Reprinted from The Los Angeles Times
Editorial Commentary ("Op-Ed") Page
April 2, 2003  

'Smart' Farming Could Avert
Urban Need for Reclaimed Water

By Ellen Stern Harris

Smart sprinklers? Only 5% of California's water goes to residential customers, so even if the Metropolitan Water District's new technology saves the optimistically predicted 10% of that, it won't significantly affect the state's water situation. Nevertheless, residential customers are expected to do 100% of the conserving.

As much as 85% of California's water is used by agriculture. Despite this, the state has no requirements for agricultural users to conserve. At noon in the hot Central Valley, spray irrigation systems are going strong as the sun evaporates the droplets before they even hit the crops.

With legislation mandating that builders first secure an assured 20-year supply of water before they commence construction, the race is now on for more and more water to be made available to developers. This is especially so since the Interior Department cut California's take from the Colorado River.

But has anybody suggested that the agriculture industry conserve? To the contrary, a federal court in San Diego told the Imperial Irrigation District that it need not relinquish any of its water to urban agencies.

No, rather than go for the obvious solution to California's water crisis -- "smart" farming -- here is what developers and state officials have proposed: reusing waste water.

Reclaimed effluent has long been used on freeway landscapes and golf courses and in industrial and agricultural applications. In 1994, when such water was about to be inserted into the aquifer near the Miller brewery in Irwindale, the company went to court. Its expert witnesses raised questions about inadequate treatment, inadequate monitoring and the lack of fail-safe protections for the public health. (Besides, imagine what Coors or Anheuser-Busch might have said, had Miller been forced to brew its beer using an aquifer that included recycled effluent.)

Next, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power built a $55-million water reclamation plant in the East San Fernando Valley. Nearby residents labeled its planned product "toilet to tap." Advocates for those with compromised immune systems, including the very young and the elderly, were concerned because there were no guarantees that endocrine disrupters, pharmaceuticals, certain viruses and other health-adverse components of sewage would not flow into the aquifers along with the reclaimed fluids.

The DWP plant has yet to open.

In 2001, Gov. Gray Davis signed a bill by Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg (D-Los Angeles) creating the 2002 Recycled Water Task Force. Its appointees are largely industry and governmental representatives. Although the task force report is not yet complete, legislation has been introduced to implement the expected recommendation for development of ever more reclaimed effluent to supplement municipal supplies.

In Northern California, the Redwood City Council recently agreed to build a water reclamation plant whose output would be applied to school grounds, parks and even residential gardens. Homeowner groups expressed concern that children with cut knees might play on lawns watered with reclaimed sewage and end up with infections. Proponents of the plant accused these homeowners of being more concerned about their property values.

The one solution to California's water needs that has yet to be seriously discussed is providing low-cost loans to agricultural water users to acquire water conservation systems such as those in arid Israel. If the agricultural sector conserved no more than 5% of its use, residential users could slake their urban thirst with top-quality water.

But there is not an infinite amount of good-quality water for all Californians for all time. The growth-inducing result of theoretically providing as much water as developers may want, to supply all comers, has its downside: More water may also bring more traffic congestion, greater stress, loss of productivity and worse air quality.

Unfortunately, we've yet to figure out how to fairly manage growth and to provide a sustainable, desirable quality of life for all. This is what we must do, because when a restaurant is full, reservations are not taken for people to sit on the laps of those who were already seated.

Ellen Stern Harris is executive director of the Fund for the Environment and a former board member of the Metropolitan Water District. Web site: www.beverlyhillscitizen.org.