The past year has shown Arizonans how critical water is to all we hold dear. It’s a pillar of public health, a precious and finite resource, and the lifeblood of our economy and food production.
Water is essential for life, and climate change is shrinking already scarce supplies. Fortunately, we also know what we can do now to help safeguard our water.
Arizona tribal officials told a Senate committee Wednesday that the federal government can help address a crisis with water infrastructure on their lands through more funding, and less meddling.
Navajo Department of Water Resources Director Jason John and Colorado River Indian Tribes Chairwoman Amelia Flores made the comments during a Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing on water infrastructure for Native communities. Leaders of Oregon and Alaska tribes also testified at the hearing.
San Diego County Water Authority crews recently replaced two pickup truck-sized valves at the agency’s Pressure Control and Hydroelectric Facility in central San Diego – each valve weighing about 35,000 pounds. The pressure-control facility is a key piece of the Emergency and Carryover Storage Project, which ensures water is available around the region if imported water deliveries are disrupted.
San Diego County Water Authority crews recently replaced two pickup truck-sized valves at the agency’s Pressure Control and Hydroelectric Facility in central San Diego – each valve weighing about 35,000 pounds.
The replacement project took place during a scheduled shutdown of a portion of Pipeline 5, which delivers untreated water throughout the county. The pressure-control facility is a key piece of the Emergency and Carryover Storage Project, which ensures water is available around the region if imported water deliveries are disrupted.
Several large-diameter valves in the facility control the pressure and quantity of water delivered to reservoirs and water treatment plants in eastern and southern parts of the county. In addition, a hydroelectric turbine in the facility generates supplemental electricity that reduces the Water Authority’s energy costs while supplying surplus power to the region.
“The new valves will allow the facility to function efficiently at both low and high water flows, depending on regional demand,” said Kirk Whitaker, a senior engineer at the Water Authority. “The project is part of ongoing improvements that enhance the flexibility of our regional water delivery system.”
To perform the valve replacement, a large crane lifted the existing valves out of the facility through the roof and placed them onto flatbed trucks for delivery to a disposal and recycling site. The new valves were then lowered into the facility through the roof and fitted with new 42-inch pipeline sections. Concrete was poured to build pedestals that secure the valves in place.
The new valves were produced in Germany and transported to San Diego by ship. The valve installation process took four days to complete.
The Pressure Control and Hydroelectric Facility serves an important function in improving aqueduct operations and enhancing the flexibility of the Water Authority’s extensive water delivery system. The $21 million facility was completed in 2007 and pressurizes a 22-mile-long section of the Water Authority’s large-diameter Pipeline 5 between San Marcos and Mira Mesa.
The pipeline previously conveyed water in one direction only, from north to south, by gravity. This limited the Water Authority’s ability to move water around the county in the event of a supply disruption. Upgrades to Pipeline 5 now allow water to be transported either north or south using water stored at San Vicente Reservoir, which greatly improves pipeline operations and ensures that water can continue flowing to member agencies.
The American food consumer has access to fruits, vegetables, nuts, grains and meat throughout the year. That’s largely because of Western producers and the projects that provide water to these farmers and ranchers.
Western irrigators have been dealing with changes in climate and hydrology for more than a century. But the outlook for water supplies in the future is not positive.
Poway is gearing up for several years of water infrastructure improvement projects, including replacing the city’s aging clearwell.
The Poway City Council received an update at its Tuesday night meeting on the Water Infrastructure Improvement Program, which includes three projects spanning the next four-to-five years.
The program includes bypassing and then replacing the clearwell with two new storage tanks. Poway’s clearwell, which was built in 1964, is used to store treated water from the city’s Lester J. Berglund Water Treatment Plant before distribution.
The other project in the program is creating a treated water connection to the San Diego County Water Authority. Poway has a raw water connection to the SDCWA and treats its own water, but a treated water connection will build redundancy in the system, said Shadi Sami, principal civil engineer.
All three major rating agencies – S&P, Moody’s, and Fitch – have affirmed the San Diego County Water Authority’s strong credit ratings, which will help the Water Authority optimize its debt portfolio and minimize the cost of financing important water reliability projects.
The reports cited the Water Authority’s strategic management, its conservative approach to water sales projections, and the benefits of the Water Authority’s rate case litigation that recently resulted in $44.4 million being refunded to local retail water agencies – among many other factors.
However, rating agencies also noted significant challenges ahead, including efforts by Fallbrook Public Utility District and the Rainbow Municipal Water District to “detach” from the Water Authority – a move that could negatively impact ratepayers across San Diego County. If the two North County agencies leave per their plans, Water Authority analysis shows that the other 22 member agencies will have to pay $16 million to $46 million more per year to cover the cost of the departing agencies.
Moody’s said detachment could lead to a credit downgrade, which would increase borrowing costs for critical water reliability projects. S&P Global called detachment uncertainty “an additional credit stressor” – “especially if an approved detachment sets a precedent if members can easily detach from the authority.” S&P added that, “this would be further exacerbated if the two members are not required to pay for their portion of the associated debt and infrastructure costs that the authority has undertaken to provide reliable water sources.”
Water Authority General Manager Sandra L. Kerl said, “The Water Authority maintains a solid financial position even in these difficult times, and the credit ratings reflect that. But the challenges are real as well, and they should unify the region to ensure that we continue to benefit from the safe, reliable water supplies we’ve invested in together for the past 30 years.”
In affirming their credit ratings, the services cited the Water Authority’s strong financial leadership, including prudent strategies to manage issues related to COVID-19, its success diversifying water supply sources, its commitment to infrastructure maintenance, and its financial reserves for managing contingencies, among other factors.
All three agencies addressed risks, such as additional local supplies that reduce Water Authority sales and member agency detachment. As proposed by Fallbrook and Rainbow, the detachments would allow those agencies to avoid paying for water supplies and infrastructure that have been developed in collaboration with those agencies and are currently being used by those agencies to meet their customers’ needs. Abandoning those cost obligations would force other ratepayers countywide to cover their portion of the bills already incurred for decades of investments in supply reliability.
In May 2020, the Water Authority’s Board of Directors voted to oppose detachment unless four conditions can be met related to protecting Fallbrook and Rainbow ratepayers, avoiding negative impacts for other member agencies, protecting the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay-Delta, and maintaining the Water Authority’s voting rights at MWD.
The issue is under review by the San Diego Local Agency Formation Commission, known as LAFCO. The LAFCO process, which is designed to provide for an impartial analysis of these issues, will allow the Water Authority and all other affected parties to determine if these conditions are satisfied. If not, the Water Authority will oppose detachment.
For more information about the Water Authority’s finances go to: www.sdcwa.org/finance-investor-relations. Information about detachment is at https://www.sdcwa.org/member-agencies/lafco-reorganization/.
Vice President Kamala Harris was right on point last year when she said that clean water is a fundamental human right. President Biden has put those words into action by signing an executive order establishing a White House council on environmental justice.
Proposed water wells in California don’t all require environmental review under state and local permit laws, but state standards governing well location will sometimes require local governments to make discretionary decisions, triggering such a look, a state appellate court said.
The California Environmental Quality Act requires discretionary decisions—those that require an agency to exercise judgment in deciding whether to approve a project—to undergo an environmental review. Ministerial decisions made to determine legal compliance, however, don’t require such weighing.
Human fingerprints are all over the world’s freshwater. A new study published Wednesday in the journal Nature shows that while human-controlled freshwater sources make up a minimal portion of the world’s ponds, lakes, and rivers, they are responsible more than half of all changes to the Earth’s water system.
