On September 8, the California State Water Resource Control Board released its draft report concluding that it is feasible to develop uniform water recycling criteria for direct potable reuse in California. Orange County Coastkeeper and California Coastkeeper Alliance are pleased to see this economic and environmentally preferred method to securing California’s future water sources moving forward. In California, recycled water is already used for non-potable purposes, such as agricultural and landscape irrigation, in a practice known as purple pipe recycled water.

Southern California faces an “above normal large-fire potential” this month and lingering through fall due primarily to vegetation left dry by five years of drought and the usual round of dangerous Santa Ana winds. The dire wildfire activity outlook came Tuesday from Angeles National Forest officials, who said a normal number of Santa Ana wind events could combine with above-normal temperatures to create fire hazards. “That affects most of Southern California south of Kern County, and possibly a greater frequency of events in November and December,” said Angeles National Forest Fire Chief Robert Garcia.

 

The nascent energy storage sector is often described in terms of how fast it’s currently expanding — and its potential for explosive growth in the near future. But across San Diego County decades-old deployments such as ice storage are still in use just as cutting-edge technologies such as lithium-ion storage grab so many headlines. At the sprawling Mission City office complex in Mission Valley not far from Qualcomm Stadium, 29 ice thermal storage tanks help slash the energy costs for the owners of three office towers who retro-fitted the facility in 1999.

 

Encinitas City Council member Mark Muir, who has represented the San Dieguito Water District on the San Diego County Water Authority Board of Directors since 2013, has been elected as the new board chair of the county organization. Muir follows two years of Mark Weston (Poway) leading the board of the Water Authority, which sustains a $222 billion regional economy and the quality of life for 3.3 million residents through a multi-decade water supply diversification plan, major infrastructure investments and forward-thinking policies that promote fiscal and environmental responsibility, according to a news release.

As the 2016 water year comes to a close, San Diego County Water Authority officials said that the region’s projected water supplies will be sufficient to meet demand in 2017 and beyond, but continued water-use efficiency remains essential to help the region manage those supplies amid an uncertain outlook for rain and snow this winter.