Southern California Water District Hopes to Tap Yuba River: L.A.-Based Metropolitan in Negotiations With Yuba County Water Agency
By Andrea Koskey, Appeal-Democrat, Marysville, Calif.
Nov. 25–Southern California’s largest water supplier hopes the Yuba River will provide help in dry years.
Directors of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California want to enter into an agreement with the state to buy water the Yuba County Water Agency will make available through the Lower Yuba River Accord.
“We are already dipping into our reserves” in Southern California, said Metropolitan spokesman Denis Wolcott. “If we continue to do that, we have to start to look ahead to 2009 and protect ourselves against a major catastrophe. We need to make sure water is available to us.”
Metropolitan’s directors said they are willing to buy between 13,750 acre-feet and 35,000 acre-feet in dry years in the next 18 years.
The estimated price is about $3.4 million annually. An acre-foot is about 326,000 gallons.
Under a more extreme scenario of severe shortages, Metropolitan could buy as much as 140,000 acre-feet, spending $16.5 million, according to a report prepared by the district’s staff.
“The only water transfer deal we have is through the accord,” Curt Aikens, YCWA’s general manager, said of the Los Angeles-based district. “MWD is out looking for other sellers, in case of a dry year.”
The State Water Resources Control Board has scheduled hearings Dec. 5-6 on the accord. The YCWA will seek approval for a long-term transfer of up to 200,000 acre-feet per year through 2025.
During the first eight years of the accord, starting Jan. 1, 2008, the YCWA will transfer 60,000 acre-feet per year and will be paid $30.9 million, according to the agreement. Additional water may be made available, depending on conditions.
Aikens said if the accord is approved by the board, the YCWA will be able to sell water to the Department of Water Resources, which then has to decide how to sell the water to different agencies.
The Lower Yuba River Accord, an agreement among 17 entities, was created to protect and enhance salmon and steelhead habitat in the Yuba, as well as ensure water continues to be supplied to farmers, power generators and environmentalists. It also creates 24 miles of protected fish habitat.
This would be the third time since 2003 that Metropolitan has tapped the statewide water market to secure options.
In 2005, Metropolitan worked with the State Water Project Contractors Authority to secure one-year transfer options on 125,000 acre-feet of Central Valley supplies, which the district did not exercise. Two years earlier, the district bought about 150,000 acre-feet of water from Sacramento Valley water users.
The report prepared for Metropolitan directors noted that the YCWA approached Metropolitan, “other water contractors, DWR and the federal Bureau of Reclamation to discuss selling a portion of the water it would be required to release, plus additional water made available by reoperation of YCWA’s storage reservoirs and groundwater substitution.”
Wolcott said there are “far more steps in getting Yuba County’s water than other agencies. The environmental processes are in place to allow the transfers. The accord will make it easier and more permanent.”
YCWA Chairman Don Schrader acknowledged there are many hurdles to transfer water from the Yuba to Southern California.
“Even if we did sell them this, how would they get it through the Sacramento Delta?” he said.
The YCWA would “need to have an extremely wet winter to supply them with 235,000 acre-feet,” Schrader said.
Metropolitan is a cooperative of 26 cities and water agencies serving 18 million people in six Southern California counties.
In addition to the Yuba River water, Metropolitan, in conjunction with the State Water Project Contractors Authority, will pursue up to 200,000 acre-feet of water for 2008 from the Central Valley through one-year option transfer agreements.
Appeal-Democrat reporter Andrea Koskey can be reached at 749-4709 or akoskey@appealdemocrat.com
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