Quarterly Water Supply Strategy and Budget Report California American Water
Main Water Distribution
System: October - December 2022
1. Management Objectives
The Monterey Peninsula Water Management District (District) desires to maximize the long-term production potential and protect the environmental quality of the Carmel River and Seaside Groundwater Basins. In addition, the District desires to maximize the amount of water that can be diverted from the Carmel River Basin and injected into the Seaside Groundwater Basin while complying with the instream flow requirements recommended by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to protect the Carmel River steelhead population. Additionally the QWB seeks to shift a large component of pumping from the Carmel River to the Seaside Groundwater Basin to recover injected PWM water. To accomplish these goals, a water supply strategy and budget for production within California American Water’s (Cal-Am’s) Main and Laguna Seca Subarea water distribution systems is reviewed quarterly to determine the optimal strategy for operations, given the current hydrologic and system conditions, and legal constraints on the sources and amounts of water to be produced.
2. Quarterly Water Supply Strategy: October - December 2022
On September 8, 2022 the Quarterly Water Budget Group which includes staff from the District, CalAm, the National Marine Fisheries Services (NMFS), State Water Resources Control Board’s Division of Water Rights (SWRCB-DWR), and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) met and discussed the proposed water supply strategy and related topics for upcoming quarter.
Carmel River Basin Cal-Am will operate
its wells in the Lower Carmel Valley in a downstream to
upstream sequence,
as needed to meet customer
demand. The group recognized that WY
2022 was a dry year and the storms in later December and early January did not
result in large sustainable flows on that Carmel River that would trigger
sustained ASR Operations or Table 13 Diversions. The River dropped
below flow triggers for diversion of ASR and Table 13 on February 3rd and with
the dry conditions additional ASR injection did not occur. For this quarterly water budget, it was agreed that CalAm would plan to produce water
from the wells in the
Lower Carmel Valley to support system demand. The Low Flow period as defined in SBO 2002-02
began on May 2, 2022. The first 2 months
of this budget remain in the Low Flow regime using the Lower River wells and
PWM Recovery as the primary sources to meet system demand. December is the first month permits allow for
ASR and Table 13 Diversions. If storms
in December bring River conditions within permit conditions, Cal-Am will use
the Upper Valley wells to provide water for injection into the Seaside Basin
while producing water from the Lower Valley and PWM Recovery to meet system
demand.
Seaside
Groundwater Basin Because flows in the Carmel River remain in the
Low Flow regime, Cal-Am
has shut off the Upper Carmel Valley wells and turned on the Seaside
wellfield. The Seaside wells are
currently being used to recover PWM injected water and Native Seaside
Groundwater. PWM water will be recovered at the same rate injected this quarter with
the goal maximizing PWM as a source to meet system demand and shift pumping
away from the Carmel River Basin. There
is also a goal to produce 25 AF of treated brackish groundwater from the Sand City Desalination Plant in each of these three months.
It is recognized that, based on recent historical use, Cal-Am’s production from the Laguna Seca Subarea
during this period may not be reduced to zero, as is set by
Cal-Am’s allocation specified in the Seaside Basin Adjudication Decision.
In
this context, the production targets represent the maximum monthly production
that should occur so that Cal-Am remains
within its adjudicated allocation for the Laguna Seca Subarea. Under the amended Seaside Basin Decision, Cal-Am is allowed
to use production savings
in the Coastal Subareas to offset
over-production in the Laguna
Seca Subarea. However, the quarterly budget was developed so that
Cal-Am would produce all native groundwater in the Coastal Subareas and Laguna Seca production would be over the Adjudication
allotment. On February 5, 2020 the Seaside Groundwater Basin Watermaster Board voted
to allow Cal-Am to claim carryover credits to cover the pumping over the Laguna
Seca allotment in the interim prior to establishing a
physical solution. Because of this
decision, the Quarterly Water Budget Group decided that the table presenting
the Laguna Seca allotment of zero would no longer be
necessary as the Watermaster is now planning to handle the pumping over
allotment with a different mechanism.
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