Environmental activist Marco Gonzalez was irked to see the San Diego County Taxpayers Association recently give a Golden Watchdog award to the Carlsbad Desalination Plant. Besides arguing that the region should simply use less water, he argues that desalinated seawater is more expensive than imported water from the San Joaquin Delta and the Colorado River. It’s surprising to see an environmentalist prefer imported water over desalinated seawater. Extracting water from the Delta and Colorado River has negative impact on fish and birds, and some of that water is lost on its way to San Diego County through evaporation and seepage.