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U.S. Senate

Energy and Natural Resources

Subcommittee on Water and Power

Honorable Jeff Bingaman, Chairman

Testimony provided on

The impacts of climate change on water supply and availability in the
U.S.

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

By

Timothy F. Brick

Chairman, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California

700 N. Alameda Avenue

Los Angeles, CA 90012

Chairman Bingaman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this
opportunity to testify regarding the impacts of climate change on water
supply and availability in the U.S. My name is Timothy Brick, and I am
the Chairman of the Board of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California.

For more than 75 years Metropolitan Water District has provided imported
water to the Southern California region from the Colorado River and the
State Water Project originating in Northern California. Our mission has
been to be the wholesale provider of high quality, reliable drinking
water supplies primarily for municipal and industrial use. In recent
decades, we have begun to diversify our resources and commit to
contingency planning in order to live up to our mission.

# 

Metropolitan Water District is the nation's largest provider of imported
water to an urban area. The population today in our service area is more
than 18 million, and it is projected to rise to 22 million by 2030.
Metropolitan is comprised of 26 member public agencies that service an
area spanning 5,200 square miles and six southern California counties.

**Climate Change**

Metropolitan's latest challenge is one shared by not only the water
community, but also the global community as a whole. California's
history shows us that change in climate and weather, both natural and
human-induced, are inevitable. This climate change will have a dramatic
impact on water supplies and demands and will necessitate a strong ethic
of water use efficiency in our communities as well as the aggressive
development of innovative, alternative water supplies to meet growing
water needs.

Southern California is currently experiencing its driest year on record.
Since July 1^st^ 2006, Los Angeles has received only 3.21 inches of
rainfall as compared to the normal of 15 inches per year. This year
seems to be a continuation of a critically dry weather trend. In the
most recent nine years, Los Angeles has averaged only eleven inches per
year, 27% below normal.

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On a larger scale, most of the western United States is experiencing
record low precipitation and runoff. For the first time in
Metropolitan's history, there are critical dry weather conditions
occurring concurrently in our service area of Southern California as
well as in the watersheds for our Colorado River and State Water Project
water supplies. These regional climate trends are shown in the recent
drought outlooks provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration.

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**Colorado River Water Supplies**

A report released by the National Research Council in February 2007
looked at past climate and streamflow conditions in the Colorado River
and raised concerns regarding the long-term adequacy of Colorado River
water supplies.

The western United States, particularly the region that depends on
Colorado River supplies, has been experiencing drought conditions since
the late 1990s. Years 2002 and 2004 are among the 10 driest years on
record in the upper basin states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and
Wyoming. Correspondingly, water storage in the basin's reservoirs has
dropped sharply and now is at the lowest level since their initial
fillings many decades ago.

It is now known that water allocations between the upper and lower
Colorado River basin, as governed by the Colorado River Compact of 1922,
were based on a short record of relatively high annual flows of 15
million acre-feet annually on the Colorado River. Recent patterns as
well as reconstructed river flows based on tree-ring data dating back
several centuries indicate that the past water management decisions on
river water allocations and use may be overly optimistic of future water
availability as annual flow could be 10 to 15 percent less than the 1922
estimate. Some experts would say even more.

Temperature records across the Colorado River basin and the western
United States document a warming trend over the past century. Most
recent climate model projections suggest that temperature across the
region will continue to rise in the foreseeable future. Higher
temperatures will result in less snowfall, increased evaporation losses,
and shifting of snowmelt to earlier in any given year. The preponderance
of scientific evidence suggests reduced Colorado River streamflow and
water supplies, as well as increasing severity, frequency, and duration
of future droughts.

In addition, the western United States is experiencing rapid population
growth, further increasing the pressure for Colorado River water
supplies. For example, population grew 66% in Nevada, 40% in Arizona,
and 30% in Colorado from 1990 to 2000; these three states ranked number
1,2, and 3 in terms of highest percentage population growth during the
last Census.

Better understanding of past climate and streamflow conditions of the
Colorado River, rapid population growth and increasing water demands in
the region, an apparent climate warming, and warnings from many climate
model simulations have cast great uncertainty in the reliability of
future Colorado River supplies to southern California and the Southwest.

**California State Water Project**

Last year the California State Department of Water Resources released a
report titled "Progress on Incorporating Climate Change into Management
of California's Water Resources." The report was prepared in response to
Governor Schwarzenegger's Executive Order S-3-05 establishing California
greenhouse gas emissions targets.

This report utilized four climate scenarios from two global climate
models and downscaled potential ranges of change to the State Water
Project watershed to analyze potential impacts. While the report does
not represent a comprehensive assessment of the climate change impact,
it does reveal at least three major potential impacts that constitute
growing concerns for water managers.

## Runoff

The first concern is related to the timing of snowmelt runoff. Studies
suggest that warmer temperatures during the past half-century have
brought significant changes in the seasonal timing of runoff. Smaller
spring snow packs are a very real possibility and earlier melting of
these natural reservoirs. When warmer temperatures in the winter
translates into more rain and/or less snow in our Sierra Nevada
mountains, it will severely lessen the ability to store water for peak
summer water needs, avoid costly flooding, and otherwise manage fresh
water - an increasingly scarce resource.

## Water Quality

Water quality is also a concern linked to climate change. A higher sea
level would likely bring increased salinity levels intruding on the
freshwater system that is already vulnerable to salt water intrusion,
and could further jeopardize levee stability, possibly leading to larger
and more frequent failures like one that happened last year. Long
periods of dry weather can also bring water quality challenges as
contaminants typically accumulate on land surfaces. When the rain
returns, it carries these contaminants in the runoff, making water
treatment more difficult.

## Extreme Weather Conditions

The third concern is linked to the possibility of extreme weather events
that change the frequency of storm and drought conditions. Extreme
weather conditions bring about many challenges, water quality being only
one. Storage becomes another challenge as managers are caught in a
tradeoff between storing water for future dry periods and lowering
reservoirs before the onset of a flood season to protect downstream
communities.

Climate change impacts further accentuate the variability and
uncertainties surrounding water supplies from the State Water Project
system.

Metropolitan's Policy on Climate Change

In March 2002, our board adopted policy principles on global climate
change as related to water resource planning. The principles stated in
part that "Metropolitan supports further research into the potential
water resource and quality effects of global climate change, and
supports flexible "no regret" solutions that provide water supply and
quality benefits while increasing the ability to manage future climate
change impacts."

# 

# Metropolitan's Response

The policy principles are reflected in Metropolitan's Integrated
Resource Plan (IRP). Metropolitan and its member agencies have developed
an IRP water resource portfolio that emphasizes diversification and
adaptability of supply sources to manage current and future uncertainty.
The IRP has also placed an increasing emphasis on local supplies such as
conservation, water recycling and groundwater recharge.

Metropolitan built a new storage reservoir in the late 1990's in order
to store water when it is plentiful during wet years for use in dry
periods. In addition, Metropolitan is completing a large project called
the Inland Feeder that will also expand our ability to obtain water from
the Colorado River and State Water Project when it is available and to
provide greater system reliability and flexibility.

Metropolitan has also forged many agreements in the past few years to
store water in groundwater basins within and outside of southern
California. Our cumulative investment in groundwater storage through
2006 was more than \$400 million for groundwater storage augmented by
\$45 million of state grants.

Metropolitan also recognizes that importing water requires a large
amount of energy. For example, importing an acre-foot of water via the
State Water Project requires 3,200 kwh, and an acre-foot of Colorado
River supplies requires 2,000 kwh. The IRP places increased emphasis on
less energy consuming local water resources.

The greatest concentration of effort and resources in recent years has
been in the area of conservation. Metropolitan has made a cumulative
investment of \$251 million in conservation. Metropolitan has long been
an advocate and supporter of water conservation providing financial
incentives to member agencies to grow conservation programs in their
service areas through a variety of programs and rebates. Conservation
has occurred in both residential and business sectors with Metropolitan
offering guidance and financial incentives to use more water-efficient
technologies. The most recent push has been in the area of outdoor
conservation. Our California Friendly® program is an umbrella for many
different programs that promote waterwise lifestyle choices.

Today, the California Friendly umbrella extends over a wide area of
Metropolitan-sponsored programs that include retail partnerships to
encourage of native and California Friendly plants in the product mix of
large home improvement stores; a bewaterwise.com Web site that hosts as
many as 3,000 visitors a day; and a landscape rebate program for new
homes and a model home program with incentives for new home builders to
install more efficient water saving devices in their model homes.

In recent years, Metropolitan has helped to bring about more than 85
water recycling and groundwater recovery programs by providing financial
incentives to member agencies. Metropolitan has invested about \$215
million through 2006 into these projects, which produce 128,000
acre-feet per year, equivalent to the water needs of over 600,000
people.

Metropolitan's diverse water resource portfolio continues to include
imported supplies from the Colorado River and California State Water
Project. To better manage the water systems for ecosystem health and
competing needs, Metropolitan has shifted the timing of deliveries from
these sources to wetter years or wetter periods when there is less
impact on the fisheries and environment. To further efforts towards
proper management of these supplies, Metropolitan has been participating
with the other Colorado River basin states to provide recommendations to
the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation on how the river system should be
managed. Similarly, Metropolitan is a participant with other interests
within the State of California on improvements to the Sacramento-San
Joaquin River Delta system, which is the hub of water deliveries for the
State Water Project. The goal is to more effectively manage water
supply, water quality, and environmental needs. Both the efforts on the
Colorado River system as well as the State Water Project Delta system
will face critical decisions in the coming year.

# Conclusion

The great challenges presented by the uncertain effects of climate
change and increasing demands on the scarce freshwater supply mean we
cannot afford to wait. Metropolitan, and the water community as a whole,
needs to partner with the scientific community to conduct further
research in assessing risks and integrating them into water management
decisions. Metropolitan will continue to implement "no regrets" actions
that incorporate climate change into our planning and investments in
infrastructure, energy management and water supply development.
Importantly, aggressive conservation and water use efficiencies must be
practiced within California's communities and businesses to use our
limited water supplies wisely and to protect the environment and
ecosystems that will be stressed by climate change.

To support Metropolitan's continued supply diversity, and better adapt
to climate change and other impacts, it is imperative that decisions
regarding the Delta's ecosystem, levee and other infrastructure
improvements. In addition, the Colorado River basin states initiatives
and water management programs must be implemented to assure proper
management of Colorado River resources during this extended drought.

Finally we need greater collaboration and partnerships with governmental
agencies, non-governmental organizations, and other entities to
implement solutions that provide benefits in multiple areas such as
water quality and quantity, ecosystem health, and reduced energy usage.
The federal government should play a key role in addressing uncertainty
with regard to climate change by being a direct participant in the State
of California's efforts on the Delta, Colorado River, and local water
management. Metropolitan stands ready to work cooperatively and
collaboratively with you and the federal agencies that you oversee.