California’s water restrictions barreled ahead Wednesday with stringent new standards for all toilets, urinals and faucets sold in the state starting in 2016 — another sign that the Golden State’s drought situation truly is circling the drain.
The California Energy Commission adopted low-flow regulations — new toilets will be limited to 1.28 gallons per flush — that will save more than 10 billion gallons in the first year, and in time, up to 105 billion gallons per year — more than three times the annual amount of water used by San Francisco.
The new regulations came one day after the State Water Resources Control Board rolled out a proposed framework requiring all urban water suppliers to cut residential water use by 10 to 35 percent below 2013 levels, and on the same day that Gov. Jerry Brown met for three hours with farmers, environmentalists and local water officials about the state’s drought response.
Some areas will have to work harder to meet the new cutback standards, acknowledged Max Gomberg, a state water board scientist who helped draft the plan.
The mandatory cuts are “going to be more of a challenge for hotter inland areas, but if you look at what the native vegetation there was, and what the vegetation is now that people live there … there has to be a transition.”
The goals aren’t set in stone yet. The state water board for the next month will hear from the public about how different areas’ climate, temperature, lot sizes and other water-use drivers should be taken into account. “We have to consider what will be fair and what will be feasible,” Gomberg said.
The plan calls for comparing each water supplier’s monthly data, starting this June, to the same month in 2013. If a district misses its assigned goal, the state could start with informal warning letters and then move to formal cease-and-desist orders — the latter of which could come with fines of up to $10,000 per day. But that doesn’t mean the board will come out guns a’blazing, Gomberg said. “We’re still working out the details… There is no enforcement plan yet.”
Some face the proposed cuts stoically. “We’ll do what it takes to get there,” said Justin Skarb, spokesman for the California Water Service.
Cal Water’s “Bear Gulch” service area — Woodside, Atherton, Portola Valley and portions of Menlo Park and Redwood City — was handed the state’s most severe 35 percent conservation target, which is far larger than the 11 percent reduction it has achieved since 2013. But mandatory means mandatory, Skarb said: “We will need to work with all our customers, including the large users, to achieve these conservation standards.”
Others already have cut water use deeply enough to exceeded the new proposal’s goals. The Dublin San Ramon Services District’s per capita residential water use is down by 29 percent since 2013, far better than the 20 percent standard it will be asked to meet. The district handed out low-flow showerheads, general manager Bert Michalczyk said Wednesday and started a “wildly successful” program letting customers get up to 250 gallons of treated wastewater for landscaping irrigation. The district’s website lets residents track their water use in real time and receive emails or texts if they’re overusing. “I give the community the tools and they’re the ones, person by person, who make it happen,” he said.
