If you noticed your lawn drying up and you began wondering just how much water the Santa Clarita Valley has, you can get your answer Wednesday when SCV Water’s Water Resources and Watershed Committee meets.
The meeting takes place at the Santa Clarita Water Division, in the training room at 26521 Summit Circle off of Centre Pointe Parkway beginning at 6 p.m.
On Monday, SCV Water staffers were putting the finishing touches on a report that details water in the ground, water from Northern California and water banked for dry times.
“Staff is finalizing the 2018 SCV Water Report that reviews 2017 conditions and projects 2018 water supplies,” Dirk Marks, SCV Water’s water resources manager, said Monday.
“The report estimates 2018 retail water demand at 85,000 acre-feet while available supplies are calculated to be over 144,000 acre-feet,” he said.
An acre-foot of water is about the same as a football field under one foot of water.
Marks noted that: “In a year when the State (Water) Project Allocation is only 35 percent, this illustrates the value of SCV Water’s strategy of a diversified water supply portfolio.”
Also unveiled at Wednesday’s meeting is an update on SCV Water’s conservation efforts.
Committee members are expected to discuss a report prepared last month by Matt Dickens, SCV Water’s resource conservation manager, which identifies which conservation measures are active and which ones are not.
When SCV Water officially formed on Jan. 1, the new agency brought together three main water retailers each promoting their own conservation programs.
In a bid to streamline those conservation efforts, Dickens came up with a plan — called the Draft Conservation & Integration Plan — which looks at ways to integrate the various programs.
“Conservation will focus efforts and resources to align programs consistently among the divisions to provide seamless coverage to all SCV Water customers,” Dickens wrote in a memo to committee members.
SCV Water conservation programs deemed active in the Dickens review include: programs that offer rebates for the use of pool covers that cut down on water lost through evaporation; Smart Controllers using technology to ensure precise use of sprinkler systems and turf conversion allowing ratepayers to swap turf for drought tolerant alternatives.
Conservation programs identified as inactive by the report to be reviewed Wednesday include conservation workshops and home water use efficiency reports.
Details about any of the rebate programs offered by SCV Water can be found on the agency’s website: yourscvwater.com.
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