SAN DIEGO—A quarter-century ago, San Diego and its suburbs imported 95% of their water supplies. Thanks to investments in desalination and other efforts to boost supplies, that figure has already dropped to 57% and is projected to fall to just 18% sometime in the next two decades.
San Diego has gone from being one of the most vulnerable areas of California during drought to one of the best prepared—and in so doing has become a model for the future of water use in cities. Even as water supplies have dwindled in many other parts of California during the current drought, San Diego has stockpiled enough to help replenish a local reservoir. The turnabout came, local officials say, after San Diego faced mandatory cutbacks of as much as 50% during another severe drought in 1991.
“The call was, ‘Never again,’ ” says Robert Yamada, director of water resources for the San Diego County Water Authority, the major wholesaler to the metropolitan area of 3.2 million.
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