Pure Water Monterey Archives

A Stormwater Capture and Recycling Project Takes Shape at Lake El Estero in Monterey

May 11, 2023/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Monterey County Weeklyby Pam Marino

As winter rains caused Monterey County’s rivers to swell past capacity and rush out to the sea, people began asking: Isn’t there a way to catch and reuse all that water? That’s what Monterey is preparing to do through a project financed by the state – in this case turning runoff lost to Monterey Bay into drinking water.

The Lake El Estero Diversion to Sanitary Sewer Project will reroute drainage from the city stormwater system at the lake into existing sanitary sewage pipes along Del Monte Avenue, which lead to Monterey One Water’s regional treatment plant in Marina for recycling into drinking water as part of the Pure Water Monterey project.

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State, Federal Officials Laud Pure Water Monterey Expansion

March 7, 2023/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Monterey Heraldby Dennis L. Taylor

Standing on a concrete pad that will support a major new water supply for the Monterey Peninsula, state and federal officials on Monday struck celebratory tones in describing government partnerships that will help usher in an expansion of the Pure Water Monterey project.

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Monterey Officials Ask, Again, for More Water

March 23, 2022/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Monterey Heraldby Dennis L. Taylor

Monterey city officials are again lobbying state water overseers to open taps that have been blocked for years because of illegal diversions from the Carmel River, arguing that those diversions are no longer occurring. State water officials disagree.

In a March 17 letter to the chairman and other members of the state Water Resources Control Board, Monterey Mayor Clyde Roberson and other City Council members argued that California American Water Co. is, more or less, no longer making illegal diversions since the amount of acre-feet that is being consumed is now down to the limit set by the water board.

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Monterey Peninsula Water Officials Reach Agreement on Cal Am Water Purchase

September 24, 2021/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /Monterey Heraldby Dennis Taylor

Key staff from three water organizations along the Monterey Peninsula have apparently reached an agreement on a deal that will send hundreds of acre-feet of new water to California American Water Co. for distribution up and down the Peninsula.

Monterey One Water, the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District and Cal Am reached an agreement at a joint meeting Wednesday whereby Cal Am agreed to purchase water from Monterey One’s Pure Water Monterey expansion project.

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State Water Board Official Urges Cal Am to Seek Water Supply Resolution

November 20, 2020/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Chelsea Campos /Jim Johnsonby Monterey Herald

A top State Water Resources Control Board administrator is “strongly encouraging” California American Water to “resolve disputes” and pursue both short-term and long-term water supply solutions for the Monterey Peninsula while pointing out that the Carmel River aquifer pumping cutback order deadline at the end of next year is approaching with no additional water supply project expected to be operational by then.

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Cal Am, Marina Open to Meeting on Desal Project ‘Solution’

October 12, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Chelsea Campos /Monterey Heraldby Jim Johnson

California American Water and Marina city officials are in the process of setting up talks on the company’s desalination project after exchanging letters over the past several weeks. In a Sept. 25 letter, Cal Am president Rich Svindland reached out to Marina officials, proposing talks aimed at resolving differences over the company’s paused desalination project and suggested a series of “possible options that could be mutually beneficial for the city, Cal Am, and the region as a whole.”

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Water Company Withdraws Desalination Proposal as Battle over Environmental Justice Heats Up

September 17, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Los Angeles Timesby Rosanna Xia

Amid mounting controversy and concerns over environmental justice, California American Water on Wednesday withdrew its application for a desalination project in the small Monterey Bay town of Marina.

The proposal had become one of the most fraught issues to come before the California Coastal Commission, which was set to vote Thursday. The decision would have been the first major test of the commission’s new power to review not only harm to the environment when making decisions but also harm to underrepresented communities.

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Opinion: Water Recycling Project Fits Needs on Monterey Peninsula Better than Proposed Desalination Plant

September 8, 2020/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /CalMattersby Bruce Delgado

Expansion of the Pure Water Monterey recycled water project is the best option for the Monterey region to meet its future water supply needs. Unfortunately, California American Water Co., a private water supplier, is discrediting the project in the hopes of instead getting approval for their much more costly, oversized and environmentally harmful groundwater desalination project to be built in, around and through the city of Marina.

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Pure Water Monterey Supply Set for Extraction, Use on Peninsula

August 28, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Monterey Heraldby Jim Johnson

Pure Water Monterey is finally poised to make water available for the Monterey Peninsula, providing a new water supply source for the area while allowing a reduction in Carmel River water usage albeit at a considerably reduced rate to start than was expected.

Last weekend, Monterey One Water announced that it had completed a 1,000-acre-foot recycled water reserve in the Seaside basin and that California American Water could start extracting additional water from the basin equivalent to the amount of recycled water being pumped into the basin beyond the reserve.

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Opinion: Pure Water Monterey Expansion Proposal Falls Short

May 13, 2020/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Monterey Heraldby Fred Meurer, Bill Kampe, Norm Groot and Joe Gunter

The board of Monterey One Water recently voted not to certify a supplemental environmental impact report for an expansion of Pure Water Monterey. While the expansion was a technical concept that might provide additional water for the Peninsula, the Board action injected some much-needed clear thinking and foresight into a critical topic for the Monterey Peninsula. It’s not about desal versus expansion or public versus private ownership. It’s about creating an adequate and reliable water supply for our future.

Initially, the expansion was described as a backup to the Monterey Peninsula Water Supply Project yet would provide substantially less water, still leaving the Peninsula with a constrained water supply.

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