School of Public Policy

The San Joaquin Valley and urban Southern California are worlds apart in many ways. Yet each face growing water challenges and a shared interest in ensuring reliable, affordable water supplies to safeguard their people and economies.

Partnerships between Southern California cities and San Joaquin Valley farms could help alleviate groundwater overdraft in the valley while building drought resilience in Southern California. More flexible supplies can help agencies adapt to changing conditions. By coor- dinating the location of infrastructure investments, agencies can use partnerships to bring the water where and when it is most needed, at least cost.

In this presentation, Dr. Alvar Escriva-Bou, an assistant professor with the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department and the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA, will introduce a variety of solutions that could benefit both regions. For the San Joaquin Valley, there are ways to augment water supplies to ease the transition to groundwater sustainability, while for Southern California could increase cities’ ability to deal effectively with extended droughts. Diversifying water supplies and building connections to share water more flexibly would increase resilience of both cities and farms.

Professor Escriva-Bou will also focus on how these ideas could have similar replications to mitigate the Colorado River crisis. Interstate partnerships could help increasing water supplies and adding flexibility to a system in need of new solutions.
 

You can watch the recording via https://youtu.be/ENJLx3BvDMM