News Release Archive

Reclamation Awards $5.9 Million in CALFED Water Use Efficiency Grants

Media Contact: Pete Lucero, 916-978-5100, 11/09/2009 22:06

For Release: November 09, 2009

The Bureau of Reclamation in September 2009 awarded $5.9 million for the CALFED Water Use Efficiency Grant Program. With combined local cost shares, more than $17 million in water management improvement projects will be implemented in the next 24 months. It is estimated that greater than 26,000 acre-feet of water will be better managed or conserved per year. This will benefit CALFED Program objectives to improve ecosystem health, water supply reliability, and water quality.

Projects were selected through a competitive process, and priority consideration was given to projects that addressed CALFED Bay-Delta Program goals on a statewide basis. Reclamation awarded a total of 16 projects, spanning California from the City of Grimes in Northern California to Orange County in Southern California. Fiscal Year 2009 grants include:

Contra Costa Water District - The District will implement a High-Efficiency Toilet (HET) Voucher Program, which will provide instant rebates to customers who participate. The goal of the program is to replace 3,100 inefficient toilets to save 2,000 acre-feet of water over a 20-year period.

City of Corona - The City will install weather-based irrigation controllers in homes within their service area that have more than 1,500 square feet of landscape. The City has estimated the program will conserve 133.4 acre-feet of water per year.

City of Santa Maria - The City will implement the Leak Watch Real Time Radio Metering program, which will allow them to install a fixed based water meter-reading system. This project will allow information to be gathered and monitored on a real time basis. This project is expected to conserve 264 acre-feet of water per year.

East Bay Municipal Utility District - The District plans to optimize landscape irrigation efficiency by initiating an Evapotranspiration (ET) Controller and Automatic Metering Infrastructure (AMI) System. This project will provide for the direct installation of 400 self-adjusting ET controllers and allow those accounts to be equipped with AMI monitoring features. This project has the potential to conserve approximately 1,000 acre-feet over 10 years.

Las Virgenes Municipal Water District - Reclamation funding allows for the Real-Time Detection/Response System for Residential Over Irrigation and Leakage Protection. This program monitors hourly water use in a large residential community, as well as offers automatic voice and e-mail notices of leaks and over irrigation. The Response System has the potential to conserve 273 acre-feet of water per year.

Long Beach Water Department - The Department will install 50 weather-based irrigation controllers to reduce excess landscape irrigation in the public sector. The controllers will irrigate landscapes based on weather patterns and evaporation rates. The program is estimated to conserve 75 acre-feet of water per year.

Long Beach Water Department - The Department will install hydrants to existing recycled water systems so that street sweepers, sewer line cleaners, and median island irrigators can fill their trucks and use the recycled water in place of treated municipal water sources. Long Beach Water Department anticipates conserving 15 acre-feet of water per year by implementing this program.

Merced Irrigation District - The District is planning to reduce operational discharge of irrigation water from the Garibaldi Lateral by eliminating seepage and preventing spillage into the Merced River. Conserved water will be redirected to the McCoy Lateral to meet existing demands within the system. This could reduce District diversions by an estimated 5,600 acre-feet of water per year.

Municipal Water District of Orange County - The District will initiate a program to provide engineering surveys to businesses to identify potential water savings activities. The businesses will receive written reports of these surveys and incentives for water conservation retrofits. The project is estimated to conserve 796 acre-feet of water per year through this program.

Municipal Water District of Orange County - The District has developed a unique program to target water savings in the hotel/motel sector. The District will perform surveys of hotels/motels to analyze the potential water savings. The hotels/motels will receive reports of findings and incentives for water conservation retrofits. The project could potentially conserve 564 acre-feet of water per year.

Rancho California Water District - The Districts residential One-Stop Installation Program will target the top 500 high water users within the District. It will offer customers onsite evaluations to identify water saving opportunities by checking for leaks and educating their customers on how to save water. This Program will conserve approximately 300 acre-feet of water per year.

Reclamation District No. 108 - The project will improve and automate the Districts Recycle and Distribution System. This project will increase the amount of recycled water and expand the service area within the Districts system. This innovative project is estimated to recycle up to 17,100 acre-feet of water per year.

Reclamation District No. 2035 - The District will install 23 Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) compatible digital registers with separate data loggers on the new and existing flow meters for groundwater wells, water level loggers, and a SCADA Doppler flow measurement device. The District expects to improve the management of 273 acre-feet of water per year through this project.

Regional Water Authority - The project is a collaborative effort among the Regional Water Authority and four member agencies. They will issue incentives to a minimum of 689 residential and commercial customers to install weather-based irrigation controllers. The Authority has estimated it could conserve 47 acre-feet of water per year.

San Luis Water District - The project consists of lining 3.3 miles of existing earthen canal in the San Luis Water District. Lining the canal will decrease the amount of water lost to an irrecoverable saline groundwater sink. The project is estimated to conserve 780 acre-feet of water per year.

Santa Barbara County Water Agency - The Agency will expand their pilot landscape efficiency program, which will provide rebates to landowners to increase water conservation in its landscapes. Rebates may cover up to 50 percent of approved water efficient irrigation supplies and landscape materials. The agency anticipates conserving 15.7 acre-feet of water per year.

The CALFED Bay-Delta Program is a 30-year Program (2000-2030) among 25 Federal and State agencies with responsibility in the Sacramento San Joaquin Delta. The Program is based on four major resource management objectives that guide its actions to achieving a Delta that has a healthy ecosystem and can supply Californians with a reliable water supply. Those objectives are levee system integrity, water quality, water supply reliability, and ecosystem restoration. Reclamation plays a key role as the Federal lead agency for implementation of water supply reliability actions in coordination with our State CALFED partner agencies.

For more information on the CALFED Water Use Efficiency Program, please contact Ms. Anna Sutton, at 916-978-5215 or asutton@usbr.gov.

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The Bureau of Reclamation is a federal agency under the U.S. Department of the Interior and is the nation's largest wholesale water supplier and second largest producer of hydroelectric power. Our facilities also provide substantial flood control, recreation opportunities, and environmental benefits. Visit our website at https://www.usbr.gov and follow us on Twitter @USBR; Facebook @bureau.of.reclamation; LinkedIn @Bureau of Reclamation; Instagram @bureau_of_reclamation; and YouTube @reclamation.