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Monterey venture moves a step closer to increasing area water supply – California

The 10 members of the board of Monterey One Water all voted to approve an environmental document called a supplemental environmental impact report, or SEIR, that advances closer to the expansion of its regional treatment plant.

Monterey One is the sewer treatment provider in northern Monterey County that has invested in proven technology that can purify wastewater to the degree it becomes drinkable.

It is then reintroduced into local groundwater. Typically people only use just 10% of their fresh water for drinking and cooking, according to research from Columbia University. The rest is flushed away. That’s some of the water Monterey One wants to capture.

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Water Authority Offers to Help Parched Areas of California with Stored Supply in Central Valley -California

The San Diego County Water Authority’s board has directed its staff to explore opportunities to help other water districts weather an emerging drought across California.

The authority said that because of three decades of investment in supply reliability, along with a continued emphasis on water-use efficiency, the San Diego region has sufficient water supplies for multiple dry years.

Those investments include high-priority Colorado River water from the Imperial Valley, seawater desalination, and access to the Semitropic Original Water Bank in Kern County, where the authority has stored about 16,000 acre-feet of water — enough to supply more than 30,000 homes for a full year.

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Permit terms might kill Poseidon desalination proposal in Huntington Beach – California

Recommended terms for a permit to build Poseidon Water’s controversial desalination plant in Huntington Beach would make it impossible to get financing for the $1.4 billion project, according to the developer.

Regulators question that claim, although they acknowledge that the requirements could create financing obstacles.

Poseidon’s three-year effort to win a permit from the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board is scheduled to culminate within the next month, with a vote as soon as the board’s April 23 meeting.

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Column: This desalination plan stinks all the way from Orange County to Gov. Newsom’s office – California

You’d need a scorecard, a good set of reading glasses and a special prosecutor to stay on top of it all.

The botched vaccine rollout, mixed messaging and delivery inequities are enough to keep anyone busy. And when the state introduced the My Turn vaccination scheduling system, which was supposed to straighten things out, nobody was surprised to learn that it’s full of bugs, or that people of means managed to get vaccinations intended for low-income communities hardest hit by COVID-19.

On top of that, we’ve had one of the greatest boondoggles in state history, with billions of dollars scammed from the Employment Development Department by prison inmates and others, while needy, out-of-work people were left penniless and waiting for months to get hold of anyone in Sacramento who might help.

California Gov. Newsom pushes private seawater desalting plant despite local, environmental opposition – California

When Gov. Gavin Newsom was photographed dining at an opulent Napa Valley restaurant during a surge in coronavirus cases, many Californians saw it as hypocrisy. For opponents of a planned $1 billion desalination plant along the Orange County coast, however, the optics were menacing.

The unmasked Newsom was celebrating the birthday of a lobbyist for Poseidon Water, which is close to obtaining final government approval for one of the country’s biggest seawater desalination plants.

Poseidon boasts that the facility will provide a local, inexhaustible source of water for Southern California. Critics complain that Newsom and his political appointees are exerting heavy influence to benefit a private company that would produce some of the state’s most expensive supplies.

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Eastern Municipal Water District To Receive $25M In Federal Funds – California

The Eastern Municipal Water District will receive $25 million in federal funds over the next several years to expand its desalination program, increasing fresh water stocks and reducing dependence on water imports, the agency announced Tuesday.

The Perris-based EMWD was selected to receive the additional funding under the recently approved federal Water Resources Development Act, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will be responsible for distributing the funds.

“EMWD is incredibly appreciative of our federal elected officials and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for their partnership and support of our expanding desalination program,” EMWD Board Vice President Phil Paule said.

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Here’s what desalination plant projects private companies presented to City Council – Texas

The city of Corpus Christi won’t decide how it’s going to build and operate a desalination plant until next year or 2022. 

But during its regular meeting Tuesday, City Council heard from 10 companies that presented their proposals for alternative water sources for Corpus Christi.

Two of the proposals were for ground water projects, two were for wastewater reuse and six were for desalination. 

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Water company withdraws desalination proposal as battle over environmental justice heats up – California

Amid mounting controversy and concerns over environmental justice, California American Water on Wednesday withdrew its application for a desalination project in the small Monterey Bay town of Marina.

The proposal had become one of the most fraught issues to come before the California Coastal Commission, which was set to vote Thursday.

The decision would have been the first major test of the commission’s new power to review not only harm to the environment when making decisions but also harm to underrepresented communities.

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Water recycling project fits needs on Monterey Peninsula – California

Expansion of the Pure Water Monterey recycled water project is the best option for the Monterey region to meet its future water supply needs.

Unfortunately, California American Water Co., a private water supplier, is discrediting the project in the hopes of instead getting approval for their much more costly, oversized and environmentally harmful groundwater desalination project to be built in, around and through the city of Marina.

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McComb: Passage for first loan for Desal Plant will result in ‘no increase’ to your water bill – Texas – United States

On August 25, Corpus Christi City Council members voted to accept a loan from the Texas Water Development Board to execute the next step in building a Seawater Desalination Plant.

Mayor Joe McComb announced via Facebook that this loan is not to build a plant and will result in no increase to your water bill.

Despite a heated debate during the City Council meeting, there were enough council members who voted (6-3) in favor of pursuing an $11.4 million loan from the Texas Water Development Board.

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