Wishful thinking will not solve California’s water challenges. Not with climate change creating drought conditions that can no longer be ignored.
It requires a bold approach, a game-changing move that will set the state on a sustainable water-usage path for future generations.
Californians’ failure to adequately reduce water consumption while their reservoirs have dropped to shockingly low levels is a reflection of the state’s inability to address what is rapidly becoming its most pressing issue — yes, more urgent than the housing crisis or the threat of wildfires.
Some 1 million Californians now lack access to safe drinking water. This, despite the fact that in 2012 the Legislature passed the Human Right to Water Law, which is designed to ensure that every resident has access to clean drinking water.
Groundwater depletion continues at an alarming rate. Experts expect more than 2,500 wells to go dry this year as unrestricted pumping continues throughout large portions of the state. The 2014 law designed to halt over-pumping doesn’t go into effect until 2040, so the California farmers who produce 25% of the nation’s food continue to pump water to irrigate their crops.
Meanwhile, the health of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, the largest estuary west of the Mississippi, continues to deteriorate at an alarming rate. The Delta, which supplies fresh water for 25 million Californians, is home to endangered salmon and other native fish that serve as a bellwether to the health of the Delta. But the California Department of Fish and Wildlife said in June that “it is possible that nearly all in-river juveniles will not survive this season.” The problem stems from the lack of cold water available from reservoirs to cool downstream water. The Shasta Reservoir now stands at 25% of capacity.
California governors have struggled for decades to find the proper balance for how much water is used for growing crops, the environment and drinking water. Much like his predecessors, Gov. Gavin Newsom has made reaching “voluntary agreements” between users the centerpiece of his water policy. And, like his predecessors, that approached has yielded no meaningful results. Farmers have more to gain from preserving the status quo than they do in signing on to an agreement that would potentially reduce water transfers to irrigate their crops.
Article X, Section 2 of the California Constitution provides Newsom with the leverage he needs in the water wars.
It declares “because of the conditions prevailing in this State the general welfare requires that the water resources of the State be put to beneficial use to the fullest extent of which they are capable, and that the waste or unreasonable use or unreasonable method of use of water be prevented, and that the conservation of such waters is to be exercised with a view to the reasonable and beneficial use thereof in the interest of the people and for the public welfare.”
The governor should tell the parties involved that if they can’t come to an agreement, he plans to invoke the Constitution and reset California’s approach to water usage.
“For the most part it’s kind of been treated as the nuclear option,” said Doug Obegi, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council. “I think it’s worth thinking about. It’s a reminder that the state has a tool in its toolbox to rebalance water rights.”
Any move in that direction would land the state in a lawsuit of historic proportions. But the courts have on multiple occasions backed the State Water Board’s right to regulate or curtail water-rights holders from waste or unreasonable use of water.
Californians watched almond growers triple their orchard acreage from 400,000 acres in 1990 to 1.36 million acres in 2018. Big Ag has become more efficient in its water use over the same time period, but it still takes a gallon of water to grow a single almond in California. Almond growers harvested an estimated 2.5 billion pounds of almonds in 2018 and exported 65% of the crop to India and China.
It’s fair to ask whether that’s a reasonable use of the state’s limited water supply at the same time that the health of the Delta — and the fresh drinking water for more than half of Californians — is threatened by continuing to send water south for crops that can’t be fallowed during dry years.
“Some of the water allocations that have gone to senior water rights holders for more than a century may not be reasonable any longer given climate change,” said Obegi. “We need a very public process to rebalance the state’s water use.”
California is paying a heavy price for waiting too long to address the wildfire challenges created by climate change. We should not make the same mistake with our water supplies.
