Item 21 - Water Supply Assessment for the Warner - Red Hill Mixed Use Development Project

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T HE W ARNER P ROJECT W ATER S UPPLY A SSESSMENT A UGUST 21, 2020 F USCOE E NGINEERING , I NC. 16 Metropolitan Imported Water The City of Santa Ana is one of only three retail member agencies of Metropolitan in Orange County. As a member agency, pursuant to the Metropolitan Act, the City has preferential rights to a certain percentage of water delivered to Metropolitan each year primarily from the State Water Project and/or the Colorado River Aqueduct as well as other Metropolitan storage programs. Being a member agency of Metropolitan puts the City in a better position relative to receiving water directly from Metropolitan, as opposed to other agencies in Orange County which obtain their imported Metropolitan water through MWDOC. The main sources of water Metropolitan provides to the City include water from northern California delivered via the State Water Project (SWP) and water from the Colorado River Basin delivered via the Colorado River Aqueduct. More details on these sources of imported water are explained below. Colorado River The Colorado River was Metropolitan’s original source of water after Metropolitan’s establishment in 1928. Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two largest reservoirs in the United States, can store four times the annual flow of the Colorado River. River flows are primarily generated from snowpack in the Rocky Mountains. Colorado River water is allocated and delivered to seven states in the US including Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada and California. Mexico also has an allocation of 1.5 million acre-feet (MAF) along the Colorado River each year. California’s urban water allocation is managed by Metropolitan and imported from the Colorado River via the Colorado River Aqueduct (CRA) which is stored at Diamond Valley Lake and Lake Mathews in Riverside County. The CRA includes supplies from the implementation of the Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA) and related agreements to transfer water from agricultural agencies in Imperial County to urban uses throughout Southern California including Los Angeles, Orange County and San Diego. The 2003 QSA enabled California to implement major Colorado River water conservation and transfer programs, stabilizing water supplies for 75 years and reducing the state’s demand on the river to its 4.4 MAF entitlement. Colorado River transactions are potentially available to supply additional water up to the CRA capacity of 1.25 MAF on an as-needed basis. California is apportioned the largest allocation on the River of 4.4 MAF of water from the Colorado River each year plus one-half of any surplus that may be available for use collectively in Arizona, California, and Nevada. In addition, California has historically been allowed to use Colorado River water apportioned to but not used by Arizona or Nevada. Metropolitan has a basic entitlement of 550,000 AFY of Colorado River water, plus surplus water up to an additional 662,000 AFY if certain conditions exist. The remainder of California’s allocation goes to Imperial County, primarily to the Imperial Irrigation District, and is used mainly for agriculture production. Over the past 19 years (2000-2018), there have only been three years when the Colorado River flow has been above average.7 On May 20, 2019, the Department of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation and representatives from all seven Colorado River Basin states and signed completed drought contingency plans for the Upper and Lower Colorado River basins. These 7 USBR Lake Mead at Hoover Dam Water Elevation Data. Found here: https://usbr.gov/lc/region/g4000/hourly/mead-elv.html