Protecting Groundwater and Reversing Subsidence in the Coachella Valley
T
he Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) is a 2014 California law intended to preserve and protect California’s precious groundwater resources. The law required all hydrological basins and subbasins across the state to be assessed for their priority and overdraft status and then to develop appropriate plans for the sustainable management of their groundwater. Coachella Valley Water District (CVWD) was able to prove that its existing groundwater management activities lived up to the SGMA standard, obviating the need for new plans. Moreover, its groundwater management is resulting in a significant increase in groundwater levels and even the reversal of ground subsidence. In this interview, Zoe Rodriguez del Rey, the manager of CVWD’s water resources division, speaks with Irrigation Leader about the requirements of SGMA and the results of the district’s management activities. Irrigation Leader: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position. Zoe Rodriguez del Rey: I have a bachelor’s degree in biology and a master’s in environmental science, but my primary focus has always been on water. During my undergraduate studies, I worked with a group at the University of New Orleans that combined research and practical application, working to restore Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans. Thereafter, I secured a job with the City of Portland, Oregon’s Water Bureau, working in their water quality and compliance division of operations, which included both groundwater and an unfiltered surface water system. I fell in love with the planning and implementation it takes to operate a water system and ensure that folks have a long-term, reliable, sustainable water supply. That led to the opportunity 2 years ago to join CVWD, where I am now the manager of the water resources division. Irrigation Leader: Please tell us about CVWD.
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down further by sector. For example, our agricultural sector primarily uses imported surface water. Imported water is also used to replenish the groundwater basin. Irrigation Leader: What is SGMA and why was it introduced? Zoe Rodriguez del Rey: There are areas of California that are heavily reliant on groundwater and are overdrafting groundwater supplies to an extreme degree. The Central Valley, which has a large agricultural sector, is seeing the effects of long-term groundwater pumping. Groundwater is an important resource, and we needed to start thinking about how we can manage it in a sustainable manner and ensure that system outflows aren’t greater than inflows. That was the main driver for the establishment of SGMA. There has been strong collaboration among a broad spectrum of individuals, businesses, and state entities to implement the law. Irrigation Leader: What does SGMA require of districts like CVWD? Zoe Rodriguez del Rey: Initially, the Department of Water Resources (DWR) had to do an assessment of all the groundwater basins in California. It designated each basin as either low, medium, or high priority and either critically overdrafted or not. Once a subbasin was identified as being medium or high priority, then certain local agencies, for example water purveyors, had the authority to form groundwater sustainability agencies (GSAs). SGMA lays out which entities can form a GSA. Once formed, the GSA must be approved by the DWR. There are places in California where new agencies were formed to fill the GSA function, but for the most part, the entities that form GSAs are existing agencies. CVWD provides services in two subbasins that are medium priority and not
PHOTOS COURTESY OF CVWD.
Zoe Rodriguez del Rey: CVWD covers 1,000 square miles, mainly within Riverside County but also stretching into Imperial and San Diego Counties. We serve approximately 110,000 domestic accounts. We provide seven water-related services: domestic water service, sanitation, water recycling, regional flood control protection, groundwater replenishment, agricultural irrigation, and agricultural drainage. Our two largest sources of water are imported water, which makes up a particularly large portion of the mix, and local groundwater. We also use a small amount of local surface water, although we don’t use it directly, like other purveyors in the valley do. This could be broken
CVWD's Whitewater Groundwater Replenishment Facility.
