Council Approves Water Integrated Resource Plan
The City of Pasadena and neighboring communities receive water supply from the City of Pasadena Water and Power Department (PWP), which relies on two main sources: local groundwater from the Raymond Basin and imported water purchased from Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD). The historical supply mix has averaged 60% imported and 40% local supplies.
MWD imports water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta via the State Water Project, and from the Colorado River. In recent years, prolonged droughts, climate change and environmental flow restrictions have triggered MWD to impose allocation limits to its member agencies for the first time since 1991.
To address these critical water supply challenges, PWP has taken a proactive step to lead as a model water agency by developing a Water Integrated Resource Plan (WIRP). The WIRP was developed using an open, participatory planning process with input from the public at large.
The Plan calls for:
- Aggressive water conservation
- Devil’s Gate Dam storage to Eaton Canyon for groundwater recharge
- Recycled water from Los Angeles-Glendale Water Reclamation Plant
- Groundwater storage of imported water and;
- On-site stormwater capture projects for direct landscaping use and groundwater recharge.
The benefits of these elements are greater supply reliability, reduced overall lifecycle costs, improved groundwater levels, improved local environment and surface water quality, mitigation against potential climate change impacts, consistency with MWD’s regional water strategy and compliance with new state mandate for reducing water usage–thus, positioning Pasadena to be able to meet the continuing needs of its citizenry.
