Bay Area Council Applauds Governor’s Water Supply Strategy to Adapt to Drought, Climate Change
The Bay Area Council today (Aug. 11, 2022) applauded Governor Newsom’s Water Supply Strategy to strengthen the state’s resilience to increasingly severe droughts and reiterated our call to increase funding in the state budget for increased water recycling, desalination and storage.
“Expanding California’s water supply is absolutely the right move,” said Bay Area Council President & CEO Jim Wunderman. “Conservation alone won’t save us, we need to manufacture more drought-resilient freshwater supplies. By setting ambitious targets for expanding water recycling, desalination, stormwater capture, and by expanding storage above and below ground, Governor Newsom’s plan is achievable and essential for ensuring water remains plentiful in the decades ahead. Now we just need the funding. The Bay Area Council and a statewide coalition of business groups, water agencies, and labor organizations are calling on state leaders to provide an additional $1.35 billion in the state budget to support water recycling and storage projects.”
By calling for the creation of 1.6 million acre feet of new water supply annually by 2030, and 2.9 million acre feet by 2040, the Governor’s plan hews closely to the Bay Area Council’s recent call to action that the state commit to meeting 25 percent of its annual urban water needs (about 1.75 million acre feet) with new, drought-resilient water supplies like recycled and desalinated water by 2030.
A recent WateReuse California survey indicates that California water agencies have about $10 billion worth of water recycling projects at various stages of the project pipeline. With rising infrastructure costs, additional state support is needed to make these projects pencil.
