and tap on-the-ground knowledge.
Integration: Integrated water management gets better results by examining all the pieces of the water puzzle together to see how solutions to one problem might affect other areas. The Yuba Accord is a very effective example of this. The accord hinges on the flexibility achieved by managing surface water and groundwater as an integrated system to benefit salmon. But the augmented river flows provide additional benefits in Yuba County and beyond. The accord authorizes flows downstream of the Yuba to be traded to agricultural and urban communities farther south who face shortages during dry years. Moreover, the revenue generated by water trades has helped fund flood protection upgrades in Yuba County—an area facing high flood risk.
Planning ahead: The accord demonstrates the advantages of planning for different hydrologic conditions. Careful work went into deciding how surface water and groundwater would be managed in wet and dry years. This meant that during the 2012–16 drought the Yuba was one of few watersheds in the state that was prepared to weather the extended dry conditions. California needs more such watershed-level plans for managing water for ecosystems before, during, and after droughts.

To be sure, Yuba County stakeholders started out with some advantages: in addition to relatively abundant water supplies, the county has a governance structure that makes integrated water management easier to implement. The Yuba County Water Agency (YCWA) is a county-wide special district whose board consists of county supervisors—local leaders for all county matters, not just for water. YCWA is responsible for both surface water delivery and flood management, and its boundaries overlap with the local groundwater basin. YCWA also had some very committed leaders who wanted to find a creative alternative to a protracted legal battle over flow regulations.

Even so, other California watersheds could adopt the accord’s focus on integrated, cooperative planning. One near-term opportunity lies in the implementation of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), a state law that requires local water districts to bring their basins into balance but leaves it to the locals to decide how to achieve that goal. Another opportunity lies in improving conditions for fish and wildlife in Central Valley rivers as part of the update to the Water Quality Control Plan for the Bay–Delta. The State Water Board is proposing regulations to increase river flows, but is also inviting parties to propose alternatives that take a more holistic approach. This offers locals a chance to leverage the new groundwater management authorities under SGMA to integrate the management of groundwater and surface water. These kinds of pragmatic, consensus-based approaches can generate long-term solutions to some of the toughest challenges in California water.

Watch a short video about the accord.

New Federal Policies Will Help Manage Wildfire Risk

California’s headwater forests have experienced a long-term decline in health and have suffered unprecedented tree death and severe wildfires as a result. About half the Sierra Nevada and southern Cascade forests are owned and managed by the US Forest Service (USFS). HR 1625, the federal budget bill enacted in March of this year, contains four new reforms that will make it easier for the USFS to ramp up management efforts and reduce wildfire risk in this region:

Protecting funds dedicated to forest management and restoration. The Forest Service’s fire suppression activities have traditionally been funded from the same pot of money that pays for management to reduce hazardous fuels, like prescribed burning and mechanical thinning. The rising costs of wildfire suppression thus draws resources away from management actions. This fiscal practice, sometimes known as “fire borrowing,” creates a vicious cycle. With low levels of management, fuels continue to build up, increasing the likelihood and intensity of future fires—and the cost of suppressing them. The reform freezes USFS expenditures on wildfire suppression at 2015 levels and creates a new source of wildfire suppression funds that is independent from funds for forest management and restoration. This change becomes effective in fiscal year 2020.
Expediting small-scale forest management projects. Currently, the USFS can streamline environmental review for certain types of small-scale projects that don’t pose a significant environmental threat, such as restoring burned areas, stopping insect infestation, and performing some commercial harvesting. This reform expands USFS authority to streamline approval for small, proactive fuel-management projects that improve forests’ resilience to drought, pest, and wildfires. USFS Region 5 (serving California, Hawaii, and the Pacific Islands) is evaluating opportunities to use this new streamlining tool in 2019.
Improving tools for collaboration between the Forest Service and local parties. USFS’s stewardship projects allow businesses, local governments, and nonprofits to play a larger role in carrying out forest management projects on USFS lands. This harnesses additional resources to promote forest health on these lands. The new policy doubles the maximum duration of stewardship projects to 20 years, which could encourage larger projects and more substantial investments in supportive infrastructure, such as roads, sawmills, and biomass energy generators.
Improving tools for collaboration between the Forest Service and states. This reform expands the management work that states may perform on USFS lands under the Good Neighbor Authority (GNA). The GNA can be helpful when private or local government landowners share a boundary with federal forests. The new policy expands the use of GNA programs to include road rehabilitation and repair projects that can improve access to forests in need of management. The USFS expects this will encourage partnerships with state agencies such as Caltrans and California State Parks, which regularly repair roads in the vicinity of national forests.

This new suite of policies signals a growing prioritization of forest management and provides concrete steps to increase the pace and scale of active management. The changes will allow USFS to develop stronger partnerships with other forest landowners and stakeholders, and could help lead to healthier headwater forests in California.

How “Weather Whiplash” Could Change California

First came the drought, then the floods: California has long bounced between the two weather extremes―most recently when the latest drought segued into 2017’s record-breaking rain and snow. Such “weather whiplash” could become much more common as the climate changes, according to a new study. We talked to Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA—and the study’s lead author—about what to expect.

PPIC: California already has a highly variable climate. How will this be different?

Daniel Swain: There will be much bigger swings between wet and dry years. We project a 25–100% increase in extreme swings in this century. On top of that we’ll probably see some changes in seasonality. While it will still be dry in summer and wet in winter, spring is likely to become considerably drier in most of the state, especially in the south. This will have big consequences for things like the snowpack and wildfire risk.

California’s human and natural systems can usually withstand the kind of variations we’ve seen in the past. But as the frequency and intensity of these swings increases, it could push some species to the edge. For example, the warming climate is already stressing our forests faster than they can adapt—we’re seeing a dramatic example of this right now with widespread Sierra Nevada tree mortality. And warming temperatures are making it difficult to manage for salmon and other fishes that rely on cold water.

It could be equally hard for the state’s water system to adapt to the bigger floods. Our big dams were designed to capture smaller floods than what we expect in the future. We can make some changes on the margins, but these structures were built for a climate that we no longer have.

PPIC: What is the most surprising thing about your findings?

DS: We were surprised by how much the risk for really severe flood events increases. We project a 300–400% increase in the likelihood of events similar to California’s 1862 Great Flood, which brought weeks of unrelenting rain and inundated much of the Central Valley. We found that it’s more likely than not that an event comparable to the 1862 flood will occur in the next 40–50 years. Keep in mind that there’s no modern precedent for this—it would exceed all previous tests of our flood management infrastructure.

It’s important to remember that we based our study on fairly pessimistic assumptions. If the world greatly reduces greenhouse gas emissions, California could see a smaller increase in extreme flood risk. But social and political factors will ultimately determine how much we reduce emissions in coming decades, so uncertainty remains.

PPIC: What is the key takeaway for water managers?

DS: We need to think about managing droughts and floods simultaneously, because some adaptations to help manage drought could make it harder to manage floods and vice versa. For example, increasing water stored behind California’s big dams gives us a nice buffer against a couple years of drought. But this saved water can become a liability because it reduces the reservoir space available to capture flood water. A higher risk of big floods necessitates bigger safety margins, which means storing less water behind dams for dry times.

One way to help manage this trade-off is to increase the use of natural floodplains to take up some of the water from big storm events. For example, Sacramento’s Yolo Bypass is intentionally inundated to protect the city from big floods. Another approach is to capture the water released from dams to make space for floods and store it underground. And when floods inevitably come, use flood waters to recharge groundwater.

Are California’s Cities Ready for the Next Drought?

California’s urban areas—where more than 90% of residents live—managed the last drought quite well. How well prepared are cities and suburbs to weather the next long dry spell? Here are two things to know about urban drought preparedness.

Are we backsliding too much on water conservation?

While it’s true that urban water use is not as low as it was at the height of the latest drought in 2015, it is still much lower than in 2013, before Californians were asked to significantly limit their water use. This winter, some media stories highlighted unfavorable month-to-month comparisons—for example, water use in December 2017 was about the same as in December 2013. But what’s lost in this message is that water use in California is normally much lower in winter months, when very little is going to outdoor landscaping. When we smooth out the seasonal differences, water use in 2017 was roughly 13% lower than in 2013—and it has stayed down across all regions of the state (see figure).

During droughts people save water in all kinds of ways, but especially by reducing landscape watering, which in normal years accounts for about half of all urban water use. During the latest drought this saved a lot of water, but it also entailed costs—gardens and trees died and urban landscapes suffered.

Another thing to remember is that the large reduction in urban water use in 2015 and early 2016 was the consequence of state-imposed mandatory rationing. It’s normal for water use to rebound somewhat when rationing is lifted. This also happened after other recent droughts. Generally, though, Californians have been reducing their water use for the past several decades.

What should cities be doing now to prepare for the next drought?

With California’s variable climate, it’s always prudent to be prepared, because the next drought can be just around the corner. Even though urban water utilities have done a good job preparing for past droughts, they can’t rest on their laurels. For example, as cities and suburbs become increasingly efficient with water over the long term, this affects their ability to tighten their belts during droughts. There’s less of a cushion and fewer easy steps that can be done quickly. Utilities will need to address this trade-off by ensuring that some portion of the long-term water savings is reserved in storage for times of drought emergency.

Urban utilities also need to be better fiscally prepared for times when they sell less water. This was a real weakness during the latest drought. The dilemma is that up to 80% of the costs of supplying water to businesses and households don’t change with the amount of water people buy. Utilities still have to maintain their systems, but most of their revenues are based on the number of gallons sold. When you start asking everyone to conserve, you can quickly end up in the red. We recommend that as soon as a utility knows it will have to ask for drought savings, it should inform its customers about how that could affect rates. Some communities have drought surcharges, which work well. The key is to have a plan, communicate in advance, and engage the public in understanding the issue of balancing revenues and costs.