State Board to Discuss New Report on Ag Water Use

State Board to Discuss New Report on Ag Water Use

The State Water Resources Control Board will discuss a report next week recommending ways to employ California’s Reasonable Use Doctrine to promote agricultural water efficiency.

The informational report, prepared by Delta Watermaster Craig M. Wilson, notes that while many growers are using water efficiently, expanding efficient practices on a relatively small percentage of farms could result in significant reductions in water use.

The report recommends that the State Board convene a Reasonable Water Use Summit to consider specific ways to promote efficiency. It also recommends that the Board create a Reasonable Use Unit within the Division of Water Rights, streamline procedures for enforcement actions against waste and unreasonable use, and pursue a mix of strategies to promote more efficient practices.

“The focus on agriculture in this paper is grounded in two principles: small changes in agricultural water use efficiency can produce significant amounts of ‘wet’ water” and California’s agricultural sector, which has tested and proven many conservation practices, is in a position to identify economically justified and locally cost effective water management techniques that retain the value of return flows to both downstream users and other environmental beneficiaries,” the report says.

Maximizing water efficiency is particularly important to the Delta, the report notes, because more efficient use of water upstream of the Delta can increase flows into the Delta, while more efficient water use within the Delta can increase Delta outflows. In addition, reducing the amount of agricultural return flow, both upstream and downstream of the Delta, has important water quality benefits, the report says.