The City of Marina is calling on the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to reject adoption of outdated regional water supply and demand estimates that are being used to justify the unnecessary and harmful California-American Water (CalAm) desalination project.
At a critical meeting on July 24, the CPUC will consider voting on a proposed decision that will determine the Monterey Peninsula’s future water supply targets. If adopted as proposed, this action would allow construction of a desalination project that will produce thousands of acre-feet (AF) of water not needed for the region’s future supply and will thereby saddle ratepayers with decades of unjustified expense and cause other Monterey communities irreversible environmental harm.
“The CPUC has a duty to protect ratepayers and the environment,” said Marina Mayor Bruce Carlos Delgado. “The facts are clear: there is no long-term water shortfall on the Monterey Peninsula, and this project would create a huge and costly supply surplus that benefits no one but CalAm’s bottom line.”
The July 24 CPUC vote will determine whether to adopt CalAm’s outdated water supply and demand projections as the basis for approving its proposed 6.4 million-gallon-per-day desalination facility. This decision will memorialize what the Commission believes is the region’s long-term water need.
The City of Marina contends that relying on obsolete data to establish this baseline would misrepresent actual conditions, distort future planning and give a preliminary green light to an unnecessary project that will cost ratepayers for decades to come. It will also immediately impose major adverse environmental and economic impacts on Marina, the project’s main location, where CalAm would like to start construction this year.
Originally proposed in 2012, CalAm’s desalination project was intended to meet a projected shortage of 5,000 AY per year (AFY) by 2021. Today, in 2025, the project has not been built. Demand has declined, conservation has improved and alternative sources have filled the gap. The Commission’s own revised estimates now project a shortfall in water supply in 2050 of just 2,500 AFY— half the original estimate and still 25 years away. The Monterey Peninsula Water Management District and Marina Coast Water District experts who testified before the CPUC concluded that no water supply shortfall would exist in 2050 given current water supplies.
Despite this, CalAm continues to push forward with a desalination plant capable of producing 7,100 AFY of water, almost three times the CPUC’s projected need — at a cost that could significantly increase water bills in an area already burdened with some of the highest rates in the country.
“The Commission should not approve an outdated plan that lacks economic justification or environmental responsibility,” Delgado added. “It’s wrong to force families, businesses and seniors on fixed incomes to pay for a project that is neither needed nor responsible.”
The environmental risks to the Monterey Peninsula area residents are clear. The proposed facility would draw more than 15 million gallons of fresh water per day from local aquifers, threatening coastal ecosystems and increasing the risk of seawater intrusion. These impacts would disproportionately affect the community of Marina, whose beaches and dunes would contain CalAm’s proposed industrial wellfield, which relies on local groundwater resources.
The City of Marina urges the CPUC to fulfill its regulatory duty to protect the public. For more information about this project, visit ProtectMarinaWater.org.